Alcovy Circuit Superior Court Chief Judge John Ott officially announced Wednesday that he will seek reelection.
Ott, 58, has sat on the bench since 1990 and served as District Attorney prior to that. Before his career as a lawyer, he taught school for a year in Bibb County. He was hired at the Newton County DA's office in 1981. He ran opposed in 1996 but has been unopposed until now. He was named Chief Judge in 2004.
Ott has served on the Walton County Little League Board and has coached several teams there and has coached in Newton County for both baseball and football. He currently serves as a representative of the Superior Court judges on the State Council for Interstate Adult Offender Supervision and the county and municipal probation advisory council. He chairs the personnel committee for the council of Superior Court judges.
He currently lives in Walton County, and he and his family attend First United Methodist Church of Monroe where he serves on several committees. His wife works as a personal banker and mortgage loan originator and serves on the board of the McDaniel-Tichenor House and the Walton County Boys and Girls Club.
Since taking office in 1990, Ott has handled over 48,000 cases and had jury trials in over 500 cases. For jury trials, the appellate courts have reversed his decisions during trial three times in criminal and three times in civil trials. In the 21 years Ott has been a judge, he has been reversed just 20 other times for the decisions he made.
"I think I run an efficient courtroom, and it is applying the law fairly and justly and that's meaningful to me," Ott said Wednesday. "That gives me self-satisfaction and that's really why I want to run. I want to keep on doing it if the people will have me. I'm a servant of the people."
Ott will be challenged by local defense attorney Stephanie R. Lindsey, who announced her run in January.
He will be holding a campaign kickoff meet-and-greet from 7:30 until 9:30 a.m. March 29 in the community center of the Turner Lake Recreation Center. The community is invited to attend. The campaign mailing address for Ott is Campaign to Re-Elect John Ott, P.O. Box 1159, Covington 30015-1159.
