As many have already discovered, Superior Court in the Griffin Judicial Circuit has more of a Fayette County flavor as of the first of the year.

Chris Edwards became the circuit's fourth judge and the only Fayette County resident on the Superior Court bench when he won the seat in a 1998 election. The circuit had three judges until this year.

Edwards has a wealth of experience in the area, having served as an assistant district attorney in the Griffin circuit ­ which includes Spalding, Pike and Upson counties ­ from 1981 to 1986.

The way the circuit has evolved since that time is most telling in the results of his recent election. Whereas Griffin was the center of voting strength in the 1980s, Fayette County's rapid growth is proven by Edwards' ability to win his seat even though he carried only Fayette.

Now in his third home in the county, he lives in Brooks with his wife and two daughters.

He moved to Fayette because his previous work experience here convinced him that its beauty and potential for growth would provide the ideal personal and professional opportunities, Edwards says.

"It looked like a great place to raise kids," he says. "Nothing could have been truer."

After growing up in south Florida, he first came to the Atlanta area when a judge at the National Moot Trial competition, which he participated in during law school, offered him a job in downtown Atlanta. His first trial was a murder trial; soon after he passed the bar.

He gives a clue as to how long ago that was when he points out that the location of his downtown office led to an opportunity to meet actor Burt Reynolds during the filming of the movie Sharky's Machine. Viewers who check out a video of that film will notice a much different Atlanta skyline than what is in place today.

His downtown job consisted mostly of writing, and he soon looked around for other opportunities. That led to his stint in this circuit.

All district attorney work at that time was done out of offices in Griffin and Thomaston. When Edwards and his associates came to Fayette County, they brought their work with them in cardboard boxes. Current judges Paschal English and Johnnie Caldwell also worked in the DA's office at that time.

After spending about six months in the Brunswick Judicial Circuit, Edwards returned to Griffin to practice law with Tim Cramer, who is now a State Court judge in Spalding County. Edwards ran Cramer's campaign.

His time as a prosecutor cemented Edwards' desire to remain involved in the criminal process. "I never really wanted to leave it," he says. "It's where the rubber meets the road."

He credits Chief Judge Miller with giving him exceptional advice and guidance during the early days of his term on the bench. Among the things Edwards has learned is that he never wants to make a ruling based on public opinion.

"This is not an area where politics pervades prosecutorial decisions," he says of the judge's role.

Edwards wants court to be as pleasant an experience as possible for all participants, and he wants the jurors to know their work is appreciated. As for himself, he wants to be "the humblest person in the room," adding that he doesn't want to be perceived as a mean judge. "A mean judge doesn't like his job," he says.

The judge takes care not to form opinions in a jury trial, where he leaves the verdict up to the defendant's peers. Of course, in a bench trial, he does not have that luxury, and must decide on guilt or innocence himself.

Two areas of Edwards' work show his special interest in the role he sees education playing in the judicial process. He instructs anyone he sentences to probation, where applicable, to study for and obtain a GED (General Equivalency Diploma), citing statistics that show 61 percent of those in Georgia prisons are high-school dropouts.

On the other side, he spends a good deal of his time speaking in schools in an attempt to reach students before they become lawbreakers. He says this is "probably the most pleasant part of the job."

Edwards has spoken to about 15,000 students, and he regularly appears at schools with prison system staff members and probation officers, as well as recent inmates.

The focus of these meetings is to emphasize how nearly all crime involves drinking and/or drug use, and how a person's school background, such as the aforementioned dropouts, is a telltale sign of the potential for future criminal activity.

Speaking to students in the third grade and up, Edwards plans to appear at all 28 schools in the Griffin circuit, hopefully within a year's time. He also plans to speak to parents, helping them spot potential problems with their children that could lead them to appear in his courtroom.

In the first 12 weeks of his term, the judge has had eight weeks of jury trials - four weeks of civil trials and four weeks of criminal trials. He believes that a judge needs to keep a hand in both and stay balanced.

Another step in his education as a judge is a three-week session at the National Judicial College at the University of Nevada, which began April 12. The course he is participating in is not mandatory, but he says nearly every judge attends.

He also is participating in the Council of Superior Court Judges, a statewide organization that meets twice a year. He finds the experience of meeting other judges from across the state, including many he has appeared before as a prosecutor, fascinating and educational.

Edwards sees a general public, specifically the jury pool, being much more knowledgeable about various aspects of the law than it once was. He attributes this to increased media exposure from such outlets as Court TV.

He recalled a recent case where a witness pointed out that a particular type of testimony would be hearsay. The typical juror understanding a concept like hearsay so well would have been unheard of years earlier, he says.

"Concepts like hearsay and reasonable doubt are much more easily understood," the judge says.

This evolution places more of a burden on the prosecution, and particularly on law enforcement, to make its case.

"The public is more aware of the judicial process" than in past years, he says. "Jurors expect more from law enforcement in criminal cases, and they're meeting that challenge."