Beginning this Friday, new or returning Tennessee residents with a driver license from California, Connecticut, Illinois, Kentucky, Nevada, Oklahoma, Vermont or West Virginia must present a Motor Vehicle Record (MVR) from their previous state when applying for a drivers license. According to The Tennessee Tribune, all other states, including Tennessee, participate in the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators’ State-to-State (S2S) Verification Service, which allows participating states to electronically access the complete Driver History Record of anyone applying for a driver license. Individuals moving from one of those 41 states do not need to obtain an MVR to qualify for a Tennessee driver's license. For more information on the required documents, visit the state's Department of Safety & Homeland Security website.

The TBA Young Lawyers Division's Mock Trial Committee is seeking sitting judges and attorneys to serve as volunteers at the 2025 Tennessee State High School Mock Trial Competition, which will take place March 21-22 in Nashville. The 2025 case material was released in December and district mock trial competitions will take place in February. Teams will argue the civil case of Lee Jasper v. Reece Witherfork, which takes place at a rodeo. Teams prevailing at the district level will advance to the state competition. The problem, rules and other competition information can be found on the TBA website. Those interested in helping at the state competition should indicate availability on this form. This year also marks the inaugural Artist in the Courtroom Competition, which invites student artists to interpret mock trial courtroom scenes during the district competition. The first, second and third place entries will be announced at the state competition award ceremony. The top student artist will join the state championship team in representing Tennessee at the National High School Mock Trial Championship in Phoenix, Arizona, on May 8-10.

Apple has agreed to pay $95 million in cash to settle a proposed class-action lawsuit claiming its voice-activated Siri assistant violated users' privacy, Reuters reports. A preliminary settlement was filed Tuesday in a California federal court and requires approval from U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White. Mobile device owners alleged that Apple routinely recorded their private conversations after unintentionally activating Siri, and then disclosed the conversations to third parties, including advertisers. The class period runs from 2014 to 2024, starting when Siri incorporated the "Hey, Siri" feature, which allegedly led to the unauthorized recordings. Class members, estimated to number in the tens of millions, may receive up to $20 per Siri-enabled device, such as iPhones and Apple Watches. Apple denied wrongdoing in agreeing to settle.

The Memphis Bar Association (MBA) hosted a virtual panel of city officials and local leaders to discuss findings from the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) report on the Memphis Police Department, Action 5 News reports. The panel included former police director Toney Armstrong, judicial commissioner Zayid Saleem, and veteran attorneys Damon Griffin and Deborah Godwin. The discussion addressed the DOJ’s 72-page report, which found that Memphis police used unconstitutional practices. Last month, the city of Memphis declined to enter into a consent decree with the DOJ.

The nonprofit Beacon Center of Tennessee has filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of those who have paid Metro Nashville's stormwater capacity fee. The suit, filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee, centers on a fee established in 2023, which charges $0.71 per square foot of "post-development impervious surface project area" exceeding 800 square feet. This includes surfaces like paved concrete, asphalt or roofs, through which water cannot penetrate or penetrates with difficulty. The fee is in addition to other stormwater user fees, and is assessed only against those who seek permits to perform development work. The suit argues the fee is unconstitutional and seeks full refunds for anyone who paid the fees. Read more in The Tennessean.

Hundreds of Clarksville area high school students recently had the chance to watch the Tennessee Supreme Court in action at Austin Peay State University (APSU) through the Supreme Court Advancing Legal Education for Students (SCALES) program. A nationally recognized model for judicial outreach, SCALES brings court cases to college campuses, where participants hear oral arguments and meet with attorneys and justices to ask questions about the legal process. According to Main Street Clarksville, cases are selected based on their relevance and interest to students and typically include both civil and criminal proceedings. “We think this is important because so many students today don’t get the civics education that they used to, and there are particularly few ways to learn about the judiciary,” said Tennessee Supreme Court Justice Jeff Bivins.

Memphis ended 2024 with significantly fewer homicides than the previous year. According to the Daily Memphian, 297 people were killed in Memphis last year, a 25% decrease from 2023, when 398 people were killed. Most of the homicides, which also included justifiable killings and instances of vehicular manslaughter, were murders. Last year also marked the lowest number of homicides in the city since 2019, when there were 224. A spokesperson for the Memphis Police Department (MPD) told the paper that a sharper focus on gangs, the hiring of more homicide investigators and the creation of a fugitive task force aimed at arresting those with active warrants helped reduce the homicide count. "While we are encouraged by the reduction in the homicide rate in 2024, we still have work to do in 2025," the department said in an email response.

Gov. Bill Lee last month pardoned 43 individuals who had served their sentences and been out of prison for at least five years. Lee said the individuals had demonstrated "exemplary citizenship" since their release. Among the group were seven individuals represented by Nashville criminal defense lawyer Ben Raybin with Raybin & Weissman PC. According to an email sent by Ben’s father David Raybin, this accomplishment marks the “most pardons any lawyer has ever acquired in a single year, except of course Gov. Ray Blanton's legal counsel, who took a cut of the bribes in the 1975 clemency-for-cash scandal.” According to the elder Raybin, less than 10% of applicants get pardons, making Ben’s work extraordinary. He also notes that the individuals now should be able to get their rights restored, and in most cases, a full expungement of their criminal record.

President Joe Biden today presented the nation’s highest award for valor by a public safety officer to five Metro Nashville police officers for their actions during the 2023 shooting at The Covenant School. Sergeant Jeffrey Mathes, Officer Rex Englebert, and detectives Ryan Cagle, Michael Collazo and Zachary Plese received the Medal of Valor during a ceremony at the White House. On March 27, 2023, law enforcement arrived at the school following reports of an active shooting. The five officers entered the building, cleared classrooms and "ran toward the sound of gunfire where they encountered the shooter," Tennessee Lookout reports. Nominees for the award are recommended by the U.S. attorney general and the Medal of Valor Review Board.

Shelby County Juvenile Court Judge Tarik Sugarmon has filed two lawsuits against Shelby County Sheriff Floyd Bonner Jr. to force the sheriff’s office to continue operating the youth detention center and transport youth to court hearings. The suits, filed in Shelby County Chancery Court on Dec. 23 and Dec. 31, 2024, are the latest developments in a yearlong debate about management of the detention center, the Daily Memphian reports. Sugarmon argues that Bonner should continue all operations related to the detention facility through the end of the fiscal year in June. On Dec. 30, Bonner sent Sugarmon a “notice of termination and relinquishment” of the center to the Juvenile Court effective Dec. 31, at 11:59 p.m. CST. On Dec. 31, Chancellor James R. Newsom III issued an order requiring Bonner to maintain the Youth Justice and Education Center’s operations until the matters can be argued in court, but he did not require continued transportation of juveniles to court, according to the Commercial Appeal.