The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday struck down an injunction blocking Georgia from enforcing a state campaign finance law against two nonprofits founded by former Democratic Georgia gubernatorial nominee Stacey Abrams.
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A coalition of energy, biofuel and agriculture groups – including the Illinois Corn Growers Association – are taking their challenge of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s emissions mandate to the nation’s highest court.
The group filed a petition for a writ of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court challenging the EPA’s decision to grant a waiver to California for its 2021-2025 electric vehicle mandate. Illinois lawmakers have considered adopting California’s strict EV policies.
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Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) did not respond to a Monday inquiry from The Tennessee Star that sought to establish whether VUMC took any actions to mitigate any possible financial liabilities that may have resulted from its 22-year treatment of Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale.
The Star contacted VUMC about what actions it may have taken to address possible legal liability after publishing the MNPD document, “Vandy Psych,” which contains notes written by an MNPD investigator who secured at least 75 pages of documents about Hale’s treatment at VUMC after obtaining a search warrant.
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Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale created duplicates of materials she wanted to be discovered by Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD), a detective told the killer’s parents in a June 12, 2023 interview, according to a transcript obtained by The Tennessee Star.
The interview was conducted by three MNPD detectives, who were investigating the Covenant case, and included both Ronald and Norma Hale, the parents of Audrey Hale, and their attorney David Raybin.
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The Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) referred The Tennessee Star to the court of Tennessee Chancery Court Judge I’Ashea L. Myles when asked if the department provided specific documents to Judge Myles before she declared in her decision that not one page of the writings left by Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale will be released, citing the copyright allegedly held by the parents of Covenant School children.
The Star asked MNPD Public Affairs director Don Aaron whether investigators provided Judge Myles with the document titled “Vandy Psych.” The document contains notes written by an MNPD investigator who received at least 75 pages of documents from Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC), where Hale was a 22-year mental health patient, after obtaining a search warrant in the wake of her March 27, 2023 attack that claimed the lives of six.
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Oklahoma is the most recent state facing a legal battle with the Biden administration on the issue of illegal immigration, with a federal judge blocking legislation that would make entering the country illegally a state crime.
Oklahoma’s House Bill 4156 makes it a crime to be in Oklahoma without legal status. The legislation was signed into law on April 30, but was blocked by a federal judge in June after the Biden administration filed a lawsuit against the state.
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A father is pleading for change to Nashville’s criminal justice system after his daughter was murdered by her ex-boyfriend just days after he was released from the Davidson County Jail.
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Tennessee Chancery Court Judge I’Ashea L. Myles last Thursday ruled that not one page of the materials written by Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale will be released to the public, citing the copyright claims raised by parents of minor students who claim to own the copyright to the killer’s works.
The parents of Covenant School students successfully claimed before Myles that they were assigned the intellectual property rights of the materials left by Audrey Hale before to her attack, and a probate court filing reveals Ronald and Norma Hale appear to have transferred the copyright to the parents of in June 2023.
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The House Judiciary Committee and the subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement released a report Wednesday detailing the Biden administration’s spending of millions of taxpayer dollars on services that support illegal immigrants.
“[F]ar from imposing consequences on illegal aliens and removing them from the country, the Biden Administration encourages illegal aliens to arrive at the border, chauffeurs them into the interior, and then rewards them with concierge services, all on the taxpayers’ dime and at the expense of public safety,” the report stated.
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Tennessee’s Advisory Commission on Rules of Practice and Procedure decided to start a committee looking into rules to make court briefs available online moving forward.
Tennessee Supreme Court Justice Dwight Tarwater will chair the committee, which will include commission Chairman Gino Bulso, Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals Judge Tom Greenholtz, former Solicitor General Andree Blumstein and attorney Tim Mickel.
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Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin has filed a lawsuit alleging the Chinese e-commerce app Temu is “malware” that is illegally obtaining personal data from consumers.
Griffin referred to Temu as a “data theft” business in a press release put out recently.
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A panel of five New York appeals court judges this week unanimously disbarred former President Donald Trump’s former attorney, Rudy Giuliani, over statements he made about election illegalities in the 2020 presidential election.
The opinion from the Supreme Court of the State of New York Appellate Division, First Judicial Department relied on ethics rules used to target conservative attorneys: “engag[ing] in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation,” “engag[ing] in conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice,” and “engag[ing] in any other conduct that adversely reflects on the lawyer’s fitness as a lawyer.”
