Tennessee summer study examines felony-murder and criminal-responsibility laws; no votes taken

The Judiciary Committee held a summer study hearing on felony murder and criminal responsibility laws, hearing technical briefs and personal testimony but taking no votes.

Sponsor Leah Dragbery opened the session and framed the meeting as a fact-finding discussion intended to inform possible changes in the next legislative session. “This is just a starting point for discussion,” Dragbery told the committee, adding that no action would be taken that day.

The hearing combined national legal context, regional comparisons and local testimony. Amanda Essex, program principal with the National Conference of State Legislatures, told lawmakers that states approach felony murder differently and cited recent reforms in several states. “Almost every state has a felony murder law on the books, although Hawaii and Kentucky are the two that do not,” Essex said, describing four common statutory limits states have adopted to narrow the doctrine.

Representatives from the Council of State Governments’ Southern office described variations among the 15 Southern states and pointed to statutory language — for example Louisiana Revised Statutes §14:10 — that defines specific and general intent and includes statutory defenses in some jurisdictions. Erin Toomey of CSG South said Tennessee’s criminal-responsibility language lacks the same explicit intent definitions found in some other states.

The Tennessee District Attorneys General Conference, represented by Executive Director Steven Crump, urged preserving the statutes. “These laws are not abstract doctrines. They are practical time‑tested tools that protect Tennesseans, deter violent crime, and hold all culpable actors accountable,” Crump said, arguing that the rules prevent delegating violence to avoid responsibility.

By contrast, Patrick Frogg, executive director of the Tennessee District Public Defenders Conference, and family members and formerly incarcerated people urged revision and retroactive relief in some cases. Frogg described recurring facts in cases brought under criminal-responsibility provisions and felony-murder doctrine in which non‑shooting defendants — including people he described as traumatized youths or survivors of abuse — received far longer effective sentences than co‑defendants who fired a weapon. “When you pair that with felony murder, you can get people who are charged, who are technically guilty under this law and it just doesn't feel right,” Frogg said.

Several family members and formerly incarcerated people gave emotional testimony about specific cases. Shauna Hatcher and Betty Sanders described relatives who were convicted under criminal-responsibility or felony-murder theories and who they say were more culpable for presence than for action; they asked lawmakers to make statutory changes retroactive so people already serving long sentences could seek relief. Other speakers, including Mindy Dodd, Alicia Sellers and Sharonda (Sharonda) Lumpkin, described histories of abuse, youth, or developmental disability and called for statutory limits on charging or mandatory exclusion of certain groups from felony‑murder exposure.

Committee members asked prosecutors and defense representatives a series of hypotheticals — for example, whether a driver who claims not to know a co‑occupant would commit a robbery should face the same murder charge if someone is killed. Crump and other prosecutors pointed to prosecutorial discretion, jury adjudication and existing defenses such as duress, diminished capacity and insanity as safeguards. Patrick Frogg and witnesses pointed to plea bargaining dynamics, uneven resources among prosecutors and defenders, and difficulty in securing effective representation as structural reasons the law can produce disproportionate outcomes.

Witnesses and committee members cited recent statutory changes in other states: California’s 2018 reform narrowing felony‑murder liability, Illinois’s Safety, Accountability, Fairness and Equity Today Act (SAFETY) in 2021, Colorado’s 2021 changes reducing felony murder to second‑degree in certain cases, and the Minnesota aiding‑and‑abetting task force work that informed 2023 reforms. Committee staff noted where to find the Minnesota materials online.

Chairman Gordon (committee chair) reiterated that the hearing was informational and that the committee would gather additional data and follow up in the coming months. Walker (committee staff) posted a link to Minnesota Department of Corrections materials on aiding and abetting as an immediate follow-up resource. The committee did not vote on any bills or amendments and adjourned at the end of the scheduled hearing.

The record logs testimony from national and regional policy groups, Tennessee prosecutors and public defenders, and multiple family members advocating retroactive relief or statutory narrowing. Lawmakers said they will use information from the hearing to determine whether to file or revise legislation before the next legislative session.