Gov. Bill Lee has appointed Pele Godkin as a new judge on the Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board, the Tennessee Bureau of Workers’ Compensation announced today. Godkin is a former workers’ compensation specialist in the Nashville and Murfreesboro offices of what was then the Division of Workers’ Compensation. In 2008, she joined the law firm of Cornelius & Collins and later because a partner. Godkin is a Rule 31 Listed General Civil Mediator and has more than a decade of experience in workers’ compensation. The board will hold an official swearing-in ceremony later this month.

The Legal Aid Society and the Rutherford & Cannon County Bar Association will hold two free legal clinics this month at Greenhouse Ministries, 309 S. Spring St., Murfreesboro 37130. Clinics will be held from 3 to 5 p.m. on Jan. 9 and Jan. 23. No appointments are necessary. Contact Kendra Cheek at 615-780-7131 with any questions.

The Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee & the Cumberlands will hold a free legal clinic from 4 to 6 p.m. Wednesday at the Nashville Public Library, 615 Church St., Nashville 37219. The clinic will address issues such as conservatorships, wills and estates, homeownership, landlord problems, family problems, debt, employment issues and government benefits. For more information or to volunteer contact Kendra Cheek at 615-780-7131.

This year’s Construction Law Forum is focused on the growing trend of resolving commercial construction disputes via binding arbitration. The seminar — set for Jan. 24 in Nashville — will cover all aspects of commercial arbitration from A to Z and is for lawyers who are new to this field of law as well as those who are experienced in arbitration. The program will provide 6.25 CLE hours, including one hour of ethics credit.

Belmont University College of Law will soon add a new opportunity for a select group of students when Professor Kristi Wilcox Arth begins a spring semester legal fiction writing workshop. An extracurricular activity, the group of up to eight students will work on short stories with legal themes throughout the semester with the goal of submitting final versions to the American Bar Association's legal fiction competition in June. Along the way, students will attend an opening lecture on the short story form, engage in peer review, and turn in a draft for faculty review. Arth was the winner of the Tennessee Bar Journal's Fiction Contest in 2017. She teaches Legal Information and Communication I & II at Belmont. Before she joined the school's faculty, she was a partner with Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP.

A longtime criminal justice advocate and managing editor of Prison Legal News was arrested in Nashville over the weekend on charges of attempted burglary, evidence tampering and possession of burglary tools. Police say Alex Friedmann entered a new downtown detention center on false pretenses several times, and during the final visit was caught on video spray painting around a control room door. The facility has yet to open and is in its final stages of construction, the Tennessean reports.

Rep. Phil Roe, a Republican from Jonesborough, announced Friday he will retire from the U.S. House of Representatives at the end of the current Congress, Chattanoogan.com reports. Roe, a retired OB-GYN, also served as mayor of Johnson City before running for Congress. He is currently serving his sixth term in the House. During his time in Congress, Roe has focused on veterans’ issues — serving as chair and now the top Republican on the Veterans’ Affairs Committee — and has been an outspoken critic of the Affordable Care Act. CNN has more on his career.

Johnson City lawyer Lee Davis died Friday following complications from a bone marrow disease. Davis, 77, earned his law degree from Vanderbilt University in 1967 and later became a certified public accountant. After working with a “Big 8” accounting firm and a real estate developer, Davis began practicing law in Mountain City. In 1978, he moved his practice to Johnson City, focusing on estate planning and probate, real estate, and business and tax matters. He retired from Hunter, Smith & Davis in 2014. Davis was a member of the Tri-Cities Estate Planning Council as well as the National Association of Estate Planners and Councils, serving as president of both organizations. No funeral services will be held. Memorial donations may be made to the Johnson City Central Church of Christ, Rotary Foundation or MDS Foundation Inc.

With the holidays and all you may not have had time to read our December issue, but you still can. Did you know hemp and marijuana smell exactly the same, which is causing some confusion and hardship when it comes to detecting the illegal substance using "plain smell." Authors Cynthia Sherwood, Davis Griffin and Alex Mills explain. Watch for them in an upcoming episode of SideBar, one of the TBA's fun new podcasts. This TBJ also has an excellent primer by Billy Leslie on how to keep your law license up to date and in good standing. By the time you read this, Katie Edge will have cleared out her desk and headed for Texas — retiring from the practice of law to a strenuous full-time job as grandmother to triplets. Read her closing comments, as well as our rebuttal.

Please tell us that you have not already given up on your New Year’s resolution. It's only been a week! But hey, studies show that about 41% of people make New Year’s resolutions, and by Jan. 7 -- WHICH HAS ALREADY HAPPENED -- 72% have kept their resolution (here's to you, 28 percenters who have given up!). By the end of the year, only 8% will have kept their resolutions. But what we really want to talk about is the cool number that is this year -- 2020. And you know what that means: Hindsight is gonna be big this year.