NEW HANOVER COUNTY, NC (WWAY) — After serving for nearly two decades as district attorney for New Hanover and Pender Counties, Ben David announced he is resigning next year.
Earlier this week, David shared he would leave office on September 3.
“This date is not arbitrary,” David wrote in a news release. “Vacating the office at least 60 days before Election Day on November 5, 2024 will ensure that the people of the Sixth Prosecutorial District will get to decide who occupies this position next.”
On Wednesday, David shared with WWAY that he isn’t resigning to run for office in 2024, to leave the Cape Fear Area, or because there is something wrong.
“In fact, it’s just the reverse. It’s never been better and that’s exactly why I should be leaving,” David said. “This office is such an important thing. There’s 50 people who work here and we advise 1200 officers with 20 different police agencies. This office will still be here when I leave and the career public servants in it will too. This is the right time for a PEACEFUL transfer of power.”
Please see this which EVERYONE I EMAILED IT TO AT WWAY-TV3 (ABC Network): has READ and KNOWS I CAN PROVE IN COURT!!!:
Through his lengthy career, he says he’s most proud of the people he has hired and the public servants working in his office.
As for a legacy he hopes to leave behind, he says it would be that crime is best fought by building community.
“We’re going to put people in prison who have done terrible things; rape, murder, armed robbery, child molesters, of course and as long as possible. But the vast majority of people who come through the criminal justice system either have bad problems with drugs and alcohol or they’ve made bad choices. Frequently, they’re young people who hung out with the wrong crowd,” David said. “To really get to the root causes of trying to take care of childhood trauma and not have people become tomorrow’s defendant who are today’s victim because we’re helping them now as victims. It means we’re stopping the revolving door of recidivism.”
For much of his career, David has worked closely with his twin brother, Jon David, who serves as the district attorney for Brunswick, Bladen, and Columbus Counties. A partnership that Ben says has greatly helped the administration of justice in the Cape Fear.
“What we try to say is bad guys don’t respect jurisdictional boundaries. So when people are playing cat and mouse across the Cape Fear River, going from New Hanover into Brunswick County for example, or between Pender and Bladen or going out to Columbus. All that stuff is still violent crime, it’s still drug trafficking, it’s still literally traffic that we have to take a regional approach to solving,” he said.
SEE how Ben & Jon David and the OTHER CHRISTIAN D.A.s and Sheriffs of FIVE COUNTIES in the Lower Cape Fear REFUSED to arrest my CHILD-MOLESTING (14-year-old girls), roommate, "Shake" despite their having ACTIVE WARRANTS for his arrest and my telling WHERE, EXACTLY, to ARREST HIM !!!
ALL are "CHRISTIANS", but only Ben David and Sheriff Ed McMahon are allegedly DEMOCRATS !!!:
While Ben David plans to step down in 2024, he says he’s heartened to know that his brother will still be serving just across the river and hopes he will continue to do so for years to come.
As for the cases that have come across his desk and have been heard in his courtroom, he says some have been the first of their kind as science and technology continue to advance.
“Whether we’re talking about cell phone technology pinpointing people’s locations, ShotSpotter data letting us know where guns went off, mitochondrial DNA that convicted people sometimes two and a half decades later. All of these things have happened because we never forgot that science is necessary to do our jobs,” David said. “Just as we can use science to solve cases and prove them beyond a reasonable doubt, I believe we can use science to prevent cases from ever occurring if we understand that childhood trauma is the number one gateway drug to the opioid epidemic, if we understand that childhood trauma leads people to pick bad relationships and join gangs. If we love on our children and we really take care of them, we’re stopping crime tomorrow.”
Looking ahead, although David doesn’t know who will be serving as the district attorney for the Sixth Prosecutorial District this time next year, he leaves voters with what he believes is one very important qualification.
“I truly think the person who sits in this seat should be a prosecutor and not merely a politician,” David said. “The test is this — if the person you love most on this earth were taken by a crime of violence tonight, who would you want going to the crime scene to advise local law enforcement and then giving a closing argument in that courtroom? The answer to that question will be who my successor should be.”
Even though he will not be serving as district attorney, David says he will never stop fighting for people and giving victims a voice. He says whatever is next for him will still involve a law license and a courtroom.