Court Report

Girl Fails GED, Dad Sent to Jail

An Ohio man who was ordered by a juvenile court judge to make sure that his daughter passed her GED exam has been sentenced to six months in jail because the teen has yet to pass the test. Brian Gegner was given the jail sentence even though his daughter Brittany doesn't even live with him, she lives with her mother. Read more...

Arsonist Sought in Florida Fires

PALM BAY, Fla. (AP) - Investigators searched for one or more arsonists behind a string of stubborn wildfires that have destroyed or damaged more than 160 homes on Florida's Atlantic coast. Firefighters in Brevard County were trying for the third day to contain fires that have scorched an estimated 10,000 acres, or more than 15 square miles, in and around the neighboring towns of Palm Bay and Malabar. Read more...

Lawyers Charged With Defrauding Clients

COVINGTON, Ky. (AP) - Two part owners of last year's Preakness winner went on trial on charges they defrauded clients out of millions in a case being watched closely by the thoroughbred industry because the men could lose their share of the horse. Shirley Cunningham Jr., 52, and William Gallion, 56, are accused of keeping money that prosecutors say should have gone to plaintiffs in a $200 million settlement from the maker of the diet drug fen-phen. Read more...

GPS Grows as a Crime-Fighting Tool

BOSTON - It was just after 10 p.m. when William Cotter, wearing a belt full of ammunition, burst into the home of his estranged wife, Dorothy, shooting her in the back with a sawed-off shot gun before taking his own life. Just five days earlier, a court had ordered him to stay away from his wife after decades of drunken violence and she was carrying a panic button linked to the local police station, in Amesbury, Massachusetts. But it wasn't enough to save her on the night of March 26, 2002. Read more...

Deputies Kill 2 on Indian Reservation

SAN JACINTO, Calif. - A man and woman opened fire on guards at an entrance to an American Indian reservation and fled into its hilly interior, where they were killed in a gun battle with sheriff's deputies and a police commando team, authorities said. It was the second deadly gunfight involving deputies on the reservation in five days. The motive for the attack was unknown, said Riverside County Sheriff's Department spokesman Dennis Gutierrez. The guards were unhurt, as were the officers involved in the shootout. Read more...

'America's Most Wanted' Notches 1,000th Arrest

NEW YORK - When he started "America's Most Wanted," John Walsh could point to at least one thing in its favor: Society's swampland of bad people doing bad things would never run dry. On that basis, the show seems a cinch to run forever. It recently marked 20 years on the air. And this week (9 p.m. EDT Saturday on Fox) it observes another milestone: arrest of the 1,000th fugitive targeted by "AMW" since April 1988 — Dwight Smith, a New York real estate agent accused of murdering a friend over a deal gone awry. Read more...

Anonymous Rape Tests to Protect Victims

Victims who are reluctant to report being raped to the police will be able to take an anonymous forensic rape examination and preserve the evidence in case they change their mind later, thanks to a new federal policy. Beginning next year, law enforcement agencies will pay the costs for the "Jane Doe rape kits" or face the loss of federal funding. Read more...

Former Teacher Gets 6 Months for Sex Crime

A former Arizona teacher has been sentenced to six months in jail for having a sexual relationship with one of her students at Paradise Valley High School. Jennifer Mally, 27, pleaded guilty in March to three felony charges of sexual conduct with a 16-year-old student. Read more...

Man Sentenced to Die for Teen's Fire Death

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) - A central Florida man has been sentenced to death for murdering his ex-girlfriend by setting her on fire. Orange County Circuit Judge Lisa Munyon followed a jury's recommendation when she sentenced 21-year-old Dane Abdool. The jury convicted Abdool of first-degree murder in December for the 2006 death of 17-year-old Amelia Sookdeo of Winter Garden. Read more...

Sean Taylor Murder Suspects Won't Face Death

MIAMI - Prosecutors said they will not seek the death penalty against four people charged with murdering Washington Redskins star Sean Taylor because the accused shooter was a minor when the crime was committed. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that people cannot be executed for crimes committed when they're under 18, and it's a well established legal principle that others involved in the same case as a minor cannot face the ultimate penalty if they are less directly responsible. Read more...

Potential Jurors Questioned in R. Kelly Trial

CHICAGO - Attorneys and the judge in R. Kelly's child pornography trial began questioning 150 potential jurors, asking what they know about the allegations against one of urban music's biggest stars. The 41-year-old R&B singer, known for sexually charged hits like "Bump N' Grind," has pleaded not guilty to charges that he videotaped himself having sex with a girl as young as 13. Read more...

