Arizona

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is working to open its first small-scale grocery stores in Arizona, according to city planning officials, as the world's largest retailer looks to fend off competition from British supermarket rival Tesco. Tesco entered the U.S. marketplace last year, opening 37 Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market stores in California, Arizona and Nevada. The company is seeking to woo U.S. shoppers with small grocery stores that feature ready-to-eat meals and fresh produce. Bentonville, Ark.

Sen. John McCain's run for the presidency is gaining momentum across the nation, but the campaign is meeting disapproval in one of the most unlikely places: his home turf in Arizona. In a straw poll vote two weeks ago of 721 Republican leaders in Maricopa County, the major population center of the state, a majority ranked McCain as the least acceptable Republican candidate for president. The reason, Republicans say, is his record on illegal immigration.

A federal judge Thursday upheld a controversial new Arizona law that mandates the closure of businesses that knowingly hire illegal immigrants. U.S. District Judge Neil Wake rejected the arguments of business and immigrant-rights groups, which sued saying the law was an unconstitutional usurping of the federal government's right to regulate immigration. "The act does not make employers conform to a stricter form of conduct than federal law," Wake wrote in his 37-page decision.

On an uninviting swatch of arid desert, marked by sagebrush and mesquite trees just east of the California border, the winds of war blew together the fates of two beleaguered peoples. In a now familiar tale, 120,000 Japanese Americans were removed from the West Coast and relocated to internment camps after Japan's 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor and the subsequent U.S. entry into World War II. But in a little known piece of that history, the U.S.

Rep. Rick Renzi, a three-term Republican from Arizona, was charged in a federal indictment unsealed Friday with multiple counts of wrongdoing, including using his official position to promote a land deal that secretly brought millions to him and a business partner. The indictment, handed up by a federal grand jury in Tucson late Thursday and revealed by Justice Department officials at a news conference Friday, charges Renzi with 35 counts, including extortion, money laundering and fraud.

The Supreme Court agreed Monday to rule on whether police officers are free to search a parked vehicle whenever they arrest a driver or a passenger. Prosecutors, including Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley, asked the high court to set "a clear, bright-line rule" that permits officers to search a vehicle whenever an arrest is made, even if the handcuffed person has been taken away.

A U.S. Border Patrol agent was threatened with a rock when he fatally shot an illegal immigrant, his defense attorney told a federal jury Wednesday, but a prosecutor contended that the man did not provoke the attack. "The victim was surrendering, going down on his knees, was hit from behind . . . and shot through the heart while surrendering," special prosecutor Grant Woods told jurors during opening statements in the agent's trial.

A federal appeals court Thursday refused to block a controversial Arizona law that shuts down businesses for knowingly hiring illegal immigrants. The action by the three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco clears the way for the statute to be enforced beginning Saturday. In a brief order, the judges said that business and immigrant rights groups had not shown an adequate need for delaying enforcement of the law. After the measure went into effect Jan.

As it has become the favorite entry point for undocumented migrants trying to sneak into the United States, Arizona has become a laboratory for whether a state can single-handedly combat illegal immigration. In recent years it has barred illegal immigrants from receiving government services, from winning punitive damages in lawsuits and from posting bail for serious crimes. A new state law shuts down businesses that hire illegal workers.

One of two men charged in a series of random slayings that terrorized the Phoenix area in 2005 and 2006 pleaded guilty Friday to first-degree murder. The move does not guarantee that Samuel Dieteman, 32, will be spared a death sentence, which prosecutors said they still intend to pursue. However, Dieteman's agreement to testify against his alleged partner, Dale Hausner, will be taken into account when a jury considers his penalty.