A light went out on the halls of justice over the weekend. And we are mourning. Chief District Court Judge H. Thomas (Tom) Jarrell, Jr. died unexpectedly last Saturday. He was many things: Chief District Court Judge for District 18, president of the North Carolina Association of District Court Judges, member of the NC Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission, commissioner on the North Carolina Governor’s Crime Commission, husband to Cindy, and father to Thomas, Robert, and David. He was also a friend to many of us at the School of Government, and we will keenly feel his absence. Judge Jarrell had an impressive record of public service. He served seven years as an assistant district attorney before being appointed as a district court judge in Guilford County in August 1999. He spent the next twenty years serving in that role, and was appointed Chief District Court Judge by then-Chief Justice Mark Martin in 2016. After becoming chief, Judge Jarrell created a DWI court to reduce a backlog of thousands of pending DWI cases. To do that, he obtained buy-in from many interested parties, including law enforcement, the district attorney, the defense bar, the Administrative Office of the Courts, and the senior resident superior court judge, who agreed to allow a superior court courtroom to be used for DWI court. Judge Jarrell’s ability to engage people with differing interests and perspectives and to encourage their work to better the public interest was one of his many special talents. Judge Jarrell was simply [...]
Faculty Coordinators