Pair Accused of Making Child Dominatrix

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) - Federal prosecutors unsealed an indictment accusing a man and woman of training the woman's child to be a dominatrix, selling her sexual services and photographing some of the acts. U.S. Attorney John Wood said the case is unusual in that a parent has been charged with the commercial sex trafficking of his or her own minor child. Todd B. Barkau, 35, of New York state, and the 44-year-old mother were charged in the seven-count indictment. Read more...

Lawyer: 2 Will Admit Fraud

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Presumably, she didn't fleece Prince Charles. But a couple of young jet-setters plan to admit in court that other people who crossed their paths unwittingly financed their luxury lifestyle. A lawyer for Jocelyn Kirsch, 22, said that she and her now-ex-boyfriend have signed federal plea agreements that likely will send them to prison for several years for ID theft and other crimes. Read more...

Deadly Mob Beating Unnerves Neighborhood

CLEVELAND (AP) - Even by tough, urban-crime standards it was a grisly attack: Up to 15 people chased a man, then kicked and beat him to death on the street. Before police arrived, one attacker urinated on the victim's head. When the crime-hardened neighborhood awoke later that morning, two people reported a man lying on the pavement, his clothes being dragged off by his assailants. Read more...

Hundreds Arrested in Iowa Immigration Raid

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) - Federal immigration agents raided a northeastern Iowa meat processing plant, arresting more than 300 people and housing many of them at a converted fairgrounds. The raid of the Agriprocessors Inc. plant in Postville was the largest in state history and had been planned for months, said U.S. Attorney Matt M. Dummermuth. Read more...

No Bail for Man in Child Porn Case

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) - A small-time New Jersey actor accused of traveling to Thailand to have sex with underage boys was denied bail. U.S. District Court Judge Michael A. Schipp ordered Wayne Nelson Corliss of Union City to remain in jail, saying that he was a flight risk and a danger to the community. Corliss, 58, was arrested at his Union City home after an international manhunt. Interpol released photos of him last week and asked for the public's help in identifying him. Read more...

R. Kelly's Child Porn Trial Begins

Jury selection has begun in the trial of R&B star R. Kelly on 14 charges of child pornography related to him videotaping himself having sex with minors. Before jury selection began, Cook County Circuit Judge Vincent Gaughan turned down a motion by the defense to delay the trial, which has already been delayed numerous times in the past 10 years. Read more...

Book: O.J. Simpson Confessed to Murders

A former friend and memorabilia dealer has written a tell-all book about O.J. Simpson in which he claims the former NFL star confessed to killing Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman. Mike Gilbert says Simpson confessed while taking sleeping pills, smoking marijuana and drinking beer at his Brentwood home just weeks after the murders. Read more...

'Limited' Excavation Set for Manson Hideout

Almost four decades after Charles Manson and his followers committed their "Helter Skelter" murders, authorities plan to search for more possible victims at the group's hideout at Barker Ranch in Death Valley National Park. But Manson's top lieutenant, Charles (Tex) Watson, says their are no more bodies to be found. Read more...

5 Bodies, Including 3 Children, Found

HOUSTON (AP) - The bodies of five people, including three young children, were found Saturday afternoon on a sprawling property with several structures in northeast Houston, police said. A neighbor made the grisly discovery after seeing a man's body on porch next to a .22-caliber rifle, investigators said. Read more...

ID Thief to Cop Federal Plea?

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - A former college student accused of stealing people's credit to travel the world with her Ivy League boyfriend is nearing a federal plea deal, her lawyer said. Jocelyn Kirsch, 22, and Edward Anderton, 25, are due in state court in Philadelphia on Monday for a preliminary hearing. They will not appear as the case is moved to federal court, the lawyer said. Read more...

Ex-Cop's Rape Trial to Begin

Four times between the winters of 2002 and 2005, a blue-eyed man wearing a ski mask and dark clothes crept quietly into the bedrooms of women in Bloomington, Ill., and raped them. He told the women — all in their 20s and single — that he'd studied them, tracking their habits. He threatened one woman's family if she resisted, reciting their address lest she doubt he knew where to find them. "I've been watching you," prosecutors say the rapist told another victim as he held a knife to her throat on a December night in 2002. Read more...

'Best Santa' Arrested on Child Sex Charges

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) - A rare international alert seeking a man shown in dozens of raw child porn images quickly led to the arrest of a small-time actor, who painted faces at children's parties and performed as "the best Santa Claus anyone has ever seen." Wayne Nelson Corliss told authorities he had sex with three boys in Thailand six years ago, an experience he described as "euphoria," a prosecutor said Thursday at Corliss' first court appearance. Read more...

