Commission Members

• R. Larry Brown, Chair
• Thomas J. Garland
• Donald J. Hall
• Linda W. Knight
• Dianne F. Neal
• Benjamin S. Purser, Jr.

R. Larry Brown, Chair

R. Larry Brown is Senior Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer for FedEx Express. In this position, he is responsible for all strategic aspects of Human Resources for a worldwide work force of over 138,000 employees operating in 210 countries.

The Jackson, Tennessee native earned his bachelor’s degree from Lane College in Jackson, Tennessee and his Juris Doctorate from the University of Memphis School of Law, where he was a member of the Law Review Staff, the Moot Court Board, and the National Moot Court Team.

Mr. Brown joined FedEx in 1987 as Managing Director, Litigation, after serving as an Assistant U.S. Attorney, Western District of Tennessee for five years and being a supervisory trial attorney for the EEOC for two years.

He was also a Reginald Heber Smith (REGGIE) Fellow, and Managing Attorney with Memphis Area Legal Services.

Mr. Brown is Chairman of the Board of Partners in Public Education (PIPE), a board member of the Youth Education Through Sports (YES) Foundation, and Co-chair of the Memphis mentoring Partnership.

He belongs to the National Bar Association (NBA), and is a past president of the Ben F. Jones (Memphis) Chapter of the NBA. Mr. Brown also holds memberships in Omega PSI Phi, and Sigma Pi Phi Fraternities, and is past national President of Pro Duffers, USA. He has received the Thurgood Marshall Scholarship Foundation Award of Excellence, and the Pi Beta Sigma African American Image Award. Mr. Brown is a two-time recipient of the Federal Express Five Star Award.

Mr. Brown was appointed by the Speaker of the Senate as a Democrative representative.

Thomas J. Garland

Thomas J. Garland was born in Kingsport, TN (1934). He was educated in the Kingsport and Oak Ridge school systems and served in the United States Air Force (1952-56). He graduated from East Tennessee State University with a B.A. degree (1959) and received the Outstanding Alumnus Award (1973). His careers in business, education, and government include: Chairman of the Board of Commerce Union Bank (now Bank of America), Greeneville, TN; Chancellor of the Tennessee Board of Regents; Interim President of Tusculum College, where he serves as a member of the Board of Trustees and is the immediate past Chairman of the Board. He holds an Honorary Doctor of Law and was awarded the Distinguished Service Award by Tusculum College. He served in the Tennessee Senate (1964-85), seventeen years as Senate Minority Leader. He also served on numerous civic and corporate boards and currently serves as senior advisor to the Niswonger Foundation, Chairman of the Tusculum Institute for Public Leadership and Policy, and is a director of Atmos Energy Corporation.

Mr. Garland was appointed by the Governor as a Republican representative.

Donald J. Hall

Donald J. Hall is a celebrated teacher, who has served on the Vanderbilt faculty since 1970. Professor Hall is the inaugural holder of the Vanderbilt University Chair for Teaching Excellence. His teaching and scholarship focus on criminal law and procedure, particularly victims' rights in the criminal process. His casebook on criminal procedure is widely used in American law schools. Active in Tennessee criminal justice issues, he has served as co-chair of the Tennessee Commission on Gender Fairness, was the reporter for the state's pattern jury instructions in criminal cases, and, while a member of the Tennessee Sentencing Commission, helped to shape the state's revised penal code. Professor Hall is currently serving as the appointee of Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen on the state Ethics Commission, having previously served as a member of the Governor's Commission on Juvenile Justice Reform and on the Governor's Task Force on the Use of Enhancement Factors in Criminal Sentencing.

Mr. Hall was appointed by the Governor as a Democratic representative.

 

Linda W. Knight

Linda Whitlow Knight is a native of Jackson, Tennessee, where she attended public schools.  After attending Sweet Briar College for two years, Linda received her B.A., cum laude, from Vanderbilt University, where she majored in Political Science and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.  In 1976, she graduated magna cum laude from Cumberland School of Law in Birmingham, Alabama.  She served on the Law Review and the Moot Court Board, and was elected to Who’s Who Among Students in American Colleges and Universities. 

After practicing in Birmingham for four years, Linda moved to Nashville in 1980.  After serving as law clerk to former Supreme Court Justice Frank F. Drowota, she entered private practice.  She has been with Gullett, Sanford, Robinson & Martin, PLLC and its predecessor, Martin & Cochran, since 1982.  Her practice concentrates on insolvency and commercial law and litigation.  She belongs to the American, Tennessee and Nashville Bar Associations and the Tennessee and Nashville Lawyers’ Associations for Women.  She has served as President, and four terms as Treasurer, of TLAW and as a Board member of LAW.  She is Secretary of the Nashville Bar Association, and has served on and chaired several committees.  Linda is a Hearing Officer for the Board of Professional Responsibility and is on the Board of the Tennessee Supreme Court Historical Society and the Bench-Bar Relations Committee of the Tennessee Judicial Conference.

Linda has been a Board member of the Nashville Women’s Political Caucus.  She was one of the initial members of the Tennessee Economic Council on Women, serving from 1998 to 2004, and remains a member of the Board of the Tennessee Women’s Economic Council Foundation, Inc.

Ms. Knight was appointed by the Speaker of the House as a Republican representative.

Dianne F. Neal

Formerly Chief Legal Counsel to Governor Ned McWherter and Chief Counsel to the Tennessee Public Service Commission, later Tennessee Regulatory Authority, Dianne left state government to become President and CEO of the Cumberland Science Museum, now Adventure Science Center, for an eighteen-month transition to streamline operations and encourage board and patron development.

Dianne was appointed to the Metropolitan Arts Commission, where she served for six years, two as Chairman.  Dianne was a charter member of the Nashville Sports Council, which she chaired in 1996.  She remains on the Executive Committee of the Council. Additionally, Dianne sits on the board of the Tennessee State Museum Foundation, the Belle Meade Plantation, Habitat for Humanity Advisory Board and the Advisory Board to the Women’s Fund for the Community Foundation.  In 1998, Dianne was asked to join the President’s Circle of the National Academy of Sciences, where she served until 2002.

A graduate of Vanderbilt University School of Law, Dianne received a B.A. from Baylor University and an M.A. from Tulane University.  Dianne and her husband, Jim, live in Nashville, Tennessee.  Dianne has one daughter, Sarah, a teacher in Chicago.

Ms. Neal was appointed by the Speaker of the House as the Democratic representative.

Benjamin S. Purser, Jr.

Mr. Purser is a retired FBI executive with over twenty-nine years of diverse and unique government experiences and eight years in the corporate world identifying risks and providing solutions to those risks. Mr. Purser is currently the Senior Vice President for Risk Management & Compliance at the Sommet Group headquartered in Franklin, TN

Mr. Purser supervised all FBI operations and personnel in Middle Tennessee from 1981 until late 1998. He was appointed to a Management Advisory Committee by the Director of the FBI. The committee of nine FBI executives provided Counsel to the Director regarding all FBI policies, procedures, and operations. He supervised an extremely sensitive and complex public corruption investigation focusing on wrongdoing by State officials (code name Rocky Top). He managed a national health care fraud investigation for a three year period.

Mr. Purser is originally from Dayton, TN. He attended the University of Tennessee at Knoxville and graduated from William Jennings Bryan College in 1968 with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration. During his time in Middle Tennessee, Mr. Purser served on the boards of several non-profit organizations; currently he serves on the board of the YMCA and is a member of the Nashville Rotary Club.

Mr. Purser was appointed by the Speaker of the Senate as a Republican representative.