New attorney takes oath Tuesday, hangs shingle in his hometown

Cairo’s newest attorney was sworn in Tuesday by Superior Court Judge J. Kevin Chason.
Gabe Ridley successfully passed the Georgia State Bar exam and is now a practicing attorney in Thomas L. Lehman’s firm.
Ridley, son of Mary Faye and Jerry Ridley of Cairo, is a Cairo native. He attended Cairo High School and played basketball under his father and coach Isaiah Chance.
Following graduation from high school in 1999, Ridley attended Huntingdon College in Montgomery, Ala., where he played basketball and graduated with a biology degree in 2004. In 2006, he earned his masters degree in environmental engineering from the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Ridley then joined the U.S. Army, where he was commissioned as an infantry officer and earned the coveted Airborne and Ranger qualifications. He deployed to Iraq in 2009 with the First Calvary Division for a 12-month tour, serving as battalion staff officer and platoon leader.
In 2010, Ridley completed his active duty service and began working for Omnova Solutions as an environmental engineer. He managed the environmental program at Omnova Solution’s Calhoun, Ga. chemical plant for two years.
During that time, the new Cairo attorney served in the Georgia Army National Guard as a captain.
Then in 2012, Ridley decided to change careers and enrolled in Georgia State University College of Law and graduated with honors in June 2015.
Ridley returned to Grady County in July to begin work with the Lehman law firm.
“I’m excited to be back in Cairo with my family and enjoying the small-town lifestyle,” Ridley said.
Ridley, 34, and his wife Laura are the parents of two boys, Luke, 4, and Noah, 3, and the couple is expecting the arrival of a baby girl in January.
Mrs. Ridley is a dentist and works in the office of A Confident Smile in Thomasville and with Dynamic Mobile Dentistry based out of Macon, which is a traveling dental service that visits nursing homes.