Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland man whose deportation to El Salvador made him a flashpoint in the administration’s immigration policy, has been indicted in federal court in the Middle District of Tennessee on conspiracy to transport undocumented immigrants and MS-13 gang members into the United States. The Tennessean reports that Abrego Garcia was returned to the states on Friday and appeared in an after-hours court hearing in Nashville. He will be arraigned on Friday. The U.S. Department of Justice says Abrego Garcia played a significant role in a nine-year smuggling ring. "He made over 100 trips, the grand jury found, smuggling people throughout our country … This is especially disturbing because Abrego Garcia is also alleged with transporting minor children," Attorney General Pam Bondi said at a news conference. In 2022, the Tennessee Highway Patrol pulled over a Chevrolet Suburban driven by Abrego Garcia on Interstate 40 in Putnam County. “There were nine additional passengers in the Suburban, all of whom were Hispanic males, and none of whom had any identification,” the indictment alleges. Abrego Garcia’s attorney called the charges an “abuse of power.”

Gov. Bill Lee on Tuesday signed into law legislation aimed at combating AI-generated child pornography, according to Local Memphis.com. The law criminalizes the possession, distribution or production of software or technology designed to create AI-generated child sexual abuse material. Penalties include a Class E felony for possession, a Class C felony for distribution and a Class B felony for production. Lawmakers said the measure is intended to address the misuse of artificial intelligence and protect minors from exploitation, while equipping law enforcement with tools to address the growing threat. The law takes effect July 1.

A federal judge on Wednesday ruled that a group of Venezuelans deported to a Salvadoran prison under the Alien Enemies Act must be given a legal avenue to contest the Trump administration’s accusations that they are gang members, according to The Hill. U.S. District Judge James Boasberg did not specify the steps the administration must take but said it violated due process rights by failing to allow the migrants to challenge their removal before being sent to CECOT, a high-security Salvadoran prison. The Trump administration has argued it lacks the ability to secure the return of anyone held at the facility, and Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele has said he will not return individuals sent there under regular immigration authorities. While Boasberg acknowledged the administration may have lawfully invoked the rarely used Alien Enemies Act — as another judge has ruled — he emphasized that the deportees were denied basic legal protections and cited evidence suggesting many have no gang affiliation. He gave the administration one week to propose a compliance plan.

Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris and Shelby County District Attorney General Steve Mulroy are exploring plans for a limited local crime lab that could be housed within the West Tennessee Regional Forensic Center. Harris and Mulroy presented the proposal on Wednesday to the Shelby County Commission’s Budget Subcommittee at an estimated annual cost of $5.5 million. According to the Daily Memphian, the lab would focus on ballistics, digital device analysis and rapid DNA testing. Harris said the county is well-positioned to expand forensic capacity, while Mulroy emphasized that the lab would complement and not compete with the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation's existing services. According to the paper, the lab could take more than a year to fully implement, with initial steps focused on hiring a planning team and determining interagency coordination.

Gov. Bill Lee recently announced that Deputy Governor and Tennessee Department of Transportation Commissioner (TDOT) Butch Eley will step down from his role in the third quarter of 2025, after seven years of service in the governor’s cabinet. A successor will be named at a later date, and Eley will remain involved during the transition. Eley began his tenure in the Lee administration as chief operating officer, overseeing 23 state departments and 35,000 employees, and led the implementation of Tennessee’s first four-year strategic planning process. “It has been the honor of a lifetime to serve Gov. Lee and the people of Tennessee,” Eley said. “From building long-term systems that better serve Tennesseans to navigating some of our state’s toughest challenges, I’m deeply proud of what we’ve accomplished.” Read more in a press release from the governor's office.

Second-year Belmont University College of Law student Gabrielle Armer was awarded the school's Best Story Award for her short story "What He Left Behind," which explores a prosecutor’s emotional reckoning with second chances during Christmastime. The story was selected through an anonymous review process by novelist and Belmont Law alumnus Brandon Dragan, who praised its narrative tension and exploration of grief, addiction and generational trauma. Armer’s work, developed through Belmont’s Legal Fiction Workshop, is also under consideration for the American Bar Association’s Ross Writing Contest for Legal Short Fiction. Read more in a press release from the law school.

Whitney Hermandorfer appeared before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday to answer questions about her nomination to the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals. Tennessee’s senior U.S. senator and Senate Judiciary Committee member Marsha Blackburn introduced Hermandorfer and praised her clerkship experience and commitment to originalist jurisprudence, the Nashville Scene reports. Democrats on the committee focused on Hermandorfer’s experience and her position on President Donald Trump’s interpretation of birthright citizenship, according to Reuters. Several also used the hearing to criticize the administration for recently deciding to remove the American Bar Association (ABA) from its role in vetting judicial nominees. Hermandorfer was nominated by Trump in May to fill the seat of outgoing Judge Jane Branstetter Stranch, who plans to take senior status.

The city of Memphis wants to use the U.S. Department of Justice’s (DOJ) recent decision to retract its civil rights investigation into the Memphis Police Department to limit information it has to share with lawyers representing Tyre Nichols’ family and estate in a civil suit, the Daily Memphian reports. The city and Nichols’ attorneys have sparred for months over access to documents the city gave to DOJ as part of the investigation. The city, in court filings, is arguing that DOJ’s recent decision to drop the investigation should keep it from having to hand over the information. As part of its filing, the city provided a letter from Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet K. Dhillon that said, in part, “The current Justice Department does not have faith in the previously reported findings in this case. Accordingly, the findings report is withdrawn in its entirety.”

Bar exam officials have released details about the structure and scoring of the new national test set to debut in July 2026, Reuters reports. The NextGen UBE will be significantly shorter than the current Uniform Bar Exam, according to a new test blueprint issued by the National Conference of Bar Examiners. It also will place greater scoring weight on the performance task portion of the test than the existing exam in an effort to rely more on practical legal skills and less on the memorization of laws. The testing time will be shortened from 12 to nine hours comprised of three testing sessions: three hours for 120 multiple choice questions, three hours for integrated questions and three hours for performance tasks. So far, 41 states and territories across the country have announced plans to transition to the new exam. Tennessee will implement it in July 2027.

An inmate at the Trousdale Turner Correctional Center, run by CoreCivic, is suing prison officials, alleging they allowed gang members to repeatedly assault and extort him. The federal lawsuit alleges that Charles Anderson was beaten, sexually assaulted, and forced to have his mother and family friends send money to gang members, despite repeatedly asking prison staff for protection. The Tennessee Lookout reports that the complaint claims staff ignored warnings and failed to place him in protective custody, even after severe attacks and a hospital visit. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) in 2024 opened an investigation into conditions at the facility; in April, a former Tennessee state trooper sued CoreCivic after he was allegedly beaten by a cellmate there.