Judy Jackson Winston

I have dedicated my career to serving people with behavioral health issues and families in crisis. I spent 19 years as a client rights officer for people with behavioral health issues for my county, advocating for those who needed a voice. For the past 9 years, I have served as a magistrate judge in Family Court in Cuyahoga County, where I preside over matters of custody and property. The majority of my docket, about 85%, is custody cases, and 15% is property. What I do is try to assist parents with coming to resolution over whatever their emotions are, and generally it's fighting over children and over property. I also spend some of my time daily writing, and what I've tried to do is take my professional experiences and my expertise and craft compelling stories that basically raise awareness about things that are important to me. That includes raising awareness about behavioral health, which includes drug and alcohol and mental health and trauma, and talking about forgiveness and marriage. I also write about human trafficking because I live in Ohio, which is very high up on the list of places where human trafficking occurs. I also raise awareness about sickle cell disease because I have a child that lives with sickle cell disease, and I lost a child when I was younger to sickle cell disease. I wanted to use my fiction to help raise awareness about important topics to our community and to me personally.