Saturday, September 12, 2020

Tennessee disbars a lawyer permanently for the first time

As you probably know, contrary to popular belief, in most states disbarment is not permanent. In most jurisdictions disbarred lawyers can ask to be reinstated after a specified period of time, and, in fact, many are.  

This used to be the case in Tennessee until back in January when the Supreme Court amended the disciplinary rules to state that attorneys who are disbarred are not longer eligible for reinstatement, or, simply stated that they can no longer ask the Court to reinstate their law license.  Ever. Disbarred lawyers in Tennessee will never again practice law in the State.  Period.

This new rule went into effect on July 1 and just a few days ago, the Court announced the name of the lawyer (now former lawyer) who was "honored" to be the first permanently disbarred lawyer in the state.  The Legal Profession blog has the story here.

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