Al Wong broke barriers by becoming the first Asian-American judge in the Southeast when he was elected to the DeKalb State Court in 1998. Since then, he’s presided over myriad cases—high stakes tort matters, defamation cases, an unusual federal-state mediation for suits against a vitamin supplement-maker and a case over a brawl at Waffle House involving the musician Kid Rock. Wong has also run a DUI court that gives offenders a chance to get sober and clear their record. One participant told the Daily Report, “I believe Judge Wong saved my life.”
Wong grew up in Hong Kong until he was 14 and his parents sent him to military school in Virginia. He stayed in the U.S. through Auburn University and an early career in the insurance business then went to Atlanta’s John Marshall Law School. After being mentored by plaintiffs lawyer Hugh Head and working on his own, he joined Gambrell & Stolz, becoming a partner in 1995.
