User:Pjmergen/Nicholas L. Chiarkas

Nicholas L. Chiarkas is the Director of Wisconsin’s State Public Defender Agency. Under his leadership, the agency received three consecutive awards for excellence. In addition, he is the founder of Justice Without Borders, is an adjunct professor of law at the University of Wisconsin Law School, and was a visiting lecturer in law at Justus-Liebig-Universität, Gießen, Germany.

Previously Mr. Chiarkas served as the Deputy Chief Counsel and Research Director to the President’s Commission on Organized Crime; Deputy Chief Counsel to the United States Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations; Professor of Law; Professor of Criminology; and a New York City Police Officer.

Mr. Chiarkas has a Doctorate and Master’s degrees from Columbia University; a law degree from Temple University; a Master’s and Bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice from the City University of New York; a Post Graduate Certificate in Computer Systems Analysis from New York University. And, was a Pickett Fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

Mr. Chiarkas worked with Israel in establishing and enriching Israel’s first National Public Defender Agency; with Japan as it introduced a public defender system; with the U.S. Department of Justice in examining indigent defense in the United States, including New Orleans following Katrina; and with the NLADA in assessing defense services in Oakland County, Michigan.

In 1996, Mr. Chiarkas became the nation’s first public defender to receive the “Law Enforcement Commendation Medal” awarded by The Sons of the American Revolution. In 1999 and again in 2000, Governor Thompson recommended to the National Governor’s Association that Nick be named the National Public Executive of the Year. In 2000, the Wisconsin Chapter of the American Society for Public Administration named Nick Administrator of the year. In 2001 Nick was elected to the Alumni Executive Council of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, and to the Board of Directors for Wisconsin Forward Award, Inc. In 2002, Nick received the Outstanding Professional Award by the Wisconsin Law Foundation.

Among Mr. Chiarkas’ publications are five law books, three books dealing with Criminal Organizations and Enterprises, two articles, translated in Japanese, published in Japan by the Japan Federation of Bar Associations on “Wisconsin Public Defenders” and “Legal Ethics.” And he just completed his first novel “Weepers.”

Mr. Chiarkas grew up in the Al Smith housing projects on Manhattan’s poverty stricken Lower East Side. When Nick was in the fourth grade, his mother was told by the Principal of P.S.#1, that, since Nick was unlikely to ever complete high school and would certainly never go to college, she should gear him toward a simple and secure vocation.

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