State lawmakers advanced two bills limiting criminal defendants’ right to bail on Tuesday, Feb. 13, amid objections that the legislation would cause more people to be detained before trial because of their inability to pay.
Keith Humphrey is former chief of police in Little Rock, Arkansas.
Courdarion Craft, 20, is indicted on charges of criminal attempt of first-degree murder, criminal attempt of especially aggravated robbery and employing a firearm during a felony.
Sen. Brent Taylor is exploring concepts and asking questions about separating the Shelby County suburbs and Memphis into different judicial districts.
An affidavit in the case, posted to the online Shelby County Criminal Justice System Portal, describes one of the shootings that caused a city-wide manhunt for Craft Sunday. Related story:
The Memphis Police Department has identified the man allegedly behind three Sunday, Feb. 11, shootings that caused a citywide manhunt.
The suspect was out of jail on a bond of $100,000 for criminal attempt first-degree murder and criminal attempt especially aggravated robbery, according to a press release.
On Jan. 30, the City of Memphis released additional footage from the night Tyre Nichols was beaten. The video revealed the names of several officers who responded to the scene and were previously unknown.
The case was ultimately against three Shelby County Sheriff’s Office employees in their treatment of Kesha Gray during a March 29, 2020, interaction.
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump said an independent, preliminary autopsy described a Shelby County Jail inmate’s manner of death as a homicide.
“This court feels like that would be too onerous and would delay the trial,” Shelby County Criminal Court Division 10 Jennifer Mitchell said in her verbal ruling.
A judge has been reprimanded by the Tennessee Board of Judicial Conduct for saying last year that he “detests” the bail-bond system in Shelby County.
The federal trial for four of the former police officers accused of killing Tyre Nichols last year has been pushed back four months.
The investigation comes after the Jan. 12 death of Ramon McGhee; his family stated through attorney Ben Crump that McGhee was covered in a “massive amount” of lice and bed bugs when he arrived at the hospital. McGhee’s passing followed the 10 others who died in either of SCSO’s jails in 2023.
Some Democrats said it was unnecessary because public safety is already part of the bail determination; they also said it would chip away at defendants’ liberty by expanding pretrial detention.
“You miss graduation, you miss birthday parties. You miss the little scrapes and the falls,” Artis Whitehead said of the things he missed about being a dad during the 21 years he spent in prison. “You miss being able to actually guide them.”
Demarion Tackett, 16, is accused of shooting 76-year-old John Materna, who was known for selling watermelons in The Heights neighborhood, on May 15, 2023. Materna died in the hospital two weeks after being shot.
The Tennessee General Assembly passed a law in 2023 taking the power away from local DAs in collateral review of death penalty convictions and instead putting the authority in the hands of the Tennessee Attorney General’s Office.
Gene Dewayne Saulsberry was arrested by Shelby County Sheriff’s Office’s Fugitive Apprehension Team around 2 p.m. on Monday, Feb. 5, in Hickory Hill.
Last year, the Tennessee General Assembly gave a 20% raise to most of state prosecutors and state public defenders. But the raise for Shelby County is capped at 5%.
Despite a rise in violent crime, the overall crime rate fell 6.4% in the city and 7.2% in the county compared to the previous year, according to the Memphis Shelby Crime Commission.
During her Jan. 9 reappointment presentation to the Memphis City Council, Cerelyn “C.J.” Davis noted that crime in the city had been slashed in half over a six-month period.
The trial for Justin Johnson and Cornelius Smith initially was scheduled for March 11 in Shelby County Criminal Court Division 10 Judge Jennifer Mitchell’s courtroom.
“You took my best friend, my soulmate, the one person that understood me,” the victim’s husband told the defendant. “I will never forgive you.”
Ramon McGhee was found unresponsive in his cell on Jan. 10, according to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, which is investigating McGhee’s death.