Hon. Kristal R. Rivers is a judge for the Cook County Circuit Court in Illinois. She was appointed to the Circuit Court by the Illinois Supreme Court in June 2014 and was later elected to the seat in November of that same year.
After joining the bench, she has held an assignment in the Juvenile Justice Division.
Rivers attended Florida A&M University, where she received a B.A. in political science in 1993. She went on to complete a J.D. at Drake University Law School in 1996.
Shortly after graduating from law school, Rivers joined the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office in Dallas, Texas, where she worked as an assistant district attorney from 1997 to 2000.
Then, after relocating to Illinois, Rivers entered into solo practice at her own law firm in 2001. During her tenure in private practice, she handled real estate, mortgages, wills, trusts, power of attorneys, and tax appeals and tax exemption matters.
She left her practice in 2010, to join the Illinois Attorney General's Office, where she served as an assistant attorney general assigned to the Sexually Violent Persons Bureau until her appointment to the bench.
In 2019, she was named Best Judge by the Women’s Bar Attorney Conflict Panel.
Her memberships have included the Illinois Judges Foundation (board member), WINGS Program, Inc. (board member), the Cook County Bar Association (past board member), the Illinois Judges Counsel (past officer), the Illinois Judges Association, and the Chicago Bar Association.
She also served on the Illinois Supreme Court’s Committee on Equality, the Community Service Committee of the Black Women’s Bar Association, and was a liaison to the Judicial Conference, Lawyers Division for the American Bar Association’s Task Force on Human Trafficking and also served as a member of the Diversity Committee of the Lawyers Division.
Rivers is registered as a Democrat.