NATIONAL CRIMINAL DEFENSE COLLEGE ALUMNI
- The results are being filtered by the region: Georgia
B
Lynne Borsuk
C
Mekka Crawford-Franklin
Managing Attorney
D
Letitia Delan
Chief Assistant and Director of Professional Development
Biography
Letitia graduated from Emory University School of Law in 1993 and has been with the Law Office of the Public Defender since 1994. She has represented thousands of accused and indigent members of society in all manner of cases ranging from misdemeanors to homicides where the State is seeking the death penalty. She attended NCDC in 1996 and still uses the principles she learned in this program.
Bret Dunn
Defense Counsel
Biography
Marine Corps Defense Counsel defending service members in trials by court-martial.
H
Jennifer Hanson
Senior Trial Attorney
J
Alissa Jones
Assistant Public Defender
M
Sarah Martin
Senior Attorney
Biography
When Sarah’s son was three years old, he asked her why he had to go to school, and his mother explained that he needed to learn, and she needed to go help people get out of jail. Years later, the boy would reveal that he believed that his mother actually broke people out of jail, and that she was some sort of superhero. While Sarah has not admitted to actually breaking someone out of jail, she has secured the release of countless indigent defendants thru her work at the Fulton County Public Defender’s Office in both Superior and Juvenile Court. In her private practice, she continues to strive to be the type of lawyer that her young son believed her to be. When not allegedly breaking clients out of jail, Sarah enjoys camping along the Georgia coast, getting lost in the West Texas mountains, listening to music loudly, and dancing. Sarah currently lives in Southwest Atlanta with her husband and son, and their four pets—Georgia (a blind, deaf, diapered, geriatric cocker spaniel), Meow Meow Purr Purr Fuzzy Kitty (a tuxie pretty kitty), and Jim Morrison and Bat Boy (two ill-behaved baby panther brothers).
S
Claudia Saari
Biography
Claudia Saari is the Circuit Public Defender for DeKalb County, Stone Mountain Judicial Circuit. Ms. Saari received a bachelor’s degree from Brown University in 1984 and a law degree from Emory University School of Law in 1987. She joined the DeKalb County Public Defender’s Office in 1987 and over the next three decades tried a wide variety of cases ranging from DUI to death penalty cases, and the first criminal trial in Georgia that featured DNA evidence. Ms. Saari now leads an office of over 100 people who represent clients in Juvenile Court, State Court, Superior Court, Magistrate Court, Appellate Courts, and all Accountability Courts and diversion programs.
Ms. Saari is a Fellow with the American College of Trial Lawyers, serves on both the State Committee and the Access to Justice Committee, and previously chaired its national Public Defender Committee. She is a 1999 graduate of Leadership DeKalb, a Master with the Carley-Clarke Inn of Court, a member of the State Bar Board of Governors, a former member of the Chief Justice’s Commission on Professionalism, and Chairperson of the Commission on Continuing Lawyer Competency. Ms. Saari also serves on a number of committees and boards including the Indigent Defense committee for both the State Bar and the Georgia Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, serves as a Regional Vice President for the Georgia Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, an Advisory Board member for the Emory University School of Law Public Interest Law Committee, a Steering Committee member for the DeKalb Reentry Services Division for the Department of Community Services, a Board member with the Olmsted Linear Park Alliance, a former officer with the Clyde Shepherd Nature Preserve, and served on the Board of Directors for Gideon’s Promise. In 2009, Ms. Saari was the recipient of the Georgia Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers Indigent Defense Award, a 2018, 2019, and 2022 recipient of the GACDL President’s Commitment to GACDL Award, in 2016 she was honored by the American Constitution Society with its Legal Legend Award, and in 2020 she received the Gideon’s Promise John Lewis Lifetime Achievement Award.
W
LaToya Williams
Senior Assistant Public Defender
Y
