Barbara E. Whiting-Wright Networking and Awards Reception

The Greater Washington Area Chapter, Women Lawyers Division, National Bar Association (GWAC) is a network of African-American women attorneys dedicated to the professional development of its members. We are committed to improving the quality of life in the Greater Washington D.C. area through a variety of activities, including educational programs and community service projects.

Mission GWAC is a network of African American women attorneys dedicated to the professional development of its members. We are committed to improving the quality of life in the Greater Washington D.C. area through a variety of activities, including educational programs and community service projects.

Purpose The purpose of GWAC is to address the concerns of our community with an emphasis on women in the legal profession. Our objectives are: To assist in fostering and sustaining a viable presence of women in the legal profession throughout the Greater Washington D.C. area; To monitor problems and programs in the Greater Washington D.C. area; To provide aid to women in their efforts to obtain a legal education, bar admission, and employment in their chosen areas of interest; To promote continuing legal education and the pursuit of academic excellence; To provide advice and counsel on problems which have particular impact on women.

We carry out our objective through programs and projects including seminars, workshops, and publications.

Trailblazer Award

Nicole Cober, Principal Managing Partner Cober Johnson & Romney

Nic Cober is an executive coach & business strategist who specializes in developing management, legal, & branding strategies for leaders in the business world. She is also an author, a media influencer and contributor, and an advocate for women’s empowerment and small business growth in her community. She is currently the Principal Managing Partner at Cober Johnson & Romney, PLLC which is an award-winning multi-million dollar legal and business consulting firm. With 15 years of experience and a sharp entrepreneurial acumen, Nicole has turned her attention to helping other women grow their businesses, become leaders in the industry, and maintain a healthy balance in their personal and professional lives.

She founded the BOW Collective which seeks to create a powerful sisterhood and social capital focused on bringing awareness to Black women-owned businesses in a unified and strategic manner. The BOW Collective creates a platform where the media, the public/ private sector or lending institutions can look to find and do business with black women. She is also a Council Member of the National Women’s Business Council which is a non-partisan federal advisory council established to serve as an independent source of advice and policy recommendations to the President, Congress, and the SBA on issues of importance to women business owners and entrepreneurs.

She shares her advice with audiences large and small as a coach and public speaker. She coaches small business owners as a SCORE Mentor and an Emerging Leaders Instructor for the Small Business Administration and a Mentor for CRU. Her commentary is also sought after by local and national media. She serves as an analyst on Fox 5 and NewsChannel 8 and she is a contributor to the American Express OPEN Forum, Black Enterprise, and Citibank’s Women and Co. A graduate of the University of California, Berkeley with a BA in Mass Communications & Sociology, she also received her Juris Doctor from Howard University School of Law.

Trailblazer Award

Robin Nunn, Partner Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP

Robin Nunn has a wealth of experience gained in private practice as well as working in-house for Fortune 500 companies. Robin’s practice focuses on complex civil litigation, enforcement litigation, white collar defense, transactional due diligence, creation and review of corporate compliance programs, and investigations. She also counsels on novel issues connected to new communication technologies, blockchain, cryptocurrencies, payments, artificial intelligence, and big data. Robin is also a co-leader of the firm’s banking industry team.

Robin has handled high-stakes cases on behalf of a wide range of clients, including banks, financial services firms, fintech companies and pharmaceutical companies. She also advises on privacy, cybersecurity, breach investigation, breach reporting and breach responses, and has assisted clients on compliance with the Truth in Lending Act, Equal Credit Opportunity Act, Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, amongst many others.

Robin has also represented individuals and institutions before a number of US agencies. She is often called on by the national media for commentary. She maintains an active pro bono and diversity and inclusion practice, and has been awarded a Pro Bono Publico Award for her representation of immigrant adults and children and led a prisoner rights case which led to the reversing of a wrongful dismissal in McPeek v.

Blanchard (8th Circuit).

