The U.S. Senate confirmed Russ Ferguson as the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. The Trump-nominee took the oath of office on Christmas Eve.
Courtesy of U.S. Attorney Russ Ferguson
The Trump-appointed U.S. attorney who is pursuing federal charges against the men accused in Charlotte’s recent light rail stabbings will remain the top prosecutor in Western North Carolina for the next several years.
Russ Ferguson was sworn in as the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina in an otherwise closed courthouse on Christmas Eve.
Senators confirmed Ferguson earlier this month, and President Donald Trump signed his commission Tuesday. Senior Judge Frank Whitney opened the court first thing in the morning Wednesday to swear in Ferguson, his former law clerk, Ferguson told The Charlotte Observer.
Ferguson’s 4-year-old daughter held her family’s third-generation Bible underneath her father’s hand as he took the oath of office. She wore a red dress and matching red bow inside the U.S. District Court for the Western District of North Carolina.
Later in the day, she debuted as an angel in a Christmas pageant.
WNC’s top federal prosecutor
Ferguson has already served in his role for nearly a year. Attorney General Pamela Bondi appointed him as interim U.S. attorney in March after Biden-appointee Dena King stepped down, and federal judges serving the district extended that term in late June. Trump in late July officially nominated him, and the Senate confirmed him to the role Dec. 18. The Senate vote and Christmas Eve oath made everything official.
This year, Ferguson, a Charlotte native, has witnessed the city reel from two separate stabbings on Charlotte’s LYNX Blue Line train. In the wake of those attacks, he charged both suspects with 9/11-era terrorism charges that had never been used in the district.
DeCarlos Brown Jr., the suspect in the August stabbing death of Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska, and Oscar Gerado Solorzano-Garcia, the suspect in last month’s nonfatal stabbing, both are charged with committing a “terrorist attack or other violence against a mass transportation system.”
“We are a district that punches above our weight — and we will continue to deliver justice that is tough, fair, and focused on keeping our communities safe,” Ferguson said in a news release. “I am grateful to the President for his trust and to the U.S. Senate for my confirmation. I will continue to approach this responsibility with integrity and accountability.”
Ferguson has largely focused about 100 assistant U.S. attorneys (working from Charlotte, through the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and to the Tennessee border) on prosecuting gangs, cartels and convicted felons found with guns.
Ferguson previously tried 28 cases while working in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia and served as Legislative Counsel for the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He was a partner at Womble Bond Dickinson and led the firm’s complex litigation group, “handling high-profile civil and criminal matters in courtrooms and arbitration tribunals around the world,” according to a news release.
More than 10 years ago, Ferguson clerked for Judge Whitney in the same court where he took his oath of office in front of his family.
Julia Coin
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