In Utah, the judge in the Warren Jeff's polygamy trial has ordered a reporter to write a public service article or be held in contempt of court.

The backdrop: Reporter Katie Baker was a reporter covering the Warren Jeffs trial. She was new to covering trials and didn't know the Judge had entered an order prohibiting reporters from interviewing prospective jurors. Baker interviewed a female potential juror outside the courthouse and the tv station she worked for aired it that night. (The tv station did know about the rule but the regular managing editor was not working on the Jeffs case that day.)

So, is the judge's order proper? First Amendment lawyer guru Floyd Abrams has his doubts and calls the order "extraordinary."

"The notion that a judge can either compel a journalist to write a story, or sit in judgment on a story to determine if it sufficiently serves the public interest, is extremely disturbing," Abrams said in an interview from New York.

"It puts the judge in a classic role of censor," he said. "The judge is deciding whether the story is worthy or not - not even if it's true but whether it's worthy."

The tv station says its reviewing its options.

Bump and Update: Here's the hearing transcript (pdf.)

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The House Judiciary Committee held a hearing yesterday about the Jena 6 case.

Al Sharpton again called for more hate-crime laws. That's not the issue. Nor is the issue whether the "noose incident" justified the beating of a white student.

The issue is whether the Jena 6 defendants were treated more harshly because they are black.

That question still begs an answer.

The police in Scranton, PA apparently have so little crime to address that they've taken to citing people who use bad language in their own homes.

"It doesn't make any sense. I was in my house. It's not like I was outside or drunk," [Dawn] Herb told The Times-Tribune of Scranton. "The toilet was overflowing and leaking down into the kitchen and I was yelling (for my daughter) to get the mop." Herb does not recall exactly what she said, but she admitted letting more than a few bad words fly near an open bathroom window Thursday night.

Would the police have bothered with this if the neighbor who called to complain hadn't been an off-duty cop?

In the not-suprising news, two of O.J. Simpson's co-defendants have taken deals and will testify against him.

Of possible interest is that the co-defendants, Walter Alexander and Charles Cashmore, are pleading to felonies. While I'd expect them not to get jail time in exchange for their testimony, a felony conviction is no walk in the park. It also raises the bar for any plea deal for O.J. I think the prosecution would be hard-pressed to give O.J. a misdemeanor while forcing the others to cop to felonies.

Which means, we may see yet another O.J. trial. The preliminary hearing is set for Nov. 8 and 9th.

Despite settling with Duke University last year over his forced resignation as coach of the Duke Lacrosse team following the barrage of publicity of the unfounded sexual assault charges against some of the team's players, Mike Pressler is suing Duke and trying to rescind the settlement.

His reason: a Senior VP at Duke disparaged him after the settlement.

More...

The New York Daily News reports that Rudy Giuliani pal Bernie Kerik, already disgraced from his failed nomination for Homeland Security Secretary and guilty pleas for state tax violations, is sending his lawyers to Washington for a last-chance meeting with the Justice Department to avoid indictment on federal tax charges:

Kerik's lawyers recently agreed to waive the statute of limitations on the tax charges until Nov. 17, which will allow them to make one last plea to try to ease the pain.

Kerik will go to the Justice Department in Washington in the coming weeks to try to get expected criminal tax charges reduced to civil fines.

Kerik still faces probable charges of bribery and obstruction of justice over a secret meeting with former Giuliani officials in Tribeca in 1999.

More...

Jena Six defendant Mychal Bell was sentenced to 18 months in jail today on a prior juvenile charge. His parents were ordered to pay court costs and witness fees. The prior case involved two counts of simple battery and two counts of criminal destruction of property.

Bell was on probation and had incurred new charges prior to the December 4 incident which resulted in six defendants being charged with felonies.

More...

Actor Kiefer Sutherland has pleaded "no contest" to his latest D.U.I. arrest and will likely serve 48 days in jail. It's his 4th alcohol-related driving offense.

The Los Angeles city attorney's office, as part of a plea deal with Sutherland, recommended that he be sentenced to 48 days in jail. The sentence would reflect 30 days for the misdemeanor charge and 18 days for violating probation on a separate 2004 DUI case.

But Sutherland could be sentenced to as much as a year if the judge who took over the case Tuesday, Stuart M. Rice, rejects the plea deal.....Under the plea deal, a related misdemeanor charge, driving under the influence, was dropped.

The story of his latest arrest is here.

John David "Roy" Atchison, the Florida federal prosecutor arrested in Detroit and charged with planning to have sex with a five year old girl, and who unsuccessfully tried to commit suicide days later, has now succeeded.

He hanged himself this morning at the federal prison in Milan, where he was taken after trying to commit suicide last month at Sanilac County Jail, authorities said.

Officials said Atchison, 53, of Gulf Breeze, Fla., had been housed in solitary confinement and was under close supervision, adding that he had shown no signs of despondency.

Very sad. If the charges were true, this was a man in desperate need of psychiatric help. Our system, it seems, is only geared towards punishment.

Rush Limbaugh is in his final month of probation. When the month is up, the charge of doctor shopping will be dismissed without his ever having had to enter a plea. He will have a clean record.

According to records, he'll have made an estimated $50 million while on conditional liberty.

"All's well that ends well," he said, contemplating the Oct. 31 finish of his 18-month probation, barring unforeseen trouble. "The system is what it is," Limbaugh, 56, said from his oceanfront compound in Palm Beach. "I became addicted to drugs because of a medical condition" - a bad back - "and I'm convinced now that most addicts come to a point where they do drugs just to stave off withdrawal.

The details of Rush's plea bargain are here.

According to court documents, investigators alleged Rush obtained 2,000 pills over a five month period. What a great job his lawyer, Roy Black, did for him. I'm sure it cost him a pretty penny but I hope he appreciates it.

When we last checked in on the Darren Mack case, the prosecutor had been found to have engaged in unethical conduct by speaking with Mack to elicit a confession even though he knew Mack's family had retained counsel for him. The conversation was suppressed.

Mack is accused of killing his wife and then shooting the couples' divorce judge. He was on the lam in Mexico for days before surrendering. He's represented by David Chesnoff of Las Vegas (former partner of Mayor Oscar Goodman) and Scott Freeman.

Today, after three days of jury selection in Reno failed to yield sufficient jurors due to pretrial publicity, the judge ordered the trial moved to Las Vegas.

Mack has plead not guilty by reason of insanity.

The three much maligned and wrongfully charged Duke lacrosse players filed their civil suit against ex-DA Mike Nifong and the City of Durham today.

The three former Duke lacrosse players wrongly accused of rape filed a sweeping civil rights lawsuit today against the city of Durham, a host of police officers, former District Attorney Mike Nifong, and the DNA laboratory hired by the disbarred former prosecutor.

The 162-page lawsuit called the case "one of the most chilling episodes of premeditated police, prosecutorial, and scientific misconduct in modern American history, which resulted in charges brought and maintained against three innocent Duke University students and lacrosse players over a period of more than one year. "

Here's what the players want. The copy of the complaint is here (pdf).

The Defendants: