We haven’t seen too many impact freshmen during the Josh Heupel era at Tennessee, but that could change this year. Boo Carter wasn’t the highest ranked player in Tennessee’s class of 2024, however his play-making ability might just be immediately put to use in the Vols’ rebuilt secondary.

The four-star athlete was a two-way player in high school, winning the Mr. Football award as a senior. He could have landed on either side of the ball at this level too, but Tennessee has a more immediate need on the defensive side of the ball. The Vols saw their entire starting secondary — and plenty of veteran depth — exit the program. That’s going to open the door for someone like Carter to find some early playing time.

“Oh, man, I’m not sure how he’ll be used, but a special player, really athletic,” Tennessee center Cooper Mays said during SEC Media Days. “You said you’re from Chattanooga. I’m sure you’re familiar. You’ve watched him. Super athletic kid. Cool kid too. Really easy to get along with, fits right in. I’m not sure how we’ll use him, but you’ve got to find ways to use somebody like that, you know.”

Carter ended up finishing ranked 149th overall in the 2024 class, according to 247Sports. The 5-11, 195 pounder was dynamic in all phases for Bradley Central High School near Chattanooga. Now in Knoxville, it’s up to the staff to figure out where to play him.

“The way he moves — he moves really well and makes some plays, his frame. You can tell by how he carries himself he loves football, and you can tell he cares,” Tennessee linebacker Keenan Pili said. “But I’d say most importantly those talents that he carries. The sky’s the limit for him as he goes on throughout his career.”

Though Carter only just arrived this offseason, he’s made a big impression throughout the spring and summer periods.

“I feel like Boo has come in with a mindset as a young guy wanting to learn, wanting to be great, wanting to actually be on that field this year, his freshman year, and you see that in a guy who’s putting in the extra work, looking up to older guys and is always hanging out with older guys just trying to learn the way fast so he’s able to be on the field and help us,” Omari Thomas told reporters. “He’s a great athlete. He’s going to make a bunch of plays for us, so it’s great to see a guy like Boo doing that.”

So where will he end up playing? Tennessee’s cornerback depth chart seems fairly set but the safety spot and STAR position are very much up in the air. The Vols brought in safety Jakobe Thomas from MTSU, while Andre Turrentine should push for the other safety position. Jourdan Thomas handled STAR responsibilities late last season and should return as the likely starter there this fall. After that though? Carter could likely man any of those three positions.

How quickly can he earn the trust of the staff? That will be the key here. He’ll likely see plenty of time on special teams to start, but I’ll be interested to see how long it takes him to find the field.

A Tennessee man died after he was horrifically burned by a hotel shower that reached a scorching 150F. 

Alex Chronis, 76, tragically lost his life on June 19, 2022 after he took a shower at  Econo Lodge in Erlanger, Kentucky- about 10 miles across the border from Cincinnati, Ohio, on November 19, 2021. 

His family were awarded more than $2million for medical and funeral expenses on July 3 after filing a wrongful death lawsuit against Sanjay Patel, the owner of the budget hotel and Aspyn, LLC, which operated the Econo Lodge. 

Following the incident, Chronis, of Knoxville, Tennessee, was in and out of the hospital and had to undergo grueling procedures, according to the lawsuit. 

‘His death was caused by complications from the serious scalding wounds that were so easily preventable had the hotel management simply had a procedure in place for their customer’s safety,’ Jeff Blankenship, the family’s lawyer, told Law&Crime. 

According to the lawsuit, Chronis was on a business trip when the fateful incident took place. 

While sharing a hotel room with two co-workers Chronis decided to take a shower, where he was ‘almost immediately bombarded with scalding hot water which knocked him to the floor of the shower tub where the water continued to scald him,’ the lawsuit said. 

His co-workers heard him fall to the ground and scream in pain before they rushed into the bathroom and helped him out. 

The following day, he and his co-workers attended a festival and sold food before he was taken to Miami Valley Hospital. 

Although doctor’s instructed him to rest after he was released, Chronis went back to work at the festival, The Cincinnati Enquirer reported. 

Two days later he checked back into the hospital and stayed there for about five months. 

Chronis underwent multiple grafting procedures for his intense burns and was also treated for unspecified medical conditions related to the incident, the lawsuit said. 

Chronis decided to take a shower, where he was ‘almost immediately bombarded with scalding hot water which knocked him to the floor of the shower tub where the water continued to scald him.’ (pictured: The Econo Lodge in Erlanger, Kentucky)

In April 2022 he was stable enough to be transferred to a rehabilitation facility in Knoxville, but his health did not improve. 

By June 2022, after being transferred to another hospital, Chronis succumbed to his injuries and died. 

A Kenton Circuit County jury found that Patel and Aspyn, LLC, ‘failed to exercise ordinary care in inspecting and maintaining’ the hotel room ‘in a reasonably safe condition for the use of their guests.’

