New ADA joins Moore's staff

By BOB GIBBINS

TAHLEQUAH DAILY PRESS August 07, 2008 09:57 am

— Cherokee County’s newest prosecutor has always been fascinated with criminal law.
Yvette DuVall joined District Attorney Jerry Moore’s staff July 28, replacing Greg Combs on the staff. This is her first prosecutorial job, aside from a brief stint as a municipal prosecutor in Arkansas.
DuVall said both the regular prosecutor and another potential prosecutor had a conflict, and she was standing nearby.
“They handed me the case file and said, ‘You’re the special prosecutor,’” she recalled.
DuVall is from Strafford, Mo., and graduated from high school there in 1987. She received a bachelor’s degree in public administration from Southwest Missouri State University, now Missouri State University, in 1997. She earned her juris doctorate in 2001 from the University of Tulsa.
The new ADA is licensed to practice law in both Oklahoma and Arkansas.
“It’s something I’ve always wanted to do,” DuVall said of prosecution.
She did some criminal defense in her general practice in Rogers, Ark., where she was a solo practitioner. She was an intern for former First Assistant District Attorney Donovan Dobbs when he was in private practice in Wagoner.
DuVall, who is engaged to be married, has been spending some of her first days meeting the people she’ll be working with, including police officers, the judges and defense attorneys. She said she attended law school with Jim Cosby, a local defense attorney.
“It seems like a nice community,” she said of Tahlequah. “It’s fairly small, but not too small, and it’s a rural area.”
All of the people she’s met to date have been supportive and helpful.
“I’m very happy to be over here and working in the DA’s office,” she said..
She enjoys camping and spending time with her five cats.
Assistant District Attorney David Pierce, supervising attorney in Cherokee County, said DuVall’s primary caseload will be juvenile cases and those involving crimes against children and women.

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