Drug testing delayed for Mississippi welfare recipients
(Reuters) – A new Mississippi law requiring drug testing for some welfare recipients will not take effect on July 1 as scheduled after state officials agreed to allow civil liberties groups to voice concerns at an upcoming public hearing.
‘Miscommunications’ followed Newtown school shooting, parents say
HARTFORD Conn. (Reuters) – Parents of some of the 20 first graders shot dead at Sandy Hook Elementary School told a gubernatorial commission on Friday there were “serious miscommunications” among local, state and federal authorities during the 2012 attack and in its aftermath.
Suicide nets approved for San Francisco’s Golden Gate bridge
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – It could soon be a lot harder for people bent on suicide to leap from San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge, as California state officials approved a funding plan on Friday to install mesh barriers beneath the historic span to ca…
Hawaii sentences ex-soldier to life for killing daughter: report
(Reuters) – A former U.S. Army soldier convicted of killing his daughter was spared the death penalty on Friday, sentenced to life in prison by a Honolulu jury in Hawaii’s first such capital case since it became a state in 1959, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser newspaper reported. 
Montana judge facing censure tied to rape case calls penalty unprecedented
(Reuters) – A Montana judge facing suspension by the state’s top court for implying a 14-year-old girl was partly to blame for her rape by a teacher and imposing an unlawfully lenient sentence in the case contends his punishment was unprecedented and s…
U.S. appeals court blocks lawsuits over Darvon, Darvocet painkillers
(Reuters) – A federal appeals court on Friday upheld the dismissal of nearly all claims in 68 cases seeking to hold drug makers liable for injuries from the use of the prescription painkillers Darvon and Darvocet, which were pulled from the U.S. market…
Wrongly convicted men speak of injustice after ‘Central Park Jogger’ deal
NEW YORK (Reuters) – A group of men wrongfully convicted of raping a jogger in New York’s Central Park in 1989 said they continued to battle feelings of injustice on Friday, a day after the city signed a $40 million settlement to end their civil rights…
New Jersey may be first state to ban smoking on beaches, in parks
NEW YORK (Reuters) – New Jersey could become the first state in the nation to ban cigarettes, cigars and other tobacco products in all public parks and beaches if Governor Chris Christie signs into law a sweeping anti-smoking bill approved by lawmakers…
Kansas coal plant fight back in court; emission concerns cited
(Reuters) – A long-running battle over coal-fired energy in Kansas continued Friday as the Sierra Club environmental group filed a legal challenge to the state’s issuance of a permit intended to give a green light to a controversial new power plant.
Massachusetts abortion clinics boost security, lawmakers seek fix
BOSTON (Reuters) – Massachusetts is beefing up security around abortion clinics and scrambling for a legal fix after the U.S. Supreme Court voided the state’s buffer zone law that kept protesters 35 feet away, saying it violated freedom of speech.
