News
August 27, 2019
Leslie Barrett Kinkead, the longtime coordinator of the Tennessee Court Improvement Program at the Administrative Office of the Courts, was recognized for her decades of service recently at a statewide conference for juvenile court professionals.
Kinkead, whose dedication and influence in the…
August 26, 2019
Tennessee Judge Duane Slone is the 2019 recipient of the National Center for State Courts’ (NCSC) William H. Rehnquist Award for Judicial Excellence, one of the highest judicial honors in the country. Judge Slone, of the Circuit Court in the Fourth Judicial District, is being recognized for his…
August 23, 2019
In an opinion released today, the Tennessee Supreme Court vacated the Tennessee Board of Professional Responsibility’s Formal Ethics Opinion 2017-F-163, which provided guidance to prosecutors about ethical duties under Tennessee Rule of Professional Conduct 3.8(d).On March 15, 2018, the Board of…
August 21, 2019
In an opinion released today, the Tennessee Supreme Court held that a trial court acted within its discretion in excluding from trial a defendant’s videotaped statements given in a post-polygraph interview. In so doing, the Court reversed the decision of the Court of Criminal Appeals.The defendant…
August 21, 2019
Tennessee Administrative Office of the Courts Director Deborah Taylor Tate will appear as a guest on OpenLine on Wednesday, August 21 from 7 -8 p.m. OpenLine is a nightly, live, current events based talk show hosted by NewsChannel 5’s Ben Hall and includes a viewer call-in segment.The August 21…
August 21, 2019
A number of Tennessee judges, including one of the longest serving judges in the state, received awards recently at the joint Tennessee Council of Juvenile Judges/Tennessee Juvenile Court Services Association Conference in Franklin.
These awards included annual service awards, as well as one award…
August 19, 2019
The toll that the opioid crisis has taken in Tennessee is clear.In 2017, 1,776 people in the state died of drug overdoses. Of those deaths, 1,268 were caused by opioids. From 2013 to 2017, the number of opioid deaths caused by heroin rose by over 300 percent. The number of deaths from fentanyl…
August 16, 2019
The Tennessee Administrative Office of the Courts has launched a new podcast called Tennessee Court Talk, which brings together the very best law experts to discuss topics affecting judges, attorneys, law students, and the people of Tennessee. The intended audience is announced at the…
August 7, 2019
The Tennessee Supreme Court today ruled unanimously that the Court of Criminal Appeals should no longer vacate convictions when criminal defendants die during an appeal guaranteed by law, known as an appeal as of right from the conviction.In the case before the Court, Mr. Hassan Falah al…
August 5, 2019
The Tennessee Supreme Court has reversed a Court of Criminal Appeals’ decision construing the actions of defense counsel in a criminal case to have caused an amendment to the indictment, thus resulting in a criminal conviction for an offense that was not an enumerated lesser-included offense of the…
August 2, 2019
The Administrative Office of the Courts has approximately $125,000 in grant funding available for the development or continuation of initiatives that will address the needs of never-married, self-represented litigants and focus on services to help them resolve any or all issues concerning parenting…
August 1, 2019
Longtime City of Clarksville Municipal Court Judge Charles W. Smith was named the 2019 recipient of the Sharon G. Lee Award of Excellence at the most recent meeting of the Tennessee Municipal Court Judges Conference.The award, named in honor of Tennessee Supreme Court Justice and former…
July 25, 2019
For more than 20 years, the Davidson County Drug Court Residential Treatment Program has been a statewide and national leader in the effort to reduce recidivism, lower costs, and improve the lives of non-violent offenders with chemical dependencies.Founded in 1997 by 20th Judicial District Criminal…
July 24, 2019
Judge Carma Dennis McGee was publicly sworn in as a member of one of Tennessee’s highest courts Friday in Savannah at an investiture. Judge McGee, a former 24th Judicial District chancellor, was appointed to the Court of Appeals by Governor Bill Lee to fill the seat of former Judge Brandon…
July 22, 2019
In an opinion released today, the Tennessee Supreme Court held that a trial court should not have considered the constitutionality of the Public Safety Act prior to entering two defendants’ guilty pleas.The defendants, A.B. Price, Jr., and Victor Sims, were charged with crimes in separate cases,…
July 22, 2019
The Tennessee Supreme Court has reversed an award of summary judgment and sent a contract dispute back to the trial court based on factual disputes about the parties’ intent to substitute a new contract for an existing one. A development company had contracted with a Nashville architect firm,…
July 15, 2019
Life did not start out easily for Judge Don Elledge. Born into a housing project built for the economically deprived during the New Deal era in Charleston, West Virginia, Judge Elledge’s living conditions took a turn for the worse after he moved to DeKalb County in Tennessee just before he started…
July 11, 2019
The Advisory Task Force on Composition of Judicial Districts will hold a public hearing in Memphis on Monday, July 15 to receive comments from those interested in sharing their thoughts on judicial districts in Tennessee. The public hearing will be held from 1 – 5 p.m. CDT at the University…
July 9, 2019
While the criminal justice side of the opioid epidemic has received significant attention, the civil legal issues it has caused have quietly smoldered into a raging inferno, overwhelming legal aid providers, families, social service providers, and courts. The Legal Services Corporation, which funds…
July 8, 2019
Tennessee Governor Bill Lee today appointed Wesley Bray of Putnam County as the criminal court judge to the 13th Judicial District to fill the vacancy created by the retirement of Judge David. A Patterson. The 13th Judicial District covers Clay, Cumberland, DeKalb, Overton, Pickett, Putnam, and…