Lawyer accused of destroying child-porn images on client's cellphone
Criminal defense lawyer Jocelyn Mims of Sumner County, Tennessee, has been charged with tampering with evidence, making false reports to an officer and intentionally failing to report child sex abuse. Image from Shutterstock.
A lawyer in Sumner County, Tennessee, is facing criminal charges after she was accused of deleting child pornography from her client’s cellphone.
Criminal defense lawyer Jocelyn Mims has been charged with tampering with evidence, making false reports to an officer and intentionally failing to report child sex abuse, the Tennessean reports in a story noted by the Legal Profession Blog. She was indicted last week.
Mims had been disbarred in 2009 for conspiring to smuggle drugs to a jailed inmate, but she was reinstated to law practice in July 2017, according to the Tennessean. Police had alleged that Mims was having an affair with the inmate.
The hearing panel that recommended reinstatement in May 2017 said Mims had satisfied all conditions of her disbarment. She had also taken continuing legal education classes to increase her legal knowledge, had received counseling for depression, had worked as a volunteer for the Georgia Legal Services program, and had done volunteer work to assist low-income people.
Mims is a graduate of the Vanderbilt University Law School who was first licensed to practice law in 2004.
