A contractor doing business with the Army has pleaded guilty to providing an illegal gratuity to the former director of construction at Fort Carson.

Wendel P. Torres, a registered agent with a Colorado Springs-based company, faces up to two years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Torres pleaded guilty to a charge that in May 2007 he delivered $3,500 in construction materials to a home owned by William T. Armstrong, former construction division chief at the posts' Directorate of Contracting.

Armstrong was sentenced earlier this month to a year of probation and fined $5,000 for failing to disclose the illegal gratuity.

The charges are part of the Justice Department's ongoing investigation into contracts awarded at Fort Carson.

A federal judge on Tuesday ordered the U.S. government to pay more than $2.5 million in attorney fees and damages after he concluded investigators wiretapped the phones of a suspected terrorist organization without a warrant.

U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker said the attorneys for the Ashland, Ore., chapter of the now-defunct Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation should receive $2.5 million for waging its nearly five-year legal challenge to the Bush administration's so-called Terrorist Surveillance Program.

Walker also awarded $20,400 each to Wendell Belew and Asim Ghafoor, two of the foundation's Washington D.C.-based lawyers. They had their phone conversations with Al-Haramain principals monitored, the judge said.

"The system worked," Ghafoor said. "And we really hope that the government lets this stand and writes it off as a bad program from a previous administration.."

Earlier this year the judge found that investigators illegally intercepted the electronic communications without warrants. Government lawyers have refused throughout the litigation to disclose whether investigators eavesdropped, "although the fact of such surveillance is not in doubt," the judge concluded.

The Department of Justice lawyer who defended the program in court for the Bush administration and then the Obama administration, Anthony J. Coppolino, didn't return a phone call late Tuesday.

The judge refused to award any punitive damages, saying the investigators didn't act in bad faith in following the guidelines of the controversial program exposed by the New York Times in 2005.

A Corpus Christi-area man has pleaded guilty to two weapons charges and will forfeit a grenade launcher and more than 11,000 rounds of ammunition.

Jeremy Charles Davenport of Odem will be sentenced March 9, 2011, and faces up to 10 years in prison on each count.

Davenport on Tuesday pleaded guilty to being in possession of an improvised explosive device when he was arrested Sept. 29 by Corpus Christi police in a domestic disturbance investigation. Davenport also pleaded guilty to being a drug user in possession of 19 firearms, including a machine gun.

Federal law bars the possession of firearms while being an unlawful user of a controlled substance. Davenport, who says he was using cocaine at the time of the incident, remains in custody.

The House has passed a sweeping bill aimed at making food safer following recent contaminations in peanuts, eggs and produce, sending it to President Barack Obama for his signature.

The legislation passed Tuesday would give the government broad new powers to inspect processing plants, order recalls and impose stricter standards for imported foods. The $1.4 billion bill would also require larger farms and food manufacturers to prepare detailed food safety plans and tell the Food and Drug Administration how they are working to keep their food safe at different stages of production.

Praising the House, FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said the bill will give her agency new tools to make substantial improvements in food safety.

"This law makes everyone responsible and accountable at each step in today's global food supply chain," Hamburg said.

The food safety bill has faced several false starts since the House first passed it in July 2009. It stalled in the Senate for more than a year as small farms objected to the increased oversight and conservatives complained about the cost. Most recently, the Senate passed the bill in November with tax provisions that were supposed to originate in the House under the Constitution, threatening completion of the bill.

House leaders tried to revive the bill by including it in year-end budget legislation, but that legislation later died when Senate Republicans objected to adding food safety and other unrelated measures to the giant spending bill. Democratic leader Harry Reid gave the legislation a last-minute, surprise reprieve Sunday by working with Republicans to pass a stand-alone food safety bill by voice vote, sending it to the House. The House passed it 215-144, sending it to Obama just under the wire as Congress prepares to adjourn for the year.

The head of the judiciary in England and Wales ruled Monday that there is no ban on using Twitter in court.

Lord Chief Justice Igor Judge said the use of "unobtrusive, hand held, virtually silent" equipment to give live text updates was unlikely to interfere with the administration of justice.

Among the traditions of British justice — alongside lawyers' black robes and horsehair wigs — are strict restrictions on communications. Cameras and recording equipment are banned, phones are usually prohibited, and even court artists are barred from sketching in the courtroom — they must make notes and then go outside to draw.

Twitter has been a gray area. Last week a judge allowed journalists to tweet from a bail hearing for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange — the first time it had been expressly permitted. But two days later the judge at another hearing for Assange said tweeting was barred.

The chief justice said there was no legal prohibition on using "a mobile phone, small laptop or similar piece of equipment, solely in order to make live text-based communications of the proceedings" — giving journalists a green light to tweet, text or liveblog from hearings.

But he said users would have to seek the judge's permission first, and this could be refused in criminal trials if there was a risk that information posted on Twitter might influence witnesses or jurors.

Ernst & Young LLP may be sued for fraud as early as today by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo for allegedly helping Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. mislead investors, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Cuomo will be sworn in as governor on Jan. 1. The suit would relate to Ernst & Young’s audits of Lehman financial statements aimed at downplaying its liabilities, said the person, who wasn’t authorized to speak publicly about the case. The fraud suit would be brought under the state’s Martin Act, said the person, adding that a settlement is possible.

Richard Bamberger, a spokesman for Cuomo’s office, declined to comment. Charles Perkins, a spokesman for Ernst & Young, declined to comment. The Wall Street Journal said earlier today a lawsuit might be filed this week.

Lehman, once the fourth-largest investment bank, failed in September 2008 because of risky real estate bets and too much debt including Repo 105 trades, which it tried to hide from investors, according to bankruptcy examiner Anton Valukas’s report. Valukas, in the report, said Ernst & Young could be accused of “professional malpractice” for its role as auditor.

Repo 105 transactions are a form of short-term financing that Valukas said Lehman used to move as much as $50 billion off its balance sheet temporarily to show investors it wasn’t carrying too much debt.