On behalf of Patrick T. McNally, Attorney at Law | Apr 29, 2019 | State Appeals
Each year, the National Registry of Exonerations sends out an annual report that reveals how many innocent people were exonerated that year, along with information about what problems brought about their wrongful convictions. Last year, 151 people were found not to...
On behalf of Patrick T. McNally, Attorney at Law | Mar 8, 2019 | State Appeals
For many Tennessee residents, the process of appealing a court ruling is a bit unclear. In order for an appellate court to consider an appeal, there must be demonstrable evidence indicating that a grievous error was made during the trial, one that had a large effect...
On behalf of Patrick T. McNally, Attorney at Law | Feb 19, 2019 | State Appeals
“We need to be able to look at old cases, especially where someone is claiming that they are wrongfully convicted,” says Assistant District Attorney Robert Jones, who leads the Conviction Review Unit at the Nashville District Attorney’s office....
On behalf of Patrick T. McNally, Attorney at Law | Jan 28, 2019 | State Appeals
As you probably know, Governor Bill Haslam granted clemency to Cyntoia Brown. Brown, 30, was sentenced to life in prison after she, a teenage sex trafficking victim, killed a man who paid to have sex with her. Brown had appealed her life sentence after the U.S....
On behalf of Patrick T. McNally, Attorney at Law | Jan 15, 2019 | State Appeals
If you’ve been found guilty of a felony, you might wonder how your trial could’ve gone differently. Paying fines, providing compensation to a victim or their family, serving prison time and parole may all factor into your sentencing. But in some cases, your punishment...
On behalf of Patrick T. McNally, Attorney at Law | Dec 11, 2018 | State Appeals
In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Miller v. Alabama that sentencing juvenile offenders to life in prison without the possibility of parole violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments. The court had previously ruled that...
On behalf of Patrick T. McNally, Attorney at Law | Oct 8, 2018 | State Appeals
In 1992, 24-year-old Lorie Lee Lance was killed in a house fire in Old Hickory, Tennessee. Claude Francis Garrett, Lance’s boyfriend, was accused of setting the fire. Although he swore he was innocent, an arson investigator claimed that a set of large, irregular...
On behalf of Patrick T. McNally, Attorney at Law | Sep 24, 2018 | State Appeals
There have been developments in the case of Joe B., a former high school principal who was convicted of his wife’s 1985 murder based largely upon bloodstain-pattern evidence that has now been discredited. Now 78 and in frail health, Joe is hoping for a new...
On behalf of Patrick T. McNally, Attorney at Law | Sep 10, 2018 | State Appeals
There are certain rules law enforcement must follow when setting up sobriety checkpoints or DUI roadblocks, but the Tennessee highway patrol failed to follow them in a 2012 roadblock in Harris County. Therefore, the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals found the...
On behalf of Patrick T. McNally, Attorney at Law | Aug 27, 2018 | State Appeals
In the 1963 case of Brady v. Maryland, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the Constitution requires prosecutors to hand over to the defense any evidence that tends to prove the defendant’s innocence. When they do not and the defendant is convicted, their failure or...
