Russ Overbey celebrated his 40th anniversary with Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee and the Cumberlands (LASMTC) with a celebration at the Tennessee Justice Center yesterday. Since 1974, Overbey has worked to provide access to justice for those who have nowhere else to turn. See photos of the event on the LASMTC Facebook page.

The Nashville Business Journal ranked the largest litigation judgments awarded in Nashville during the past year (July 2013- June 2014). First Bank’s May 2014 suit against Gold Building LLC/Feras Abualrob tops the list with a judgment of $1.4 million.

Thursday is the last day for registered voters to cast their ballots early in the Nov. 4 general election. Tennessee voters will be asked to consider four new constitutional amendments on the ballot, including Amendment 2, which will change the way appellate judges are appointed and retained in the state. The Tennessee Bar Association has developed this Q&A page to help voters understand the issues at stake. 

Leitner, Williams, Dooley & Napolitan recently moved to the Tallan Financial Center in downtown Chattanooga after nearly 50 years in the Pioneer Building. The new office was designed to facilitate effective mediation, including free parking and a state-of-the-art mediation center. The Hamilton County Herald has more.

Shelby County Juvenile Court handed down its justice and rehabilitation plans yesterday for the 10 juveniles and one adult charged in the videotaped attack at a Memphis Kroger, the Commercial Appeal reports. The two teenagers who pleaded or were found guilty of aggravated assault were removed from their homes and placed in the custody of the Department of Children’s Services. Eight others who pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of aggravated riot were ordered to complete 40 hours of community service by August, write a letter of apology to the victims and stay in school and out of trouble. An 11th defendant is a 19-year-old adult whose case is being presented to a grand jury. 

The Rutherford County District Attorney's office has chosen veteran Davidson County prosecutor Sarah Davis to fill the space left by former Assistant District Attorney Laural Hemenway who was fired following an altercation with Judge Keith Siskin in which she accused him of sexism during a rape trial, the Daily News Journal reports. Davis was one of five prosecutors fired just one day after Davidson County DA Glenn Funk took office.

John Jay Hooker is raising concerns that the method for counting votes does not pass constitutional muster, the Tennessean reports. The longstanding interpretation of the state constitution has been that to be ratified, proposed amendments must receive a majority of the number of votes cast in the governor’s race. Hooker, who is one of the leading opponents of efforts to write the state’s plan for merit selection of appeals judges into the Tennessee Constitution, argued in a letter to Republican Gov. Bill Haslam on Tuesday that only voters who both cast actual ballots in the governor’s race and vote on the amendment should have their votes counted on the amendments.

The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati has upheld a district court ruling involving a local Girl Scouts council’s pension dispute with its parent organization, the Nashville Post reports. In 2012, the Girl Scouts of Middle Tennessee (GSMT) sued Girl Scouts of America after the national group’s pension plan went from a 2007 surplus of $150 million to a $340 million deficit five years later. GSMT asked a district court to force the national organization to spin off pension assets, alleging breaches of fiduciary duty and financial mismanagement. It also asked the court to force the national group to allow it to operate its own plan. The district court dismissed the claim and, last week, the appeals court upheld the dismissal. The three-judge panel said allowing the spin-off would be tantamount to creating a new law.

Opinion pieces in the New York Times and Mother Jones are blaming Citizens United for the influx of outside money into judicial races and are raising questions about the impact, the ABA Journal reports. The articles assert that outside money is pouring into judicial elections since the U.S. Supreme Court in 2010 struck down a ban on corporate campaign spending on independent ads before an election. Their question: Are courts for sale? This year, overall spending in judicial races is rising in many of the 38 states that hold judicial elections, according to Bert Brandenburg, executive director of Justice at Stake.

The mood inside law school admission offices may be brightening, the Wall Street Journal Law Blog reports. About 46 percent of American Bar Association-accredited law schools expect to see an increase in applications for the 2015-2016 cycle, according to Kaplan Test Prep’s latest annual survey of admissions officers. A year ago, only 34 percent of schools polled by Kaplan predicted a larger pool of applications for the year ahead. Additionally, 47 percent of law schools said their incoming class for the 2014-2015 academic year is smaller than last year’s, compared to 54 percent of schools that reported a decline last year.