18-02-2025
‘Made a huge impact.' Retired Muscogee County Superior Court Judge John Allen dies
Judge John Allen, who grew up in a Columbus public housing complex, became a decorated U.S. Air Force fighter pilot and presided in State Court and Superior Court in Muscogee County for a combined 26 years, has died.
The Muscogee County Sheriff's Office announced his death in a news release.
'On behalf of the Allen family, we were requested to announce with a heavy heart that Senior Superior Court Judge John Allen has transitioned from labor to reward,' Sheriff Greg Countryman and Superior Court Judge Ben Richardson said in the release. 'The Hon. Judge John Allen made a huge impact in the lives of so many in our city, state and nation. We ask for your continued prayers during the family's time of bereavement.'
Allen's cause of death, his obituary and funeral arrangements weren't available before publication.
After retiring from the court as its chief Chattahoochee Judicial Circuit judge in 2013, Allen was inducted into the Georgia Military Veterans Hall of Fame in 2020.
Superior Court Judge Bobby Peters, the mayor of Columbus from 1995-2002, wrote on his Facebook page that Allen was 82 when he died Sunday at his home.
Allen and Peters formed the first integrated law firm in Columbus during the 1970s. Peters described Allen as a 'highly respected civic leader.'
'John was a gift from God to our community,' Peters wrote. 'A dear friend that left an indelible mark on our judicial circuit & me personally.'
According to his GMVHOF bio, Allen was a distinguished military graduate from Tuskegee University (1966). He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Air Force and accepted into flight school.
After earning his wings, he served two tours in Southeast Asia. He flew an F-4D Phantom, an interceptor and ground attack aircraft.
He completed 284 combat missions over hostile enemy zones. He destroyed 'some of the most highly defended vital enemy support holdings, thus seriously deterring further threats to the region,' his GMVHOF induction citation says.
Allen was awarded six Distinguished Flying Crosses and 23 Air Medals. He was honorably discharged from the Air Force as a captain in 1973 to attend law school at the University of Florida.
After earning his law degree, Allen returned to Columbus in 1976 to begin his law practice. He was a judge in Recorder's Court before State Court and Superior Court.
'He should be lauded for his early contributions to the civil rights movement as well as subsequent service in Columbus community organizations, membership and chair of several judiciary committees and as a recipient of several judicial awards by the State Bar of Georgia and others,' the GMVHOF said in the news release announcing his induction.
Allen served as the city attorney for Geneva, Georgia, according to his bio on the Black history website
The Institute for Continuing Judicial Education of Georgia selected Allen as a mentor for newly appointed or elected judges. The Georgia Supreme Court selected him to work on the Court Futures Vanguard, drafting proposals to improved the state's courts for the future.
Allen's community service included membership on the Columbus Airport Commission, the Columbus High School Vocational Education Advisory Board, the Urban League Board of Directors, the Area Ten Special Olympics Advisory Board and the African American Historic Preservation Society.
In 2012, Allen resigned as chairman of the Georgia Judicial Qualifications Commission, which investigates and prosecutes judicial misconduct, and became the first Black president of the Rotary Club of Columbus.
One year later, just before he retired from the bench, Allen wrote to then-Gov. Nathan Deal and urged him to consider race and gender when appointing his successor. Allen was the only Black judge along with five white males in the six-county Chattahoochee Judicial Circuit's Superior Court.
If the governor follows his pattern in recent judicial appointments, Allen's memo stated, he would create 'an all-white male superior court bench.' That 'would be egregiously unrepresentative of the population served,' Allen wrote, according to the September 2013 report by the American Bar Association Journal.
In December 2013, Deal ended up appointing a white male, Judge Ron Mullins, to replace Allen and a white female, Judge Maureen Gottfried, to fill the circuit's seventh judgeship, created by the Georgia Legislature.
Now, the circuit's seven Superior Court judges comprise four white males, two white females and one Black male — Richardson, who was appointed by Gov. Brian Kemp in 2022, when Judge Ben Land was promoted to the Georgia Court of Appeals.
Allen graduated from Spencer High School in 1961. The school summarized Allen's service to his country and community this way in its Facebook post:
'Judge John Allen marched in Selma, dropped over 1.5 million pounds of bombs from his F4 Phantom over North Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, and served Columbus as a Superior Court Judge. In the tumultuous 1960s, this nation focused on two battlegrounds at once — civil rights agitation and the Vietnam War. John Allen found himself on the front lines of both. In 1965, he was among the Montgomery crowd who took part in the famous march from Selma for the cause of voting rights.
'Life handed Allen's age group the opportunity to become social pioneers, for they were to be the first group of African American youth to break out of a segregated world and become successful in the white mainstream.'
Josh McKoon, the Georgia Republican Party chairman who represented the Columbus area in the state Senate (2011-19), said Allen broke barriers.
In his tribute to Allen, McKoon wrote on X, 'He was one of the best judges I ever had the privilege to try cases in front of during my time as a trial attorney. Off the bench, he was gracious and kind. He always asked about my family members and took the time to give me valuable feedback as a young lawyer. . . . Columbus and the State of Georgia will never be the same.'
