WASHINGTON, D.C. — Local attorney Bill Powell has been nominated to serve as the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of West Virginia.
President Donald Trump made the nomination Thursday.
Powell, a former Managing Member of Jackson Kelly PLLC in Martinsburg, currently works in the Jefferson County Prosecuting Attorney’s office.
Jefferson County Prosecutor Matt Harvey said Powell is the right man for the job, and will bring a lot of benefit to the Eastern Panhandle.
“The Northern District’s getting the best person they possibly could,” Harvey said during Panhandle Live Friday.
Harvey said the change is significant for his office and other prosecutors in the northern part of the state.
“It gives us a renewed and strengthened partnership with the U.S. Attorney’s office,” he said.
Harvey said having Powell in the position will, among other things, help in the battle against drug abuse because of Powell’s Eastern Panhandle roots.
Powell served as Assistant United States District Attorney for the Southern District of West Virginia, in the Criminal Division, prosecuting fraud and violent crime cases.
U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito recommended Powell’s nomination to President Trump earlier this year.