Speaking in San Francisco Thursday, ACLU national executive director Anthony Romero criticized parts of the Patriot Act and urged judicial review and public scrutiny of any investigations into alleged terrorism. Romero, who was responding in part to a pitch for renewal made yesterday by President Bush , also cautioned against passing judgment too quickly in [...]

A lawyer for Saddam Hussein said in a BBC interview broadcast Friday that his legal team had not yet received any list of formal charges, despite the Iraqi government's statement that the former Iraqi president's Saddam Hussein's trial could begin within months . Issam Ghazzawi, a Jordanian, also said that the defense hasn't yet seen [...]

The US Senate confirmed Judges David McKeague and Richard Griffin to the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit Thursday by 96-0 and 95-0 votes, respectively. The confirmations came the same day Senators approved former Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor's permanent appointment to the Eleventh Circuit. McKeague was appointed as a federal district judge [...]

Senior Vice President at Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary General Re Richard Napier pleaded guilty Friday to helping international insurance giant AIG misstate its finances. Both Napier and former General Re executive John Houldsworth, who pleaded guilty Thursday to the same charge, worked on a reinsurance transaction with AIG in 2000. Houldsworth's plea agreement indicates that Napier [...]

The Washington-based monitoring group Human Rights First has released a new report detailing a significant rise in violent hate crimes against Jews, Muslims, and immigrants in Europe. In France, anti-Semitic hate crimes rose 63% from 2003 to 2004. In Britain, violent anti-Semitic assaults doubled in 2004. Published to coincide with Conference on Anti-Semitism and Other [...]

The leading Sunni Muslim political grouping in Iraq rejected the Shiite-led Iraqi government's offer of an additional 13 seats on the country's constitutional committee Friday, sticking to its demand for 25 seats and threatening to boycott negotiations on the charter if their demands are not met. Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari had endorsed the offer, which [...]

Financial giant Citigroup said Friday that it will pay $2 billion to settle a class-action lawsuit over its role in helping to engineer a massive accounting fraud at Enron . The settlement will distribute payments to Enron investors who bought stock in the company during the period when Enron sought bankruptcy protection between 1997 and [...]

In an apparent dig at the US, a veteran Spanish anti-terror judge emphasized the necessity of international cooperation, law and reason in the pursuit of terrorism Thursday in a special UN-sponsored meeting in New York . Baltasar Garzon , an investigating judge for Spain's National Court, said "Terrorism is a crime, it's not a movement [...]

Nevada death row inmate Robert McConnell invoked an 11th-hour appeal Thursday night to avoid a scheduled execution at Nevada State Prison , saying he didn't want to die. The former car salesman was sentenced to death for murdering his ex-girlfriend's fiance and told reporters he should have followed through with a plan to murder his [...]

A group of US navy veterans who survived a surprise attack by Israeli forces against their vessel during the Six Day War in 1967 are seeking a Pentagon investigation into alleged Israeli war crimes. Members of the USS Liberty Veterans Association claim that the unprovoked attack, which occurred in international waters against the spy ship [...]