Sharlyn Grace (she/her) is the Deputy Public Defender for Policy at the Law Office of the Cook County Public Defender, where she helps identify and implement the Public Defender’s strategic goals inside and outside of the office. Prior to her current role, Sharlyn was a founding member of Chicago Community Bond Fund and served as CCBF’s first Executive Director. She has also been the Senior Criminal Justice Policy Analyst at Chicago Appleseed Center for Fair Courts. Sharlyn has played a leading role in developing, drafting, and passing several pieces of legislation in the Illinois General Assembly, including bills affecting sentencing, diversion, pretrial policy, and public defense system reform. Outside of work, Sharlyn has provided legal and organizing support for grassroots movements in Chicago since 2012. She is a graduate of Northeastern University School of Law and an Illinois licensed attorney.

Elisabeth Pollock currently serves as the Chief Public Defender for Champaign County, Illinois, a job she accepted in December of 2022 after eleven years working as an Assistant Federal Public Defender in the Central District of Illinois. She works with clients charged with a variety of offenses, from possession of controlled substances to first degree murder. Prior to joining the FPD, Lis worked for six years as a general practice attorney at Beckett & Webber, P.C., in Urbana, Illinois, handling a variety of cases in the areas of civil litigation and state and federal criminal defense. Lis’s mission is, and has always been, to provide the highest quality of representation to every single client who enters her orbit. It is her belief that public defenders are the cornerstone of the criminal justice system, and no one’s rights are protected unless everyone’s rights are protected. Every single client is a whole person, a human being who is deserving of respect, empathy, and dedication. These principles are the foundation for the representation provided every day by the Champaign County Public Defender’s Office. In her spare time, Lis serves on the Scholarship Foundation Board of the CU One to One Mentoring Program, the East Central Illinois Women’s Association Program Committee, the Champaign County Bar Association Board of Governors, and the CU Schools Foundation Board of Directors.

Nathan Rowland -- An attorney from McLeansboro, Illinois, graduated from University of Illinois College of Law in 2000, was sworn in as an Illinois attorney November 9, 2000, and has actively practiced in McLeansboro since that time. A principal in Bonan Bonan & Rowland, LLC, a general practice law firm, Nathan has significant experience in business formation and management, real estate, estate planning, administrative, and agricultural law. Nathan holds contracts as Public Defender in Hamilton County (2005-present) and Gallatin County (2021-present). Appointed as Commissioner to the State Public Defender Commission. Nathan served as an Administrative Law Judge for the Secretary of State, 2004-2012. Nathan is President of the Illinois Council of Chief Defenders (2013-present) organizing Public Defenders in Illinois to support legislative improvements to the Public Defense system, and address practice issues which Public Defenders face on a day-to-day basis.