Courts

Colombia's civilian courts will take over from military investigators a case that has strained U.S.-Colombian relations -- the killings of 17 civilians, allegedly by a bomb dropped by the Colombian military. The Superior Judicial Council made the ruling after the United States cut off aid last month to the Colombian air force unit involved. The military investigation had languished for four years.

A Los Angeles court late Friday unsealed documents revealing details of billionaire Ronald W. Burkle's bitter divorce fight -- records that he went to extraordinary lengths over the last three years to keep private. The 1,200 pages of documents were made public two days after the California Supreme Court rejected Burkle's effort to keep them under seal, which he said was necessary to protect the safety of his children.

The state's highest court unanimously upheld a ban on cameras in the courtroom, concluding the ban did not violate constitutional rights. Court TV had sought to end the ban, arguing it infringed on the public's right of access to the courts and the press's freedom to cover court proceedings. "In New York state, the decision whether or not to permit cameras in the courtroom is a legislative prerogative," Judge George Bundy Smith wrote in the decision issued in Albany.

Re "The courts and Prop. 8," editorial, Nov. 20 The editorial regarding Prop. 8 cautions, "but the legal system is designed to guard against the tyranny of the majority." What? Any tyranny rests in our convoluted legal system. If the will of the people means nothing, revolution cannot be far behind. The Times' editorialists have gone over the cliff this time around. Barry Cook La Quinta :: I always suspected that you only tolerated the democratic process as long as it furthered your causes.

New World Entertainment lost a round in Massachusetts courts Tuesday in its $401.8-million bid to buy Kenner Parker Toys. In separate rulings, a U.S. District Court judge in Boston denied New World's plea to block enforcement of a Massachusetts anti-takeover law, and a Superior Court in Beverly, Mass., refused to void an order it issued last week blocking the company from buying any more Kenner Parker stock or launching a tender offer.

In a hearing Wednesday, the daughter of "Columbo" star Peter Falk described lifelong tensions between the 81-year-old actor's children and his wife of more than 30 years. Now Catherine Falk and her stepmother are locked in a court battle for control of the ailing star, who has dementia.

On summer nights in the mid-1960s, while black-and-white television crackled elsewhere in his Staten Island home with news of Southern violence and Vietnam, Bobby Lasnik would stretch out in his bedroom to let the righteous soundtrack of the civil rights movement waft into his impressionable teenage soul. Tuned in to WBAI-FM, coming across the water from Manhattan, he heard baleful laments about injustice that he would carry with him for a lifetime. "Suddenly there was someone speaking a certain kind of truth to you. You'd say, 'Wow!

Re Helen Ruppert sentencing ("Woman Gets Probation, Fine in 'War of Roses' Case," Oct. 3): Some feminists won't admit it, but sexism cuts both ways. The sentence of probation shows an example that if a white woman hires thugs to intimidate her spouse not only will she do no time, but her spouse will wind up paying her fine. This reinforces the message to males that the court system is unfair to them in family matters. Your kids can be taken away on her allegations, not yours; you're expected to be the source of support, not her; and worst of all, if she batters, steals, or harasses you, you better take things into your own hands, because no one else is going to help.

When the Legislature passed its landmark makeover of the workers' comp system in April, several hot-button issues were addressed only in the vaguest terms, leaving it to court rulings and bureaucratic regulations to fill in the details. Perhaps the thorniest question involves the law's mandate that existing medical problems must be taken into account when assessing a workers' comp claim.

A Republican senator wants to bar suspected foreign terrorists in the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, from challenging their detentions in U.S. courts. Human rights groups protest the proposal. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) also faces some Senate and White House resistance as he considers trying to attach his proposal to a defense bill the Senate is debating this week, he said. Senators could vote on the proposal as early as today.