Columbia attorney Charles “Chaz” Molder joined his longtime mentor Dalton Mounger to form Mounger & Molder on Jan. 1. Molder, who ran an unsuccessful bid to become the 22nd Judicial District Attorney in August, attended schools with Mounger’s youngest daughter, Quinn, from kindergarten until they both graduated from University of Tennessee in 2005. The transition to working with Mounger was natural, Molder said, and gave him a chance to work with an old friend. “We just want to build a firm that offers a broad range of legal services to the community, (that) provides excellent service,” Mounger said. “I felt lucky to have a lawyer like Chaz join me — good man, good lawyer.” The Columbia Daily Herald has more.

Patterson Intellectual Property Law today announced its partnership with Project Music, a music and technology business accelerator program. Developed in partnership with the Nashville Entrepreneur Center and the Country Music Association, Project Music guides eight tech start-up companies through an intensive 14-week business development and music business boot camp. All eight start-ups in the program are building businesses to work with the music industry.

Arvin H. Reingold received a public censure on Jan. 13 for failing to advise his client that her case against her insurance company had been dismissed on the defendant’s motion for summary judgment. As a result, the client lost her right to appeal. View the BPR notice.

Columbia will soon welcome the new general practice law firm of Tisher, Wolaver, Free, Carter and Lynn. The new firm is being co-founded by Patrick M. Carter -- a former member of the TBA Board of Governors and a graduate of the TBA Leadership Law Program -- Mark Free, Cara Lynn, Maury County Board of Education lawyer Jake Wolaver and Columbia city attorney Tim Tisher. Offices will open Feb. 1 at 809 South Main Street in Columbia. 

The Tennessee Bar Association will be closed Monday for the  Martin Luther King Jr. national holiday. View a full slate of activities scheduled across the state over the next several days. 

When Ryan Park ended his clerkship with Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg this past summer, he took on another challenging role as a stay-at-home dad. In an article for The Atlantic, Park describes how he benefited from Bader’s advice on juggling career and child care. “My deepest fear is that, decades from now, I will look back at the heart of my life and realize I made the wrong choices in favor of work,” Park writes.

Tennesseans in Congress are not supporting President Barack Obama’s plan to make a version of the Tennessee Promise scholarship program available nationwide, Knoxnews reports. Obama visited Pellissippi State Community College last week to talk about his plan. “The president was right to hold up Gov. Haslam’s Tennessee Promise plan as an effective way to prioritize higher education,” said U.S. Rep. Phil Roe, R-Johnson City, “But a better way to expand access to college would be to encourage states to follow Tennessee’s example and find state-based solutions that work for their citizens."

Dallas-based entertainment law firm Shackelford, Zumwalt & Hayes has added three attorneys to the firm’s Nashville office, which opened in 2010. Jay Bowen, Will Parsons and Lauren Kilgore will head the firm's litigation practice in Nashville, which previously specialized in entertainment business and commercial law, according to a news release. The firm will now be known as Shackelford, Bowen, Zumwalt & Hayes. It is part of Shackelford, Melton, McKinley & Norton. The Nashville Busines Journal has more.

Apple, Google and two other Silicon Valley companies have agreed to pay $415 million in a second attempt to resolve a class-action lawsuit alleging they formed an illegal cartel to prevent their workers from leaving for better-paying jobs. The settlement filed yesterday in a San Jose federal court revises a $324.5 million agreement that U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh rejected as inadequate five months ago. Koh indicated that she believed the roughly 64,000 workers in the case should be paid at least $380 million, including attorney fees. The lawsuit, filed in 2011, sought $3 billion in damages that could have been tripled under U.S. antitrust law. Attorneys for the workers decided to settle after concluding it would have been difficult to prove the alleged conspiracy to a jury. WRCB has more from the Associated Press.

Memphis attorney and city council member Jim Strickland yesterday announced his mayoral candidacy, challenging incumbent AC Wharton who has held the office sine 2009. WREG notes that Memphis has not elected a white mayor since Willie Herenton beat Dick Hackett in 1991 by 146 votes. Strickland said he is not concerned about race being an issue. Voters will make their choice Oct. 8.