NEW HANOVER COUNTY — New Hanover County has not seen the end of District Attorney Ben David after all.
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David was named CEO and chief legal counsel of his endowment-funded Community Justice Center at Wednesday’s ribbon-cutting, two weeks ahead of his retirement as DA. Board chair Michael McWhorter announced the coronation at the event, noting the board of directors, picked by the DA’s office and Harrelson Center leaders, offered the position to him at their meeting last night.
“And I accept!” David said to the clapping dozens in the audience, made up of prosecutors, law enforcement, nonprofit organizations and community supporters.
In an interview with Port City Daily published in January, David indicated he was not looking to take a position at the Community Justice Center — an idea he percolated last year. He applied for funding through the New Hanover Community Endowment in September and announced his retirement in November.
David said earlier this winter he was taking time to plan his next move.
“The positions [at the CJC] make less than my current salary and I don’t know if I can afford to do that alone,” David said.
The DA’s salary was capped at $200,000, which he said he could triple by moving to private practice.
“I was still going through a period of discernment,” David told Port City Daily Wednesday. “I have arrived at a place where I’ve prayed about this. I’ve talked to a lot of good people. I realized what was possible with what we can do now. I said, ‘I’m not done fighting for the people in this area. I am not finished with working with the great relationships I’ve forged.’”
He conceded his salary now is less than the DA position. However, he hasn’t abandoned plans to go into a private practice in the future — to “take on causes and clients that [he] cares about.”
The CJC is modeled after the Family Justice Center concept pioneered by former San Diego attorney Casey Gwinn and championed by President George W. Bush. More than 100 have been launched across the country.
Like other family justice centers, the New Hanover County CJC is set to focus on “reluctant victims,” mainly women and children experiencing abuse. The goal is for them to be able to tell their stories to police, prosecutors and others only one time.
However, David said the CJC takes the model a step further, by also targeting youth violence, something very few centers are doing. The space will co-locate 25 employees — prosecutors, law enforcement and nonprofits — at the Harrelson Center with the goal of providing victims of domestic violence and youth involved in violence with easier access to services. This includes counseling, obtaining protective orders, filing police reports, all of which will be offered 24/7 (the hours are 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. with agencies allowed 24/7 access for emergencies).
The CJC’s launch is supported by two grants: the DA’s office received $3.4 million and the Harrelson Center received $1.5 million to staff and outfit the center. Having put together the endowment application over four days to get it in by last year’s deadline, David will now see his idea through its infancy.
“I am doing this at a fragile time in this organization’s history,” David said. “I wish I could hand it off now and say, ‘Run with it.’ Frankly, it’s a bit of a sacrifice. Still, it’s worth doing because, as I’ve said consistently, I’m going to say again, you can make money or you can make a difference.”
When he takes over as CEO and chief legal counsel, David was clear he will no longer be in charge of the prosecutors, who will answer to the new DA. David’s job will be to coordinate the infrastructure to support the coworking of the agencies, whose employees will still answer to their current bosses.
The application for the executive director position — now called the operations director — will be posted Wednesday; the person hired will handle the CJC’s day-to-day.
All agencies involved signed an MOU on Wednesday, indicating partners “agree to pledge their resources and assistance, to the degree allowed by their governing boards or agencies, as well as law, respective policies, budget, and staffing, to contribute to the successful operation of the CJC, including, to the extent allowed by law and policy, the sharing of information through a system of signed client releases.”
Because the CJC endowment grant did not provide money to partner agencies, they will be responsible for staffing and supplying their space in the center.
Agency partners include:
- Wilmington Police Department
- New Hanover County Sheriff’s Office
- The District Attorney’s Office
- The Carousel Center
- Domestic Violence Shelter and Services
- Rape Crisis Center of Coastal Horizons
- Legal Aid
- NHC Social Services
- UNCW
Notably missing from the MOU is Novant Health. Per the DA’s endowment application for the CJC, Novant committed to conducting sexual assault exams and evidence collection on site, letting victims avert a hospital visit. They will also be responsible for supplying the equipment to do so.
PCD reached out to Novant to ask if it was still on board with the CJC, but did not receive a response by press.
Despite the leadership announcement, Wednesday’s event was mostly subsumed with David speaking about the relationship between trauma and justice.
“Today’s victim is tomorrow’s defendant,” David said repeatedly throughout the day, at one point asking everyone to repeat the phrase after him.
He used several New Hanover County incidents and cases, paired with mugshots, to demonstrate his point, including the high-speed chase and killing of Brent Gilmore after he assaulted a woman and fired a gun at her children.
David brought up Gilmore’s sister, arrested for prostitution, noting the unaddressed trauma they both experienced in their family led to their crimes.
“We have to turn back the clock,” David said, referring to the trauma-based approach the CJC will take, combining hope, healing and justice.
David also had the family of one-time Wilmington resident Gabby Petito on a panel earlier in the day. The death of the 22-year-old came at the hands of her fiance while traveling cross-country and ignited a media firestorm in an effort to find Petito. She was announced missing Aug. 27, 2021, in Wyoming and her remains were found three weeks later
Gabby’s fiance and murderer, Brian Laundrie, exhibited physically aggressive behavior toward Gabby on their road trip, to the point where Utah’s Moab Police Department was called on the couple. Body-cam footage showed Gabby in a state of distress, but neither parties wanted to press charges and the incident was labeled a “mental breakdown” rather than domestic violence.
“Then we didn’t know what the message looked like, we didn’t know the signs,” her mother, Nichole Schmidt, said. “Now we want everybody to know the signs.”
The Petitos answered audience and CJC employee questions on identifying domestic abuse, improving the justice system and the community’s power to look out for those in need. They also emphasized the importance of media and societal attention for missing people of color as much as white women like Gabby; this inequity emerged in the national conversation following Gabby’s disappearance.
“The justice centers are fantastic because that’s bringing everybody together, and that’s really what we need,” Nichole said.
Along with Gabby’s father, stepfather, stepmother and other family members, Nichole runs the Gabby Petito Foundation, where they advocate for trauma-informed policing and the domestic violence protocols. Successfully passed in Florida as Gabby’s Law, it includes a mandatory 12 questions, known as the “lethality assessment,” to determine a potential aggressor’s actions toward a partner.
David said he supported adding them to New Hanover County law enforcement protocol.
At Wednesday’s event, the Petitios also announced a donation of a print of Gabby’s artwork to the CJC.
Despite Wednesday’s ribbon-cutting presented as a grand opening, the CJC will not officially be operational for another four weeks. Wednesday’s participants were welcomed to tour the space; desks and couches have been installed, but agencies have not added to the space yet.
Port City Daily reached out to the DA’s office after the event to ask about the safety protocols in place for survivors at the center. It is located in the Harrelson Center at 20 N 4th St., open to the public. An answer was not received by press, but will be updated upon response.
Reach journalist Brenna Flanagan at brenna@localdailymedia.com.
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