Lawyer named to public defender spot in Suffolk has ties to region

SUFFOLK

Lawyer Jim Grandfield has been named the city's lead public defender. Grandfield was previously with the Suffolk office from 1998 until 2004. Hired by the Virginia Indigent Defense Commission, Grandfield has a staff of six lawyers.

He replaces Anita Lester, who left the office to go into private practice in Richmond.

Grandfield, a native of Massachusetts, graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1986. He got his law degree in 1994 from the Widener University School of Law in Wilmington, Del.

He moved to Hampton Roads when he was in the Navy, he said, and has also worked in the public defender's offices in Chesapeake and Portsmouth.