William T. Ferris III first joined the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office as an Assistant District Attorney in 1976, where he prosecuted homicide, rape, vehicular homicide and high-profile corruption cases. He went on to serve as Chief of the Rackets Bureau, Major Crime Bureau, and Training and Education Bureau before leaving the office in 2002 to go into private practice. He returned to the Office on January 1, 2018 as Chief Assistant.

Upon leaving the District Attorney’s office in 2002, Mr. Ferris joined Bracken Margolin Besunder LLP, practicing criminal law in state and federal courts, Surrogate’s Court and Article 81 Guardianships.

He also previously served as Dean of the Suffolk Academy of Law; President of the Suffolk County Bar Association; a member of the Board of Directors for the Suffolk County Criminal Bar Association; a member of the Grievance Committee, Tenth Judicial District; and a member of the Felony Screening Committee, Assigned Counsel Defender Plan.

Mr. Ferris has lectured and conducted training for the National District Attorney’s Association, the New York Prosecutors Training Institute, the National Advocacy Center, and the District Attorneys Association of the State of New York. He has also argued cases in the Appellate Division, the Second Department and the New York State Court of Appeals.

Throughout his career as an attorney, Mr. Ferris has received many awards, including the Suffolk County Bar Association’s Outstanding Leadership Award and the President’s Award as Chair of the 18-b Task Force.

Mr. Ferris is also a proud veteran. He was commissioned an Ensign in the U.S. Navy in 1968. He volunteered to be assigned as an Officer-in Charge of Swift Boats (PCF) in the Vietnam War and later served a tour of duty on the USS HOEL (DDG-13). He transferred to the Naval Reserve upon his release from active duty, serving two separate tours as a Commanding Officer of Naval Reserve Units, and retired as a Captain in 1996.

He is a graduate of Hobart College and received his Juris Doctor from the Fordham University School of Law.

Howard S. Master serves as Special Counsel to Suffolk County District Attorney Timothy D. Sini and Division Chief responsible for prosecution of public corruption offenses and complex financial crimes. Mr. Master assisted District Attorney Sini in creating and overseeing a Conviction Integrity Bureau that will evaluate claims of wrongful conviction based on alleged governmental misconduct or other causes.

Previously, Mr. Master served as Senior Enforcement Counsel to the New York State Attorney General and as Deputy Chief of the Criminal Division in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. Over the course of his career, Mr. Master has prosecuted numerous public corruption offenses, including crimes by elected officials and government contractors, as well as complex schemes involving fraud, money laundering, and corporate misconduct.

Mr. Master has received several awards for his work as a prosecutor, including the Department of Justice’s Director’s Award for Superior Performance and the Federal Law Enforcement Foundation’s Prosecutor of the Year award.

Before becoming a prosecutor, Mr. Master clerked for the Honorable Victor Marrero of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York and the Honorable José A. Cabranes of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He is currently an adjunct professor at University of Pennsylvania Law School. Mr. Master is a 2003 magna cum laude graduate of the NYU School of Law.

Megan O’Donnell serves on the Executive Team as the Division Chief of Criminal Investigations. Ms. O’Donnell is a seasoned attorney with over twenty years of experience. She began her career in this Office in 1998 as a prosecutor, serving as a trial attorney throughout various bureaus where she prosecuted a gamut of crimes, including sexual assaults, gang violence, major narcotics offenses, and homicides.

In 2010 Ms. O’Donnell was named Attorney-In-Charge of the Anti-Gang Unit, and shortly thereafter Deputy Bureau Chief of the Special Investigations Bureau, which comprised of a number of specialized units to combat gangs, organized crime, and human trafficking.

Ms. O'Donnell is recognized within both law enforcement and the legal community as a dynamic, ethical, and dedicated attorney, and was given the distinguished honor of being named 2010 Prosecutor of the Year in Trial Advocacy by the New York Prosecutors Training Institute.

In 2013 Ms. O’Donnell left the District Attorney’s Office, to litigate cases in Federal Court as an Assistant County Attorney for the County of Suffolk. As a federal litigant, Ms. Donnell once again handled a breadth of cases including employment discrimination and constitutional claims brought against the County.

In 2018, Ms. O’Donnell returned to the District Attorney’s Office as Division Chief of Special Investigations. She currently oversees the Narcotics Bureau which includes the Special Narcotics Unit, Asset Forfeiture Bureau, and the Enhanced Prosecution Bureau which is comprised of three investigative units including the Gang Unit, Crime Strategies and Major Investigations Unit, and the Electronic Surveillance Unit.

Ms. O’Donnell strives to continuously implement investigative strategies for all the bureaus, and utilize the assistance of the vast law enforcement agencies available to this Office.

In January of 2018, District Attorney Timothy D. Sini appointed Tad Scharfenberg Trial Division Chief. As Division Chief, Tad oversees the Homicide, Major Crime, Child Abuse & Domestic Violence, East End, Vehicular Crime, Case Advisory, and District Court Bureaus.

In 1989, Mr. Scharfenberg was hired by the Suffolk County District Attorney Patrick Henry as an Assistant District Attorney. For more than six years as an Assistant District Attorney, he prosecuted and tried cases for the District Court, East End, Family Crime and White Collar Crime/Complex Litigation Bureaus.

At the time of his departure from the Office in 1996, he was a trial supervisor in the District Court Bureau. That same year he also was the recipient of the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Excellence in Prosecution Award.

For the next 22 years, he ran a successful private law practice exclusively handling criminal defense matters. During this time, Mr. Scharfenberg was appointed numerous times as a Special District Attorney.

Mr. Scharfenberg also previously served as President of the Suffolk County Criminal Bar Association.

Mr. Scharfenberg is a lifelong resident of Suffolk County. He received his Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from Hofstra University and his Juris Doctorate from St. John’s University School of Law.