Staff

Gretchen joined CDPL in 1992, after graduating from Northeastern University School of Law and interning at the Southern Center for Human Rights and the Alabama Resource Center. Gretchen grew up largely in the Great Lakes region and received her B.A. from Oberlin College. In 2004, she received the Paul Green Award from the NC-ACLU Legal Foundation for her work against the death penalty.

Hannah joined CDPL in February 2017. A native of Cumberland County, Hannah received her undergraduate degree at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and graduated with honors from North Carolina Central University School of Law in May 2013. During law school, she formed a student death penalty project and organized events and programs highlighting death penalty reform efforts. Before joining CDPL, Hannah practiced in the public defender's office in Frankfort, Kentucky for 3 years. She is excited to be back home and working for CDPL.

Stephanie joined CDPL in 2007. She is a licensed clinical social worker, has a Master’s of Social Work degree, and is trained in Defense-Initiated Victim Outreach (DIVO). Before coming to CDPL, she provided treatment to persons living with substance abuse, mental illness and HIV/AIDS.

Susan joined CDPL in November 2016, after many years in program and financial management at Duke University. She also worked for several years in administration at the National Humanities Center in Research Triangle Park. She earned a bachelor's in French and Italian at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and master's in French at UNC-Chapel Hill.

Becky joined CDPL in June 2018. A Chapel Hill native, Becky received a BA from Connecticut College in 1990 and an MFA in Graphic Design from Yale School of Art in 1997. After working as a graphic designer in Washington DC and in Durham, she ran a toy store in Chapel Hill for 18 years.

Kristin joined CDPL as a writer and researcher in 2012. She previously served as executive director of Uniting NC, a non-profit that works to create a welcoming climate for immigrants. Before beginning her career in non-profits, Kristin worked as a newspaper reporter for 13 years, 11 of them with The News & Observer in Raleigh.

Sandy joined CDPL as a consulting accountant in 2001 and was hired as the first financial controller in 2002. Sandy graduated from Clarkson University in upstate New York with a B.S. in accounting and business law in 1978, and with an M.B.A. in finance in 1985. She is a certified internal auditor and certified management accountant.

William attended East Carolina University and Georgetown University School of Law. He is licensed in Hawaii, Oregon, and North Carolina. From 2004 to 2008, William represented indigent persons in child welfare, domestic, and housing cases with the Legal Aid Society of Hawaii. In 2007 and 2008, he helped create and grow Lawyers for Equal Justice, which now exists as the Hawaii Appleseed Center for Law and Justice. There, William won multiple large scale class actions against the State of Hawaii on issues of public housing conditions and access to education for homeless children. In 2008, William joined the Fair Trial Initiative in Durham, first as a J. Kirk Osborn Fellow and later as a staff attorney representing capital defendants at the trial level. Since 2011, William has represented capital defendants at the trial level and in post-conviction proceeding at CDPL.

Elizabeth has been a CDPL staff attorney since 2004. She grew up in Raleigh, and received her undergraduate and law degrees from UNC-Chapel Hill. Before coming to CDPL, she was a staff attorney at North Carolina Prisoner Legal Services. In addition to representing her clients, she trains other attorneys and works with the public information staff to share her deep knowledge of the N.C. death penalty.

Johanna joined CDPL in 2015. Prior to that, she was an Assistant Public Defender in Guilford County and a J. Kirk Osborn Fellow at the Fair Trial Initiative. She began pursuing her passion for death penalty defense as an undergraduate at Rice University in Houston. After graduating from Rice, Johanna returned to her hometown of Durham and graduated from Duke University School of Law with honors. Johanna’s work at CDPL involves trial-level, state post-conviction, and federal habeas cases. In addition, she serves on the Forensic Resource Counsel Advisory Board, is a member of the North Carolina Public Defender Committee on Racial Equity, and is a member of the statewide Racial Equity Network.

