Jill Roth

Jill Roth currently serves as Senior Judicial Staff Attorney at Cobb County Juvenile Court. Previously, she served as a Judicial Staff Attorney for Fulton County Juvenile Court, where she primarily served the Honorable Judge Renata D. Turner. In that role, Jill played a key part in organizing events like the annual Youth and the Law Summit and the Fulton County Juvenile Court’s Juvenile Justice Enhancement Initiative. She assisted with multiple collaborative efforts, including the CHOICES teen drug court and the Pathways Project, a collaborative initiative involving Fulton County Juvenile Court, the City of Atlanta, and Fulton County Schools aimed at dismantling the school-to-prison pipeline.

Jill graduated summa cum laude from Georgia State University with a B.A. in history and earned her J.D. with distinction from the University of Georgia School of Law. During law school, she engaged in the Public Interest Practicum and Juvenile Justice Projects. She began her legal career as a law clerk to the Honorable G.R. Smith, United States Magistrate Judge with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Georgia in Savannah. Subsequently, she served as an Assistant Public Defender, initially handling appeals before the Court of Appeals of the State of Georgia, pre-trial hearings in magistrate court, and criminal proceedings before various municipal courts. Her long-time interest in youth advocacy led her to transition to juvenile court where she represented numerous children in delinquency and CHINS matters, first before the Chatham County Juvenile Court and later before the DeKalb County Juvenile Court. While working as an Assistant Public Defender, Jill served as faculty for the Georgia Public Defender Council’s Transition into Law Practice Program. She also volunteered as a contributing author for the Georgia Association of Criminal Defense Attorney’s What’s the Decision publication and served on the Advisory Committee for Georgia Appleseed’s Embracing Common Wisdom: The New Juvenile Code in Georgia - An Assessment. 

Since 2019, Jill has served as an Executive Committee Member with the State Bar of Georgia’s Child Protection and Advocacy Section, taking on roles such as Interim Secretary and Secretary. Jill is certified by the National Association of Counsel for Children as a Child Welfare Legal Specialist. Jill also serves on the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act Citizen Review Panel.

Jill resides in Marietta, Georgia, with her husband, son, daughter, dog, two cats, and a leopard gecko. In her free time, she serves as a Dare to Dream Mentor with the Atlanta Angels, providing one-on-one mentorship to youth in foster care. She also enjoys swimming and watching her daughter horseback ride. As a teenager, Jill encountered many of the same challenges faced by young people today and ever since has worked to improve the systems that effect youth and to assist young people with navigating adolescence and young adulthood.