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Tenn. Code Ann. § 40-35-217

Sentence conditioned or based upon defendant submitting to birth control, sterilization, or family planning services prohibited

Known as the Tennessee Criminal Sentencing Reform Act

The act spans §§ 40–40 (69 sections).

Applied in 1 court decision — leading case Sullivan v. Benningfield (2019)

Most recently applied in Sullivan v. Benningfield (April 2019)

Acts 2018, ch. 917, § 1.

(1) As used in this section, “sterilization” means the process of rendering an individual incapable of sexual reproduction by castration, vasectomy, salpingectomy, or some other procedure and includes endoscopic techniques for female sterilization that can be performed outside of a hospital without general anesthesia such as culdoscopic, hysteroscopic, and laparoscopic sterilization.

(2) No guilty plea agreement or plea of nolo contendere shall be accepted by the court nor shall any criminal sentence be imposed by a judge if any part of the plea or sentence is in whole or in part conditioned or based upon the criminal defendant submitting to any form of temporary or permanent birth control, sterilization, or family planning services, regardless of whether the defendant's consent is voluntarily given.

(3) A sentencing court shall not make a sentencing determination that is based in whole or in part on the defendant's consent or refusal to consent to any form of temporary or permanent birth control, sterilization, or family planning services, regardless of whether the defendant's consent is voluntarily given.

(4) This section shall not apply to the provision of educational services on the matters of temporary or permanent birth control, sterilization, or family planning services.

Current official text: Tennessee Code (LexisNexis). Digitized from the UniCourt Code Improvement Commission public-domain capture. Reproduced from public-domain Tennessee statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.