A: No, you cannot deduct as theft losses the amount you invested in Enron stock that is not covered by the reimbursement.

The Internal Revenue Service stated in an April 19, 2004, notice that it would "disallow such deductions and may impose penalties" on taxpayers who claimed theft loss deductions for "the decline in market value of their stock caused by disclosure of accounting fraud or other illegal misconduct of the officers or directors of the corporation that issued the stock."

The tax code limits losses for individuals to:

• Losses incurred in a trade or business.

• Losses incurred in any transaction entered into for profit outside of a trade or business, which are called capital losses.

• Losses of property not connected with a trade or business or a transaction entered into for profit, if such losses arise from theft or casualties, such as fire, storm and shipwreck, which are called theft or casualty losses.

In its notice, the IRS cites several judicial rulings that have found that capital losses do not become theft losses, even when a stock becomes worthless because of "corporate officers misrepresenting the financial condition of the corporation, even when the officers were indicted for securities fraud or other criminal violations."

You can challenge that determination by filing a lawsuit and proving in court that the "loss resulted from a taking of property that is illegal under the law of the state where it occurred and that the taking was done with criminal intent."

Otherwise, claim a capital loss.

Capital losses are deducted first from capital gains, and then again up to $3,000 of other income. Any amounts of the loss remaining can be carried over into future tax years. A carry-over loss may be deducted from capital gains in later years plus up to $3,000 of ordinary income.

Ryan's lawyers said in a petition to the court that the trial judge replaced two jurors with alternates after deliberations in the case had already begun.

"The manipulation of the jury's composition deprived the petitioners of the fundamental right to a fair trial by an impartial jury," Ryan's petition said.

The jurors' opinions on the case were already known when trial Judge Rebecca R. Pallmeyer replaced two of them for omitting mention of their police records on pretrial questionnaires, the petition says.

The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which upheld Ryan's conviction, erred in not seeing that the jury irregularities ruined any chance the trial would be fair, the petition read.

The petition asks the Supreme Court, which turns away most appeals, to consider the case.

A message left at the office of U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald on Wednesday night was not immediately returned.

The Supreme Court may be the last stop in the long quest by the former governor to get out from under his conviction and the 6 1/2-year sentence he is serving in a federal prison.

Ryan, who turns 74 next month, was convicted of steering lucrative leases and contracts to lobbyists and cronies in exchange for valuables ranging from vacations in Jamaica and Mexico to a free golf bag. He was also convicted of using state workers and money to run his campaigns and of quashing an investigation into bribes paid in the secretary of state's office in exchange for drivers licenses.

Joining Ryan in the petition was businessman Larry Warner, who made millions of dollars in state leases and contracts from the secretary of state office Ryan held before being elected governor.

Law firm Stinson Morrison Hecker has marshaled some of its lawyers from different specialties to form the Climate Change Practice Group.

The group's members include David Bengtson, Stinson's Wichita managing partner, as well as 29 other lawyers in five of Stinson's eight offices across the country.

Mark Johnson, practice leader of the climate change group and a lawyer practicing in environmental law, said several factors led the Kansas City, Mo.-based firm to form the practice group. Those include client needs and an increasing focus at the state and federal levels on climate change legislation.

The idea solidified when Johnson attended a seminar on the Clean Air Act last year in Washington, D.C.

"It seemed like the discussions were dominated by climate change," he said.

Legislation in Congress, such as the America's Climate Security Act, whichaims to cut greenhouse gas emissions, will likely have an impact on business, Johnson said.

A bill has been introduced in the Missouri Legislature that would require greenhouse gas emissions reporting and also calls for greenhouse gas reductions.

And in Kansas, Sunflower Electric Power Corp., which wants to build two coal-fired power plants, is battling state regulators over the potential of carbon dioxide emissions.

"I think it's really a reaction to the changing legal environment... in which all of our clients operate," Bengtson said of the creation of the practice group.

Johnson and Bengtson, who specialize in the oil and gas industry, said the lawyers in the practice group specialize in several areas, including securities law, corporate law and real estate.

Bengtson and Johnson think Stinson is the first firm in Kansas and Missouri to create a practice group representing businesses affected by climate change issues.

Local law firm officials said they are not aware of other firms forming similar practice groups, though there are lawyers in the Wichita area who specialize in environmental law.

Nationally, there are firms that have similar environment-focused practice groups, including Hogan & Hartson in Washington, D.C., and Perkins Coie in Seattle.

Linda Diane Sherrow faces up to five years in prison when she returns for sentencing April 21 in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles.