Before joining Morgan Lewis, Robin served as in-house counsel with two Fortune 500 companies. In those roles, she established and executed legal strategies for the company’s legal department, including on lawsuits and enforcement matters. She also counseled internal clients on legal issues across the business, including on cybersecurity, breach response, product design and launch, regulatory compliance, corporate governance, credit, operations, underwriting, and risk in a broad range of products including financial services, credit card, mortgage, auto, broker-dealer, and banking.

Rising Star Award

Carla Jordan-Detamore, Assistant United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia White Collar & General Crime

Carla Jordan-Detamore is an Assistant United States Attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA) where she focuses on white collar investigations and enforcement in areas such as pandemic relief program fraud, tax fraud, bank fraud, and more. A native of West Philadelphia, Jordan-Detamore received her undergraduate degree in Cultural Anthropology from Duke University and her J.D. from Washington University in St. Louis, before going on to clerk for the Honorable Gerald Bruce Lee in EDVA. Jordan-Detamore dedicates significant time to organizations and groups promoting diversity and inclusion in the legal profession such as GWAC, where she served as the 2018-2019 President, the GWAC Foundation, the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity, Just the Beginning – A Pipeline Organization, and the National Bar Association’s Young Lawyers Division (YLD) and Women Lawyers Division (WLD) where she currently serves as the Co-Chair of the WLD We Empower Mentoring Program.

Prior to joining the U.S Attorney’s Office in 2022, she worked as a white collar defense attorney at Vinson & Elkins, where she served as the co-head of V&E’s Women of Color Network, founder and co-head of the firm’s Black Affinity Network, and co-founder and coordinator of the firm’s 1L mentoring program with George Washington University Law School’s Black Law Students Association. She also served on the Legal Advisory Committee of the Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition, where she helped place pro bono cases with attorneys at V&E such as asylum cases and special immigrant juvenile status matters, some of which she had been able to take on herself, and on the Young Lawyers Leadership Network of the D.C. Bar Foundation.

Jordan-Detamore has also been recognized as the 2021 Chambers’ Diversity & Inclusion Future Leader, and among the National Bar Association’s 40 Under 40: Nation’s Best Advocates, American Bar Association’s On The Rise -Top 40 Young Lawyers of 2021, DCA Live’s Emerging Women Leaders of 2019, the National Black Lawyers Top 40 Under 40, and the Capital Pro Bono Honor Roll.

Rising Star Award

Chanell Autrey, Director of Government Affairs Target

Chanell Autrey currently serves as Director of Government Affairs for Target Corporation. In this role, she leads the government affairs strategy for the Mid-Atlantic Region/Great Lakes, which includes ten states. Prior to joining Target, she served as Senior Manager of Government and Community Affairs at Starbucks, where she managed government relations and curated community activations for their Mid-Atlantic Region. Chanell has also served as Senior Director of Government and Community Affairs for Monumental Sports and Entertainment. In this role, she led and executed the government relations strategy and public policy initiatives for four venues and six sports teams, including the Washington Wizards, Mystics, and Capitals. A dedicated public policy lawyer, Chanell spent five years at the Council of the District of Columbia, serving in various roles, including as Committee Director for the Committee on Business & Economic Development. In that capacity, she executed the strategic direction of the Committee’s 27 agencies and commissions and worked collaboratively with stakeholders to pass legislation on subjects ranging from equitable economic development to environmental justice for communities of color.

A graduate of Pennsylvania State University and George Washington University Law School, Chanell began her professional career as an Assistant Public Defender in Baltimore and is an active member of the Maryland Bar Association.

Chanell is a board member of DC Justice Lab, a team of law and policy experts researching, organizing, and advocating for large-scale changes to the District’s criminal legal system. She also sits on the board of the Musicianship, a youth development organization that offers a wide range of music education programs, geared towards enriching the lives of students, their families, and the communities in which they live.

Chanell has been named to the National Black Lawyers Top 40 under 40 and the National Bar Association’s Top 40 Under 40. She is a native of Washington, D.C. and a proud member of Xi Omega Chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.