EXECUTIVE STAFF

Executive Director

Wendy White, JD, Atty 

Wendy graduated from the University of Colorado-Boulder in 1982 with a degree in English and a sub-focus in Anthropology. She then obtained her law degree from the University of Colorado Law School in 1986 graduating Order of the Coif. She was Staff Editor of the University of Colorado Law Review and recipient of the Am. Jur. book awards in Criminal Law, Contracts, Evidence, and Wills and Trusts.

 
    She has been a public defender in Coconino County, Arizona; a prosecutor for the City of Flagstaff and Coconino County; the County indigent appeals attorney; a solo practitioner; and the appointed Legal Defender for Coconino County.  

       In 2005 Wendy was instrumental in founding the Coconino County Criminal Justice Coordinating Council and was the director/coordinator of the Council for its first four years. As director she was responsible for implementing numerous criminal justice system reforms including the establishment of a mental health court, a CIT (mental health) training curriculum for the Flagstaff Police Department, a Failure to Appear demonstration project for the Flagstaff Justice Court. She was also responsible for the customization and implementation of a Jail Population Analysis system that provides real time aggregate data mining of the Coconino County Detention Center. She was able to bring together law enforcement, courts, defense, behavioral health providers, prosecution from different jurisdictions to work on systemic reform of the entire system. She was also responsible for research and analysis of criminal justice system issues and prepared a report for the Police Department regarding the impact of its arrest practices on the local jail population.

           In 2006 Wendy co-founded Flagstaff Shelter Services, a non-profit secular shelter for chronically homeless men and women. She was the Chair of the Board and de facto Executive Director for several years. She succeeded in overcoming NIMBYism and negotiated with the City of Flagstaff to provide space for the shelter at no cost. 

          Wendy was presented with the Homeless Advocate of the Year award in 2008 and the Northern Arizona Pro Bono Attorney of the Year award for her successful efforts to bring the plight of homelessness to the forefront of consciousness in Northern Arizona which resulted not only in the creation of a new shelter but also a more cooperative method of service delivery by the entire network of homeless providers. 

          Wendy has taught classes at Northern Arizona University in Criminal Law and Wrongful Convictions. She has presented CLE seminars at the Arizona Public Defender Association annual conference in Hopi Traditional Law, Effective Representation of Persons with Mental Illness, Cultural Awareness, What Jurors Really Think, and Ineffective Assistance of Counsel for Trial Attorneys. She was recently invited to be a member of a “think tank” hosted by the BJS and the NAPD seeking to research issues regarding the delivery of indigent defense services. 

               You can reach Wendy at wendy.white at swcej.org

Chief Operating Officer

Gary Pearlmutter, JD, Atty

Before going to law school, Gary spent several years as a National Park Ranger assigned to various beautiful parks around the country. He graduated from the University of Arizona Law School and was admitted to practice law in 1992. He has dedicated his career to indigent defense, first as a Deputy Public Defender for Coconino County and from 2005 until 2019 as the Coconino County Legal Defender. 

Gary is deeply involved in indigent defense and criminal justice reform.

          You can reach Gary at gary.pearlmutter at swcej.org