Judge Archives - Tennessee Star

Shaterra Reed Marion Appointed as Judge on the Court of Workers’ Compensation Claims

September 24, 2022September 23, 2022 Kaitlyn Osteen

Shaterra Reed Marion was appointed as a judge on the Court of Workers’ Compensation Claims in Memphis, by new Bureau of Workers’ Compensation (BWC) Administrator Troy Haley the state Department of Labor & Workforce (TDLW) announced Wednesday.

“Shaterra Reed Marion will be a welcome addition to the Court of Workers’ Compensation Claims in Memphis. She has the heart of a public servant and, as a judge, I know she will be fair to all parties and reflect the values for which the Court of Workers’ Compensation Claims is known,” Haley said.

Commentary: No Shot at a Fair Trial for January 6 Defendants in the Swamp

February 9, 2022February 8, 2022 Admin

Large group of people storming Washington D.C. in protest on January 6.

The first set of trials for the hundreds of protesters charged in the Justice Department’s sweeping criminal investigation into January 6 begins later this month. Since the Capitol building is considered the scene of the crime, every trial will be held in the District of Columbia—which means the jury pool will be composed solely of residents living in the nation’s capital.

To say this is a problem for Trump supporters facing even minor charges is a huge understatement.

January 6 defendants already have suffered the wrath of D.C.-based federal judges who’ve imposed unusually harsh prison sentences for low level misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies while routinely berating defendants from the bench.

Iowa Senators Consider Increasing Governor’s Role on District Court Judge Selection

January 26, 2022January 25, 2022 The Center Square

Iowa senators advanced a bill Monday that would change the makeup and leadership of district judicial nominating commissions.

Iowa’s 14 judicial election subdistricts each has a nominating commission that screens applicants and selects two nominees for district court judicial vacancies. The governor chooses one of the two to appoint for a district court vacancy.

Currently, the judge of the longest service in the district is the chair of the nominating commission, according to Iowa state statute. If there are two longest-serving judges, the elder is the chair. The commissions have 11 members: five elected by lawyers; five nonlawyers appointed by the governor; and the chair. Each commissioner, apart from the chair, serves a six-year term.

Judge Rules Absentee Ballot Drop Boxes Illegal in Wisconsin, Regulators Must Retract Guidance

January 14, 2022January 14, 2022 Admin

People at a voting location, voting early at polls

A Wisconsin judge has ruled that the absentee ballot drop boxes widely deployed during the 2020 election are not allowed under state law, a decision that could dramatically impact voting ahead of the swing state’s midterm elections.

Waukesha County Circuit Court Judge Michael Bohren ordered on Thursday the Wisconsin Elections Commission to retract its instructions to election officials on how to use drop boxes. Bohren declared that the WEC had overstepped its authority in issuing the guidance in the first place.

Bohren called the WEC’s guidance a “major policy decision that alter[s] how our absentee ballot process operates,” that was significant enough that it should have required approval by the Legislature.

Judge Suspends COVID Vaccine Mandate for Military Service Members Seeking Religious Exemption

January 5, 2022January 4, 2022 Admin

The Navy cannot force service members with religious objections to COVID-19 vaccines to take them so long as the exemption process remains “by all accounts … theater,” a federal judge ruled Monday.

“Our nation asks the men and women in our military to serve, suffer, and sacrifice. But we do not ask them to lay aside their citizenry and give up the very rights they have sworn to protect,” U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor wrote in approving a preliminary injunction against the mandate as applied to the 35 service members who sued.

“Every president since the signing of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act has praised the men and women of the military for their bravery and service in protecting the freedoms this country guarantees,” O’Connor said.

Tennessee Supreme Court Justice Cornelia A. Clark Dies After Battle with Cancer

September 25, 2021September 24, 2021 Kaitlin Housler

Tennessee Supreme Court Justice Cornelia A. Clark passed away on Thursday after a short battle with cancer. She was 71.