The jury also concluded that the plumbing company that installed the water heater at the hotel was not at fault. 

Though it is unclear exactly what caused the scorching hot water, the lawsuit said there was ‘failure to provide functioning faucets/fixtures.. and valves.’ 

The $2,037,545.30 award included $1,271,486.60 in medical bills, $250,000 for Chronis’ mental and physical pain, $500,000 in punitive damages and $16,058.73 for funeral costs. 

A private funeral service was held for Chronis, who was a brother, uncle, and great uncle. 

‘We thought the world of him and will so miss him,’ a loved one said on his obituary page.  

According to Arizona Department of Child Safety, most adults can endure third-degree burns when exposed to 150F water for just two seconds.  

The Tennessee government has agreed to begin scrubbing its sex offender registry of dozens of people who were convicted of prostitution while having HIV, reversing a practice that federal lawsuits have challenged as draconian and discriminatory.

For more than three decades, Tennessee’s “aggravated prostitution” laws have made prostitution a misdemeanor for most sex workers but a felony for those who are HIV-positive. Tennessee toughened penalties in 2010 by reclassifying prostitution with HIV as a “violent sexual offense” with a lifetime registration as a sex offender — even if protection is used.

At least 83 people are believed to be on Tennessee’s sex offender registry solely because of these laws, with most living in the Memphis area, where undercover police officers and prosecutors most often invoked the statute, commonly against Black and transgender women, according to a lawsuit filed last year by the American Civil Liberties Union and four women who were convicted of aggravated prostitution. The Department of Justice challenged the law in a separate suit earlier this year.

Both lawsuits argue that Tennessee law does not account for evolving science on the transmission of HIV or precautions that prevent its spread, like use of condoms. Both lawsuits also argue that labeling a person as a sex offender because of HIV unfairly limits where they can live and work and stops them from being alone with grandchildren or minor relatives.

“Tennessee’s Aggravated Prostitution statute is the only law in the nation that treats people living with HIV who engage in any sex work, even risk-free encounters, as ‘violent sex offenders’ subjected to lifetime registration,” the ACLU lawsuit states.

“That individuals living with HIV are treated so differently can only be understood as a remnant of the profoundly prejudiced early response to the AIDS epidemic.”

In a settlement agreement signed by Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee on July 15 and filed in both lawsuits on July 17, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation said it would comb through the state’s sex offender registry to find those added solely because of aggravated prostitution convictions, then send letters alerting those people that they can make a written request to be removed. The language of the settlement suggests that people will need to request their removal from the registry, but the agency said in the agreement it will make “its best effort” to act on the requests “promptly in the order in which they are received.”

The Tennessee attorney general’s office, which represents the state in both the ACLU and DOJ lawsuits and approved the settlement agreement, said in an email statement it would “continue to defend Tennessee’s prohibition on aggravated prostitution.”

In an email statement, the ACLU celebrated the settlement as “one step toward remedying the harms by addressing the sex offender registration,” but said its work in Tennessee was not done because aggravated prostitution remained a felony charge that it would “fight to overturn.”

Molly Quinn, executive director of LGBTQ+ support organization OUTMemphis, another plaintiff in the ACLU lawsuit, said both organizations would help eligible people with the paperwork to get removed from the registry.

“We would not have agreed to settle if we did not feel like this was a process that would be extremely beneficial,” Quinn said. “But, we’re sad that the statute existed as long as it did and sad that there is any process at all that folks have to go through after living with this extraordinary burden of being on the sex offender registry for really an irrelevant reason.”

Michelle Anderson, a Memphis resident who is one of the plaintiffs in the ACLU lawsuit, said in court records that since being convicted of aggravated prostitution, the sex offender label has made it so difficult to find a home and a job that she was “unhoused for about a year” and has at times “felt she had no option but to continue to engage in sex work to survive.”

Like the other plaintiffs, Anderson said her conviction kept her minor relatives at a distance.

“Ms. Anderson has a nephew she loves, but she cannot have a close relationship with him,” the lawsuit states. “Even though Ms. Anderson’s convictions had nothing to do with children, she cannot legally be alone with her nephew.”

The Tennessee settlement comes months after state lawmakers softened the law so no one else should be added to the sex offender registry for aggravated prostitution. Lawmakers removed the registration requirement and made convictions eligible for expungement if the defendant testifies they were a victim of human trafficking.

State Sen. Page Walley (R-Savannah), who supported the original aggravated prostitution law passed in 1991 and co-sponsored the recent bill to amend it, said on the floor of the legislature that the changes do not prevent prosecutors from charging people with a felony for aggravated prostitution. Instead, he said, the amendments undo the 2010 law that put those who are convicted on the registry “along with pedophiles and rapists for a lifetime, with no recourse for removal.”

“Having stood, as I mentioned, in 1991 and passed this,” Walley said, “it is a particular gratifying moment for me to see how we continue to evolve and seek what’s just and what’s right and what’s best.”

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