TBA Law Blog


Posted by: Kate Prince on Jun 15, 2021

A new report from the U.S. Sentencing Commission shows that federal courts in Tennessee granted 18% of the compassionate release requests they received from federal prisoners seeking early release in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Tennessean reports. Most of the 336 motions for compassionate release were filed by the defendants themselves and only 61 were granted. Of the three districts in the state, Middle Tennessee released 28% of those who petitioned the court, East Tennessee released 16.6% and West Tennessee released 7.7%. Another report from the Vera Institute of Justice shows that incarceration rates in the state’s jails and prisons were down 18% in mid-2020 from where they were in late 2019. That figure dropped another 2% by spring of this year, signaling a slowing downward trend.