Judge in Case of Anti-Trump Mudslinger is Married to Attorney for Ex-FBI Lawyer Lisa Page

September 21, 2021September 20, 2021 Admin

Last week, the special counsel appointed to oversee the probe into the FBI’s investigation of former president Donald Trump indicted Michael Sussmann, a lawyer for the 2016 Hillary Clinton presidential campaign. Republicans and Trump allies are optimistic about the latest development in John Durham’s investigation but are still concerned that Attorney General Merrick Garland might halt the investigation to protect allies and even the president himself.

FBI notes appear to suggest that as vice president, Joe Biden played a role in the Democratic Party project to smear Trump as a Russian asset by raising the obscure, disused, 18th century statute the Logan Act as a possible vehicle for prosecuting Michael Flynn for speaking with the Russian ambassador to Washington — even after FBI case agents had cleared Trump’s incoming national security adviser of wrongdoing.

And now Republicans are raising concerns that the judge appointed to the Sussmann case has too many conflicts of interest to preside over it fairly.

Tennessee Governor Lee Appoints Blake Neill to Serve as 25th Judicial District Circuit Court Judge

September 16, 2021September 15, 2021 Kaitlin Housler

On Friday, Tennessee Governor Bill Lee appointed A. Blake Neill to serve as circuit court judge for the 25th Judicial District to fill the Honorable Joe H. Walker III’s vacancy, effective immediately, according to a news release from Lee’s office.

Judge Okays Preliminary Injunction for Western Michigan University Athletes

September 13, 2021September 12, 2021 The Center Square

Western Michigan University football practice

Federal District Court Judge Paul L. Maloney granted 16 Western Michigan University (WMU) athletes’ request to continue participating in intercollegiate athletic competition without being injected with the COVID-19 vaccine.

Initially, four soccer stars sued in August over WMU’s vaccine mandate for athletes, which required athletic participants take the COVID-19 vaccine by Aug. 31 or forfeit their spot on the team. WMU has denied all the athletes a religious liberty accommodation.

No similar vaccine requirement exists for any other students at WMU and other universities. The lawsuit says Michigan State University and the University of Michigan are granting religious accommodations to their athletes.

Judge Rules Christian Baker Jack Phillips Must Make ‘Gender Transition’ Cake

June 20, 2021June 19, 2021 Admin

A Colorado baker and self-described cake artist who won a 2018 victory at the Supreme Court faced a related setback this week when a state court ruled in another case that the law requires him to make a cake to celebrate a gender transition.

Denver District Court Judge A. Bruce Jones ruled against Jack Phillips, the Christian owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado, in the case of Scardina v. Masterpiece Cakeshop.

“The anti-discrimination laws are intended to ensure that members of our society who have historically been treated unfairly, who have been deprived of even the every-day right to access businesses to buy products, are no longer treated as ‘others,’” Jones wrote Tuesday in a 28-page opinion.

Tennessee Supreme Court Hears Case Concerning Availability of Absentee Ballots for All Tennesseans

August 2, 2020August 1, 2020 Sam Medley

The Tennessee Supreme Court heard arguments Thursday concerning the citizens’ right to vote via absentee ballot.

The cases presented (Earle J. Fisher et al. v. Tre Hargett et al. and Benjamin Lay et al. v. Mark Goins et al.) have become the focal point of the ongoing debate surrounding the efficacy of absentee and mail-in ballots and voters’ rights to absentee and mail-in ballots during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ohio Supreme Court Justice Pat DeWine Recuses Himself from Voting on His Father Gov. Mike DeWine’s Effort to Quash State Primary

March 18, 2020March 17, 2020 Jason M. Reynolds

When Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine went court shopping to quash the state’s primary Tuesday as a way to fight the coronavirus, one of three Supreme Court justices who abstained from voting in his favor was his eldest son, Justice Pat DeWine.

