Former assistant district attorney loses her license
By John Joyce
Published in News on October 10, 2013 1:46 PM
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Ada Lucrettia Mason
A former Wayne County assistant district attorney has been stripped of her license to practice law as she awaits trial on breaking and entering and drug charges.
Ada Lucrettia Mason, 43, known around the county courthouse as "Chrissy," wept as her defense attorney struggled to explain the difficult time she has had expressing to her client the severity of what she is facing.
The Goldsboro/Wayne County Drug Squad arrested Ms. Mason, of Newton Grove, in September 2012 at a house at 1447 Falling Creek Church Road and charged her with possession of methamphetamines.
Authorities again arrested her in June 2013 on charges of breaking and entering. They also found her in possession of marijuana on jail premises subsequent to that arrest.
Ms. Mason has also missed at least two prior court dates and had orders for arrest issued each time. She has also had difficulty paying her bail bondsman after being bonded out of jail.
District Attorney Branny Vickory offered a plea agreement to Ms. Mason through her attorney, Sarah Heekin, but that agreement was rejected by the defendant. The details of the agreement have not been made public.
Vickory, in lieu of the plea deal, is seeking to turn the case over to State Attorney General Roy Cooper's office for prosecution, citing a conflict of interest in that Ms. Mason worked for his office up until 2005.
Ms. Mason was ordered to report to the Day Reporting Center as a condition of pre-trial release. There she will undergo monitoring, classes and drug screens. A single violation of any of the pre-trial release conditions will result in her immediate arrest under a $25,000 secured bond, as ordered by Senior Resident Superior Court Judge Arnold O. Jones.
It was under his authority as the court's senior resident judge that Jones, on behalf of the North Carolina State Bar, suspended Ms. Mason's law license effective immediately.
Her next court date is scheduled for Nov. 5.