Shelagh has been a staff attorney at CDPL since 2001. In 2005, she served as the legal director of the ACLU of NC. Prior to joining CDPL, Shelagh clerked for the Hon. Aleta Trauger in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee. She also clerked for the Hon. Napoleon Jones, Jr., then a federal district court judge for the Southern District of California. Shelagh is a 1996 cum laude graduate of the Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago. She is a 1991 magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College. Between college and law school, Shelagh was a teacher in south central Los Angeles through Teach for America. She also worked for Public Counsel, a nonprofit legal organization in Los Angeles.

Mark joined CDPL in 2013. Mark graduated from North Carolina Central University School of Law in 2009, and received his undergraduate degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2003. After graduating from law school, Mark worked as a J. Kirk Osborn Fellow with the Fair Trial Initiative, where he assisted with trial-level death penalty cases throughout North Carolina. Before coming to CDPL, Mark spent two years conducting research for the American Bar Association’s Death Penalty Due Process Review Project.

Zach has been an investigator at CDPL since August 2012. Before joining CDPL, he worked at the Fair Trial Initiative as a mitigation investigator for eight years, where he worked on both trial-level and post-conviction cases. He started at Fair Trial Initiative as a mitigation fellow and later became the Initiative’s mitigation project manager. Zach graduated with a Master’s of Social Work from the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Social Work in 2002, where he completed field placements at organizations focusing on mental health and conflict resolution.

Gerda has worked at CDPL since 1991. Until 1999, she served as a mitigation investigator on the defense team in capital cases, researching the social histories of people facing the death penalty. Since 2000, she has led CDPL’s work on public education and media relations. She has served or currently serves on boards and various committees of the ACLU of North Carolina, The Fair Trial Initiative, Blueprint NC, Wake Teen Medical Services, a national strategic death penalty working group, the Jamie Kirk Hahn Foundation, and the North Carolina Coalition for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. Gerda is a licensed social worker.

Barrie has worked at CDPL since 2003. She worked in CDPL’s Trial Assistance Unit from 2003 to 2007. She has held her current position since 2007. Barrie graduated with a B.A. in English Literature from Smith College. She was born and raised in Birmingham, Alabama, and now resides in Hillsborough.

Olivia joined CDPL in 2019. After graduating from Harvard Law School in 2017, she clerked first for the Hon. Stephen Reinhardt on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and then for the Hon. Ketanji Brown Jackson on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. In law school, Olivia represented indigent clients in state court through the Criminal Justice Institute, and represented prisoners in disciplinary and parole hearings through the Prison Legal Assistance Project. Olivia received a B.F.A. in Dance from Marymount Manhattan College in 2011.

Erica joined CDPL as a staff attorney in 2017 after graduating from New York University School of Law. Prior to law school, Erica spent two years working on issues of fair housing, disability rights and police misconduct with the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs. In law school, Erica worked with the Equal Justice Initiative to provide post-conviction legal support to prisoners on Alabama’s death row. Erica was a Root-Tilden-Kern Public-Interest Scholar at NYU and received her BA from the University of Virginia in 2012.

David has been a staff attorney at CDPL since 2007. David is a 2006 graduate of the UNC School of Law.  He began his career as a law clerk to the Honorable James A. Beaty, Jr., United States District Court Judge for the Middle District of North Carolina. In addition to handling capital cases at the state and federal levels, David now devotes a significant portion of his practice to litigating civil challenges to lethal injection procedures in North Carolina, and to litigation of issues arising from the NC Racial Justice Act.

James Williams joined CDPL in 2018. He coordinates racial equity work and other special projects at CDPL. Williams served as the chief public defender for Orange and Chatham counties for 27 years before retiring in 2017. He is the founder of the N.C. Public Defenders’ Committee on Racial Equity, as well as a board member of the N.C. Commission on Racial and Ethnic Disparities and the Orange County Bias-Free Policing Coalition.