Terese Dick

Terese Dick served for almost 29 years as an attorney with the Wisconsin State Public Defender in Milwaukee, the largest urban public defender office in the state, where she represented indigent clients charged with felony and misdemeanor level offenses. Ms. Dick was a member of the Milwaukee Trial Office Management Team from 1993-2003 supervising a team of 10-12 staff attorneys. She was instrumental in developing a felony level Drug Practice Group, and was involved in a system-wide Restorative Justice Program and other diversion/resolution alternatives to traditional court processes. Ms. Dick served as the defense bar representative to the three specialized Domestic Violence Courts representing the staff and private bar attorneys and acted as a liaison to the Judiciary presiding in the Domestic Violence Courts. In 1998, when Milwaukee was chosen as one of the three sites for the Judicial Oversight Demonstration Initiative (“JODI”), Ms. Dick was selected to serve as a member of the Advisory Board and served on many committees including: court processes; BIP programs; Victim’s rights; Victim/Witness Services in the court system; information sharing among the Civil, Criminal, Family and Children’s Courts; and worked in collaboration with the District Attorney’s office and the Department of Corrections, including Probation and Parole.

In 2009, Ms. Dick was invited to participate in the “Judicial Roundtable Discussion: Batterer Accountability and Opportunity for Change” sponsored by the National Judicial Institute on Domestic Violence (NJIDV) in partnership with the NCJFCJ, Family Violence Prevention Fund (now, Futures Without Violence) and the Department of Justice Office on Violence Against Women. From 2009 until her retirement in 2019, Ms. Dick was a faculty member at the “Enhancing Judicial Skills in Domestic Violence Cases Workshop” teaching judicial officers from across the United States in the area of domestic violence, a program sponsored by the NCJFCJ and Futures Without Violence. Additionally, Ms. Dick was a faculty member at the 2009 BISC-MI Annual Conference. To increase awareness and knowledge of domestic violence issues and to enhance trial practice, Ms. Dick created and coordinated a Domestic Violence Trial Practice Group for staff attorneys who made a commitment to practicing in the Domestic Violence Courts.