Meet Mary Pollard, the new Director of the Office of Indigent Defense Services

Yesterday, Mary Pollard began work as just the third Executive Director of the North Carolina Office of Indigent Defense Services (IDS), which began its work two decades ago in 2000. IDS is the statewide agency responsible for overseeing and enhancing legal representation for indigent defendants and others entitled to counsel under North Carolina law. Over the weekend, before she became deluged with her new responsibilities, Mary graciously agreed to do a quick interview with me. Read on to get to know a little more about her. Tell us about your legal background. I went to Wake Forest Law School, and after graduating in 1993 I went to work as an associate attorney at Womble, Carlyle, Sandridge & Rice in Winston-Salem and then Raleigh. I did civil litigation—business litigation and products liability. The cases ranged from simple breach of contract cases to patent infringement to complex products liability. How did you get into indigent defense work? In 1999, Tye Hunter, who was then the Appellate Defender in North Carolina called me. [Tye Hunter later became IDS’s first executive director, serving from 2000 to 2008.] He had heard that I was interested in working on a death penalty case. I’m still not sure where he heard that. I told him I was wholly unqualified, and he explained in his inimitable way how capital post-conviction litigation was JUST LIKE products liability litigation, with extensive discovery and expert witnesses. I had reservations given that my criminal law experience up to then had consisted of going [...]