Loring Justice (“Plaintiff”), individually and as next friend of N.N./N.J. (“the Child”) sued Vey Michael Nordquist, Ph.D. (“Defendant”) in the Circuit Court for Knox County (“the Trial Court”) over Defendant’s actions in connection with paternity litigation to which Plaintiff was a party. Defendant filed a motion to dismiss, but never filed a responsive pleading to the original complaint. The Trial Court granted Defendant’s motion to dismiss. Before time for appeal expired, Plaintiff filed an amended complaint as he was entitled to do under Tenn. R. Civ. P. 15.01 given that Defendant never filed a responsive pleading to the original complaint. However, the Trial Court never ruled on Plaintiff’s amended complaint. The order appealed from is not a final judgment, meaning we lack subject matter jurisdiction to hear this appeal. Therefore, we dismiss this appeal.

James H., II (“Father”) appeals the termination of his parental rights to the minor child, James H., III (“the Child”). In April 2017, Ashley P. (“Mother”) and Trinity P. (“Stepfather”) filed a petition to terminate Father’s parental rights in the Weakley County Chancery Court (“Trial Court”). Following a trial, the Trial Court terminated Father’s parental rights on two grounds of abandonment due to Father’s willful failure to visit the Child and willful failure to support the Child prior to Father’s incarceration. The Trial Court further found that termination of Father’s parental rights was in the Child’s best interest. Discerning no error, we affirm.

Week of June 21, 2021 - June 25, 2021

A Johnson County jury convicted the defendant, Mathew Anthony Perry, of unlawful possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, and the trial court imposed a sentence of fifteen years’ confinement. On appeal, the defendant argues the trial court erred in sentencing him as a Range II offender, asserting the State’s notice of enhanced punishment was deficient. The defendant also argues the trial court erred in failing to grant a mistrial based upon alleged improper testimony. After reviewing the record and considering the applicable law, we affirm the judgment of the trial court. However, we remand the matter for the sole purpose of ensuring that judgment forms were entered for each count of the indictment.

The petitioner, Kristin M. Myers, appeals the denial of her post-conviction petition, arguing the post-conviction court erred in finding she received the effective assistance of counsel at trial. After our review of the record, briefs, and applicable law, we affirm the denial of the petition.

The trial court revoked the community corrections sentence of the defendant, Jason Burchfield, and ordered him to serve the remainder of his sentence in confinement. On appeal, the defendant contends that, while he did violate the terms and conditions of his alternative sentence, the trial court’s full revocation of his sentence was excessive and constituted an abuse of discretion. After a thorough review of the record, the applicable law, and the briefs of the parties, we affirm the judgment of the trial court.

This is the second appeal of this action concerning the enforceability of a licensing ordinance applicable to sexually oriented businesses in the City of Knoxville. The trial court found the ordinance lawful upon remand from this court and granted summary judgment in favor of the City. We affirm.

KETHLEDGE, Circuit Judge. Among the several requirements for the rule of law is that the law be reasonably certain. Certainty in the law is what allows citizens to plan their actions knowing that neither the state nor other individuals will interfere with them. That same certainty is what constrains government officials to exercise their coercive powers according to rules—rather than according to their own will, which is what the Founding generation called arbitrary action, or a “government . . . of men.” John Adams, “The Constitution of Massachusetts,” in The Political Writings of John Adams 98 (George A. Peek, Jr. ed. 1954). And when those rules take statutory form, the courts must apply them, regardless of whether a court likes the results of that application in a particular case. Otherwise all statutory law becomes discretionary, and the law itself is rendered uncertain.

The district court’s order denying Smith’s motion for a stay is reversed, and the case is remanded with instructions for the bankruptcy court to dismiss Smith’s most recent Chapter 13 case. The bankruptcy court need not take any action to restore the status quo prior to its June 2019 reinstatement of Smith’s case.

This case involves a petition to terminate parental rights. The petition was filed by the children’s biological father and stepmother against the biological mother. The trial court terminated the mother’s rights, finding that the mother abandoned the children under Tennessee Code Annotated section 36-1-113(g)(1) and -102(1)(A)(iv) and that termination was in the best interest of the children. We affirm the trial court’s decision and remand.

JULIA SMITH GIBBONS, Circuit Judge. Alva Tobias-Chaves and her daughter Ana Ramos-Tobias challenge the jurisdiction of the Immigration Court in Louisville, Kentucky, that denied their request for asylum in the United States. Although there is little question that the Immigration Court in Memphis, Tennessee, violated procedural rules in transferring the proceeding to the newly opened Immigration Court in Louisville sua sponte, that violation was a procedural question relating to venue, not jurisdiction to hear the case. In order to successfully challenge a procedural error such as an improper change of venue, a petitioner must show prejudice. Tobias-Chaves failed to do so. Accordingly, we affirm the Board of Immigration Appeals.