The TBA will host its 30th Annual Labor & Employment Law Forum on May 1 in Nashville. The daylong program, held at the Tennessee Bankers Association building, will feature sessions on return-to-the-workplace issues, Federal Trade Commission noncompete rules and trade secrets, wage and hour developments, and an ethics session addressing sexual harassment and assault. The program will run from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. CDT and attendees may earn up to five general and one dual CLE credits. For more information and to register, visit the TBA website.

A judge in Memphis will hear arguments this week on whether death row inmate Tony Carruthers is mentally competent to be executed, the Nashville Banner reports. Attorneys with the Federal Public Defender’s Office argue Carruthers suffers from schizoaffective disorder and psychotic delusions that prevent him from rationally understanding why the state plans to execute him. A forensic psychiatrist retained by the defense is expected to testify that Carruthers’ delusional beliefs — including that a conspiracy of judges and attorneys framed him and that his release from prison is imminent — render him incompetent for execution. Experts for the state are expected to argue he is fit to be executed. If the court finds him competent, Carruthers’ execution is scheduled to take place on May 21 at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. Carruthers was sentenced to death in 1996 for the kidnapping and murders of three people in Shelby County.

Feedback about the Tennessee Supreme Court's order considering a range of potential changes to regulation of the legal profession is due to the TBA Legal Access and Regulatory Reform Task Force by March 16. The task force will be reviewing responses submitted by email as well as comments submitted as part of a statewide survey and six virtual town hall events, which took place in January and February, and ongoing conversations with stakeholders. The task force then will make recommendations for any proposed action to the TBA Board of Governors. Members are encouraged to review the TBA's Legal Access & Regulatory Reform resource page to become familiar with the issues at stake. Feedback to the task force should be submitted via email to townhall@tnbar.org. Comments on the court order also may be filed directly with the court by April 30.

Building on the success of the TBA Young Lawyers Division's popular Trial College, the TBA YLD is launching Business College, a new in-person program focused on sharpening transactional law skills. Designed for new and young lawyers — and any attorney wanting a refresher — this hands-on course covers core business law concepts, ethical considerations and emerging issues. Attendees will leave with practical insights and actionable tools they can immediately use to handle business matters with greater confidence. 

Session 1

Jack Wagster, Eden Firm PLLC, Nashville
Business Formation Fundamentals

Choosing the right business structure is one of the most important early decisions for any organization. This session provides a practical overview of the major business entity types and the mechanics of formation, helping attorneys identify structural options, avoid common pitfalls and understand the key legal formalities that matter when clients are starting or restructuring a business.

Session 2

Laura Chastain, Board of Professional Responsibility, Brentwood
Ethics for Transactional Lawyers and Ethics Updates from the Board of Professional Responsibility

This session will explore the ethical responsibilities of transactional lawyers, including managing conflicts of interest, responding when a client provides false or misleading information and navigating engagements involving services for third parties at a client's request. The session will also address other challenging ethical issues that arise in transactional practice. In addition, attendees will receive important ethics updates from the Board of Professional Responsibility.

Session 3

Claire Tuley, Baker Donelson, Chattanooga
How to Get to Closing: Deals, Documents and Averting Disasters

Your client signed the purchase agreement — now what? Turning a contract into a closed deal requires more than paperwork. This practical session on real estate and business transactions will walk through the key steps from contract to closing, including essential closing documents, county-specific variations and signature page best practices. Learn how to avoid the common mistakes that delay closings and how to handle the worst-case scenarios when they arise.

Join colleagues on Friday, April 10, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. CDT at Baker Donelson, 1600 West End Ave. in Nashville.
Parking and lunch are included. For more information and to register for the Business College, visit the TBA website.

The Tennessee Alliance for Black Lawyers (TABL) and the TBA Young Lawyers Division's (YLD) Diversity Committee will hold a networking mixer on April 30. The free event will run from 5:30-7:30 p.m. CDT at Burch Porter & Johnson, 130 N. Court Ave., Memphis, TN 38103. Special thanks to the law firm for sponsoring this event. All are welcome but an RSVP is required by April 23. See a flyer for more information.

SUTTON, Chief Judge. Minority shareholders of HPIL Holding, a Wyoming corporation, successfully petitioned a state court for the appointment of a receiver. Three years later, HPIL filed this lawsuit alleging that the minority shareholders looted the corporation during the receivership proceeding. Pointing to the state-court order that appointed the receiver, the district court dismissed the lawsuit for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1257(a), which permits disappointed state-court litigants to seek review of state-court decisions in the United States Supreme Court but does not permit them to appeal such decisions to a federal district court. See Rooker v. Fid. Tr. Co., 263 U.S. 413, 416 (1923); Dist. of Columbia Court of Appeals v. Feldman, 460 U.S. 462, 463 (1983). Because HPIL did not purport to seek a writ of certiorari or otherwise appeal the state-court appointment of a receiver, because the implied and vanishingly narrow jurisdictional bar under § 1257(a) does not apply, and because the bar does not displace the customary way that federal courts respect prior state court rulings (issue and claim preclusion), we reverse.

