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The District Attorney's Office for the 11th Judicial District of Tennessee prosecutes felony and misdemeanor crimes throughout Hamilton County. We represent the State of Tennessee and serve a population of approximately 345,000 people.
Neal Pinkston is the elected District Attorney General of Hamilton County. He began serving an eight year term in September 2014. General Pinkston oversees 27 Assistant District Attorneys in the DA's office who are responsible for prosecuting the more than 50,000 criminal cases filed in Hamilton County each year. Prosecutors have extraordinary power and along with it special responsibilities to ensure justice is done. With every criminal case, a prosecutor reviews the facts to evaluate whether there is enough evidence to support the charges originally brought by police. If the evidence is convincing, the case is prosecuted. A prosecutor may decline to prosecute or “reject” a case if there is insufficient evidence or if more investigation is required. The Hamilton County District Attorney's Office is committed to the pursuit of justice. We are dedicated to the vigorous and professional prosecution of those who violate the law. |
The [prosecutor] is the representative not of an ordinary party to a controversy, but of a sovereignty whose obligation to govern impartially is as compelling as its obligation to govern at all; and whose interest, therefore, in a criminal prosecution is not that it shall win a case, but that justice shall be done. As such, he is in a peculiar and very definite sense the servant of the law, the twofold aim of which is that guilt shall not escape or innocence suffer. He may prosecute with earnestness and vigor - indeed, he should do so. But, while he may strike hard blows, he is not at liberty to strike foul ones. It is as much his duty to refrain from improper methods calculated to produce a wrongful conviction as it is to use every legitimate means to bring about a just one. |
