Bridgestone Corp. has agreed to plead guilty and pay a $425 million criminal fine in the Justice Department’s ongoing probe into price fixing and bid rigging. Twenty-six companies including Tokyo-based Bridgestone have pleaded guilty or agreed to plead guilty and pay more than $2 billion in criminal fines. Bridgestone has its North American headquarters in Nashville and several area manufacturing facilities. The Tennessean has more.

Butler Snow announced it was expanding into Georgia with four new attorneys in Atlanta and Macon and five new attorneys in Denver. The Mississippi-based firm has offices in Memphis and Nashville, and recently announced its expansion into New York with two attorneys. The Memphis Business Journal notes that the additions will boost the firm’s Public Finance, Tax Incentives and Credit Markets practice groups.

Douglas T. Jenkins of Rogersville has filed a petition to run for the office of Chancellor in the Third Judicial District, which includes Greene, Hamblen, Hancock and Hawkins counties. The Greeneville Sun has more on election filings (subscription required).

The Chattanooga Bar Association Young Lawyers Division will host its annual Tennessee High School Mock Trial Competition in Chattanooga Feb. 19-21. The YLD is asking for volunteer judges and jurors from the bar. If you are interested in volunteering on any or all of the dates, please contact Andrew Godbold. Learn more at the Hamilton County Herald.

Clark & Washington in Chattanooga has become one of only two Pillar Law Firm partners with Legal Aid of East Tennessee. Following a model developed by the Tennessee Supreme Court and its Access to Justice Commission, Pillar Law Firms select a particular area of law on which to focus their pro bono efforts and then receive steady referrals from Legal Aid in that area. Clark & Washington is accepting bankruptcy cases in which the client has significant debt and is in danger of losing his or her home, driver’s license, or having his or her wages garnished. The Hamilton County Herald has the story.

The Senate today approved a bill 26-7 that would lift gun bans in local parks, despite opposition from Nashville Mayor Karl Dean and other city leaders, the Tennessean reports. Senate Bill 1496 — sponsored by Sen. Stacey Campfield, R-Knoxville — would undo a 2009 law that allows city councils and county commissions to decide for themselves whether to permit guns in their parks. Dean has lobbied lawmakers to reject the bill, arguing that local governments should continue to decide how to police their own parks. Gov. Bill Haslam, a former mayor of Knoxville, also has said he opposes the measure.

Sen. Brian Kelsey, R-Germantown, and State Rep. Sheila Butt, R-Columbia, have filed Senate Joint Resolution 481 designating Feb. 6 as “State Constitution Day” in Tennessee, the Columbia Daily Herald reports. That date recognizes the 218th birthday of the adoption of the state’s first Constitution by delegates at a convention held for that purpose in Knoxville before the birth of the Volunteer State. The resolution declares that during the annual recognition of Constitution Day the document will be read aloud in both the House of Representatives and the Senate by any legislators desiring to participate.

In an opinion piece last week for the Tennessean, Atlanta attorney Thurbert Baker criticizes lawsuit lending practices that prey on vulnerable consumers and evade regulation in many states. “’Crash cash’ offers are attractive to people who have few options and don’t have time to wait for the legal system,” he writes. But in addition to harming consumers, lawsuit lending poses a danger to our legal system, he contends. Baker urges Tennessee lawmakers to pass legislation such as SB 1360 by Sen. Jack Johnson, R-Franklin, and HB 1242 by Rep. Curtis Johnson, R-Clarksville, which creates a regulatory framework for lawsuit loans and caps interest rates.

A bill filed last week by Sen. Ken Yager, R-Harriman, would require Tennessee to use an electric chair for executions if the drugs needed to carry out lethal injections are unavailable, or if a court strikes down the lethal injection option, Knoxnews reports. Currently, the state is scheduled to execute 10 death row inmates between April 2014 and November 2015.

Sen. Jim Tracy, R-Shelbyville, head of the Senate Transportation Committee, moved yesterday to block state funding for the Amp, Nashville’s proposed bus rapid-transit system. The Nashville Business Journal reports that Tracy's plan would add language to an appropriations bill for the Tennessee Department of Transportation preventing any spending on a bus rapid transit service that uses a portion of a state highway. Officials have said they could still fund the $174 million Amp without help from the state, however, they have not detailed how.