About WM Dane
WM Dane DeKrey is a lawyer whose career cuts across public defense, civil liberties work and private practice. He moves easily between trial work and policy advocacy. Colleagues describe him as methodical in court and purposeful in written argument.
He earned his J.D. from the University of Minnesota Law School in 2011 after completing a B.A. at the University of North Dakota in 2004. Those schools bookend a period of early professional development that brought him back to the Upper Midwest to practice law.
DeKrey joined Zimmerman Reed as an associate in 2014. He spent the next phase of his career in federal public defense. In 2016 he became an assistant federal public defender at the North Dakota Federal Public Defenders Office. There he handled felony cases in federal court, worked on sentencing matters and litigated pretrial issues. The role deepened his courtroom experience and gave him frequent opportunities to argue motions and manage complex factual records.
In 2019 two new developments shaped his public profile. He took on the title of Advocacy Director at the ACLU, a role that placed him in the intersection of litigation, education and policy work. That same year he co-founded DeKrey Hock LLC and assumed the duties of a founding partner. The dual paths of advocacy and private practice have continued to inform his work since then.
DeKrey is admitted to practice in the Eighth Circuit, North Dakota and Minnesota. Those admissions reflect a practice that ranges from district court litigation to federal appeals. He has worked on matters that require an understanding of both trial strategy and appellate briefing. His background in federal public defense is a throughline. It shows up in his case selection and in how he prepares for hearings.
Clients and other lawyers see a practitioner who balances courtroom tactics with careful written advocacy. He has experience drafting motions, preparing appeals and advising on constitutional questions that arise in criminal cases. That combination of public-sector litigation and private practice shapes how he approaches disputes.
He currently practices at DeKrey Hock LLC, where his work concentrates on federal criminal defense, civil liberties matters and appeals.
