Nevada Supreme Court Rules IME Statute Is Unconstitutional

Nevada’s Supreme Court decided in Powers v. Dist. Ct. that NRS 629.620 violated Nevada’s separation of powers and is unconstitutional. This has immediate implications for clients defending traumatic brain injury cases in Nevada.

The Decision
The statute was sponsored by the local plaintiffs' bar and purported to regulate physical and mental examinations, replacing Nevada Rule of Civil Procedure 35(NRCP). This was a second attempt, as the Supreme Court also deemed an earlier statute, NRS 52.380, unconstitutional for the same reasons. Both statutes upset the balance in tort litigation, violated separation of powers, and negatively affected defendants' ability to defend themselves.

Powers also addressed recurring questions concerning neuropsychological examinations. These examinations generate raw data. In practice, courts had ruled this raw data could be exchanged only between the parties’ neuropsychologists. Here, the plaintiff wanted his counsel to have access to the raw data generated