The former California Institution for Men correctional officer entered the guilty plea to perjury Wednesday.

The 49-year-old Sherrow lied to the grand jury in 2004. The panel was investigating fellow officer Shayne Ziska, who had helped inmates associated with the Nazi Low Riders prison gang.

Ziska was eventually sentenced to more than 17 years in prison for racketeering and civil rights allegations.

But when Albrecht's parents learned years later that they had buried him without a brain, they filed a lawsuit that raises ethical, moral and religious questions about the treatment of one's body after death.

The case, to be argued Wednesday before the Ohio Supreme Court, has drawn international attention for its ramifications to coroners, crime investigators, EMTs, funeral directors and followers of religions that espouse the importance of burying the whole body.

The Albrechts argue that they had a right under the Ohio Constitution to their son's brain, and a right under the U.S. Constitution to reclaim the brain before it was destroyed. The lawsuit is a class action suit against coroners and commissioners in 87 of Ohio's 88 counties covering cases dating to 1991.

Under Ohio law, brains, hearts and other body parts and fluids removed during an autopsy are classified as medical waste, which generally means they are incinerated after use.

"What this case really comes down to is, for the convenience of the government, are we Ohioans, we humans, supposed to give up our most basic rights to the human remains of our loved ones?" said John Metz, an attorney who brought the Albrechts' suit. "I am absolutely amazed to have to be standing in front of the highest court in our state to defend against such a socialist view."

Defenders of the coroners, including the Ohio State Coroners Association, Ohio State Medical Association and the National Association of Medical Examiners, contend that establishing property rights for families to the organs, tissue, blood and other fluids extracted during an autopsy could jeopardize timely autopsies and jeopardize criminal evidence.

"The longer you wait to perform an autopsy, the more evidence and information you lose," said Elizabeth Mason, an assistant Clermont County prosecutor leading the county coroners' defense.

Brains are particularly difficult to reunite with a body in time for burial, because it takes three to 14 days to prepare them for examination.

Mason anticipates an onslaught of litigation against counties if the Albrechts prevail. Relatives are often upset about autopsies taking place, and may begin negotiating with coroners about what to do with body parts. But relatives may not always agree with each other.

"I call that the 'Chicken-Little-Sky-Is-Falling' defense," Metz said. "We recognize you, as the state, have a right to our loved one's body to do an autopsy. But once you're done, all you have to do is pick up the phone and talk to these people, and say, 'I'm done with your child's heart.'"

Metz and co-counsel Patrick Perotti have been taken to task before the court for making a legal question too emotional. Perotti's briefs have contained references to Achilles' slaying of Hector in The Iliad, the drowning of Shakespeare's Ophelia and poet Walt Whitman's "I Sing The Body Electric."

Lawyers for the coroners at one point tried and failed to get one particularly verbose submission — which traced the history of death from ancient to modern times — stricken from the record.

"We don't dispute that it is a cultural norm for us to accord that kind of respect for our dead," Mason said. "But that doesn't mean that when they went out to get Hector's body back, they scraped up every drop of blood to make sure they got everything."

In a brief, the Medical Examiners Association said material from a dead body is almost always lost. Bodies lose fluids at accident scenes and parts of some bodies are never found, the group said.

It argued that material taken by coroners is being singled out unfairly in this case.

Christopher Albrecht, 30, died in December 2001 when he suddenly plunged his vehicle into a pond.

The coroner determined that an epileptic seizure prompted his accident, but that his death was caused by drowning.

According to the autopsy, a portion of his brain had been removed during his life as part of a surgical procedure related to his epilepsy.

The Government has been accused of a "cavalier" attitude to personal information after it emerged that four CDs containing details from court cases have gone missing in the post.

In the latest embarrassing loss of potentially sensitive data, the computer discs vanished after being sent by recorded delivery.

Greater Manchester Police (GMP) hand-delivered the four CD-Roms to Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Court Administration (HMICA) on December 6.

The discs contained details of at least 55 magistrates' court defendants and other "restricted" data not released in open court, the Daily Mail reported.

They went missing after being posted on December 15, according to the paper.

A GMP spokesman said the CDs contain only "routine material" and were handed to HMICA by police in a "completely secure way" before going missing later.

The police spokesman could not confirm whether the discs contain details of witnesses, although he said they may have held defendants' names.

HMICA has launched an internal investigation into what has happened to the discs.

Shadow justice secretary Nick Herbert said: "Yet another data blunder suggests a cavalier attitude to the handling of personal information by Government agencies.

"We need to know whether this is a problem limited to these courts, or whether it is more widespread across the criminal justice system."