(CN) - A federal judge in San Diego refused to dismiss a Mexican housekeeper's claim that a married couple paid coyotes to smuggle her into the United States, where they held her captive for six years and forced her to work more than 100 hours a week in their home.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010Last Update:
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DELRAY BEACH, Fla. (CN) - A South Florida rabbi says he was strip searched in front of a female officer after being arrested for driving without a valid license. He says the strip search violated his constitutional rights and Palm Beach County's own regulations. When you're a former actress in the final burn stages of a career flameout, you've dropped the booster rockets, large chunks of whiskey bottles and balloons of cocaine have begun circling the atmosphere as space litter, and everyone on earth has pretty much forgotten about you as you take off into the darkness of oblivion, it's usually not best to make a u-turn and blaze back across the headlines without at least a Golden Globe nomination in hand.
WASHINGTON, D.C. (CN) - A woman who called herself "JihadJane" was charged with using the Internet to recruit terrorists and raise money to "wage violent jihad in South Asia and Europe" because she was "desperate to do something somehow to help" suffering Muslims. Colleen LaRose, also known as Fatima La Rose, agreed to kill an unidentified Swedish citizen after getting orders from an unnamed terrorist, and even traveled there to carry out her plan, according to a four-count indictment against the suburban Philadelphia woman. LOS ANGELES (CN) - Two paparazzi tossed out just before last month's taping of "The Bachelor" wedding have sued for battery and false imprisonment. WASHINGTON (CN) - Worker protections for foreign nurses hired under the Nursing Relief for Disadvantaged Areas program are still in place, according to a Labor Department regulation. WASHINGTON (CN) - The Defense Department plans to address requirements for safeguarding unclassified defense industry information. |
LOS ANGELES (CN) - Fifteen special interest groups have spent more than $1 billion in the last decade to influence California lawmakers and voters, the state's watchdog agency said Wednesday. The interest groups include six corporations, three Indian tribes, two labor unions and four business associations, according to a report by the Fair Political Practices Commission called "Big Money Talks." WASHINGTON (CN) - Senators and experts battled in the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday over the Supreme Court's recent decision letting corporations spend unlimited amounts to influence voting, with Vermont Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy saying the decision "turns the idea of 'government of, by and for the people' on its head."
WASHINGTON (CN) - Global health programs are good foreign policy, former President Bill Clinton and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday. "If people think you care whether their children live or die," Clinton said, "you don't have to send our young people off to war as often."
(CN) - Gospel singer Isaiah Thomas claims his record label told him it would not pay his promised $30,000 advance because God said it wasn't time yet. Thomas says the message was delivered to him in an email that stated: "I have been seeking God about the timing of your next recording. To date, God has not confirmed His approval for Habakkuk Music to participate."
ATLANTA (CN) - Latosha Lee claims celebrity gossip blog Young Black and Fabulous defamed her by calling her "Shaq's stripper mistress." Lee, a college graduate who describes herself as an actress and waitress, says she has never worked as a stripper. MILWAUKEE (CN) - A Milwaukee man says he was conned into investing $800,000 in a musical project called "The Shirelles" by writer-director Floyd Mutrux and Academy Award-winning producer Jonathan Sanger, who "had no intention of honoring the promises and representations" they made. HOUSTON (CN) - Diamond Offshore oil company says its administrator in Mexico conspired with an HSBC bank manager to embezzle 14.6 million pesos through false invoices and depositing into the employee's account. The peso is trading at about 12.6 to the U.S. dollar.
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (CN) - A Jewish group says the City of Hartford denied them the right to use a building for religious purposes, though Baptists and Catholics used the building to practice their religions for more than 80 years. MANHATTAN (CN) - A New York broker misappropriated millions of dollars by shifting the trading risk from a large institutional investor to Creswell Equities, giving Creswell a $3.3 million windfall, the Securities and Exchange Commission claims in Federal Court. SANTA ANA, Calif. (CN) - The chairman of an Irvine-based investment firm and his girlfriend were arrested Tuesday and charged with running an $8 million Ponzi scheme that targeted Korean-Americans throughout California. WASHINGTON (CN) - Israel on Tuesday announced confrontational plans to construct 1,600 homes for ultra-Orthodox Jews in the East Jerusalem area slated by Palestinians for their future capital. The announcement came within a day of Vice President Joe Biden's visit to restart long-abandoned peace talks. Upon learning of the plan, Biden changed the tone of his visit, saying he "condemn(ed) the decision." WASHINGTON (CN) - The head of the Food and Drug Administration resisted calls by Democratic senators Tuesday to allow cheaper foreign drugs to compete in the American market, but said she is open to a Republican proposal to ease regulation on certain U.S. drugs. WASHINGTON (CN) - China and India joined the rest of the world's major economies Tuesday in signing on to the Copenhagen climate agreement, which seeks to limit global temperature increases to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above pre-industrial levels. |
(CN) - The 10th Circuit upheld the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's approval of uranium mining in northwestern New Mexico, despite claims that the mining activity would endanger drinking water for thousands of Navajos. (CN) - Members of the European Union can develop their own guidelines on holding polluters liable for environmental contamination and forcing them to clean it up, Europe's top court ruled. (CN) - The owner of a patented strain of herbicide-resistant soy can't collect royalties on soy meal imported from Argentina and used for animal feed, a European Court of Justice adviser ruled. (CN) - A Protestant Indonesian family might not be deported after the 9th Circuit granted their petition for review, saying the Board of Immigration Appeals failed to recognize that "Christians in Indonesia are a disfavored group," the targets of violence and persecution by Muslim extremists. (CN) - A candidate for city council can't run for office despite his pardon from a felony conviction, the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled. (CN) - The owner of a home-based daycare center failed to prove that a Colorado sheriff's detective had her license stripped in retaliation for her alleged refusal to cooperate in a sexual abuse investigation, the 10th Circuit ruled. (CN) - San Francisco police officers who fatally shot a man after a warrantless entry into the apartment where he was staying are not immune from charges because they may have "intentionally or recklessly" violated the man's Fourth Amendment rights, the 9th Circuit ruled. (CN) - A federal judge in San Jose, Calif., granted class-action status to a lawsuit accusing Allstate of issuing misleading billing statements that listed more than 200,000 customers' renewal payments as due one month before the actual due date. (CN) - The 9th Circuit dismissed a class action accusing Wells Fargo of charging excessive underwriting fees. The three-judge panel said the law "does not reach the practice of 'overcharging.'"
