Tennessee Lawyers Can No Longer Be Reinstated After Disbarment

Tennessee attorneys who are disbarred on July 1 or after no longer have the option of being reinstated after the state’s highest court adopted several changes to one of its rules.

“I think we have to think of this as permanent disbarment,” said Lucian T. Pera, an attorney with Adams & Reese in Memphis whose practice includes legal ethics.

The Tennessee Bar Association, in comments it submitted to the Tennessee Supreme Court, noted that by adopting this change, the state would join a “small number of U.S. jurisdictions with ‘permanent disbarment.’”

Pera noted that the court “gave us no reasons ...