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The assistant police chief of the Memphis Police Department (MPD) is reportedly still registered to vote and resides in Atlanta, Georgia after nearly three years since accepting the position in Memphis, according to a report by ABC 24.
Atlanta is approximately 400 miles away from Memphis, which is a nearly six-hour drive.
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Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody welcomed new police officers to the state after they relocated from Georgia, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, New Mexico and New York.
“Florida is the most pro-law enforcement state in the nation because we back our blue,” Moody said. “We’ve been spreading the word about all the great incentives to join our ranks, and individuals like the new Sarasota recruits have answered the call – leaving behind places where their service was not as appreciated as it is here.”
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Reasonable constitutional scholars and jurists could quibble about the details and impact of the Supreme Court’s immunity decision in Trump v. United States, but the hysteria coming from the left, including President Joe Biden and dissenting Justices Sonya Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown-Jackson, is beyond rational discourse. An inability to control emotions and anger has become commonplace for progressives who don’t get their way.
Writing for a 6-3 majority, split on ideological lines, Chief Justice John Roberts’ opinion laid out a three tiered approach to presidential immunity premised on the Constitution’s vesting of the complete executive power in one individual, giving him duties and power of “unrivaled gravity and breadth” and making that individual a full and equal branch of the United States government, alongside the Congress and courts. Roberts observed that the president’s constitutional powers are often “conclusive and preclusive” and those powers may not be subject to review by Congress or the courts.
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Voters in Wisconsin will once again be able to drop their ballots in drop boxes in the November election.
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The Thursday ruling by Tennessee Chancery Court Judge I’Ashea L. Myles, when she decided not one single page of the writings of Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale would be released, will “absolutely” be appealed, stated Michael Patrick Leahy, the editor-in-chief of The Tennessee Star and the CEO of Star News Digital Media, Inc. (SNDM), on Friday.
Leahy declared in his Friday statement, “The judge has erroneously accepted a dubious copyright claim made by intervenors who should not have been allowed to intervene in this case in the first place.”
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Tennessee Chancery Court Judge I’Ashea L. Myles ruled in a decision released at 11:58 pm on Thursday that none of the writings left by Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale shall be released to the multiple parties who sued Metro Nashville to secure their release, citing the copyright claims of the parents she earlier allowed to intervene in the lawsuit.
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The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi has halted the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) from implementing its final rule which redefines the Affordable Care Act’s prohibition against discrimination based on “sex” to include “gender identity” at the request of Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti.
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Police investigators told the parents of Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale their daughter “felt close” to those who perpetrated the Columbine High School attack in 1999 and created her own version of the Columbine Tapes.
The investigators told the killer’s parents, Ronald Hale and Norma Hale, that their daughter divulged the information to an unknown physician, according to the transcript of a July 12, 2023, interview The Tennessee Star obtained last month.
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Tennessee State Senator Brent Taylor’s (R-Memphis) ‘Make Memphis Matter’ initiative has been applauded by the Shelby County Deputy Sheriff’s Association (SCDSA).
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Federal immigration authorities arrested an illegal migrant wanted in his home country on child rape charges and hiding out in the United States.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents apprehended a Ecuadorian national, who remains unidentified, in western Massachusetts last month, the agency announced on Tuesday. The individual entered the U.S. unlawfully in 2021 and is wanted in his home country for allegedly raping a child.
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Last week, in Murthy v. Missouri, the Supreme Court hammered home the distressing conclusion that, under the court’s doctrines, the First Amendment is, for all practical purposes, unenforceable against large-scale government censorship. The decision is a strong contender to be the worst speech decision in the court’s history.
(I must confess a personal interest in all of this: My civil rights organization, the New Civil Liberties Alliance, represented individual plaintiffs in Murthy.)
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After the parents of Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale described a violent outburst during a police interview, a Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) investigator referred to the incident as “leakage” of “anger,” in a possible reference to the “leakage of intent” researchers say is commonly displayed by mass killers.
The Tennessee Star confirmed last month it obtained the transcript of an MNPD interview with Ronald and Norma Hale, the parents of Audrey Hale, which was recorded on July 12, 2023.
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Christy Kelly, reporter at The Arizona Sun Times, said the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 ruling on Monday in Trump v. United States that former President Donald Trump is immune from federal prosecution for official acts he took while in office may have a major impact on the former president’s conviction in the Stormy Daniels hush money case.