WASHINGTON (CN) - The Social Security Administration has proposed to allow disability examiners in state agencies to make temporary "fully favorable" determinations on certain claims for disability benefits, without approval by a medical or psychological consultant. WASHINGTON (CN) - The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has rejected a petition from the nuclear energy industry to delay the March 31 implementation deadline for the construction of physical barriers and installation of intruder detection systems. |
WASHINGTON (CN) - Dealing a blow to business lobbyists, House Democratic leaders on Wednesday banned no-bid contracts to private contractors, often referred to as legislative "earmarks." WASHINGTON (CN) - Despite drastic cuts in air pollution, more than 40 percent of Americans still live in areas with unacceptable air quality, according to an Environmental Protection Agency report released on Wednesday. PITTSBURGH (CN) - A 1-year-old girl is permanently disabled with anoxic brain injury from a Target toy-storage trunk that has killed or injured the brains of at least 45 other children, her parents say in Allegheny (CN) - Two miniature horse enthusiasts say the American Miniature Horse Association defamed them after a squabble at a horse show in Texas. The plaintiffs say the ruckus started when a man protested their entry and his mother, who ran the show, accepted his protest. BEAVERTON, Ore. (CN) - Nike claims that Vince Lombardi Jr. and his father's estate took $150,000 for licensing rights to an audio recording of a speech by the famous football coach - without revealing that it had no such recording. Presstek CEO Edward Marino disclosed inside information to an investment manager, who dumped Presstek shares before the public announcement, the SEC claims in Boston Federal Court. Harold Haynes claims Je'Caryous Johnson and I'm Ready Productions violated copyright and mangled the script of his play, "Love on the Rocks," and performed it as "Love Overboard," without compensating him, in Houston Federal Court. Heritage Auction Services sued Benson Hopp, Henry Vaccaro, Vintage Associates and the Internal Revenue Service, seeking a declaration of who really owns Michael Jackson memorabilia that it auctioned off on consignment, and whether any of it was stolen, in Dallas Federal Court. A woman claims Compass Group USA dba Chartwells Dining Services fired her for complaining of her boss's sexual predations, including violating her with a dildo, in Chicago Federal Court. Greg Garrison Productions and Barrump-Bump Publishing claim Howard West and Shapiro/West Productions owe more than $1 million in commissions for "Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts," in Santa Monica Superior Court.
RCN Corp. is selling itself too cheaply to ABRY Partners, for $1.2 billion or $15 a share, shareholders say in Delaware Chancery Court.
Charles Wallert claims Dr. William Ballance Jr., Bluewater Recordings, and Bobby Tomlinson dba The Embers owe him $472,650 for his work as a producer, in New York County Court. Wireless Ink Corp. claims Facebook and Google violate its wireless technology patent, in Manhattan Federal Court. |
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WASHINGTON (CN) - Environmental groups have filed a federal complaint against the Secretary of the Interior on behalf of 12 parrots species the department refuses to protect. The parrots, cockatoos and macaws have seen their habitat destroyed, often by people in the pet trade who steal baby birds from nests and cut down the forest to get at them. 
(CN) - A sheriff's deputy assaulted and locked up a musician for 13 hours, and threatened to throw him in prison for 3 years, because he didn't like the way the musician treated the flag during a show, the musician claims in Tulsa Federal Court. The complaint does not state precisely what the musician did to the flag, but Rogers County sheriff's Officer John Ketcher allegedly said while arresting him, "He is being arrested for stomping on the American flag. We take that very seriously around here." 
(CN) - Johnson & Johnson lied to government inspectors, faked clinical data, shipped falsely labeled products around the world, and abused the credentials of the M.D. Ph.D. it hired as its director of global clinical research, the doctor says. Dr. Margaret Cobb says the pharmaceutical giant fired her because she "voiced strong objections and complaints about and refused to engage in" the illegal behavior. 
