Are you sure you aren't sharing a neutral on the same ungrounded side of the panel (Miswired multiwire circuit)?
John, I believe an inspector has the "authority" to inspect pretty much everything, time becomes the issue. When I was working travel was my biggest time burner so I looked a a lot of things that surprised people. I was not going to drive 2 hours to look out the window of my truck
I have had them pull a device if I saw something funky and if I found something wrong we were going to look at some more. I really had no time constraints tho. It was why I liked my state job and why I never looked for a muni job. I was doing 1, maybe 2 a day. Ten a month was busy for me.
