Nightly Brief

Top CNS stories for today including the federal courts system has enough money to run through Jan. 11 amid a government shutdown that is expected to grip parts of Washington well after Christmas; A federal judge slammed North Korea with a $501 million judgment in connection to the death of American student Otto Warmbier; Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has returned to work from the New York hospital where she had cancerous growths removed from her lungs, and more.

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National

The Second Circuit’s Thurgood Marshall U.S. Courthouse at 40 Centre Street in New York City. (Photo via Wikipedia Commons)

1.) While a government shutdown is expected to grip parts of Washington well after Christmas, the federal courts system has enough money to run through Jan. 11.

In this March 16, 2016, file photo, American student Otto Warmbier, center, is escorted at the Supreme Court in Pyongyang, North Korea. A federal judge has ordered North Korea to pay more than $500 million in a wrongful death suit filed by the parents of Otto Warmbier, an American college student who died shortly after being released from that country. (AP Photo/Jon Chol Jin)

2.) A federal judge slammed North Korea with a $501 million judgment Monday in connection to the death of Otto Warmbier, the University of Virginia student whom it kept hostage for a year and a half.

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg answers a law student's question as she participates in a "fireside chat" in the Bruce M. Selya Appellate Courtroom at the Roger William University Law School on Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2018, in Bristol, R.I. (AP Photo/Stephan Savoia)

3.) A spokeswoman for the Supreme Court indicated Sunday that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has returned to work from the New York hospital where she had cancerous growths removed from her lungs.

4.) A federal judge in Ohio ruled that a company operating hundreds of CVS pharmacies must face a class action from patients claiming it sent letters disclosing their HIV status on the envelope.

Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis arrives to give House members a classified security briefing, with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, on the murder of Jamal Khashoggi and Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Dec. 13, 2018. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

5.) Irritated with the criticism and fallout from Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’ resignation, President Donald Trump on Sunday pushed the Pentagon chief out the door two months earlier than planned, an acrimonious end to a tense relationship that had been eroding in recent months.

International

Window shoppers look at a pair of Labrador puppies for sale at the Barkworks Pup & Stuff, an upscale pet store at the Westside Pavilion Shopping Center in Los Angeles, on Oct. 4, 2010. Retailers are reporting surprisingly solid sales gains for September, boosted by back-to-school shopping in the first half of the month. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

6.) Britain has banned third-party sales of puppies and kittens to protect the animals from exploitation.

An archaeologist inspects the remains of a horse skeleton in the Pompeii archaeological site, Italy, on Dec. 23, 2018. A tall horse, well-groomed with the saddle and the richly decorated bronze trimmings, believed to have belonged to an high rank military magistrate has been recently discovered, Professor Massimo Osanna, director of the Pompeii archeological site said to the Italian news agency ANSA. (Cesare Abbate/ANSA Via AP)

7.) Archaeologists have unearthed the petrified remains of a harnessed horse and saddle in the stable of an ancient villa in a Pompeii suburb.

Snow-covered Mount Etna, Europe's most active volcano, spews lava during an eruption in the early hours of March 16, 2017. A new eruption that began on March 15 is causing no damages to Catania's airport, which is fully operational. (AP Photo/Salvatore Allegra)

8.) The Mount Etna observatory says lava and ash are spewing from a new fracture on the active Sicilian volcano amid an unusually high level of seismic activity.

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