Abraham declined to identify the office she might seek, but her longtime political adviser, Eleanor Dezzi, said yesterday that her potential run would be statewide.
"A lot of people have been approaching her about running for attorney general," Dezzi said in a telephone interview. "She's considering it."
She'll have plenty of time, since the office won't be up for election until 2012. If Attorney General Tom Corbett, who is running for governor this year, were to resign, a replacement would be nominated by the governor and confirmed by the state Senate and would serve the remainder of Corbett's term.
Williams, the first African-American to serve as district attorney in Philadelphia or any other Pennsylvania county, said yesterday that the city's "criminal-justice system is broken."
He promised to be tough on violent crime, but also to see that drug addicts are treated for their addiction rather than "warehoused" in prisons.
"Justice without mercy is evil," Williams said.
Williams said after the ceremony that he would appoint a deputy for performance and policy who would gather "performance-based empirical data, so we can evaluate what we're doing."
Williams also said that he would begin assigning assistant district attorneys geographically so they would get to know police and citizens in particular neighborhoods.
And he said that the office would develop "a new protocol to investigate police corruption, police shootings, to change the entire way the District Attorney's Office does that."
Williams said that he'll make veteran prosecutor Joe McGettigan first assistant district attorney, his top adviser on operational and policy matters.
Mayor Nutter pledged in his speech to work with Williams and others to help stem gun violence and to bring relief to "mothers, fathers, families and children [who are] ripped apart by this bloody slaughter."
