Tears welled in Lisa Dubs' eyes as the Mecklenburg jury acquitted her client of murdering his pregnant fiancee. Her voice cracked as she hugged Michael Mead.

"I told you we'd do it," she said.

The high-profile verdict last week was the latest victory for a Hickory-based defense attorney who is gaining a reputation as one of the best capital defenders in North Carolina.

"I wouldn't have any qualms with Lisa Dubs representing me if I were charged with a crime," Superior Court Judge Timothy Kincaid told the Observer. "She's good."

Kincaid said Dubs, like all good lawyers, makes prosecutors prove their case before they take clients' liberty away.

"The most important things to being a good lawyer are being prepared, knowing your case and knowing the kind of jurors you're looking for," the Catawba County judge said. "Lisa Dubs does all that very well."

Dubs has represented more than 100 clients charged with murder during her 24-year legal career. A dozen of her clients have been tried for their lives. Only one was sentenced to death.

In 2007, Dubs helped free Jerry Anderson of Caldwell County, who was charged with murdering his wife and stuffing her body in the toolbox of her pickup, when a jury deadlocked.

She helped acquit Christy Holland Seitz, a 22-year-old charged with murdering her boyfriend, who was shot to death in 1996.

Last year, she helped negotiate a deal sparing Elisa Baker a possible death sentence. Baker, who Dubs no longer represents, is charged with murdering her 10-year-old stepdaughter, Zahra Baker.

"There is not a finer lawyer in North Carolina," said defense attorney Scott Reilly, who currently represents Elisa Baker. "She's totally devoted to doing what she can to help her clients."

Reilly said Dubs puts more hard work into her cases than anyone he knows. He said she connects with jurors. Jurors often seek her out after trials, he said, wanting to know more about the case and asking about their own legal problems.

"She has a gift," Reilly said. "I wish I knew what it was. I'd try to use it more."

Prominent Charlotte lawyer Jim Cooney, a death penalty expert, described Dubs as "a great lawyer" who believes in her clients.

"Lisa Dubs is tenacious, meticulous and passionate," Cooney said. "Put all that together, you've got a pretty good lawyer."

Dubs graduated from Wake Forest University's law school in 1987. She joined the public defender's office in Scotland and Hoke counties in 1989, where she eventually specialized in death-penalty cases.

Dubs moved back to her hometown of Hickory in 1996 and opened up her own office, where she has continued to focus on capital murder cases.

Over the years, she's worked with private investigator Steve Ehlers on many of her death-penalty cases. The two have traveled as far as Panama to learn more about their clients and to find evidence that could help save their lives.

Dubs, 50, is divorced with two children, both girls, and two grandchildren.

She was in high school when she first began thinking of becoming a lawyer. Like many lawyers, she was inspired to be a criminal defense attorney after reading about Atticus Finch in "To Kill A Mockingbird."

Stilettos and jelly beans

But instead of seersucker suits, Dubs wears stiletto high heels. She has fallen out of those heels on occasion.

After the Anderson trial, jurors asked Dubs if she was naturally clumsy or if she was trying to get their sympathy. She says it's natural.

"I had walked out of my shoes a few times on my way to the bench, tripped. And my glasses got hung in my skirt," she recalled. "I think it was funny they would think I would do it on purpose."

Dubs keeps a full cup of jelly beans on the defense table in case her mouth gets dry.

"I like them because they're small enough so if the judge asks me a question I can swallow them quick and answer," she said. "Sometimes I get in a nervous habit of eating them."

Dubs says there's no point trying to hide who she is. She learned that from a high-profile Charlotte capital defense lawyer, Henderson Hill. She says he taught her one of the most valuable lessons: Be genuine with a jury, even if it hurts your case.

"If you're trying to get someone to trust you, to trust your evidence, trust your case, they first have be able to trust who you are," she said. "They're going to figure it out if you're a fake."

Some jurors in the Mead trial didn't believe Dubs was a court-appointed attorney. Dubs was appointed to represent Mead by Bob Hurley, the capital defender for North Carolina.

"They doubted that somebody indigent could afford a lawyer like her," said juror Alan Meeker. "She was very thorough."

It's impossible to outwork Lisa Dubs, said Mark Rabil, a capital defense attorney and director of the Innocence and Justice Clinic at Wake Forest University's law school.

"If I were a prosecutor," Rabil said, "I would not want to see Lisa Dubs walk through the door."