About Us
The Lookout Mountain Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office represents the people of the State of Georgia as the top prosecutor for state crimes in the Lookout Mountain Judicial Circuit including Dade, Catoosa, Chattooga and Walker counties.
The mission of the office is to seek justice for the citizens of Georgia with courage, integrity, and professionalism.
The District Attorney’s Office is responsible for seeking justice in felony and misdemeanor cases in Dade County. Misdemeanors in Catoosa, Chattooga and Walker Counties are prosecuted by three separate prosecuting agencies, the Solicitor Generals, in the state courts of those three counties. We also seek justice in all criminal offenses in the Juvenile Courts of the Judicial Circuit.
Our office is comprised of highly skilled professionals who live in the counties we represent and who are passionate about doing what’s right and seeking justice for the people we serve. The office employs 16 attorneys and 19 support and non-attorney staff members. We handle approximately 4,750 felonies and 250 misdemeanors each year.
We are committed to conducting ourselves within a strict value system that focuses on honesty, integrity, respect, courage, fairness, professionalism and humility.
The work we do is more than prosecuting people who commit crimes. We are committed to
holding the right people accountable for violating the law without fear or favor in an ethical, equitable, and independent manner. We are committed to providing advocacy, support and resources to victims, witnesses and their families. We strive to act at all times with compassion for witnesses, victims and defendants. We take seriously our obligation to serve as leaders within the criminal justice system and to foster professionalism and cooperation among all constituents including the courts, law enforcement agencies, victims, witnesses, social service agencies, and the community.
We are passionate about protecting conviction integrity, ensuring cases move quickly and justly through the criminal process, and efficiently and effectively leveraging alternative sentencing programs when appropriate.
Finally, we believe it is our duty to educate and engage the community through volunteer work and greater access to information about the functions of our office and criminal justice system.
DA Clayton M. Fuller
Clayton Fuller leverages his top-tier expertise, work ethic, passion for justice and Main Street communities to succeed in diverse settings, from rural courtrooms to the West Wing.
Clay is from Lookout Mountain, Georgia, and serves as the District Attorney for Lookout Mountain Judicial Circuit. In this capacity, he has prosecuted some of the circuit’s toughest violent and sexual crimes. He secured convictions in numerous jury trials, including murder, rape, child molestation, and armed robbery—resulting in life sentences for the perpetrators. In addition, he has argued criminal cases before the Supreme Court of Georgia and the Court of Appeals of Georgia.
Clay is also a Major and a Deputy Staff Judge Advocate in the Air National Guard, where he advises commanders in order to provide the nation with superior air capabilities. He has been rated the #1 mid-career officer by his Wing leadership. From 2010-2014, Clay was an active duty Judge Advocate General (JAG) in the United States Air Force. In that capacity he managed large sections of a military legal office and was the lead prosecutor in numerous courts-martial. He was awarded the Air Force Commendation Medal on multiple occasions for this work.
From 2018-2019, Clay was one of fourteen Americans selected and appointed by President Donald J. Trump to serve as a White House Fellow, the nation’s most prestigious program for leadership and public service. During his White House Fellowship, he served in both the Office of the Vice President and the Department of Defense (DoD). He advised the Office of the Vice President on the response to the opioid crisis as well as improving processes that impact families of the POW/MIA community. At DoD, he assisted senior Pentagon and National Security Council leaders with the oversight of the worldwide employment of special operations forces in counterterrorism. He earned the Office of the Secretary of Defense’s Award for Outstanding Achievement for work performed in counterterrorism.
After leaving the Trump administration, he and his wife Kate cofounded Atticus Impact Investing, a strategic investment firm focused on revolutionizing the economies of Appalachian small towns. In founding Atticus, Clay and Kate have chosen to focus their efforts on the renewal of communities important to their family’s future and to fight the opioid and methamphetamine epidemics. The idea for Atticus came as a result of Clay’s personal victory over cancer in 2013, following a thirteen-hour surgery and a two-week ICU stay at Walter Reed, which inspired him to leave Air Force active duty to fight rural poverty in his native North Georgia.
Clay was captain of the basketball team at Emory University and graduated with a B.A. in English before earning an M.P.A. from Cornell University and a Juris Doctor from Southern Methodist University. He is a distinguished graduate of the Air Force’s Officer Training School and a graduate of the Marine Expeditionary Warfare School. He earned a Master’s Degree in Military Operational Art and Science with a Joint Warfare Concentration from the Air Command and Staff College in Montgomery, Alabama. He and Kate have two children and reside in Dade County.