Undercover Police Procedures Examined

NEW YORK (AP) - Gov. David Paterson pledged to examine undercover police conduct, a day after more than 200 people were arrested protesting the acquittal of three detectives involved in the shooting death of an unarmed man. Paterson said he understood the activists' frustrations as he stood with the slain man's fiancee and the Rev. Al Sharpton, who were among the demonstrators arrested while disrupting evening rush hour traffic. But the governor stopped short of endorsing their actions. Read more...

7 More Cops Pulled From Philly Streets

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Seven more police officers were taken off street duty as investigators look into the videotaped police beating of three shooting suspects during a traffic stop. Thirteen of the estimated 15 officers on hand during the Monday incident have been taken off the streets as investigators pore over the television news footage, Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey told a news conference. Read more...

2 Murder Convictions in Serial Killings

LANSING, Mich. (AP) - A man suspected of killing several women in this city over several terrifying weeks was convicted of two of the slayings and of attacking a third woman who survived. Matthew Macon's eyes filled with tears as the verdicts were read. He put his hands over his head as Ingham County Circuit Court Judge William Collette set the sentencing date for June 18. Read more...

Judge Becomes Witness in Nichols Case

ATLANTA -- The judge became a witness Thursday in the Brian Nichols courthouse shooting case. Judge James Bodiford took the stand before another judge and testified that he is not biased against Nichols, the man charged with killing four people in a rampage that started at the Fulton County courthouse where he was being tried for rape. Nichols attorneys have asked Judge Bodiford, the second judge on his case, to recuse himself. A hearing on the matter took place at the DeKalb County courthouse. Read more...

Gary Dourdan Charged With Felony Drug Possession

PALM SPRINGS, Calif. (AP) - "CSI" co-star Gary Dourdan has been charged with felony possession of heroin, cocaine and ecstasy stemming from his arrest last month, prosecutors said. The 41-year-old actor was arrested after police found him asleep in his car in Palm Springs on April 28. He was allegedly parked on the wrong side of the street with the car's interior light on. Read more...

Amy Winehouse Arrested on Drugs Possession

LONDON (AP) - Amy Winehouse was arrested in connection with a January video that allegedly shows her doing drugs at a party at her north London home. London's Metropolitan Police said the Grammy winner was released on so-called police bail following several hours of questioning at a police station in the city. Winehouse's spokesman, Chris Goodman, confirmed that his client had been arrested Wednesday and held in police custody to answer police questions. Read more...

Philly Officers Taken Off Street

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - A police sergeant and five officers were pulled from street duty as city officials investigated television footage showing a group of officers kicking and punching three shooting suspects during a traffic stop. More than a dozen officers were involved, but Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey said investigators were having the videotape enhanced to help determine how many of them were actually striking the suspects. Read more...

Bailiffs Kill Man Who Fired Shots

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) - Bailiffs shot and killed a man who opened fire in the lobby of a downtown courthouse afternoon, sheriff's officials said. One of the two bailiffs who fired at the unidentified man suffered a non-life-threatening shoulder wound, Pinellas County Sheriff's Sgt. Jim Bordner said. At least four other people were in the lobby at the time but no one else was hurt, Bordner said. Read more...

Sharpton Arrested as Hundreds Protest

NEW YORK (AP) - The Rev. Al Sharpton was among dozens arrested Wednesday as demonstrators blocked traffic at the height of the evening rush hour to protest the acquittal of three detectives in the 50-bullet shooting of an unarmed black man on his wedding day. Police estimated that about 190 people were arrested, including Sharpton, two survivors of the shooting and the slain man's fiancee. They lined up and put their hands behind their backs as police arrested them on disorderly conduct charges. Read more...

Feds Easily Infiltrated SDSU Drugs Culture

SAN DIEGO - Undercover agents who posed as college students to bust more than 100 suspected drug dealers at San Diego State University never had to crack a book to gain acceptance on campus. All it took was cash. The federal agents went to one or two parties but never actually went to class or lived in the dorms. Instead, they merely arranged meetings with suspected dealers and asked about buying cocaine, Ecstasy, methamphetamine, marijuana and other drugs, authorities said. Read more...

Court Limits Grand Jury's Power in Abortion Case

TOPEKA, Kan. - The state's highest court allowed a grand jury to keep investigating one of the few U.S. doctors who performs late-term abortions but limited its power to subpoena his patients' records. The Supreme Court refused to strike down the law abortion opponents used to force Sedgwick County to convene the grand jury to investigate whether Dr. George Tiller violated state restrictions on abortion. The high court also declined to quash subpoenas it issued to Tiller and Attorney General Steve Six. Read more...