Three law graduates from as far away as Utah and as close as Bonifay were sworn in as prosecutors this week to handle cases in the 14th Judicial Circuit, State Attorney Larry Basford announced.
Bailey Harris, Daniele Thomas, and Nicholas White – already employed at the State Attorney’s Office as legal interns – were informed last week they had passed the Florida Bar exam. Wednesday Basford swore them in as prosecutors.
BAILEY HARRIS
Bailey Harris was born and raised in Bonifay. She grew up planning to go into the medical field, but at Chipola College decided to pursue a business administration degree because she had been working in the banking field.
As she neared her Bachelor’s Degree, she decided to pursue her interest in the law as it related to banking. In 2021 she entered the Florida State University School of Law without the thought that she would one day become a prosecutor.
“The law had always interested me for sure, but criminal law was nowhere on my radar,” Harris said. “Then I started taking the classes on criminal law and criminal procedure in my second year and I loved it, and excelled at it, and that’s when I decided that is what I wanted to do.”
Harris, married with two children, knew she and her husband wanted to return home and she applied for an opening at the SAO.
“This was my first and only job I applied for online, and the next day Mr. Basford called me personally and he was very interested, he had asked about me around the Bonifay office,” she said. “It showed me that he is very much interested and concerned with who is working with him and cares about his employees and that struck me as important.”
Bailey accepted a job offer and will be handling Third-Degree Felonies and juvenile cases in Jackson County.
DANIELE THOMAS
Daniele Thomas was born and raised in Jacksonville, received her undergraduate degree at Florida State University and obtained her law degree at Barry University.
Thomas spent about 5 years as an intern at Perry & Young’s Tallahassee office while going through college, and that often brought her to Panama City.
“I came to visit here a lot – our first Christmas party was at Andy’s Flour Power – and I just fell in love with the area,” she said. “My favorite thing here is that the sense of community is very strong and everyone takes care of each other.”
Thomas said she was in her freshman year of high school and was intrigued by the law so her mother, a Realtor and property manager, helped connect her with some eviction/real estate attorneys for a summer.
“I just fell in love with the law,” Thomas said. “I knew I wanted to be a trial attorney, and someone suggested that the best trial experience you can get is working for the State Attorney’s Office.
“And I am a very stubborn person, so the idea of the State having to carry the burden and prove guilty beyond a reasonable doubt appealed to me, so I was intrigued by the State Attorney’s Office.”
Thomas hopes to help make the community safer and a better place to live, while also becoming a better attorney and a better person.
“This is a great place to meet people who are having the best day of their lives, or the worst day of their lives,” she said. “It’s about treating everyone fairly and seeing if there’s any middle ground. It felt like home as soon as I got here.”
NICHOLAS WHITE
The path for Nicholas White from home to being a prosecutor here was a bit longer – it stretched from Utah, where he was born and raised, to law school in South Carolina, and then here.
Born and raised in Sandy, Utah, White also took a different path before college – he went on a two-year church mission to Guatemala.
“I was in 5 different parts of the country for an extended period,” he said. “My dad and brothers did it so I wanted to do it. It was awesome, but probably the hardest and best thing thing I’ve ever done.”
White spent time in rural areas, having to learn the language because no one spoke English. But he learned a lifetime of lessons.
“I always say that there is not a day that goes by since then that I haven’t used something I learned there,” he said. “It helped shape my path.”
Upon his return, White attended and graduated from Brigham Young University, then headed to South Carolina with his wife to get his law degree from the Charleston School of Law.
“The law was always something I thought would be a good career for me, that fit me and kind of how I function and operate,” he said. “I had several other jobs, but I didn’t think I was best utilizing my talents as well as I should have been., so I went to law school.”
White’s interest initially was in transactional contract law, business related matters that he found interesting. But that was before his second year of law school and the criminal law classes.
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“I really enjoyed those classes and more and more I realized I liked telling stories to groups of people,” he said. “I knew people who did other things for 20 years and had never been inside a courthouse.
White said once that decision was made, he knew that he wanted to be on the prosecution’s side.
“I think it’s important to have a society that doesn’t tolerate crime and has rules of law that have to be followed,” he said. “I think it’s easier for me personally to be working on something where if someone has broken the law they be held accountable, as opposed to the opposite as a defense attorney.”
White and his wife had been to Florida before, but not Panama City. A fellow graduate from the Charleston School of Law, SAO Prosecutor Morgan Morrell, got him interested in this area.
“I reached out to her and she was telling me about the office and the area and it sounded great,” White said. “And she said they were hiring. When I interviewed, I liked the methods and process that Mr. Basford used and it really seemed like the right kind of place for me.”
For more information, contact Mike Cazalas at mike.cazalas@sa14.fl.gov, or call 850-381-7454.