American judge
Willis Padgett Whichard[1] (born May 24, 1940) is an American lawyer and a prominent figure in North Carolina politics and education. Whichard is the only person in the history of North Carolina who has served in both houses of the state legislature and on both of the state's appellate courts.[2]
Legal and civil service career
Born in Durham, North Carolina in 1940, he began his legal career as a clerk to NC Supreme Court Justice (later Chief Justice) William H. Bobbitt.[3] From 1966 to 1980, Whichard practiced law in Durham and entered politics, being elected first to the North Carolina House of Representatives and then to the North Carolina Senate. In 1980, he was appointed by Governor Jim Hunt to the North Carolina Court of Appeals,[4] where he served until he became a justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court in 1986. Whichard was the justice who, in 1996, denied the appeal of Dontae Sharpe, a man later discovered to be innocent after spending more than 20 years in jail. Whichard determined there had been "no error" in the original case [5]
Whichard retired from the Court in 1998 and served as Dean of the Norman Adrian Wiggins School of Law at Campbell University from 1999 until his retirement as Dean in 2006, when he became a partner at the law firm of Moore & Van Allen in its Research Triangle Park office. In September 2013 he joined the firm of Tillman, Whichard & Cagle, PLLC.
A student of North Carolina judicial history, Whichard has written a biography of James Iredell, a North Carolinian who led the state’s Federalists in supporting ratification of the Constitution and was later appointed to the United States Supreme Court by President George Washington.
Public service
Judge Whichard has the distinction of being the only person in the history of the State of North Carolina to have served as member of the two bodies of the NC Legislature (House and Senate) and on both of the state's appellate courts (Appeals and Supreme Court).
- NC General Statutes Commission. Member, 1969–1973
- NC House of Representatives. Member, 1970–1974
- NC Senate. Member, 1974–1980
- NC Court of Appeals. Judge, 1980–1986
- NC Supreme Court. Associate Justice, 1986–1998
Professional positions
Whichard held a number of other professional positions:
- Law clerk to Associate Justice (later Chief Justice) William H. Bobbitt in the NC Supreme Court (1965–66)
- Attorney in Durham, North Carolina, at the firm Powe, Porter, Alphin & Whichard (1966–1980)
- Adjunct professor of law, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1986–1999)
- Dean and professor of law, Campbell University (1999–2006)
