WS Chronicle

Stacey Rubain has her eyes set on a new prize this week and is no longer seeking the District 21 Superior Court seat she had been campaigning hard for the last several months.

She now wants to focus on being selected as the county’s next chief public defender. The position is akin to the district attorney’s job on the prosecutorial side, but is won by appointment, not an election.

“Unexpectedly, about three weeks ago, Judge William Z. Wood announced he would be appointing a new chief public defender. When I decided to run back in February, I didn’t think the position would become available,” she said. “When he made his decision, I really had to stop and think because had the position been available, it would have weighed very heavily on my decision to run for judge.”

Stacey Rubain

Rubain, who has practiced law for 15 years, said she ran for Superior Court because she believed that more female voices were needed on the bench. She said it took some soul-searching before she abandoned that dream in favor of her new one.

“My passion is doing criminal work. I’ve done it for the majority of my career. I am a criminal attorney, and I love representing my clients in both federal and state court on criminal court cases,” said Rubain, whose name will remain on the ballot despite her new focus. “I thought I could better serve the community in (the public defender) position. I felt conflicted because so many people lovingly offered their support – whether it was kind words, financial donations or volunteers. Without those people I could not have done anything in this race.”

In addition to serving as legal counsel for defendants, the chief public defender supervises 18 other public defenders. Winning the position requires somewhat of a small-scale campaign. Wood will make his choice from a small list of candidates presented to him by the Forsyth County Bar Association, whose members may vote to dwindle the number of interested candidates.

In the spring primary election, Rubain finished second to attorney Richard Gottlieb. The top two finishers in the nonpartisan contest moved on to the general election. Donna Taylor, a local attorney, was also on the primary ballot. She finished last. The Chronicle could not reach Taylor Tuesday to get her reaction to Rubain’s decision to end her campaign.

Gottlieb said Rubain’s decision doesn’t change his objective.

“It really doesn’t change the fact that I need to run an aggressive campaign to educate voters on why they should be confidant in my background and to earn their vote,” Gottlieb said.

Rubain said Gottlieb is qualified for the job.

“I said before that I feel he has all of the qualifications to make a great Superior Court Judge,” she said. “I considered that in my decision. If I didn’t think that he had the skills and experience necessary to represent Forsyth County in the manner that a Superior Court Judge from our county would, I would not have made this decision.”