Barbara Gayle, Staff Reporter
JEWEL HANSON Scott, a Jamaican attorney-at-law, is the new District Attorney for Clayton County, Atlanta, Georgia, United States.
She ran on the Democratic ticket last month and beat Republican Robert Keller who had held the seat for the last 27 years. A total of 16,470 votes were polled for Mrs. Scott while Mr. Keller got 7,844 votes.
Mrs. Scott, 43, graduated from the Norman Manley Law School, University of the West Indies, Mona, in 1984 and entered private practice in Jamaica. She worked in the Turks and Caicos Islands before going to New York in 1988. She was called to the New York Bar and after spending several yeas there moved to Atlanta in 1991. She returned to Jamaica in 1996 and worked at the Fair Trading Commission for a year before returning to Atlanta, where she worked for Atlanta's Legal Aid Programmme.
CALLED TO THE BAR
She did further studies there and obtained the Juris Doctor degree from the University School of Law, Georgia, and was called to the Bar there. She will be sworn in on December 15 as the new District Attorney, and some of her classmates from the 1984 batch of the Norman Manley Law School say they will attend that ceremony.
"I hope to develop a system which is fair to all the residents of Clayton and stop the practice of unfair selective prosecution," Scott told The Gleaner last week. She said that such a system would prevent citizens from having a criminal record at an early age. She believes strongly in balancing justice with fairness and hopes to develop such an environment in her new office.
As District Attorney Mrs. Scott is in charge of a staff of 60, including 14 Assistant District Attorneys, and an annual budget of $2.9 million.
Mrs. Scott, who was born in Hopewell, Hanover, attended Montego Bay High School and Manchester High School. He parents are the Rev. Seymour Hanson, (now deceased), and Lurline Hanson. She has been married for the last 19 years to Lee Scott who was her campaign manager for the race District Attorney's race. They are the parents of two teenage sons.