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Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey has filed a lawsuit against the state of New York for the violation of Missourians’ First Amendment right to hear from a presidential candidate in the 2024 presidential election.
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A Tennessee judge ruled Tuesday that pro-life activist Paul Vaughn will not serve time in prison for trying to stop abortions from taking place at a Tennessee abortion clinic.
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The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to take up a challenge to Texas’ law intended to prevent minors from accessing porn websites.
Texas’ law, which it enacted in June 2023, requires websites that publish “sexual material harmful to minors” to confirm its users are over 18 years old. A district court initially blocked Texas from enforcing the law, but the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals later allowed it to take effect.
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A Tennessee State Representative is celebrating this week as a bill that he sponsored enacting harsher penalties for violence against police officers took effect Monday.
The law, called The Back the Blue Act, which was sponsored by State Representative Kip Capley (R-Summertown) makes assault on a police officer a Class E felony. Previously, it was a Class A misdemeanor.
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Lawsuits across six battleground states will significantly impact the November election as laws regarding mail-in balloting are challenged.
In the states of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, lawsuits that have either concluded or remain ongoing over laws about mail-in and absentee ballots are shaping how votes will be counted in the general election.
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Former President Donald Trump now leads President Joe Biden by four percentage points in Pennsylvania, according to a Monday poll that also showed Republican U.S. Senate nominee Dave McCormick is “within striking distance” of Senator Bob Casey (D-PA).
Following the Thursday presidential debate, the Cygnal poll found 48.3 percent of Pennsylvanians support Trump compared to 44 percent who support Biden. The former president’s polling lead against Biden is beyond the 3.45 percent margin of error reported by the pollsters.
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A federal judge on Friday afternoon halted part of a new state law barring charitable bail from taking effect while a legal challenge proceeds.
U.S. District Judge Victoria Marie Calvert issued a temporary restraining order for 14 days following a Friday hearing. The ACLU of Georgia and the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection at Georgetown University Law Center filed the lawsuit asking a judge to declare Section 4 of Georgia Senate Bill 63 unconstitutional.
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A new audit raises questions as to whether Wisconsin’s attorney general will be able to meet a new state requirement to get sexual assault kits tested within six months.
The Legislative Audit Bureau released its new report on the state’s crime recently, saying there are fewer requests for sexual assault DNA kits at the crime labs, but it is taking the labs longer to process each kit.
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A Minnesota district court judge was publicly reprimanded by the Minnesota Board of Judicial Standards after denying several convicted felons the right to vote when issuing probation orders to those felons.
On June 27, Judge Matthew Quinn of Minnesota’s Seventh Judicial District was reprimanded by the Minnesota Board of Judicial Standards (MBJS). According to the Board’s findings, Judge Quinn began issuing probation sentencing orders to convicted felons in October of 2023 which denied those individuals the right to vote.
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Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale received medical diagnoses for five mental disorders, her parents Ronald and Norma Hale told Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) investigators on July 12, 2023, according to a transcript of the interview obtained by The Tennessee Star from a source familiar with the investigation.
Ronald and Norma Hale, with the assistance of their attorney, provided the list of mental disorders after MNPD investigators questioned whether Audrey Hale was formally diagnosed with autism.
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Steve Bannon, former chief strategist to former President Donald Trump and host of the popular show War Room, made contact for the first time from inside the Federal Correctional Institution Danbury in Danbury, Connecticut, where he is currently serving his four-month prison sentence.
Bannon communicated his message through a 5-minute phone call to Grace Chong, who is the CFO and COO of War Room, on Tuesday. Like all federal prisoners incarcerated at FCI Danbury, Bannon is allowed to make 320 minutes of phone calls each month.
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The mother of Covenant School shooter Audrey Elizabeth Hale told police investigators her daughter first experienced suicidal thoughts when prescribed the antidepressant Prozac as a high school student, according to a transcript of the interview obtained by The Tennessee Star from a source familiar with the investigation.
Last month, The Star reported that police documents confirmed Audrey Hale was a 22-year mental health patient at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC). Another portion of the transcript of the police interview with Ronald and Norma Hale revealed their daughter avoided inpatient commitment during three separate mental crises.
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An FBI supervisor is blowing the whistle on his own organization, alleging to the Justice Department’s chief watchdog and Congress that the bureau has been improperly suspending or revoking the security clearances of agents it believes hold conservative political views.
