Attorneys General

MySpace says it can't guarantee that the people who sign up for its social networking site aren't underage or sex offenders. But it averted a potential legal battle Monday by agreeing to keep trying. A group of 49 state attorneys general probing safety issues at MySpace and other online social networks signed a deal with the Beverly Hills-based unit of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp.

Former Justice Department official Eric H. Holder Jr. emerged Tuesday as Barack Obama's leading candidate for attorney general, and the president-elect's transition team was trying to gauge whether there was sufficient bipartisan support for him in the Senate, sources close to the transition confirmed.

California and 29 other states have taken the side of Enron Corp. shareholders seeking damages from big investment banks in a federal case over the banks' alleged role in Enron's accounting fraud. The states' move puts them at odds with a legal stance the Securities and Exchange Commission staff had considered taking in support of one of the banks, Merrill Lynch & Co., but appears now to have decided against.

The top federal prosecutors in San Diego and San Francisco announced their resignations Tuesday as critics charged the Bush administration with forcing out a growing number of U.S. attorneys without cause. The U.S. attorneys in San Diego and San Francisco, Carol Lam and Kevin V. Ryan respectively, did not comment on whether they had been forced to resign. Lam said she would leave Feb. 15; Ryan gave no date. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), in a Senate speech Tuesday, said at least five other U.

A criminal case against a high-profile abortion provider was seriously flawed, and the state's former attorney general acted unethically while trying to prosecute him, a top aide to the current attorney general said Wednesday. Atty. Gen. Paul Morrison will not pursue 15 of 30 charges filed against Dr. George Tiller of Wichita by his predecessor, Phill Kline, spokeswoman Ashley Anstaett said. She wouldn't discuss the other 15 charges. Tiller is among the few U.S.

Eight months into his new job, California Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown has embarked on two major crusades that hark back to his past political roles. The former governor who passionately guarded the environment is hammering local governments to take heed of climate change as they plan for rising growth. "Global warming, next to nuclear war, is the most significant long-term threat to the United States and the world," he says.

A former U.S. attorney general on Tuesday accused the U.S. attorney in Pittsburgh of launching public corruption probes that targeted Democratic officeholders while looking the other way when presented with evidence of misconduct by Republican officials. The incendiary remarks by Richard L.

Louisiana Atty. Gen. Charles Foti sued the state's largest property insurers Wednesday, accusing them of conspiring to limit payments to policyholders after hurricanes Katrina and Rita and engaging in an elaborate price-fixing scheme. Foti's wide-ranging lawsuit, filed in a state court in New Orleans, alleges that Allstate Insurance Co., State Farm Fire and Casualty Co. and other insurers worked together to manipulate damage estimates and low-ball claims payments after the 2005 hurricanes.

Retired federal judge Michael B. Mukasey was sworn in as the nation's 81st attorney general, filling a vacancy left when Alberto R. Gonzales resigned amid questions about his credibility. Mukasey, 66, was sworn in at a private Justice Department ceremony about 16 hours after he narrowly won Senate confirmation as the third attorney general of the Bush administration. Justice Department spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said Mukasey was joined by family members at the closed-door ceremony.

A wildlife biologist at Grand Canyon National Park most likely died from plague contracted while performing a necropsy on a mountain lion that later tested positive for the disease. Eric York, 37, who worked in the park's cougar-collaring program, became ill on Oct. 30 and called in sick for a couple of days before being found dead in his home Nov. 2. Tests were positive for pneumonic plague. Officials said 49 people who came in contact with York were given antibiotics as a precaution.