Courtroom

The defendant was an immense man, well over 300 pounds, but in the gravity of his sorrow and shame he seemed larger still. He hunched forward in the sturdy wooden armchair that barely contained him, sobbing softly into tissue after tissue, a leg bouncing nervously under the table. In the first pew of spectators sat his wife, looking stricken, absently twisting her wedding band. The room was a sepulcher. Witnesses spoke softly of events so painful that many lost their composure. When a hospital emergency room nurse described how the defendant had behaved after the...

Apple will appear Monday before a federal court in a stubborn quest to defend its name and beat down charges that it led a conspiracy to inflate e-book prices . And as Apple fiercely protects its own image, the company will work to sully the reputation of its rival Amazon.com . The Justice Department filed suit against Apple and five book publishers in April 2012, accusing them of price fixing in an effort to outflank Amazon in...

Richard Ramirez, the serial killer known as "the Night Stalker" who terrorized Los Angeles County and was convicted in 1989 of 13 murders, died Friday, California corrections officials said. He was 53. Mr. Ramirez died of natural causes at a hospital in Marin County, the department said in a statement. No details were released. Sentenced to death, Mr. Ramirez, who was housed at San Quentin prison, was one of 735 offenders facing execution and one of 59 who have died from natural causes since...

They sit on a rough bench in the late-afternoon sun, three women looking as ancient as the city itself, residents of a place similar to so many others in Russia, where the forces that rule their lives are distant and poorly understood. Like the three women, most Russians are paying little attention to the trial here of Alexei Navalny, a charismatic opposition leader in Moscow who is charged with embezzling from the local timber company when he served as a volunteer adviser to the governor in 2009.

Steven Bochco said he has always been fascinated by the law. "Law shows and cop shows are a wonderful opportunity to look at morals," said Bochco, whose 10-episode "Raising the Bar" debuts Monday on TNT. "You see the challenges -- the kind of compromises people are challenged, forced or seduced into making. " Bochco, a creator of "NYPD Blue" and "L.A. Law," teamed up with former New York public defender David Feige to create the new courtroom drama. The show follows public defenders and district attorneys as they clash over cases.

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia, Feb. 8 -- A Cambodian genocide victim confronted a former Khmer Rouge leader in a courtroom here Friday, demanding to know who was responsible for the "hellish regime" that killed about 1.7 million people, including her parents. "It's the first time a victim is able to stand up and confront a defendant. It's extremely symbolic," said Peter Foster, a spokesman for Cambodia's U.N.-backed genocide tribunal. "We made history today. " The encounter came when Theary Seng took the stand on the second day...

GREENSBORO, N.C. — Something exceedingly strange is happening at the John Edwards trial : all four alternate jurors dressed in red shirts Friday. They each wore bright yellow the day before.    Coincidence? Few here think so.    The demeanor of the alternate jurors and their behavior has become the talk of the courthouse. The alternates enter the courtroom each day giggling among themselves. One of the alternates, an attractive young woman, has been spotted smiling at...

The gay former Army lieutenant who handcuffed himself to the White House fence to protest the military's now repealed "don't ask, don't tell" policy was found guilty in federal court on Thursday and fined $100. The guilty finding against Daniel Choi came as the West Point graduate tried to turn the usually staid courtroom of the District's federal court into a lively venue for protesting his prosecution for his role in the November 2010 demonstration . ...

A young Rockville man who crashed his car and fled from the scene, leaving three of his friends dead or dying, was sentenced to 20 years in prison Thursday after an emotional hearing that revealed the deep rift the wreck has brought to a once close-knit community. Kevin Coffay, 20, told a packed courtroom that he was "deeply sorry" for the May 15 crash that killed Spencer Datt, 18; John Hoover, 20; and Haeley McGuire, 18. The group rode with Coffay between two late-night parties that included drinking...

Tom Keary answered his jury duty summons the same way that dozens of other District residents did Wednesday, arriving at D.C. Superior Court at 8 a.m. It wasn't until a clerk called him and about 40 other prospective jurors to a courtroom that things took an unusual turn: The trial, for felony assault, was before Judge Ann O'Regan Keary, his wife of nearly 40 years. It's common for judges to see friends, neighbors or colleagues in their courtrooms, and they are generally dismissed to...

