A California state judge issued a preliminary ruling Tuesday invalidating May revisions to the state lethal injection protocol . Judge Lynn O'Malley Taylor of the Marin County Superior Court said that the proposed changes qualified as a regulation, and thus did not conform to the California Administrative Procedure Act because there had been no opportunity [...]

A Spanish court Wednesday convicted three men of murder for their roles in the 2004 Madrid train bombings , and found 18 others guilty on other charges. Seven others were acquitted, including accused mastermind Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed . Those convicted of murder – Jamel Zougam, Otman el Ghanoui, and Emilio Trashorras – each received [...]

Lt. Col. Colby Vokey, the outspoken US Marine Corps chief defense lawyer for the western US, is resigning from his post effective May 1, 2008, calling the military legal system at Guantanamo Bay "horrific" and a "sham" and urging corrective action to address abuses within the general military justice system, NPR reported Tuesday. While working [...]

The Supreme Court of Pakistan will investigate the suicide bombing that took place during the parade welcoming home exiled former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto earlier this month, Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry said Wednesday. Chaudhry said that the court will undertake its own investigation beginning with a hearing on Thursday, despite the Pakistan government's [...]

Three political leaders in Spain's Basque region, including the president of the region, were ordered to stand trial Tuesday for meeting publicly with members of the Batasuna party to negotiate an ETA ceasefire. The Batasuna party is alleged to be a front for the illegal Basque separatist militant group ETA, which has been blamed for [...]

The UK Law Lords ruled Wednesday that the government can continue to impose control orders on terror suspects in lieu of detention, but said that some elements of the orders issued under the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 violate human rights. In a series of decisions – Secretary of State for the Home Department v. [...]

CIA Director Michael Hayden defended the CIA's interrogation tactics Tuesday in the wake of the refusal of US Attorney General nominee Michael Mukasey to say whether waterboarding constitutes torture. In an address to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Hayden called the CIA's interrogation programs "as lawful as they are valuable." AP has more. Both [...]

AT&T and the US Department of Justice reached a consent decree Tuesday under which the telecommunications giant agreed to sell assets in seven rural US markets in exchange for DOJ approval of AT&T's acquisition of Dobson Communications Corp. and the withdrawal of the DOJ's lawsuit seeking to block the merger. The DOJ required the sale [...]

The US Supreme Court granted a stay of execution to a convicted murderer on Mississippi's death row Tuesday, pending the Court's decision on whether to grant certiorari in the case. Earl Wesley Berry was scheduled to die by lethal injection Tuesday night; his was the third stay granted by the justices since they agreed last [...]

US Attorney General nominee Michael Mukasey wrote in a letter to Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday that he did not know if waterboarding was illegal, and that it would be "irresponsible" of him to provide a legal opinion on any specific interrogation technique without an in depth analysis of relevant laws and more [...]