 |
| Monday, December 21, 2009 |
|
| |
| |
Commission recommends 3 to fill 30th District vacancy
The Judicial Nominating Commission on Saturday recommended three candidates to Gov. Phil Bredesen to fill the vacancy in the 30th Judicial District created by the retirement of D'Army Bailey. Those selected at the Memphis meeting are: Venita Marie Martin of Glanker Brown PLLC in Memphis, JoeDae L. Jenkins, a Bartlett attorney, and Rhynette Northcross Hurd, a Collierville attorney.
|
TODAY'S OPINIONS
Click on the category of your choice to view summaries of today’s opinions from that court, or other body. A link at the end of each case summary will let you download the full opinion in PDF format. To search all opinions in the TBALink database or to obtain a text version of each opinion, go to our OpinionSearch page. If you have forgotten your password or need to obtain a password, you can look it up on TBALink at the TBA's Membership Central.
00 - TN Supreme Court
00 - TN Worker's Comp Appeals
00 - TN Supreme Court - Rules
02 - TN Court of Appeals
00 - TN Court of Criminal Appeals
00 - TN Attorney General Opinions
00 - Judicial Ethics Opinions
00 - Formal Ethics Opinions - BPR
You can obtain full-text versions of the opinions two ways. We recommend that you download the Opinions to your computer and then
open them from there. 1) Click the URL at end of each Opinion paragraph below. This should give you the option to
download the original document. If not, you may need to right-click on the URL to get the option to save the file
to your computer. 2) Do a key word search in the Search Link area of TBALink. This option will allow you to view
and save a plain-text version of the opinion.
|
|
|
|
|
|
DOROTHY KING, R.N. and PATRICIA BATTLE, R.N., ET AL. v. VIRGINIA BETTS, Commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities, in her individual capacity, ET AL.
Court: TCA
Attorneys:
William J. Haynes, Nashville, TN, for the Appellant, Patricia Battle, R.N.
Robert E. Cooper, Jr., Attorney General and Reporter, and Michael E. Moore, Solicitor General,
John W. Dalton, Senior Counsel, Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellees, Virginia Betts, Lynn
McDonald, Dr. Lindsey Douglas and Glynda Heinicke.
Judge: STAFFORD
This is a 42 U.S.C. SECTION 1983 claim based on alleged retaliation in violation of the First Amendment. Appellant claims that Appellees retaliated against her in her employment for speaking out against a hospital policy. Appellees assert the defense of qualified immunity. Appellant appeals from the trial court's decision to grant summary judgment and judgment on the pleadings to the Appellees. Finding that there are material issues of fact in dispute, we reverse the trial court's grant of summary
judgment. Further, we find that Appellant has stated a claim upon which relief may be granted and, therefore, reverse the trial court's decision to grant Appellees' motion for judgment on the pleadings. Affirmed in part, reversed in part and remanded.
http://www.tba2.org/tba_files/TCA/2009/battlep_122109.pdf
MICHAEL SOWELL v. ESTATE OF JAMES W. DAVIS
Court: TCA
Attorneys:
Scottie O. Wilkes, Memphis, Tennessee, for the Plaintiff/Appellant, Michael Sowell.
Kyle C. Atkins, Humboldt, Tennessee, for the Defendant/Appellee, Estate of James W. Davis.
Judge: KIRBY
This appeal involves Tennessee's savings statute. The plaintiff filed a tort lawsuit against the defendant. During the pendency of the action, the defendant died. The plaintiff did not file a motion to substitute the proper party for the deceased defendant, as required under T.R.C.P. 25.01. The lawsuit was not dismissed on that basis. The trial court allowed the plaintiff to take a voluntary nonsuit. The plaintiff re-filed the instant lawsuit within one year, making the same allegations as in the original action but naming the estate of the decedent as the defendant. The estate filed a motion to dismiss, arguing that the savings statute was inapplicable because the original lawsuit should have been dismissed pursuant to T.R.C.P. 5.01 for failure to substitute the proper party, and because the defendants in the original lawsuit and the re-filed lawsuit were not identical. The trial court granted the estate's motion to dismiss on both grounds. The plaintiff now appeals. We reverse, finding that the estate's argument that it is not an entity capable of being sued has been waived, and concluding that the trial court erred in determining that the savings statute was inapplicable.
http://www.tba2.org/tba_files/TCA/2009/sowellm_122109.pdf
|
|
 |
|
| TODAY'S NEWS |
|
Legal News
TBA Member Services
|
| Legal News |
| Legal impact of ash spill likely to be felt for years |
| No fewer than 14 lawsuits, some of them class actions, have been filed against the Tennessee Valley Authority by residents and business owners who claim to have been harmed by the December 2008 coal ash spill at the Kingston Fossil Plant. Court watchers expect the U.S. District Court in Knoxville to be swamped with lawsuits spawned by the case for years to come. |
Read more in the Knoxville News Sentinel
|
| Opinion: Uneven justice for battered wives |
| Two Tennessee women who killed their abusive husbands have ended up in dramatically different places. One served 67 days in a mental health facility after conviction and is now free. The other is on death row at Tennessee State Prison, soon to become the first woman executed by the state since Eve Martin was hanged in 1820. |
Read John Seigenthaler's column in the Tennessean
|
| Johnson is dead but battle for his body continues |
| Although last week Davidson County Chancellor Russell T. Perkins ordered Nashville's medical examiner to relinquish Cecil Johnson's body to his family no later than 4 p.m. Dec. 18,
the state Court of Appeals then ordered the medical examiner to hold on to Johnson's body until it had a chance to hear arguments in the case on Jan. 8. Before Johnson was executed Dec. 2, he filed papers expressing his wishes that the state be barred from performing an autopsy. |
Follow it in the Tennessean
|
| How 5 legal cases will affect music industry |
| Since launching its legal assault on Napster nearly a decade ago, the music industry has been struggling to determine how to survive and thrive in the digital world. A number of court cases this year looked at some of the questions perplexing the industry and will help shape what the future will look like. |
The Washington Post looks at the top 5 cases from 2009
|
| Chief Justice puts it on the line to celebrate mom's 90th |
| Justice may be blind, but do you really want someone swinging a sword toward your abdomen while blind-folded? It was OK with Chief Justice Janice Holder, who agreed to lie supine on a table and let her martial arts instructor, Patrick Wrenn, use a ceremonial sword to slice open a bell pepper on her midriff during a 90th birthday celebration for Holder's mother, Sylvia. |
The Memphis Flyer has the story and a video
|
| TBA Member Services |
| First Tennessee is TBA's preferred provider |
| First Tennessee has crafted a package of discounts to meet the specific needs of Tennessee Bar Association members. Find savings on merchant credit services, checking and savings, financial planning and more |
on the TBA Web site
|
| |
|
| |
Discontinue your TBA Today subscription? ... Surely not!
But if you must, visit the TBALink web site at:
http://www.tba2.org/tbatoday/unsub_tbatoday.php
Questions, comments: Email us at TBAToday@tnbar.org
About this publication: Today's News is a compilation of digests of news reports of interest to Tennessee lawyers compiled by TBA staff, links to digested press releases, and occasional stories about the TBA and other activities written by the TBA staff or members. Statements or opinions herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Tennessee Bar Association, its officers, board or staff.
© Copyright 2009 Tennessee Bar Association
|
|
|
