KLINE HIRES THREE SEASONED PROSECUTORS

Sue Carpenter takes over as Section Chief of Domestic Violence Unit

After being introduced to the media on Wednesday, Sue Carpenter is spending time getting up to speed on the cases assigned to her unit.

Over the past week, District Attorney Phill Kline brought three seasoned prosecutors on board in a move that increased prosecutorial experience in the office in those positions from a combined 27 years to 37 years of experience.

Additionally, since he took over as District Attorney in January, Kline has doubled, from two to four, the number of women in key legal leadership positions in the office. 

Background on recent hires:

Sue Carpenter, who has been named Section Chief of the Domestic Violence Unit.  Sue joins the staff with 15 years of experience as a prosecutor with the Shawnee County District Attorney’s Office, where her duties included child abuse prosecution, as well as sexual assault and drug cases.  Sue has prosecuted numerous homicide cases and has extensive experience in domestic violence.  In addition, she has 14 years of experience in private practice, most recently as a chief counsel and associate partner with the law firm of Tomes & Dvorak. 

Michael McElhinney brings 16 years of experience as a prosecutor to the District Attorney’s office.  In addition to serving as Assistant District Attorney in Shawnee County, where he prosecuted homicides, robberies and other violent crimes, Michael is also certified as a Special Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Kansas.  Mike will focus on major felony crimes.

Peter Glasser returns to the Johnson County DA office after serving as assistant prosecutor for Harvey County and after having served as special counsel for Hudson Global Resources.  Pete has approximately five years of prosecution experience and will specialize in drug prosecutions.

Beginning this summer, eight new legal interns will join the office. Of those, six are women. The intern program is supervised by Lannie Ornburn. A number of current assistant district attorneys have been through the intern program.

Link to story in the Kansas City Star