Endorsements: Our choices for Mecklenburg and NC judicial races

Voters will decide local judicial races and five seats in the North Carolina Court of Appeals. Here’s how we see those races:

Court of Appeals

Seat 4: Democrat Tricia Shields, an attorney from Cary, faces Republican District Court judge April Wood of Lexington. Shields brings 35 years of experience in the courtroom and is well respected by her peers. She’s also been endorsed by a range of organizations, including the North Carolina Fraternal Order of Police and North Carolina Police Benevolent Association.

Wood, who almost 20 years experience in District Court, touts herself as a “conservative” judge, but she was one of very few judicial candidates we interviewed, Democrat or Republican, who said there is no systemic racism in the courts. That’s troubling. We recommend Shields.

Seat 5: Democrat Lora C. Cubbage of Greensboro, currently a Superior Court judge in Guilford County, brings a broad range of experience to the bench. She has been an assistant district attorney and assistant attorney general, served as a District Court and Superior Court judge, and she’s argued civil and criminal cases before the Court of Appeals.

Cubbage faces Republican Fred Gore, a District Court judge in Bladen, Brunswick and Columbus counties, also has served as an assistant district attorney and Judge Advocate General in the North Carolina National Guard. Both would be capable additions to the Court of Appeals. We give a slight nod to Cubbage.

Seat 6: Few candidates come to Court of Appeals races with the credentials and high regard of peers as Democrat Gray Styers. The Raleigh attorney began his 30-plus year career serving as a law clerk for Chief Judge Sam J. Ervin III on the Fourth Circuit, and he offers significant litigation experience, including arguing in front of the Court of Appeals and filing an amicus brief before the N.C. Supreme Court in the landmark Leandro case. Styers also has earned a “Citizen Lawyer Award” by the N.C. Bar Association for his public service.

Republican Chris Dillon, also of Raleigh, was elected to the Court of Appeals in 2012. He brings a business background as a real estate broker and community banker. Styers, however, brings a superior breadth of courtroom experience. We recommend Styers.

Seat 7: Democrat Reuben Young has served on the Court of Appeals since 2019, when he was appointed by Gov. Roy Cooper. He’s running against challenger Jeff Carpenter, a Superior Court judge from Union County. Young has been a prosecutor, defense attorney and Superior Court judge, and he served under three governors, including as Secretary of the Department of Public Safety.

Carpenter, a former N.C. State Trooper, also has more than a decade of litigation experience. We were troubled, however, by Carpenter being the lone dissenter on a 2018 three-judge panel that ruled N.C. Republican lawmakers used misleading language on two constitutional amendments. (Republicans later reworked the deceptive language.) We give a slight nod to Young in this race.

Seat 13: The race for this Court of Appeals seat comes down to experience. Chris Brook, a Democrat, has served on the court since his appointment by Cooper in 2019. During 14 years of private practice, he has successfully litigated cases in state and federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.

Challenger Jefferson Griffin is a Wake County District Court judge, where he has served for five years. Griffin, a former Wake assistant district attorney, is a captain in the North Carolina National Guard, where he serves as a JAG officer. He says his experience with criminal cases would be valuable on the Court of Appeals. We recommend Brook.

Superior Court

Republican Casey Viser, who is serving his first term as District 26 Superior Court judge, faces Democrat and former District Court Judge Alicia Brooks. Both are strong candidates who have the respect of their peers in the Mecklenburg legal community. Viser brings almost 20 years of Superior Court experience as an attorney and judge, however, and he’s served very capably on the Superior Court bench. We recommend Viser.

District Court

Best-Finn: Democrat Kimberly Best, who is running for her fourth term, faces attorney Pat Finn. Best brings a unique background - she’s a former teacher who became a criminal magistrate and eventually opened her own law firm. She’s worked all over the District Court, including in family law and juvenile law.

Finn is a thoughtful attorney with significant experience in criminal law in the Catawba County D.A.’s office. Best has more familiarity with Mecklenburg communities, however, as well as a broader range of District Court experience. We recommend Best.

Marvel-Panyanouvong-Rubeck: This race features two smart, young candidates in Democrat Rex Marvel, who was appointed last year, and Republican Sunny Panyanouvong-Rubeck. Both come from the Public Defender’s Office, where Panyanouvong-Rubeck supervises the Felony Drug Unit. Both bring uncommon backgrounds to the bench - Marvel’s childhood experiences included poverty and family addiction; Panyanouvong-Rubeck is an immigrant from Laos and first-generation college graduate.

There are no bad choices in this race. Marvel has been a thoughtful judge and community servant. Panyanouvong-Rubeck would be the only Asian-American District Court judge in Mecklenburg. We give a slight nod to Panyanouvong-Rubeck.

Editor’s note: N.C. Court of Appeals candidate Judge April Wood disputes the Editorial Board’s Oct 15 characterization of her view that systemic racism does not exist in the courts. In an Oct. 18 email, she said:

“Systemic racism implies that the entire system is infested with racism as opposed to isolated acts of racism. Racial disparities exist in many aspects of our society; however, judges should strive to ensure that the law is applied equally to everyone that comes before them, and to be aware of their own implicit biases and work to overcome them. In the 18 years I have served as a trial judge, I have strived to ensure that everyone is treated fairly and equally regardless of race, religion, gender, social status, or any other status.

In order to address unjust laws from the Jim Crow era as well as inequitable or widely varying sentencing by different judges, the Fair Sentencing Act and then the Structured Sentencing Act were enacted by the legislature. It was a good start.”

This story was originally published October 15, 2020 at 5:00 AM.