The Office of District Attorney belongs to the people of New Hanover and Pender County. Those of us who work in the office understand the importance of getting out into the community we represent. Every year, we speak to thousands of students at all levels in our public schools to have a dialogue about choices and consequences before they have the right to remain silent. We also hold seminars for our senior citizens on identity theft, fraud and other issues confronting them. We proactively work with area agencies and groups to confront issues as broad ranging as drug additiction to domestic violence and sexual assaults, to property offenses. Assistant District Attorneys and Victim Witness Legal Assistants sit on the boards of charitable and civic organizations that are too numerous to mention and every person within the office is encouraged to volunteer in the community. Simply put, community-based prosecution means working with everyone to achieve justice.

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To learn more about our office's approach to community-based prosecution, please visit the following resources:

- Chapter 6 of Crime & Community in the Cape Fear by Benjamin R. David (Cognella Academic Publishing, 2020)

- Listen to Ben David, Sheriff Ed McMahon, and Interim Police Chief Donny Williams on WHQR's Coastline to talk about protests and policing (June 11, 2020)

- Fixing the Bridge: Treating the Root Causes of Crime (TedxAirlie, March 29, 2019)

- Community-Based Prosecution in North Carolina: An Inside-Out Approach to Public Service at the Courthouse, on the Street, and in the Classroom (Ben David, Wake Forest Law Review, September 2012)

- The Starfish Model page

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