The ACLU of Nevada has filed a lawsuit demanding public records tied to the death of Ryan Anthony Warren-Hunt, a 35-year-old inmate who was fatally beaten and stabbed at Southern Desert Correctional Center near Indian Springs in 2025. The civil rights organization says the Nevada Department of Corrections and the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department have refused to turn over records related to the killing, and that Warren-Hunt's relatives still have not been notified of any charges connected to his death.
According to KSNV, the ACLU of Nevada filed a petition for a writ of mandamus in Nevada's Eighth Judicial District Court, asking Judge Jacob Reynolds to order both agencies to release records under the Nevada Public Records Act. Two of Warren-Hunt's relatives retained the organization to investigate his death, and the group has asked the court to impose civil penalties against both NDOC and LVMPD for their handling of the requests, court filings cited by the station show.
Per the station's reporting, LVMPD told the ACLU the records could not be released, citing confidentiality and an ongoing criminal investigation, while refusing outright to hand over anything tied to Warren-Hunt's death. NDOC initially directed the ACLU to contact the Nevada Attorney General's Office before also refusing to release records, saying they were part of an ongoing criminal investigation. The ACLU says neither agency specified how any confidentiality provisions actually applied to the records they were withholding.
A Coroner's Office That Complied, Two Agencies That Didn't
The contrast the ACLU draws in its court filing is stark: the Clark County Coroner's Office complied with public records requests submitted after Warren-Hunt's death, releasing responsive records with appropriate redactions, while NDOC and LVMPD withheld their files entirely. The ACLU points to the coroner's cooperation as evidence that redaction, not blanket denial, is the legally required path when a record contains sensitive material.
That argument leans on Chapter 239 of the Nevada Revised Statutes, which presumes all state and local government records are public and places the burden on agencies to cite specific statutory exemptions, redact confidential details, and justify any withholding in court, according to the Nevada Legislature. Under that law, non-exempt portions of a record must still be segregated and released even when other parts are properly withheld. The ACLU's petition seeks not just the specific case files for Warren-Hunt's family but a judicial ruling that state agencies cannot use broad criminal investigation exemptions to sidestep the public records law altogether.
Part of a Deadly Stretch Inside Nevada Prisons
Warren-Hunt died on August 11, 2025, while serving a sentence for armed robbery and burglary, according to KTVN, which reported that state officials linked the suspected homicide to prison drug debts. His killing was part of an unprecedented cluster of five inmate homicides across High Desert State Prison and Southern Desert Correctional Center within three weeks that summer, as Hoodline previously reported, a surge that prompted NDOC to restrict inmate movements and increase surveillance across its facilities.
That same month, Nevada corrections investigators and narcotics task forces arrested 30-year-old Las Vegas resident Hoza Del Collins on second-degree murder charges, accusing him of manufacturing homemade synthetic drugs and smuggling them into state prisons to fuel the illicit debts behind the violence. State officials at the time noted that makeshift narcotics cooked from household chemicals directly contributed to the debt-driven attacks that killed Warren-Hunt and four other inmates.
A System Under Growing Legislative Scrutiny
The lawsuit lands amid mounting frustration among state lawmakers over how NDOC tracks and explains inmate deaths. In July, members of the Interim Judiciary Committee criticized NDOC leadership over vague in-custody death statistics, noting that of 163 inmate deaths over a 2.5-year span, 98 were listed as natural causes and 25 were classified as unexplained accidents, according to reporting relayed by the Elko Daily Free Press. Lawmakers questioned whether those broad accidental designations were obscuring drug overdoses and uninvestigated violence.
Total inmate fatalities across NDOC facilities climbed from 46 in 2023 to 55 in 2024 and then to 76 in 2025, according to LV Criminal Defense, which attributed the rise to increased prison violence and drug overdoses. NDOC Director James Dzurenda told state lawmakers last October that prison overdoses had surged nearly tenfold, from 12 in 2021 to 127 in 2025, contributing to six of seven prison homicides that year and pushing correctional officer overtime costs past $18 million annually, per The Nevada Independent. NDOC attributed much of the drug influx to laced paper and mail entering its facilities.
Skepticism toward NDOC's official explanations has legal precedent. Last October, state officials approved a $4.6 million wrongful death settlement, the largest in Nevada history for an inmate death, with the family of Christian Walker, who died in 2023 after being severely beaten by High Desert State Prison guards despite medical examiners initially attributing his death to natural heart failure. That case, also reported by The Nevada Independent, has fueled public skepticism about how the state characterizes deaths behind bars.
For now, the ACLU's lawsuit against NDOC and LVMPD remains pending before Judge Reynolds, with the organization arguing it has compelling interests in oversight of NDOC operations, the safety of incarcerated people, transparency about prison conditions, and accountability for NDOC officials. Warren-Hunt's relatives, meanwhile, say they still do not know whether anyone has been charged in connection with his death.
