Honorable Janet C. Holmgren

Circuit Judge, 17th Judicial Circuit

Honorable Janet Holmgren was appointed Associate Judge in 1995 and elected Circuit Judge of the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit in 1998. She served as Chief Judge of the Circuit from 2007 to 2011. Prior to becoming a judge, she was in private practice for ten years, concentrating in the areas of personal injury and insurance defense. In 1993, Judge Holmgren was selected to be trained as one of the original mediators in the pilot civil mediation program during its development in Winnebago County. In addition, she served as both an arbitrator and a mediator in the court-annexed ADR programs in Winnebago County.

In anticipation of Illinois Supreme Court Rule 905 going into effect, which mandates, among other things, that each judicial circuit establish a mediation program for child custody and visitation disputes, Judge Holmgren served on the Council of Chief Judges Ad Hoc Committee on the New Supreme Court Child Custody Rules. She is currently a member of the Illinois Children's Justice Task Force/ Citizen's Review Panel, the Judicial Advisory Committee to the AOIC Court Improvement Project, the Illinois Juvenile Justice Commission, and the Board of Directors of the Winnebago County Bar Foundation.