Trials

Prosecutors on Tuesday painted a disturbing picture of former Orange County Sheriff Michael S. Carona's management of California's second-largest sheriff's department, citing testimony that he accepted secret cash payments, had numerous illicit sexual affairs, and provided badges and concealed weapons licenses to campaign contributors. In his closing argument, Assistant U.S. Atty.

Two weeks after his murder conviction was overturned, Bruce Lisker appeared Friday in Los Angeles County Superior Court to once again face charges for the 1983 slaying of his mother. During a brief hearing in front of Judge Peter Espinoza, Lisker, dressed in a dark suit, listened as the prosecutor read the same murder charge that was filed in 1983 and asked him how he pleaded. "Not guilty," Lisker, 44, responded. In an interview with The Times after the hearing, Lisker said he was confident that he would be exonerated at a retrial.

Sipping a cup of coffee in the Los Angeles courthouse where he is on trial for fraud, math teacher Matthias Vheru said all he wanted to do was write the best algebra book possible to help his students and those of his colleagues. "I spent my life trying to help underachieving kids," said Vheru, wearing a tie with a mathematical equation that read: 2 teach is 2 touch life 4 ever. "I'm just trying to make the language of math easy to understand."

A jury can decide whether the author of a bestselling book about the death of Playboy playmate Anna Nicole Smith defamed her lawyer by making allegations that may be too outlandish to be true, including that he pimped her to up to 50 men a year, a judge concluded Wednesday. U.S. District Judge Denny Chin found plenty of reasons to let a jury hear the facts behind a $60-million libel lawsuit brought by lawyer Howard K. Stern against "Blonde Ambition" author Rita Cosby, a veteran television news anchor and "Inside Edition" correspondent.

After four months of testimony that cast a harsh light on the operatic lives of East Coast social royalty -- with tales of greed, abuse and bitter family feuds -- a jury today convicted legendary philanthropist Brooke Astor's son of tricking her into changing her will. The jury, which deliberated 11 full days, found Anthony D. Marshall guilty on 14 of the 16 counts against him, including grand larceny involving the theft of cash and art, possession of stolen property and conspiracy to defraud Astor.

President Obama signaled his intention Wednesday to press forward on his plan to close the Guantanamo Bay prison, despite a growing challenge from both political parties and a limited set of options to make his detainee policy work. In a sign of his lost momentum, the Senate on Wednesday voted 90 to 6 to block funding for the shutdown. The vote followed criticism that the administration was backtracking on Americans' security.

The chief judge at the Guantanamo Bay war crimes court Thursday rejected President Obama's call to halt the prosecution of terrorism suspects, ruling that a delay in the case of a Saudi accused in the Cole attack would "not serve the interests of justice." Army Col. James L. Pohl said the government's request to postpone until May the Feb. 9 arraignment of Abd al Rahim al Nashiri was "not reasonable."

A man accused of being drunk and at the wheel of a car that slammed into a motorcycle, killing the driver, will go on trial Monday for murder, authorities said. If convicted, Jonathan Barber, 28, could get a maximum sentence of 15 years to life in prison for the 2003 incident. Prosecutors said he was driving 100 mph on Irvine Boulevard when his car struck Carla Olsen's motorcycle, killing her. Police said he was driving on a suspended license and fled the scene.

Inside a courthouse cordoned off by yellow tape and a phalanx of police, the alleged perpetrators of China's tainted-milk scandal are being brought to trial here. But the sensational consumer safety case has been shrouded in so much secrecy that it is hard to say whether justice is in fact being done.

Mexican media giant Grupo Televisa on Tuesday accused its longtime television partner, Univision Communications Inc., of heavy-handed tactics and financial shenanigans during the opening day of a high-stakes trial in Los Angeles. The outcome of the court case, expected to unfold over the next three weeks unless there is a surprise settlement, could reshape the landscape of Spanish-language television in the U.S.