The National Court said investigative magistrate Santiago Pedraz had produced no new evidence to indicate that the soldiers had acted incorrectly, given that they were in a war situation.

The soldiers, members of a tank crew, said they were responding to hostile fire when they shot at a Baghdad hotel housing Western journalists during the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Spanish cameraman Jose Couso was one of two journalists killed in the shooting. The other was Reuters cameraman Taras Portsyk.

Pedraz first charged the soldiers in 2007. The National Court threw out that indictment this year, saying the evidence was insufficient and concluded the Couso's death was an accident of war.

But Pedraz reinstated it in May citing new evidence from three Spanish journalists who were at the hotel at the time of the shelling and looking out of a hotel window along with Couso.

These reporters testified that the tank had not come under fire before shooting at the Palestine Hotel.

But in the latest ruling, the National Court said their testimonies provided no new evidence which could lead the court to question the soldiers' claims that they believed, rightly or wrongly, they had come under fire, possibly from a sniper.

The 6-0 decision limits the potential liability of companies that made components of lead paint for decades and are now facing dozens of lawsuits by Milwaukee children who ingested paint chips.

The lawsuits, including about 30 that are pending, will still move forward claiming the companies failed to warn consumers of the risks and created a market for a dangerous product, said Milwaukee attorney Peter Earle, who represents the children. But the plaintiffs now cannot add claims of defective product design, which could have been easier to prove.

The case at issue involved a boy who sustained lead poisoning after ingesting paint chips while living in a Milwaukee apartment in 1998, when he was 1. The boy, now 12, suffered learning disabilities as a result, Earle said.

Writing for the majority, Justice Ann Walsh Bradley said the boy and other plaintiffs cannot claim manufacturers of white lead carbonate products used as a pigment in residential paints were responsible for a design defect.

U.S. District Judge David Hittner issued an order saying he will allow the "thousands of potential victims throughout the world" to speak to the court or submit written statements before he accepts a plea agreement in the case between prosecutors and James M. Davis, the ex-chief financial officer of Houston-based Stanford Financial Group.

Davis pleaded not guilty during his arraignment Monday to conspiracy to commit mail, wire and securities fraud; mail fraud; and conspiracy to obstruct a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation.

But his attorney has said the former Stanford finance chief will plead guilty to these charges during a court hearing Aug. 6.

Davis was charged last month as part of the federal government's criminal case against Stanford and executives Laura Pendergest-Holt, Gilberto Lopez and Mark Kuhrt.

Forty-five-year-old John Fautenberry of Oregon was pronounced dead at 10:37 a.m. Tuesday at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville.

Fautenberry was sentenced to death for the slaying of Joseph Daron Jr., who picked him up while he was hitchhiking on Feb. 17, 1991.

Fautenberry also confessed to killing a four people in three other states — Alaska, Oregon and New Jersey — during a five-month period in late 1990 and early 1991.

Fautenberry is the first inmate executed in Ohio since June 3.

Ohio has put 30 men to death since it reinstated the death penalty in 1999.

James M. Davis, accused of helping financier R. Allen Stanford swindle investors in a $7 billion fraud, pleaded not guilty to criminal charges in a U.S. court and was released on bail.

Davis, 60, who was chief financial officer at Stanford Group Co., one of the companies implicated in the alleged plot, will change his plea to guilty at a hearing before U.S. District Judge David Hittner in Houston within the next two weeks, his lawyer said.

“We don’t have an agreed sentence,” David Finn, Davis’s attorney, said after today’s arraignment. “It’s going to be completely the judge’s call.”

Davis, who prosecutors said faces as many as 30 years in prison, was released by U.S. Magistrate Judge Calvin Botley on $500,000 bond with a $5,000 cash deposit, with his in-laws and son as co-signers. Finn entered today’s plea on Davis’s behalf, repeating his intention to change the plea after the government has time to notify victims, as required by federal law.

Stanford and four other people were indicted by a Houston federal grand jury for their roles in an alleged scheme that included the sales of certificates of deposit through Antigua- based Stanford International Bank Ltd. Stanford has denied all charges of wrongdoing.

Davis, the second-highest ranking executive in the Stanford Financial Group of Companies, was charged separately from the other defendants and waived indictment. During most of today’s proceeding, Davis rocked back and forth on his heels with his hands clasped before him, appearing somber in a black business suit. He left the courthouse holding hands with his wife, Lori, without speaking to reporters.

The new arrests, both in a nearby county, bring the total to six.

The Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office confirmed the arrests but declined to identify the latest suspects or release other details.

A spokeswoman said that information would be announced later Tuesday by authorities from Escambia County, where Byrd and Melanie Billings were killed. They were shot to death at their home near Pensacola last week by several intruders caught on surveillance cameras.

The couple had 17 children — four biological and 13 adopted. Nine children were at the home when the Billingses were killed.