Federal Judge Blocks Part of Ohio Law Banning Second Trimester Abortion Procedure

April 21, 2019April 20, 2019 Andrew Shirley

A Federal Judge has ruled that portions of an abortion-limiting bill, signed into law late last year, cannot be enforced as the law is written. As previously reported: On December 13, 2018, then-Governor John Kasich signed Senate Bill 145 (SB 145), commonly referred to as a Dismemberment Abortion Ban into…

Ohio Judge Recommends Resignation for Disgraced ‘Gang of Five’ City Council Members

March 8, 2019March 7, 2019 Andrew Shirley

County Judge Robert Ruehlman called on five Cincinnati City Council members – all Democrats – to resign Thursday following revelations the group, the so-called “Gang of Five” violated several Ohio Sunshine Laws. On April 9, 2017, a conservative watchdog group filed a startling lawsuit. Mark Miller, Ohio citizen and treasurer of…

Second Amendment Advocacy Organization Wins Case Over Bump Stock Ban

February 9, 2019February 8, 2019 Andrew Shirley

Friday, Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas Judge Robert Rhuehlman granted an injunction against an ordnance by the city of Cincinnati that would have made “trigger activators,” which are more commonly know as bump stocks, illegal in city limits. A bump stock is any device that uses “bump fire,” to increase the rate-of-fire of…

California Judge Blocks TPS Cancellation, Says Trump’s Decision was Based on Racial Prejudice

October 6, 2018October 5, 2018 Admin

by Will Racke A federal judge in California blocked the government’s plan late Wednesday to wind down a humanitarian program for hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals living in the U.S., citing concerns the decision was motivated by racial animus on the part of President Donald Trump. U.S. District…

The West Virgina Legislature Moves to Impeach Its Entire Supreme Court for Corruption

August 13, 2018August 12, 2018 Admin

by Kevin Daley Who presides over the impeachment trial of a state Supreme Court justice if the entire state Supreme Court is being impeached? It’s an absurd constitutional hypothetical West Virginians are left to grapple with, after the West Virginia House of Delegates Judiciary Committee drafted articles of impeachment…

Commentary: It’s Time For President Trump To Go Full Andrew Jackson On Overreaching Judges

August 8, 2018August 7, 2018 Admin

by CHQ Staff The news that a Bush-appointed federal district judge, John D. Bates (pictured), has ruled that Obama’s executive amnesty, not actual immigration law, is the law and that Trump must fully restore and renew the program is such a radical exhibition of judicial overreach that it should…

Commentary: It’s Time For President Trump To Go Full Andrew Jackson On Overreaching Judges

June 25, 2018August 8, 2018 Admin

Bob Corlew Commentary: Democrats Will Stop at Nothing to Impeach President Trump

June 13, 2018June 13, 2018 Admin

by Judge Bob Corlew, Candidate for Tennessee’s 6th Congressional District Political prognosticators have predicted there might be a blue wave coming in November. They believe the House will flip to Democrat control and the U.S. Senate race in Tennessee could decide who controls the U.S. Senate. It is important…

Commentary: Another Federal Judge Seizes Presidential Power

February 16, 2017July 18, 2018 Christina Botteri

by George Rasley, CHQ Editor February 15, 2017 Reprinted with permission from ConservativeHQ.com Emboldened by Judge James L. Robart’s anti-constitutional power grab and the refusal of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to vacate his order temporarily restraining President Trump’s Executive Order 13,769 temporarily pausing immigration from seven terrorist hotspots Judge Leonie Brinkema, of the U.S.…

Trump Moves to Fill Two Judicial Vacancies in 5th Circuit Court of Appeals

February 16, 2017February 15, 2017 Christina Botteri

The Trump administration is vetting candidates to fill two vacancies on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the New Orleans based appeals court that includes Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas. John Council of the National Law Journal reports the candidates under consideration include Texas Supreme Court Justice Don Willett, U.S.…