The Ohio State Lantern is reporting that the university has paid a Columbus law firm nearly $142,000 to represent players during recent NCAA investigations into the eligibility of several Buckeyes athletes.

The student newspaper reports that the firm of Crabbe, Brown and James LLP has been paid $141,814.30 as of mid-September. Ohio State spokeswoman Shelly Hoffman confirmed the total.

Larry James, who has represented several suspended players, says the money has not come from the university's general fund but directed questions to Ohio State.

Ohio State has had players suspended from three different NCAA investigations over the past 10 months, including accepting improper benefits from a tattoo-parlor owner, taking too much in pay for summer jobs and receiving money to attend a charity event. The university is awaiting a ruling from the NCAA for the violations.

The Delaware Supreme Court is weighing whether to maintain the secrecy surrounding a letter from an actress' lawyer that led to the ouster of former Hewlett-Packard Co. CEO Mark Hurd following allegations of sexual harassment.

The letter was sent to Hurd last year by celebrity attorney Gloria Allred on behalf of Jodie Fisher, an actress who was hired to help with HP networking events and subsequently accused Hurd of sexual harassment.

Fisher reached a private settlement with Hurd in August 2010 for an undisclosed amount. HP announced the next day that Hurd was resigning. Instead of being fired, Hurd walked away with a severance package worth tens of millions of dollars.

A Delaware Court of Chancery judge ruled in March that the letter, which was attached to a complaint filed by an HP shareholder seeking company records regarding Hurd's departure, should be unsealed.

Hurd attorney Rolin Bissell argued Wednesday that Hurd and Fisher expected the letter to be kept confidential. He suggested that disclosure of the letter would violate their rights under California laws regarding personal privacy and the confidentiality of mediation in legal disputes. Bissell also argued that neither Delaware's law regarding shareholder access to corporate books and records, nor the presumption of openness of court records, require unsealing the letter.

A Texas appeals court on Wednesday formally exonerated a former grocery store clerk who spent nearly 25 years in prison for his wife's 1986 beating death, reaffirming a judge's decision to set him free last week based on DNA testing that linked her killing to another man.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals declared Michael Morton innocent of killing his wife, Christine, and made him eligible to receive $80,000 from the state for each year of confinement, or about $2 million total.

Morton, 57, was convicted on the basis of circumstantial evidence and sentenced to life in prison. He maintained over the years that his wife and their 3-year-old son were fine when he left for work at an Austin Safeway the day she was killed, and that an intruder must have attacked her.

DNA found during tests this summer on a bloody bandana discovered near the crime scene matched that of a former convict, who remains at large. Prosecutors recommended that Morton be freed immediately after that man's DNA was also linked to a hair found 17 months later at the scene of another woman's beating death in north Austin, about 15 miles (24 kilometers) from the Mortons' home.

The Supreme Court is grappling with the question of whether jailers need a reason to suspect someone may be hiding a weapon or drugs before subjecting the person to an invasive strip search.

The court on Wednesday heard arguments concerning just how close jail guards can get to inmates who forced to undress and shower — and how thorough those searches can be. The issues arose in the case of Albert Florence, who was arrested on a warrant for an unpaid traffic fine and strip-searched in two county jails.

Corrections and the Obama administration back a policy that allows close searches of anyone entering the general jail population. Lawyers for Florence argue that while people brought in on minor charges can be asked to disrobe and shower while being watched at a distance, they should not have to submit to a more thorough search without reason.