In a turnaround from its position just a day earlier, the Environmental Protection Agency canceled a controversial study Friday involving the effects of pesticides on children. The EPA had planned to seek the advice of outside scientific experts before making a final determination on the suspended CHEERS study, but mounting pressure from Democrats willing to [...]

United States v. Hansl, United States District Court for the Southern District of Iowa Central Division, Judge Robert Pratt, April 8, 2005 . Excerpt: In this case, Defendant's admissions regarding his personal conduct as a Death's Head guard leave no room for factual dispute as to whether he personally advocated or assisted in persecution. As [...]

Joint Doctrine for Detainee Operations, US Department of Defense, March 23, 2005 . Read the full text of the publication . Reported in JURIST's Paper Chase here.

US District Judge Robert Pratt ruled Friday that a former Nazi guard who became a US citizen must relinquish his naturalization papers and passport. John Hansl of Des Moines Iowa, now 80, came to the United States under a 1953 immigration law intended to exclude people who aided in the persecution of others because of [...]

Michael Ross testified Friday at a hearing that he wants to be executed next month, defending his right to give up his death-row appeals. Ross says that he wants to spare his victims' families additional agony, but his father and a court-appointed lawyer believe that he may be suffering from mental illness and trying to [...]

Judge Thomas Horne of the Virginia Loudoun County Circuit sentenced a former Internet spammer to nine years in prison Friday for violating a Virginia anti-spam law in the first US felony prosecution for sending unsolicited bulk e-mail. Jaynes was indicted when investigators discovered that he was sending 10 million e-mails a day through a network [...]

Philip Alston , a UN human rights investigator speaking in Geneva Friday, urged countries to remove their "cloak of secrecy" and disclose the numbers of prisoners executed and those waiting on death row. Alston, an Australian jurist and law professor, remarked that secrecy undermines procedural safeguards that ensure fairness and prevent errors and abuse. He [...]

Six major electronics companies have been indicted for allegedly defrauding the federal E-Rate program, a $2.25 billion per-year project that assists underfunded schools and libraries in accessing the Internet. While some companies are accused of overcharging equipment and submitting false accounting statements, others are accused of bid rigging and billing the government for items never [...]

AP is reporting that Eric Rudolph has agreed to plead guilty to four terrorist attacks, including the 1996 bombing at the Atlanta Olympic Games.

Lawyers for Mikhail Khodorkovsky , the former CEO of Yukos , concluded their defense of the oil magnate Friday before the three judge panel that has heard the trial for the past 10 months. Khodorkovsky , once Russia's richest man, has been fending off charges of fraud, embezzlement, and tax evasion, arguing that the case [...]