Judge Caren E. Cloud has been a dedicated advocate for juvenile justice and child welfare for twenty-five years. Before joining the Juvenile Court bench in March of 2024, Judge Cloud served as the Legal and Policy Director for Georgia Appleseed Center for Law and Justice. Judge Cloud served as the Deputy Chief Administrative Officer for the Fulton County Juvenile Court as well as the Court Program Administrator for Court. She also previously served as Legal Director for the Truancy Intervention Project Georgia (TIP Georgia) and as an adjunct professor of Juvenile Law at Georgia State University’s College of Law.
A third generation Atlantan, Judge Cloud is a proud graduate of the Atlanta Public Schools system, Clark Atlanta University, and the University of Georgia School of Law. She currently serves as an advisory board member for Devereux Advanced Behavioral Health Georgia and the Truancy Intervention Project Georgia. She served as the 2020 President of the Gate City Bar Association and is a former member-at-large of the Atlanta Bar Association’s (ABA) Board of Directors and the Atlanta Board of Education Ethics Commission. She is also a past co-chair of the Atlanta Bar Association’s Law School Outreach Committee and a current co-chair of the Atlanta Bar’s Minority and Diversity Clerkship Committee.
Judge Cloud was spotlighted as a “Fearless Children’s Lawyer” in January 2024 by the American Bar Association’s Litigation Section. She was selected as an honoree amongst the “The Atlanta 500,” Atlanta Magazine’s 2020 Annual Guide to the City’s Most Powerful Leaders and is a graduate of the Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education’s Education Policy Fellowship Program and the Certified Public Manager Program under the Carl Vinson Institute at the University of Georgia.
Judge Cloud is the recipient of several awards including Distinguished Service Award, Atlanta Bar Association (2018 and 2016); the Fred Gray Social Justice Award, John Marshall Law School (2010); the Child Advocate Award, State Bar of Georgia Young Lawyers Division Juvenile Law Committee (2010); and Best Service to the Public, State Bar of Georgia Young Lawyers Division (2002-03).
