Prisoner Releases

Hours after his release from a two-month stint in prison, Sudanese opposition leader Hassan Turabi looked fit and chipper Monday in the reception hall of his Khartoum home. If he was tired at all, it was from the stream of dignitaries, political leaders and family members who came to celebrate his surprise release. One of Africa's most influential and controversial Islamists, Turabi was arrested in January after he called for Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir to turn himself over to the International Criminal Court to face prosecution over his government's counter-insurgency campaign in the Darfur region.

Roy Bennett, an official in Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change, was released on bail by order of Zimbabwe's Supreme Court, and he called for forgiveness and reconciliation in the country. His release after almost a month in jail on terrorism charges could ease tension in the power-sharing government of President Robert Mugabe and Tsvangirai, which faces the task of rebuilding a shattered economy.

Northern Ireland's senior judge ordered the immediate release of six suspected IRA dissidents being interrogated about recent killings of soldiers and a policeman, ruling that their 11-day detention was illegal. Detectives released the suspects but rearrested the most prominent figure in the group, former Irish Republican Army prisoner Colin Duffy, without explanation. The other five covered their faces as supporters drove them away from a police interrogation center. Lord Chief Justice Brian Kerr ruled that all six were being held illegally.

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. has granted the Obama administration's request to block the release of certain sex offenders who have completed their federal prison terms. A federal appeals court earlier had invalidated a law allowing the indefinite commitment of "sexually dangerous" prison inmates. Roberts, in his order, said as many as 77 inmates can continue to be held at a prison in North Carolina at least until the Supreme Court decides whether to hear the administration's appeal of the lower court's ruling.

As he walked out of prison a free man last month, Jessie Rankins barely greeted his wife, exchanging only a few words without kissing or hugging her. It was their fourth wedding anniversary, and he hadn't seen her in 2 1/2 years. "I'll feel better when I see my dog," he said a short time later. Rankins isn't a household name, but his crime was among the most notorious murders in Chicago history. Just a scrawny boy in 1994, he and a friend abducted 5-year-old Eric Morse, dangled the screaming boy out a 14th-floor window at a public housing high-rise and dropped him to his death.

A day after his surprise release from prison, Cuban dissident Nelson Aguiar urged the government Wednesday to free all political prisoners and said he was at one point held in "Stone Age" conditions during his six years behind bars. Aguiar, 64, said he was stunned that he was out of jail because he still had years to go on a 13-year sentence handed out in a 2003 government crackdown on dissidents. Aguiar was one of 75 government opponents arrested and jailed in what became known as the Black Spring of 2003.

A judge ordered all three men jailed in the disappearance of an Alabama teenager freed from custody today. Police officer Adolfo Richardson said the investigation was continuing. Prosecutors appealed the order allowing the conditional release of Surinamese brothers Deepak and Satish Kalpoe. Dutch teenager Joran van der Sloot, who turned 18 in jail, is also to be released conditionally. All reportedly were seen with 18-year-old Natalee Holloway the night she disappeared. They deny any wrongdoing.

A Contra Costa County judge has granted the state an extension to prepare for the likely release of sex predator Cary Verse. Verse, 32, convicted of sexually assaulting two teenage boys and a homeless man, was granted a petition last month for placement in a community release treatment program. The Mental Health Department had 21 days to arrange housing, counseling and other needs. Department lawyer Susan King asked for an extension Friday, saying a treatment provider had backed out of the deal.

Los Angeles County prosecutors acknowledged Tuesday that they failed to inform a West Covina woman about a plea deal in December that allowed her estranged husband out of jail after he pleaded guilty to threatening her with a stun gun. The lapse is one of several decisions the district attorney's office is investigating after Curtis Bernard Harris, 34, kidnapped Monica Thomas-Harris, 37, and killed her before taking his own life over the weekend at a Whittier motel.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is expected today to propose shutting 48 state parks -- including some popular Southern California beaches -- releasing far more prison inmates than previously projected and increasing car fees for the second straight year as part of his solution to the state's fiscal crisis.