Defense Secretary Ashton Carter announced the appointment of Bell in a Defense Department statement issued Friday.
Bell also previously served as deputy general counsel of the Merit Systems Protection Board after she worked for the Justice Department as a trial attorney, senior trial attorney and deputy chief of the civil rights division’s housing and civil enforcement section.
She was inducted into the Senior Executive Service in 2015.
Bell is a graduate of Randolph-Macon College and the University of Richmond’s T.C. William School of Law.
She also completed the Federal Executive Instituteâs Leadership for a Democratic Society Program.