Staff
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR & SENIOR COUNSEL
Justice Robert Orr: On July 31st of 2004, Justice Orr retired from the N.C. judiciary after 18 years of service to the citizens of North Carolina. He spent almost 10 years as a member of the Supreme Court and 8 years on the Court of Appeals. Justice Orr was initially appointed to the bench by Governor Jim Martin in 1986 and prior to that time practiced law in Asheville. He was elected four times statewide by the voters of North Carolina, twice to the Court of Appeals and twice to the Supreme Court.
Justice Orr has served over the years on numerous professional boards and commissions including member and chairman of the Secretary of the Interior’s National Park System Advisory Board, Vice President of the N.C. Bar Association, Chair of the Southeastern Conference on Genetics in the Courtroom and as a member of the Governor’s Crime Commission and the Chief Justice’s Innocence Commission. He has also been involved in many civic activities including the Board of Directors for the Wake County 1st Tee program, the Central YMCA Board of Directors, as a Vestry member at his church, and as a mentor through the public school system. He also currently serves on the Board of Directors of the George B. Jr. and Helen C. Hartzog Institute for Parks at Clemson University.
Over the years, Justice Orr has also taught appellate advocacy and state constitutional law at area law schools. He currently serves on the Board of Visitors at N.C. Central School of Law.
After retiring from the Supreme Court in July, 2004, Justice Orr became the first Executive Director and Senior Counsel for the N.C. Institute for Constitutional Law. He stepped down from that position in May, 2007, to run for Governor. He returned to NCICL in August, 2008.
Justice Orr grew up in Hendersonville and is a graduate of both UNC-Chapel Hill undergraduate and law school. He also served three years in the U.S. Army and is married with four children and three grandchildren.
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SENIOR COUNSEL
Chief Justice I. Beverly Lake: Prior to law school, Justice Lake was a military Intelligence Staff officer In, the United States Army from 1956 - 1958. He earned his law degree from the Wake Forest University School of Law in 196O and became a partner in a privately held law firm in September of that year. He represented Wake, Harnett and Lee Counties in the N.C. Senate for two terms from 1976 through 1980. In 1979, the N.C. Centre for Public Policy Research ranked him among the ten most effective members of the N.C. Senate. Justice Lake was the Republican Party's nominee for governor in 1980 and served as the state's lead delegate to the Republican National Convention that year. He has served as Assistant and Deputy Attorney General for the Department of Justice, as Legislative Liaison for Governor Jim Martin and as a Special Superior Court Judge. He was appointed by the governor to the N.C Supreme Court in 1992, elected to a full term on the Court In 1994 and elected Chief Justice in 2000.
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ATTORNEY OF COUNSEL
Judge Narley Cashwell: Judge Cashwell received his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Upon graduation, he served as Assistant District Attorney until he became a Wake County District Court Judge in 1982. After 4 years as a District Court Judge, Justice Cashwell became a partner of the law firm Kirby, Wallace, Creech, Sarda, Zaytoun, and Cashwell, where he concentrated in the areas of criminal defense and civil litigation. Justice Cashwell was first elected as a Resident Superior Court Judge for Wake County in 1991 and continued to serve until 2006. Throughout his years of service and practice, Judge Cashwell has participated as an instructor and speaker at schools and seminar. He has also a veteran of the US Army and is married with two children and four grandchildren.
