Tennessee Supreme Court Chief Justice Holly Kirby will be honored next month with the Tennessee Bar Association’s (TBA) prestigious Justice Frank F. Drowota III Award. The award will be presented at the Bench Bar Luncheon set for June 13 as part of the association’s Annual Convention in Memphis. TBA President Jim Barry said the association is honoring Kirby for her efforts spearheading an increase in the hourly rate of reimbursement for attorneys who accept appointed cases. Before this year, Tennessee’s court-appointed attorneys had not seen a rate increase in 27 years, while the costs of maintaining a legal practice have continued to rise, leaving fewer and fewer attorneys able to afford to take these types of cases. In October 2023, Kirby made the case for increasing compensation for attorneys representing the indigent and announced the Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) was requesting additional funding from the legislature. With the support of the TBA and others, lawmakers did approve a portion of that funding request. The TBA remains committed to working with the Supreme Court and other stakeholders to secure additional resources to fairly compensate lawyers who do this important work. The Drowota Award is given to a judge or judicial branch official who has demonstrated extraordinary devotion and dedication to the improvement of the law, the legal system and the administration of justice. Read more about Kirby's selection in the TBA's press release.

The Immigration Law Section will present its annual forum on May 31 in Nashville at Casa Azafran. This is one CLE you won't want to miss — the agenda is packed with speakers from government agencies, businesses and universities. Sessions include updates from U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) Nashville, U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Enforcement & Removal Operations, ICE Office of the Principal Legal Advisor (OPLA), and the USCIS Asylum Office, as well as information on the EB-5 Immigrant Investor Program and F-1 and J-1 programs. Please note that the morning sessions are unable to be recorded for distribution as on-demand videos due to government agency policy, so join your colleagues in-person to reap the full benefits of this program!

Henry Ford said customers could have any color so long as it’s black. At least you have two choices when it comes to core email, communication and office productivity applications. This comparison chart highlights the strengths and weaknesses of Google and Microsoft’s bundled, subscription offerings. Find this and more in the Opening a Firm section of TBA’s Law Practice Management Center.

If you have registered for Convention but not yet booked your hotel room, time is running out! The TBA hotel room block at the historic Peabody Hotel in Memphis will close next week on May 22. Book now for a special discounted rate.

According to new data from the American Bar Association (ABA), white law students are more likely to land full scholarships and less likely to receive scholarships covering less than half their tuition compared with non-white classmates. Reuters reports that white students were awarded 70% of the full-tuition scholarships given by law schools this year while comprising about 61% of the national pool of full-time law students. By contrast, students of color make up nearly 32% of full-time law students but received fewer than 23% of full-tuition scholarships. They were awarded nearly 34% of scholarships worth less than half tuition. Hispanic law students, which represent nearly 13% of the national student pool, received 9% of full-tuition scholarships, while Black students, which comprise more than 7% of all law students, and got just 5.5% of full scholarships.

The city of Memphis has subpoenaed all correspondence, documents and communication between Shelby County District Attorney General Steve Mulroy and attorneys for Tyre Nichols’ estate, and any communication between Mulroy’s office and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), reports the Daily Memphian. In the subpoena, the city is seeking any information that Mulroy’s office passed on to attorneys for Nichols’ estate. That information, if shared, could aid lawyers in their effort to prove the city’s police policies, training practices and a lack of supervision contributed to Nichols’ death, which is the crux of a civil case against the city.

Cert, a cutting-edge negative citator tool for Fastcase, is now available in Tennessee. The tool empowers legal researchers by swiftly and effortlessly identifying cases that have been treated unfavorably in subsequent decisions, thus providing a comprehensive perspective on a case's precedential value. Learn more in this FAQ document. Unlimited research with Fastcase is included with your annual TBA membership. Not using Fastcase? Find out more here.

The TBA’s 2023 Reporters Workshop has been selected to receive this year’s National Association of Bar Executives/LexisNexis Community & Education Outreach Award for state bar associations with 18,000 or fewer members. The award will be presented at a luncheon in Chicago on Aug. 1. Produced jointly by the TBA and the Tennessee Association of Broadcasters, the Reporters Workshop offers selected Tennessee journalists an opportunity to learn from lawyers, judges and other journalists about legal issues they face in their daily work. Those selected to participate receive a stipend to offset their travel costs for the two-day event. The workshop was first offered in 2019 under the leadership of then TBA Communications Section Chair Paul McAdoo. It took a hiatus in 2020 and 2021 and was revived in April 2022. 

A Knox County jury convicted Horace Andrew Tyler Nunez, Defendant, of one count of first degree premeditated murder and four counts of reckless endangerment. On appeal, Defendant advances multiple arguments related to: admissibility of evidence; improper jury communications; sufficiency of the evidence; failing to instruct the jury on voluntary manslaughter; and sentencing. The State argues: the trial court did not err, or alternatively, any error was harmless; the evidence was sufficient; and the sentence was proper. After review, we affirm the judgments of the trial court.

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti on Monday filed a lawsuit against the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) alleging federal agency overreach. The lawsuit claims that new sexual harassment guidance from the EEOC "unlawfully extends Title VII’s protections against sex-based discrimination to cover gender identity." The Tennessean reports that under the guidelines, an employer could be held liable under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act — which prohibits employment discrimination — if they (1) don't allow employees access to bathrooms consistent with their gender identity, (2) repeatedly and intentionally refer to an employee with pronouns inconsistent with their gender identity or (3) harass an employee because they dress or appear differently than the way typically "associated with that person’s sex."