It's the thing of heart-stopping nightmares — that free fall into darkness. And it actually happened to a 6-year-old boy in a Washington parking garage. He tumbled two stories into darkness down an open air shaft and landed, broken and bleeding, on the concrete floor. Oops, the suits said. They didn't realize it was uncovered. Giovanni Destefano survived that fall in 2009 and is now 10 years old. He had surgeries to fix the broken wrists and the slashed scalp. But he still has nightmares.

The gay former Army lieutenant who handcuffed himself to the White House fence to protest the military's now repealed "don't ask, don't tell" policy was found guilty in federal court on Thursday and fined $100. The guilty finding against Daniel Choi came as the West Point graduate tried to turn the usually staid courtroom of the District's federal court into a lively venue for protesting his prosecution for his role in the November 2010 demonstration . Magistrate...

At the beginning of David Mamet's film "Phil Spector" (premiering on HBO Sunday night), some boilerplate text cautions viewers against watching it too literally. That means you're supposed to put away the smartphone and stop with the Wikipedia fact-checks you usually perform while watching anything based on a true story. Though it is obviously based on the shooting death of actress Lana Clarkson at the legendary record producer's home in 2003 — he was convicted of second-degree murder six...

Prince George's County developer Pat Ricker may be in federal prison in a county corruption case, but one of his proposed developments got a boost Friday from the Prince George's planning board in an Upper Marlboro courtroom. A group of Temple Hills residents is fighting a plan that would allow Ricker to build three houses on a lot where the zoning only allows two. To do this, he won permission from the planning board in 2011 to extend the neighborhood's dead-end street into an...

A military lawyer at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, acknowledged Tuesday that microphones are hidden inside devices that look like smoke detectors in the rooms where defense lawyers meet detainees, but he said the government does not listen in on attorney-client communications. Both civilian and military defense lawyers at Guantanamo Bay meet their clients at a facility known as Echo 2, a camp that has about eight meeting huts. Navy Capt. Thomas J. Welsh, staff judge advocate at the base,...

A defense lawyer at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, said Monday that there is "overwhelming circumstantial evidence" that the U.S. government is listening to privileged communications between high-value detainees accused of orchestrating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and their attorneys. Cheryl Bormann, who represents Yemeni defendant Walid bin Attash, said devices designed to look like smoke detectors and placed in client meeting rooms were in fact audio monitors. The issue of eavesdropping...

About 30 years ago, the newest District Court judge in Prince William County was in his hometown of Norfolk, his car on a tow truck hook, looking to sweet-talk or pay his way out of an expensive and timely ordeal as a result of parking illegally. The way that longtime prosecutor and now judge William E. Jarvis tells the story, it's with some distance and caution — but, he says, there's little harm now. The statute of limitations has long passed. Jarvis would know. He's described as an...

A military lawyer at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, acknowledged Tuesday that microphones are hidden inside devices that look like smoke detectors in the rooms where defense lawyers meet detainees, but he said the government does not listen in on attorney-client communications. Both civilian and military defense lawyers at Guantanamo Bay meet their clients at a facility known as Echo 2, a camp that has about eight meeting huts. Navy Capt. Thomas J. Welsh, staff judge advocate at the base, said he...

Several months after federal officials filed suit against authorities in Meridian, Miss., for operating a "school-to-prison pipeline," a new report cites harsh school discipline practices across the state that it contends have steered students into the justice system. The report, which four civil rights groups plan to release Thursday, comes after proposals from both the Obama administration and Mississippi leaders to provide more funding for police in schools, which advocates argue could make...

Shortly after a lunch break in a recent drug trial, as D.C. Superior Court Judge Robert Richter began reading jurors their instructions, the defendant leaned over and began punching his court-appointed attorney in the face. U.S. marshals quickly pulled Jamal H. Baptist off his attorney and escorted him to a cellblock, according to several people who were in the room or otherwise familiar with the incident. Attorney Ian Williams was taken to the courthouse nurses' station, his mouth covered in...