Judge talks about his rise from poverty at Emancipation Proclamation services

YOUNGSTOWN — Judge Michael J. Ryan’s childhood consisted of parents who were heroin addicts, a mother who died when she was 28 years old and he was 14, a stepfather who beat, choked and brutalized his mother and a biological father who spent time in prison.

Between kindergarten and his sophomore year at Cleveland Heights High School, Ryan had been in and out of 10 schools.

Nevertheless, his hardships hardly stopped there. He often went to school hungry and in shoddy clothing, lived in poverty and sometimes had to study in his home under a street light’s glare because the power had been disconnected.

Yet several years later, he somehow managed to graduate from the Cleveland-Marshall School of Law and, not long after that, earn his law license and be elected as Cleveland Municipal Judge in 2005. Now he serves as judge of the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas Juvenile and Family Division.

“I was given a lot, yet more was required of me,” Judge Ryan said in outlining his main theme as the keynote speaker for today’s annual Emancipation Proclamation and Installation Service at Tabernacle Baptist Church, 707 Tabernacle Blvd., formerly 707 Arlington St.

For the complete story, read Saturday's Vindicator and Vindy.com