Pleas is new top prosecutor

Published 11:35 pm Tuesday, November 2, 2021

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Narendra Pleas won election to be the city’s new top prosecutor this week.

She and local attorney Patrick Bales were in a race to replace longtime Commonwealth’s Attorney Phil Ferguson, who decided earlier this year to retire.

Pleas, an attorney who has previously worked in the Suffolk Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office before moving to the same job in Norfolk earlier this year, had 17,503 votes as of noon Friday, to Bales’ 16,046 for a 51.85% to 47.53% margin.

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On her campaign’s Facebook page, Pleas has a graphic with a photo of herself that states, “Victory,” and “Thank you Suffolk.”

Pleas, who has worked as a prosecutor for more than 15 years, including eight in Suffolk, said her top three priorities would be to institute pre-trial services, establish a mental health docket and prosecute environmental offenders.

She also said the Commonwealth’s Attorney’s office needs to build better and stronger relationships in the community and would initiate a data dashboard to allow the public to track and analyze data “and gain deeper insight into the overall well-being of the office.”

Bales said he ran because of changes made to criminal procedure and said he would prioritize bringing a culture change to the office and how it handles cases, shutting down the school-to-prison pipeline and instituting a mentor program to help reduce the crime rate.

All results are unofficial until they are certified, which will happen Nov. 15. Provisional ballots and mail ballots were accepted until noon Nov. 5, making results incomplete.