MURPHY, Circuit Judge. Since the Founding, some Americans have celebrated New Year’s Day by dangerously shooting firearms into the air. We must decide whether a police officer violated clearly established Fourth Amendment law when the officer used deadly force to stop this gunfire. At midnight on New Year’s Day in Canton, Ohio, James Williams fired dozens of shots into the air from a patio enclosed by a wooden privacy fence. Officer Robert Huber drove to the scene to investigate. Soon after Huber arrived, Williams began a second volley of this celebratory gunfire. Without giving a warning, Huber fatally shot Williams through the fence. When Williams’s wife sued, Huber asserted a qualified-immunity defense. But this case’s key factual dispute belongs to a jury. On the one hand, Huber testified that he shot at Williams because he saw Williams turning the rifle toward him and feared for his life. Under this view of the facts, Huber would have complied with the Fourth Amendment because he had probable cause to believe that Williams posed a serious risk of harm. On the other hand, video evidence would permit a reasonable jury to find that Huber saw Williams keep firing into the air the entire time. Under this view of the facts, Huber would have violated the Fourth Amendment because he lacked probable cause to believe that Williams posed a threat. And any reasonable officer would have recognized that the police may not (without warning) shoot a man when the only information they have about his “threat” status is that he was committing what Canton treats as a misdemeanor: discharging a gun into the air just after midnight to celebrate New Year’s Day. The district court thus properly denied summary judgment to Huber. We affirm.

McKEAGUE, Circuit Judge. Employees at Brown-Forman Corporation’s (“Brown- Forman”) Woodford Reserve facility were unhappy with their compensation. To meet an unanticipated increase in demand for the facility’s whiskey products, Brown-Forman attempted to ramp up production, but employee wages remained stagnant and uncompetitive. Naturally, Brown-Forman started to experience difficulties retaining its workforce. Some employees contacted the International Brotherhood of Teamsters to discuss forming a union. Initially, the organizing efforts did not gain much traction. However, after Brown-Forman announced a mere $1 across-the-board salary increase, and informed employees that no further increases would be forthcoming, support for the union grew. Meetings with the union became well-attended, union representatives were prevalent outside the facility to hand out fliers, and the union displayed an inflatable “fat cat” outside the entrance. But as the organizing campaign gained momentum, Brown-Forman did not sit idly by. In an alleged effort to curtail the organizing campaign, Brown-Forman announced it would make three significant changes to employee compensation. Brown-Forman told employees it was going to (1) give a new $4-per-hour across-the-board pay raise to all employees, (2) expand its pay progression and merit-based salary increase policy, and (3) allow employees to save their vacation hours during the December holidays. By giving employees what they wanted—better compensation—union support began to dwindle. Nonetheless, the union declared its purported majority support via authorization cards and petitioned for an election. As the election approached, Brown-Forman did not back down. Management would meet with employees (to, at least in part, articulate anti-union talking points), and a week before the election, Brown-Forman gifted employees bottles of bourbon. When it came time to vote, the union failed to secure a majority. Only 14 employees voted in support of the union while 45 employees voted in opposition. An Administrative Law Judge determined that Brown-Forman committed unfair labor practices and interfered with its employees’ efforts to unionize. The Administrative Law Judge recommended issuing a bargaining order under the standards articulated in Cemex Construction Materials Pacific, LLC, 372 NLRB No. 130, 2023 WL 5506930 (2023) and NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co., 395 U.S. 575 (1969). The National Labor Relations Board (the “Board”) adopted the Administrative Law Judge’s factual findings and recommended remedy, but it modified the reasoning. Rather than consider whether a new election could be held by applying the Gissel standard, the Board relied solely on the standard articulated in Cemex (a previous Board decision that upended over 50 years of precedent and called for the Board to issue a bargaining order as the default remedy once it set aside an election). Because the Board relied solely on the Cemex standard to issue the bargaining order against Brown-Forman, we must—for the first time— determine whether this new standard can serve as the basis for a bargaining order. Because the Cemex standard was created through an improper exercise of the Board’s adjudicatory authority, it cannot serve as the basis for a bargaining order. Thus, we GRANT Brown-Forman’s petition for review, DENY the Board’s cross-petition for enforcement, and REMAND for proceedings consistent with this Opinion.

Defendant, Raymond Antonio Smith, appeals from his convictions for first degree premeditated murder and theft of property valued at $2,500 or more but less than $10,000, for which he is serving a sentence of life plus twelve years. On appeal, Defendant contends that the evidence was insufficient relative to premeditation and to the stolen property’s value. After a thorough review of the record, we affirm.

The Defendant, Cedric Peter Hopgood, pleaded guilty to multiple felony drug possession offenses and received an agreed-upon sentence of thirty-three years. See T.C.A. § 39-17- 417 (2025). The Defendant filed a motion to withdraw his guilty pleas, which the trial court summarily denied. On appeal, the Defendant argues that the trial court erred by denying his motion. We affirm the judgment of the trial court.