Tennessee Rep. Bruce Griffey, R-Paris, has filed legislation just ahead of next year’s legislative session that would eliminate K-12 education funding for undocumented immigrants, WATE reports. The legislation would challenge a 1982 landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Plyler v. Doe, which held that students cannot be denied a free public education due to their immigration status. Griffey says his proposal is not anti-immigrant but an effort to return power over funding decisions to the states.

Gerald L. Melton, public defender for the 16th Judicial District, has officially announced his candidacy for re-election, the Murfreesboro Post reports. He will be a candidate in the Republican primary in May 2022. The 16th Judicial District serves Rutherford and Cannon counties. Melton, a graduate of the University of Tennessee College of Law, maintains an active personal caseload and supervises the work of 13 assistant public defenders. He is a past member of the TBA House of Delegates and Board of Governors, the Tennessee Sentencing Commission and then Gov. Bill Haslam’s Sentencing and Recidivism Commission. He also has served as president of the District Public Defender's Conference on two separate occasions.

Gov. Bill Lee today requested a federal disaster declaration for nine counties affected by this weekend’s storms, which also impacted Arkansas, Illinois and Kentucky. The request asks for assistance with debris removal and emergency protective measures in Cheatham, Decatur, Dickson, Dyer, Gibson, Lake, Obion, Stewart and Weakley counties. The governor said a request for individual assistance likely will be made after officials are able to fully assess damage. Tornadoes and other severe storms Friday and Saturday resulted in fatalities, damaged structures in more than 20 counties, and disrupted power and utility operations, according to the Tennessean. The paper also reported today that at least 11 tornadoes touched down in Middle Tennessee. The Tennessee Emergency Management Agency (TEMA) is providing information for those who would like to help as well as for those in need of assistance.

Students from 15 high schools recently gathered in Columbia to hear two live court cases pending before the Tennessee Supreme Court as part of the SCALES project, which allows students to experience a live proceeding of the state’s highest court. It was the first in-person program since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Judges and lawyers participating in the program included Judge Ryan Durham, Judge Jake Hubbell, Judge Russ Parkes, Maury County Clerk & Master Larry Roe, David Bates, Christian Cahill, Amanda Castillo, Julie Heffington, Patricia A. Jones, Ed Lancaster, Bevin Lyle, Dawn Moore, Patty Sellars, Beth Oschack Tarter and Jason Whatley. The Maury County Bar Association, led by current President Patrick M. Carter, hosted a reception the evening before the event for the group. See photos from the event or watch the livestream of the two cases argued, available here and here.

Jim Todd, a defense attorney and former prosecutor, announced his campaign for Davidson County General Sessions Judge yesterday. He is seeking the Division VI seat. Todd is a practicing attorney with nearly 30 years of courtroom experience. He served as a Davidson County prosecutor for 13 years, a defense attorney for 16 years and an environmental court magistrate for 10 years. He has served on the Juvenile Justice Reform Commission, where he was chair of the Juvenile Delinquency Reform Subcommittee, and was a member of the TBA’s Leadership Law Class of 2009. He earned his law degree from the University of Memphis Cecil C. Humphreys School of Law.

Shelby County attorney Charles Robert Perkins died in Nashville on Dec. 4. He was 85. Perkins worked as an attorney and government official for more than 60 years in Memphis and Shelby County. Graduating in 1967, he was a member of the first and charter law school class from Memphis State. He was admitted to practice before the Tennessee Supreme Court, U.S. District Court and U.S. Supreme Court. His clients included major corporate businesses, a major bank, the City of Memphis, Town of Arlington and Memphis Light, Gas and Water. Visitation will be Dec. 16 at 12:30 p.m. CST with the funeral following at 2 p.m., all at Forest Hill Baptist Church, 3645 Forest Hill Irene Rd., Germantown 38138. Burial will be at West Tennessee Veterans Cemetery. In lieu of flowers donations may be made to Union University, Attn: Advancement Office, 1050 Union University Dr., Jackson, TN 38305.

Tennessee Attorney General Herbert H. Slatery III has notified Davidson County District Attorney Glenn Funk that the state will not appeal a recent modification to the sentence for Abu-Ali Abdur’Rahman. In 2019, Funk obtained an agreed order modifying Abdur’Rahman’s death sentence to life imprisonment. The attorney general challenged the action and the Court of Criminal Appeals vacated the order and remanded the case for further proceedings. Funk obtained a new order from the trial court and although Slatery maintains it too violates the law, his office made the decision not to appeal further. Slatery, however, said in his letter that the decision should not be interpreted as “tacit approval of the order obtained."

Tennessee Attorney General Herbert H. Slatery III joined a bipartisan coalition of 36 attorneys general in urging the American Law Institute to reject proposals that would weaken the ability of states to prosecute human and sex trafficking, sexual assault, abuse and exploitation crimes. The group writes that changes being considered to Section 213 of the Model Penal Code (MPC) would jeopardize the safety of victims and restrict the ability of law enforcement to protect the general public from recidivist behavior. Read more about the proposed changes in this release from the attorney general’s office.

U.S. District Judge Waverly D. Crenshaw issued a 54-page ruling today blocking the state from preventing schools from issuing mask mandates or stripping local health and school officials of their ability to set COVID-19 quarantine policies, the Tennessean reports. The ruling came in a case filed by the parents of students with disabilities. Crenshaw found that it was in the "public’s interest to slow the spread of COVID-19 in Tennessee’s schools” and that the "Defendants have proffered absolutely nothing to suggest that any harm would come from allowing individual school districts to determine what is best for their schools ...” The ruling on the merits of the case comes after Crenshaw temporarily blocked enforcement of the order in October.

A U.S. Senate panel this week advanced a bipartisan bill that would overhaul the federal judiciary's PACER electronic court record system and make the downloading of filings free for the public, Courthouse News reports. The bill now goes to the full U.S. Senate for consideration. The judiciary, which previously estimated it received $142 million in PACER fees last year, says it remains "concerned" about how the service will be paid for under the legislation. Users now pay $0.10 per page with a cap of $3 per document (with transcripts excluded). Advocacy groups have long called for free use of the database.