So I bring people here from out of town.

On a Wednesday afternoon in March, Noel Johnson takes me to his favorite art gallery in Washington, DC.

All of the art along the walls was donated and there were...

The paintings line a hallway, a portrait of a mother, an abstract of small circles, a

vase with pink star flowers.

We're not at the National Gallery of Art nor at the Smithsonian Art Museum.

And the artists are all children, many of them who have been in foster care.

We're at the superior court of the district of Columbia.

This is the John Marshall level and it's where family court is generally housed.

Okay.

Johnson is a judge.

He handles child dependency cases.

Cases where children have been abused or neglected by their parents or caretakers.

On the hall from the art gallery, Judge Johnson unlocks the door to his courtroom.

My courtroom is small, as you can see, because there are very few people that actually are

allowed to come into the courtroom other than the actual participants.

The cases are confidential.

The bench where Johnson sits in his black robe is situated a bit lower than a bench in

a typical courtroom.

It's set up intentionally this way so that I'm not towering above everyone.

It's intended to be more familial in nature.

But the stakes are high in family court.

...