Five former students filed suit in federal court yesterday alleging that top colleges, including Vanderbilt University, have engaged in price fixing and unfairly limiting aid. The Nashville Post reports that the other schools are Brown, the California Institute of Technology, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Duke, Emory, Georgetown, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Northwestern University of Chicago, Notre Dame, University of Pennsylvania, Rice and Yale.

A status hearing before federal district court judge Waverly Crenshaw Jr. was held today in the case of parents suing the state to allow mask mandates in schools, Actions News 5 reports. Crenshaw previously granted a preliminary injunction of the state law, which bans mask mandates by school districts unless virus caseloads reach certain levels. In related news, Gov. Bill Lee today filed an appeal of Crenshaw’s ruling with the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals. In December, Lee filed a motion for a stay of the injunction.

Hamilton County District Attorney General Neal Pinkston recently was honored by the Tennessee chapter of Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) at its annual Night of Remembrance and Awards Ceremony. Pinkston received the group’s 2021 East Tennessee Excellence Award, Chattanoogan.com reports. Pinkston said he was humbled and honored to receive the award, which he said would not have been possible without the assistance of the Chattanooga Police Department and its Traffic Unit. Given that, Pinkston said he would dedicate the award to the department and the traffic unit in memory of officer Nicholas Galinger, who was killed in 2021 by an intoxicated driver. 

Large law firms are increasingly adding diversity and inclusion officers to their top leadership as efforts to diversify the legal profession have stagnated, an ABA Journal article says. Multiple surveys show progress for women and people of color is advancing slowly, and a growing number of firms are hoping that creation of chief diversity officer positions will help change that. “Firms are now realizing that this is something important that they need to do in order to be successful,” says Paulette Brown, who in 2015 became the first African American woman to serve as ABA president. “More leaders are actively involved. Firms have to be hyperintentional about these issues of diversity and inclusion.” Law.com looks at the experience of one firm — Nixon Peabody — that recently created a new chief diversity officer position.

The Chattanooga Bar Association has released the results of its annual judicial poll, Chattanoogan.com reports. Local attorneys were asked to rate 17 judges. The news source has the breakdown of approval rates for each judge in four categories: superior legal ability, good moral character, diligence and judicial temperament. Those with the highest rates across all categories were Circuit Court Judge Jeff Hollingsworth, who is not running for re-election; Criminal Court Judges Tom Greenholtz, Barry Steelman and Don Poole, who is retiring; Juvenile Court Judge Rob Philyaw; and General Sessions Court Judge Alex McVeagh.

Bass, Berry & Sims has named Nashville attorney Michael Holley the new chair of its Corporate & Securities Practice Group, the Nashville Post reports. He succeeds Kevin Douglas, who has served in the role since 2018 and will remain a member of the practice group. Holley earned both his bachelor and law degrees from the University of Mississippi. He joined the firm in 2006 and made partner in 2013. He primarily represents private equity firms, strategic investors and portfolio companies in finance and merger and acquisition matters.

Davidson County Criminal Court Judge Angelita Blackshear Dalton yesterday filed an order vacating murder and child rape convictions against Joyce Watkins and Charles Dunn, the Tennessean reports. The pair were convicted in the late 1980s of killing a four-year old girl who was related to Watkins. Both received life sentences. Dunn died in custody in 2015. The Tennessee Innocence Project and the District Attorney's Conviction Review Unit both conducted extensive investigations into the case, leading the defense and prosecutors to agree that Watkins and Dunn were innocent. The reviews showed shoddy investigative work, unreliable medical evidence from now-disgraced pathologists, and hints of racism from then-prosecutors toward the Black defendants. The matter will need to go back to court one last time for charges to be formally dismissed. The Nashville Scene has more about the original case.

Rutherford County attorney Andrae Crismon left his role as director of the Volunteer Lawyers Program at the Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee & the Cumberlands at the end of the year. Crismon has been at LAS for nearly 15 years, first as staff attorney, then promoted to managing attorney for the Murfreesboro office, and finally as director of the LAS Volunteer Lawyers Program, a role he has held since May 2019. He shared that his work at LAS “has been a wonderful, exciting, humbling, instructive journey.” Crismon is a long-time member of the TBA Access to Justice Committee, most recently serving as vice chair, and an alum of the TBA Leadership Law program. He is frequently honored for his community leadership and volunteer efforts and serves as a pastor of a church in Murfreesboro.

The 6th Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a Kentucky district court ruling that the president does not have the legal authority to use procurement law to mandate vaccines for the contractor workforce, the Federal News Network reports. A three-judge panel on Wednesday voted 2-1 to uphold the lower court's ruling. In that November decision, Judge Gregory F. Van Tatenhove found the 1949 Federal Property and Administrative Services Act, a law that gives the president the power to promote “economy and efficiency” in federal contracting, couldn’t be used to justify a vaccine requirement. That decision blocked the mandate in Kentucky, Ohio and Tennessee. Read the appeals court's decision.

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland has appointed Francis M. “Trey” Hamilton III as interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Tennessee, Chattanoogan.com reports. Hamilton replaces Republican-appointee J. Douglas Overbey, who stepped down at the request of the Biden administration. Chief U.S. District Judge Travis R. McDonough administered the oath to Hamilton at the Joel W. Solomon Federal Courthouse in Chattanooga. Hamilton had been serving as acting U.S. attorney since March 1, 2021. He first joined the office as an assistant U.S. attorney in 2002. Hamilton earned his law degree from Washington & Lee University School of Law. Following law school he served as law clerk to U.S. District Court Judge Jerome Turner in the Western District of Tennessee. The interim appointment is for 120 days or until a presidential appointment is made, whichever occurs first.