Joshua D. Schaffer v. State of Tennessee Board of Probation and Parole

This appeal involves subject matter jurisdiction over a petition for a writ of certiorari. The petitioner is an inmate in the custody of the Tennessee Department of Correction. The respondent, the Tennessee Board of Probation and Parole, denied the inmate’s request for parole. The inmate thereafter filed a petition for a writ of certiorari in the chancery court challenging the Board’s decision as illegal, arbitrary, and fraudulent. The chancery court dismissed the case for lack of subject matter jurisdiction because the inmate did not file a verified, notarized petition within the sixty-day jurisdictional time limit. We affirm.