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SENIOR STAFF ATTORNEYS
Jeanette Doran graduated from Auburn University with a B.A. in political science and a B.B.A in economics, and holds a Master of Arts degree in composition and rhetoric from Oklahoma State University. She earned her M.B.A. and Juris Doctor (law degree) with honors from Campbell University, where she served as research editor of the Campbell Law Review and as research associate for Williston on Contracts (4th Edition) (a multi-volume legal treatise on the law of contracts). After graduating from law school, Jeanette served as a law clerk in the United States District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina. Before joining NCICL in August 2005, Jeanette worked in the Office of the Federal Public Defender in Raleigh and at the Institute of Government at UNC-Chapel Hill. She was a 2006 recipient of the E. A. Morris Fellowship for Emerging Leaders. Currently, Jeanette serves on the Appellate Rules Committee of the NCBA and is a member of the Board of Directors for the North Carolina Supreme Court Historical Society. She is admitted to practice before various federal district courts, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, and the United States Supreme Court. She currently serves as Senior Staff Attorney at NCICL where her responsibilities include work on all phases of trial and appellate litigation. She is primary attorney in Atkinson v. State (challenging the usurpation of the Superintendent of Public Instruction’s authority and the creation of a so-called Education CEO), Richards v. State (Challenging corporate welfare for Goodyear and Bridgestone/Firestone), El-Khouri v. State (challenging a new tax to finance judicial campaigns) and other cases. She was primary counsel in Heatherly v. State (challenging enactment of the NC State Lottery Act), Garrett v. Parton (contesting financing of the Randy Parton Theater), Blinson v. State (challenging $242million in corporate welfare for computer manufacturer Dell) and Munger v. State (challenging state handouts to Google), among others. A frequent speaker at Continuing Legal Education seminars, Jeanette has published scholarly articles in law journals, penned opinion pieces in newspapers and served as primary counsel in several reported cases at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit and at state courts of appeal.
Jason Kay earned a Juris Doctor with honors and a Master of Public Administration degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a Master of Science and Bachelor of Science degree from Indiana University at Bloomington. Jason has practiced as Corporate Counsel at Laboratory Corporation of America Holdings, a litigation partner at Sawyer & Kay, PLLC, and Law Clerk for Justice Mark Martin at the North Carolina Supreme Court. While in law school, Jason was Editor in Chief of the First Amendment Law Review and an Honors Writing Scholar. Prior to beginning his legal career, Jason consulted on leadership and management issues faced by nonprofit organizations, universities, and local governments and taught organizational leadership and environmental science at universities and educational nonprofit centers.
DIRECTOR OF PARALEGAL SERVICES
Cynthia Crowdus earned both her B.A. and M.A. in English from UNC Charlotte and NC State, respectively. She taught English Composition at NC State and English as a Second Language at Wake Technical Community College and later moved to Seoul, Korea to teach English at a private writing academy and at Gangnam University of California-Riverside. Cynthia returned to Raleigh several years thereafter, obtaining a broker’s license in real estate and a paralegal certificate from Meredith College before joining NCICL.
DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS AND DEVELOPMENT
Elizabeth Lincicome is the Director of Communications and Development for the North Carolina Institute for Constitutional Law (NCICL) in Raleigh, N.C. Before joining NCICL, Lincicome served as the Assistant Director of Broadcast Services at the Heritage Foundation.
Elizabeth’s communications and media experience include stints as an off-air producer for CBS News, where she covered the 2002 midterm elections, and as an associate producer and researcher for CNN’s White House unit, which included coverage of President George W. Bush’s trips to Crawford, Texas, and Buffalo, N.Y. She also was a staff writer for The Hill newspaper and a publicist for Regnery Publishing, both in Washington, D.C.
Lincicome, who grew up as Elizabeth Fulk in Winston-Salem, N.C., married Scott Lincicome in 2007. She graduated from Duke University in 2002 where she received her Bachelor of Arts degree in Public Policy. She later earned a Master’s degree in Communications from Johns Hopkins University. An avid runner, Lincicome has completed the Marine Corps Marathon and the Chicago Marathon as well as multiple half marathons. She and her husband, an international trade attorney, reside in Raleigh, N.C.
DIRECTOR OF DESIGN AND MARKETING
Kristin Mar has been designing professionally since she graduated from high school. She studied Art History and Design at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo where she received her Bachelor's of Architecture in 2006. Prior to joining NCICL in January 2009, she specialized in designing single and multi-family housing in California and North Carolina.