Articles

All Content


73,921 Posts found
Previous • Page 853 of 7,393 • Next
Posted by: Azya Thornton on Aug 20, 2024

Defendant, Cedric Taylor, was indicted for possession with intent to deliver 26 grams or more of cocaine (count one), possession with intent to deliver between one half ounce and ten pounds of marijuana (count two), and resisting arrest (count three). He entered an open guilty plea as charged in counts one and three, and the State agreed to nolle prosequi count two. The trial court imposed concurrent sentences of fourteen years for count one and six months for count two to be served in confinement as a Range II multiple offender.1 On appeal, Defendant argues that the trial court abused its discretion denying his request for community corrections. Following our review of the entire record and the briefs of the parties, we affirm the judgments of the trial court.

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Aug 20, 2024

This second recusal appeal in the underlying conservatorship case is currently before this Court on remand from the Tennessee Supreme Court. This Court had issued an opinion vacating, for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, three orders entered by the trial court, including the trial court’s order denying the second motion to recuse that is the subject of this appeal. The Supreme Court reversed that decision, holding that (1) the stay imposed by this Court during pendency of the first recusal appeal did not divest the trial court of subject matter jurisdiction over the case and (2) the proponents of the stay had waived any argument that orders entered by the trial court should be vacated because they were entered prior to issuance of the mandate. Accordingly, the second recusal motion is again before this Court. Upon thorough review, we affirm the trial court’s denial of the second motion to recuse.

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Aug 20, 2024

This appeal arises from a decision by the Tennessee Department of Human Services denying a recertification application for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits to a one-person household based upon the determination that the household’s income exceeded the eligibility requirements. After the petitioner questioned the finding, the trial court affirmed the decision of the agency and dismissed the petition for judicial review. Upon our review of the record, we affirm.

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Aug 20, 2024

JULIA SMITH GIBBONS, Circuit Judge. Tanika Parker and Andrew Farrier, employees of subsidiaries of Tenneco Inc., each participated in 401(k) plans covered by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA). Both plans (together, the “Plans”) had been amended to include mandatory individual arbitration provisions. These provisions required plan participants to bring suit in arbitration only in an individual capacity, not in a representative, class, or collective capacity, and to seek remedies only for losses to the participant’s individual plan account, not for monetary benefits that would accrue to any other participant’s account. These provisions explicitly applied to actions under ERISA § 502(a)(2) for relief under ERISA § 409(a). Parker and Farrier alleged that the fiduciaries of their Plans (the “Fiduciaries”) breached their fiduciary duties and sued under § 502(a)(2) on behalf of their Plans for all losses accruing to the Plans, disgorgement of all profits, and other injunctive remedies under § 409(a). The Fiduciaries moved to compel arbitration, arguing that the individual arbitration provisions blocked such a representative suit for plan-wide monetary remedies. The question for this court is whether the individual arbitration provisions are invalid as a prospective waiver of statutorily guaranteed rights and remedies. We hold that they are and affirm the judgment of the district court.

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Aug 20, 2024

NALBANDIAN, Circuit Judge. After pleading guilty to defrauding his own mother, John O’Hara was ordered to pay over $300,000 in restitution to his mother’s estate. One problem—O’Hara’s mother had passed away by the time of sentencing, leaving O’Hara the sole beneficiary of her estate. Four years later, the district court amended the judgment and directed O’Hara to pay the federal Crime Victims Fund instead of the estate. O’Hara appealed, claiming the district court had no authority to modify the judgment. We agree, so we REVERSE and REMAND.

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Aug 20, 2024

McKEAGUE, Circuit Judge. Before an employer can take any adverse action against a prospective employee based on a negative consumer report, the Fair Credit Reporting Act requires that the employer provide him with a copy of the report. When Thomas Merck applied to work at Walmart, he forgot to disclose an old misdemeanor conviction. The conviction came up on a consumer report. Walmart—through a third-party vendor—gave Merck an incomplete version of the report that listed his misdemeanor and indicated he was “not competitive” for a job at Walmart, even though it had already given him a conditional job offer. Then Walmart revoked the offer. We AFFIRM the district court’s grant of summary judgment in Walmart’s favor.

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Aug 20, 2024

JULIA SMITH GIBBONS, Circuit Judge. In 1984, a Butler County, Ohio court tried and convicted Von Clark Davis of aggravated murder with a capital specification for a prior conviction of purposeful killing of another. Forty years later, Davis is before us on habeas review of the third death sentence for this conviction. Today, we accord the Ohio courts the deference owed their adjudication of Davis’s various claims and deny his petition for habeas relief. I therefore respectfully dissent.

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Aug 20, 2024

This appeal arises out of a contract for the sale of a hotel property near the Nashville airport. After numerous amendments to the purchase and sale agreement, the seller declared the prospective buyer to be in default, sold the property to a different buyer, and retained over 18 million dollars in earnest money. The prospective buyer filed suit against the seller for a declaratory judgment that the liquidated damages provision in the contract was unenforceable and for conversion. The trial court dismissed the conversion claim and ruled in favor of the seller on summary judgment. We have concluded that the trial court erred in its disposition of both causes of action.

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Aug 20, 2024

This is a dispute over homeowner’s insurance coverage. The trial court granted summary judgment to the insuror, finding that the insureds made a misrepresentation on their application for insurance which voided the policy pursuant to Tennessee Code Annotated section 56-7-103. Because whether the insureds made a misrepresentation is a question of fact for the jury in this case, we reverse.

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Aug 20, 2024

This appeal arises from an order establishing the amount of retroactive child support owed by the father for the care of two of his children. The father challenges the trial court’s decision to impute income to him for the purposes of instituting that order. Finding no error, we affirm.


Previous • Page 853 of 7,393 • Next