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Robert Telles sentenced to life in prison


I'm happy to see that a certain trial in Nevada has come to a conclusion whereby a smug and 
privileged murderer is going to get what is coming to him. 

 As August ended a jury found Robert Telles guilty of the murder of Jeff German, a reporter for the Las 
Vegas Review-Journal. His beat for the paper had entailed organized crime and political corruption.  

Telles stabbed German to death outside of his home in early September 2022. German's editor, Glenn 
Cook, gave a wonderful interview after German's body was found, describing the deceased. Cook said 
"you could tell" when he was about to break a big story, "he had almost this kind of grouchy streak and 
if he was walking around the newsroom with a furrow in his forehead, you knew something big was up
and that he was close."

Telles was the object of some of German's stories, as Clark County Public Administrator. He was about 
to feature in another such story at the time of his death. It would have concerned the inappropriate 
relationship between Telles and a woman who worked for him in that office. German had obtained the
emails  between Telles and that subordinate. 

One procedural issue loomed rather large in the pre-trial proceedings. The prosecution wants access to German's work in progress, such as to the notes he may have been keeping on electronic devices. The Review-Journal wanted to block such access, arguing that both state and federal statutes limit prosecutorial access to such material. 

How does one have a free press, they ask, if public officials can seize notes of a reporters' work in progress? One might well ask in response: how does one have a free press if public officials can get away with shooting reporters who write unfavorable pieces about them? It seemed pretty much a lose-lose.

Fortunately, the dilemma was resolved on the side of Justice. The privileged matters were excluded, and the prosecution managed to make its case effectively nonetheless. 

Telles, who is 47 years old. will be eligible for parole after 20 years. 

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