Fayette County

State Court Judge Fletcher Sams Sr. is one of the three finalists still

in the running for the vacant Superior Court Judgeship created by chief

judge Ben J. Miller Jr., who is retiring the end of this year.

Joining Sams

on the short list selected by the Georgia Judicial Nominating Commission

are Andrew J. Whalen III of Griffin, the son of former Chief Superior

Court Judge Andrew J. Whalen II and Tommy Richard Hankinson, a Thomaston

attorney.

The finalist

will be selected by Gov. Roy Barnes.

"I'm very

humbled with everybody I know who has been involved with this to have

been included on the short list," Sams said Tuesday. "I know

the governor's got a tough decision to make and I don't envy him."

Sams, a sixth-generation

Fayette native, first worked as an assistant district attorney in south

Georgia for several years after graduating the Cumberland Law School at

Samford University in 1979. While there, he served as a special assistant

U.S. Attorney for one case involving a pharmacist accused of forging 30,000

prescriptions.

Later, Sams

returned home, serving as Judge Pro Tem for Fayetteville City Court in

the early 80s, then as District Attorney of the Griffin Judicial Circuit

from 1989-1992.

Elected as

Fayette's first state court judge in 1996, Sams has also served as a special

master in several Superior Court cases in Fayette and Pike counties which

involved him making recommendations on the case to the sitting judge.

Sams was also

the town attorney for Brooks from 1993 to 1996.

Other Fayette

residents applied for the Superior Court Judgeship, including State Court

Solicitor Steve Harris, municipal court judges Robert Ruppenthal and Charles

Floyd and Peachtree City attorneys R. Dolores Daniel and Stephen M. Kiser.

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