Arizona

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.

A federal judge has blocked a mining company from exploring for uranium near the Grand Canyon, agreeing with environmental groups that sued the U.S. Forest Service for approving the plan without full environmental reviews. The Sierra Club, Grand Canyon Trust and Center for Biological Diversity sued the Forest Service last month for allowing British mining firm VANE Minerals Group to drill as many as 39 holes on seven sites in Kaibab National Forest. The company is seeking commercial quantities of uranium, which has soared in price in recent years and resulted in a wave of new development.

Sen. John McCain championed legislation that will let an Arizona rancher trade remote grassland and ponderosa pine forest here for acres of valuable federally owned property that is ready for development, a land swap that now stands to directly benefit one of his top presidential campaign fundraisers.

When John McCain arrived in the Valley of the Sun nearly three decades ago, he was weighed down with enough negatives to sink most budding politicians. Some Arizonans dismissed him as a carpetbagger shopping for an available House seat -- and a future in Washington politics. Others were annoyed that he had left the wife who waited valiantly for his return from a Hanoi prison, and that he had then married a much younger bride.

Two men were arrested late Saturday in connection with the killing of a NASA engineer and three other people last week, Los Angeles County sheriffs said Sunday. Jae Hwan Shim, 39, of Palmdale and Steve Kwon, 37, were taken into custody in Douglas, Ariz., said Sheriff's Deputy Derrick Thompson. They are suspected of taking part in the killing of Joseph Ciganek, who worked for the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center, as well as a woman and two children June 23 in an Antelope Valley home.

Skylar Deleon, charged with murdering an Arizona couple at sea, tried to cut off his penis with a razor blade while in Orange County Men's Central Jail awaiting trial, sheriff's officials said Friday. Deleon, 29, was hospitalized after the March 13 incident. His penis was reattached and he was returned to jail the next day, said Damon Micalizzi, a spokesman for the Orange County Sheriff's Department.

Rapper DMX was arrested Saturday at a Phoenix mall on suspicion of giving a false name and Social Security number to a hospital to get out of paying for medical expenses. Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio said that when DMX, whose real name is Earl Simmons, went to Scottsdale's Mayo Clinic in April, he gave the name "Troy Jones" and failed to pay a $7,500 bill. DMX attorney Cameron Morgan of Scottsdale declined to comment.

Six months ago, this town of 5,500 took a stand against the most powerful lawman in the state. As Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio's deputies swept through town during a controversial operation searching for illegal immigrants, Mayor Rebecca Jimenez confronted the 76-year-old sheriff and told him he wasn't wanted. The town, founded by Yaqui Indians a century ago, became a symbol of a grass-roots rejection of Arpaio's tough anti-immigration tactics.