In his recusal, Judge Andrew Howorth added a severe warning about the implications of pressure tactics on the judicial system, stating this “approximates the manner in which courts operate in authoritarian regimes, such as North Korea and Iran.”

The Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals has denied the appeal of Cleotha Abston’s rape conviction last year.

Amid a surge in arrests from the Memphis Task Force, the federal public defender’s office is “straining.” 

Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris and leaders of other groups seeking to stop the National Guard deployment in Memphis say the city was never offered an option to join their lawsuit.

The administration is “confident” it will win in court. 

U.S. District Judge Sheryl Lipman dismissed 17 of 36 charges against a local gynecologist, court records show.

U.S. District Judge Mark Norris wrote that he recused himself “because of the apparent bias of others against the Court.”

Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris and Commissioners Erika Sugarmon and Henri Brooks are among those seeking a preliminary injunction to stop the guard’s deployment.

Local activists said Friday that immigrant arrests are likely higher than the figures circulated by the Memphis Safe Task Force. 

The Shelby County Jail’s population is expanding amid a surge in arrests by the Memphis Safe Task Force. One judge told The Daily Memphian he saw 50 to 70 more cases last week than in a typical week.

As the Deputy Chief of Information Technology, Joe Oakley has overseen the launch and use of the police department’s Real-Time Crime Center camera surveillance systems, as well as the department’s data collection. It was not immediately clear Thursday who would take over his duties. 

A Memphis Police Department sergeant was arrested Tuesday by the Oakland Police Department.

The combination of Whiteside’s sentence and school board member Michele Henley’s defense of her has galvanized a growing movement focused on accountability within DeSoto County’s leadership and education systems.

Since the beginning of the Memphis Safe Task Force, routine traffic stops by state troopers have turned into high-speed pursuits, several which have ended in crashes.

Crime data from the first three quarters of 2025 reveals where the city’s crime rate stood before the federal law enforcement saturation.

Memphians may be intrigued to learn what happened in 1938 in a world where Memphis stood largely united against a National Guard deployment, behind a self-assured leader with a powerful political organization and friends in Washington, D.C.

DeSoto County District Attorney Matthew Barton said his office is challenging the sentence, arguing sexual battery committed by a person in a position of trust is classified as a violent crime and is specifically ineligible for the house arrest program under Mississippi law.

“We are weighing some sort of legal action in order to put a stop to some of the unconstitutional actions that we’ve seen and heard about,” Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris said. 

A former high school coach and youth minister at a DeSoto County church pleaded guilty to sexual battery with a minor, but her sentence was considered too lenient by District Attorney Matthew Barton.

A Tennessee Highway Patrol trooper allegedly spotted Corvettes driving at a “high rate of speed” on Winchester Road at 2 a.m. Sunday.

A trial date has been set in the civil lawsuit filed by the family of Ramon McGhee, who died last year at the Shelby County Jail.

With helicopters in the air and detentions rising, some legal immigrants are afraid to leave home.

The guard’s early actions appear more casual than the federal, state and local law enforcement officers who have flooded the streets as part of President Donald Trump’s Task Force, a multiagency crime reduction effort. 

Joseph “Rusty” McKinney died April 12, 2024, during a shoot-out between 13 officers and two teenage suspects. 

Trevin Wallace, 32, has coached the Pharaohs to a 2-4 record this season.