The new whistleblower’s allegations surfaced Tuesday in correspondence obtained by “Just the News” that was sent to the House and Senate Judiciary committees and DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz, dramatically claiming that as a supervisory special agent he witnessed efforts by senior FBI brass to target employees who supported Donald Trump or opposed COVID-19 vaccines.
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Prosecutors with Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office agreed on Tuesday to delay former President Donald Trump’s sentencing, The New York Times reported.
A Manhattan jury convicted Trump May 30 on 34 felony counts of falsification of business records. Bragg’s office agreed to a request to delay the sentencing in light of a recent Supreme Court ruling that found presidents have immunity from prosecution for “official acts” taken in office, but called the motion by Trump’s attorneys meritless, according to the NYT.
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The judge in former President Donald Trump’s hush money case approved a request on Tuesday to push back the former president’s sentencing until Sept. 18.
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Christy Kelly, reporter at The Arizona Sun Times, said the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 ruling on Monday in Trump v. United States that former President Donald Trump is immune from federal prosecution for official acts he took while in office is certain to affect current and past litigation surrounding the former president.
However, the nation’s highest court also ruled that there is no immunity for unofficial acts.
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Trump ally Rudy Giuliani was disbarred Tuesday in New York for his work during the 2020 election.
The New York Appellate Division, First Judicial Department found that Giuliani, former U.S attorney for the Southern District of New York and New York City mayor, “deliberately violated some of the most fundamental tenets of the legal profession” in doing legal work for former President Donald Trump in 2020. Giuliani was admitted to the New York State Bar in 1969.
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President Joe Biden Monday night said the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling that the president has “absolute immunity” when acting in his core constitutional duties is “a dangerous precedent” that “undermines the rule of law of this nation.”
Earlier in the day, the Supreme Court in a 6-3 decision ruled that the “president’s exercise of his core constitutional powers, this immunity must be absolute. As for his remaining official actions, he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity.”
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Democratic New York Rep. Joe Morelle announced Monday that he will file a constitutional amendment that will virtually invalidate the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on presidential immunity.
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Members of the Tennessee congressional delegation reacted to the U.S. Supreme Court’s 6-3 ruling on Monday in Trump v. United States that former President Donald Trump is immune from federal prosecution for official acts he took while in office.
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A federal grand jury has indicted the Newton County Board of Commissioners chairman and a commissioner-elect on federal charges of conspiring to launder money obtained from wire fraud and honest services wire fraud.
A federal grand jury indicted Marcello Banes, 48, of Covington, the board’s chair, and Stephanie Lindsey, 52, of Covington, a real estate broker and attorney who was elected to the county commission earlier this month, on conspiracy to launder money obtained from wire fraud and honest services wire fraud and money laundering. The grand jury also indicted Lindsey for federal income tax fraud and Banes for making materially false statements to FBI special agents.
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A federal judge is weighing whether to grant a preliminary injunction to halt a Georgia law targeting organized online retail crimes set to take effect on Monday.
Earlier this month, NetChoice filed a lawsuit over Senate Bill 472, the “Combating Organized Retail Crime Act.” Proponents of the measure, which Republican Gov. Brian Kemp signed on May 6, say it protects businesses against organized online retail crimes.
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Former President Donald Trump’s lawyers moved quickly Monday night to take advantage of the Supreme Court ruling that he enjoyed immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts, sending a letter notifying the judge in his New York hush money case that they intend to ask to set aside the verdict reached by a jury last month, according to multiple sources.
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Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale avoided commitment on three separate occasions, her parents told Metro Nashville Police Department investigators in a June 12, 2023 interview, according to a transcript obtained by The Tennessee Star from a source familiar with the investigation.
The transcript reveals Ronald and Norma Hale told investigators doctors wanted to commit her daughter for inpatient treatment over an eating disorder, and that Audrey Hale was twice considered for inpatient commitment after she expressed suicidal ideation to mental health professionals.
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Covenant School killer Audrey Elizabeth Hale was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder around 2011, her parents told Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) investigators in a June 12, 2023 interview, according to a transcript obtained by The Tennessee Star from a source familiar with the investigation.
The Star previously reported that police documents revealed Audrey Hale to be a 22-year mental health patient at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, and The Star reported on Sunday that Hale’s parents, Ronald and Norma Hale, first learned of their daughter’s purported autism diagnosis from a speech pathologist in the summer of 2001.
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