Alabama
Judge approves deal in Ala prison case over HIV
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — A federal judge has approved a settlement to end the segregation of HIV-positive inmates in Alabama prisons.
U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson issued an opinion Monday saying the agreement isn’t perfect but can take effect.
Female inmates already are living with other prisoners at the state’s lone women’s prison, and male inmates will be integrated into the general prison population next year.
Thompson sided with prisoners in December and ordered the Department of Corrections to quit making HIV-positive inmates live in housing areas away from other prisoners. Thompson held two hearings last week on the resulting settlement.
The American Civil Liberties Union represents inmates who sued to end the practice. Thompson approved $1.3 million in legal fees and expenses that will have to be paid by the state.
Kentucky
Bank sues singer Montgomery over failed restaurant
DANVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Country music star Eddie Montgomery’s steak house may have once been something to be proud of, but now the closed establishment is something causing him legal problems.
Central Bank and Trust Co. of Lexington has sued Montgomery and his ex-wife, Tracy Nunan in Boyle Circuit Court, claiming the couple owes nearly $12.7 million to pay off loans related to the business.
The Advocate-Messenger reported that Montgomery and Nunan personally guaranteed repayment of several loans. Eddie Montgomery’s Steak House opened in 2009 and closed in May.
Montgomery was half of the duo Montgomery Gentry, which had a string of hits for Columbia Records’ Nashville division between 1999 and 2008, including “Lucky Man” and “Something to Be Proud of.”
Neither Montgomery nor Nunan could be reached for comment.
Ohio
Trial is set for alleged military charity scammer
CLEVELAND (AP) — A one-time fugitive is headed to trial on charges of masterminding a $100 million multi-state fraud under the guise of helping Navy veterans.
The defendant headed to trial Monday calls himself Bobby Thompson, but authorities identified him as Harvard-trained lawyer and former military intelligence officer John Donald Cody, 67.
He was arrested last year in Portland, Ore., after two years on the run.
He’s charged with defrauding people who donated to a reputed charity for Navy veterans, the United States Navy Veterans Association based in Tampa, Fla.
The alleged fraud spanned 41 states, including up to $2 million in Ohio. Authorities said little, if any, of the money collected by the charity was used to benefit veterans.
The defendant showered politicians, many of them Republicans, with political donations. His defense team had sought to force testimony by recipients to show his actions were legal, but a judge rejected the move last week.
His attorney said any fraud involved solicitors, not his client.
Authorities said the defendant used his VIP political connections to encourage donors to give to his charity.
While on the run, investigators tracked him through Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Washington and West Virginia.
New Jersey
Chemist gets life in her husband’s poisoning death
NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. (AP) — A judge in New Jersey has sentenced a chemist to life prison for fatally poisoning her husband during a contentious divorce.
Tianle Li (tee-ahn-lay lee) was sentenced Monday. She won’t be eligible for parole for nearly 63 years.
Li denies killing her husband and is appealing her conviction.
The Monroe resident worked for New York City-based biopharmaceutical company Bristol-Myers Squibb. Prosecutors alleged she poisoned husband Xiaoye (zow-yay) Wang, a computer software engineer, by giving him thallium, a tasteless, odorless poison, which she ordered through work in 2010.
Thallium is banned for consumer use in the United States. It can be fatal in tiny doses and is difficult to detect in lab tests.
Wang died in January 2011.
Judge Michael Toto says Wang’s murder was “planned, calculated and committed in a cool and depraved manner.”
Maryland
2nd challenge to Maryland gun control law filed
HAGERSTOWN, Md. (AP) — The state of Maryland faces a second challenge to a gun control law set to take effect Tuesday.
On Friday, a collection of gun shops, firearm associations and people with pending handgun permit applications filed the complaint in U.S. District Court in Baltimore. They’re challenging a provision requiring prospective buyers to submit their fingerprints to obtain a handgun qualification license.
The plaintiffs say that because Maryland State Police are already overwhelmed with permit applications, the additional procedures would create an unconstitutional, de facto ban on handgun sales.
Many of the same plaintiffs filed a separate lawsuit Thursday challenging other provisions of the law. They’re asking the court to consider both complaints at a hearing Tuesday. The plaintiffs are asking for an order that would temporarily block enforcement.
Arizona
Judge bars tactic by Joe Arpaio in immigration bust
PHOENIX (AP) — A federal judge has barred use of a policy that allowed people who paid to be sneaked into the United States to be charged under Arizona’s immigrant smuggling law as conspirators to the crime.
U.S. District Judge Robert Broomfield’s ruling Friday said the interpretation of the 2005 state law conflicts with federal law.
Broomfield’s ruling is the latest in a series of restrictions placed on Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s immigration enforcement efforts.
Seventy-five percent of the people charged under the smuggling law in the state’s most populous county through June 2011 were charged with conspiring to sneak themselves into the country.
Immigrant rights advocates argued that the law was intended for often-violent smugglers, not their customers.
Defenders of the tactic argued that the interpretation didn’t conflict with federal law.
