The plaintiffs, Kathleen Hanni of Napa, Calif., and Catherine Ray of Fayetteville, Ark., want courts to certify the cases as class actions covering thousands of passengers stranded on American flights when severe weather temporarily shut Dallas/Fort Worth airport on Dec. 29, 2006, forcing flights to go to other airports.

Both women's flights were diverted to Austin. The complaints allege passengers suffered hunger, thirst, illness, emotional distress and financial losses when American (AMR) failed to supply the planes with food or water, empty the toilets or let passengers off.

The complaints were filed in state courts last week in Napa and Fayetteville.

American spokesman John Hotard declined to comment on the complaints, saying he had not seen them. He noted that since December 2006, American has implemented new procedures designed to prevent recurrences. Those include a guideline limiting ground delays to four hours when possible and letting passengers deplane when it is safe to do so.

Hotard said a record number of American flights were diverted Dec. 29, 2006, because of severe thunderstorms.

"That was our largest weather disruption, ever, and we handled it the best we could," he said. "I think we have fixed the problem and lawsuits are not necessary."

The cases come amid public and congressional calls for stronger regulation of how airlines treat customers. A New York law that would penalize airlines for holding passengers on planes without food and water took effect Tuesday, and the U.S. House of Representatives has passed a bill that would force airlines to provide essential needs to stranded fliers.

"We're looking for justice for the passengers," Hanni said in an interview Monday.

After her experience, she founded Coalition for an Airline Passengers' Bill Of Rights.

Class actions against airlines when no crash is involved are unusual but not unprecedented. In 2001, Northwest Airlines (NWA) settled a similar class-action lawsuit by paying $7.1 million to passengers held aboard grounded planes in Detroit for up to eight hours during a January 1999 blizzard.

Aviation lawyer Jon Schneider of Boston said proving false imprisonment will be "a stretch."

"The passengers voluntarily boarded the plane," he said. "They will have to demonstrate the airline was completely unreasonable. I think the airline's response will be that they didn't do it intentionally."

Hanni's complaint says the captain told passengers American's management would not allow the plane to go to a gate. It says that after 9 hours 17 minutes, the captain declared an emergency so he could go to a gate.

During the delay, passengers received only a bag of pretzels and a cup of water, and the plane's toilets overflowed, it says.

Hanni said American later gave her a $500 coupon for a future flight. She said she hasn't used it.

The appeals court is stopping any transfer while it considers Ahmed Belbacha's request that he not be returned to his home country.

Belbacha was brought to Guantanamo Bay in 2002 from Pakistan. He had been an accountant at the Algerian government's oil company, Sonatrach.

Belbacha said that after he was recalled for a second term of service in the Algerian army, he was targeted with death threats by terrorists in Groupe Islamique Armee, then at the height of a violent campaign for an Islamic Algeria.

Belbacha never reported for duty, but he said the GIA visited his home at least twice and threatened him and his family. He left the country, traveling to France, England, Pakistan and Afghanistan before being taken into custody and sent to Guantanamo Bay.

The U.S. military has classified Belbacha as an enemy combatant, saying he associated with the Taliban in Afghanistan. The U.S. government said he is eligible for transfer subject to appropriate diplomatic arrangements for another country to take him.

Belbacha's lawyer, David Remes, said he went to court after hearing from a confidential source that Belbacha was to be sent to Algeria.

The opponents, mainly Democrats, view voter ID a modern-day poll tax that disproportionately affect poor, minority and elderly voters — who tend to back Democrats. Yet, a federal judge found that opponents of the law were unable to produce evidence of a single Indiana resident who had been barred from voting because of the law.

The Supreme Court, which famously split 5-4 in the case that sealed the 2000 presidential election for George Bush, will take up the Indiana law on January 9, just as the 2008 presidential primaries are getting under way.

A decision should come by late June, in time to be felt in the November elections in Indiana and in Georgia, the other state with a strict photo ID requirement, as well as in a handful of other states.

The justices will be asked to decide whether the law is an impermissible attempt to discourage certain voters or a reasonable precaution among several efforts aimed at cutting down on illegal voting.

"There's more than a little bit of irony in going to the Supreme Court and asking them to rise above partisan politics in election cases," said Richard Hasen, an election law expert at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles.

The court's decision in the disputed 2000 election is partly responsible for the ensuing increase in election-related lawsuits and the loss of confidence by some groups in the voting system, Hasen said. Yet, the other branches of government seem more politicized than ever, leaving the court as the best option despite the 2000 election dispute, he said.

Indiana argues that demands for identification are frequent in today's society, and producing a photo ID at polling places is hardly onerous.

"In light of such widespread demands for ... government-issued photo identification, it is almost shocking that in late 2007 Indiana can be characterized as even unusual in requiring it at the polls," the state said in its court filing.

The Bush administration maintains states need not wait for fraud to occur to take action to prevent it. "The state's interest in deterring voter fraud before it happens is evident from the monumental harm that can come from such fraud," the government said in its supporting brief.

The law's opponents counter that an ID may be just one card among many in most people's wallets, but some groups are far less likely to have them.

Homeless people wanting to vote might face the most difficulty under the law. While the state will provide a voter ID card free of charge to the poor, applicants still must have a birth certificate or other documentation to get the ID card.

"I think it's wonderful, but if you can't prove who you are, you can't get an ID," said Carter Wolf, executive director of Horizon House, which provides services to homeless people.

Getting a birth certification isn't always easy, Wolf said, or cheap. Sometimes it can cost $60 to $70 to get a birth certificate from other states.

"Obtaining a photo identification card under Indiana law requires documentation that is difficult, if not impossible, for many homeless individuals to provide," Carter Phillips, a leading Supreme Court lawyer, wrote in a supporting brief.

Even without an ID, indigent people can cast provisional ballots, then show up within 10 days at county offices and sign a form attesting to their vote.

But the Marion County Election Board, which includes Indianapolis, said just two of 34 voters who cast provisional ballots because they lacked voter ID showed up at county offices to validate their vote in the 2007 municipal election. Their signatures all matched those on file, but could not be counted because of the photo ID requirement.

Hasen said while neither side has abundant evidence to back its position the fraud argument is far less plausible than the claim that and ID requirement will reduce voter turnout.

Someone wanting to sway an election through fraud would be unlikely to get individuals to show up at the polls, pretend to be someone else and then ask them to cast a secret, unverifiable ballot, said Hasen.

But he said, "When voting is more difficult, people tend to not vote."

Opponents to the law argue the real potential for voter fraud lies in the filing of absentee ballots and that Indiana has made it easier to vote absentee in recent years.

James M. DiBlasio, 38, of Carmel, Ind., worked for Aspen-based Ski.com from September 2004 to November 2006, court documents said. The company is a travel agency that specializes in ski vacations.

An indictment accused him of accessing a Ski.com server in Denver to delete airline reservations and other information. Ski.com's losses were estimated at $5,000.

He originally was charged with two counts of unlawful access to protected computers and seven counts of intentional damage to protected computers.

A statement filed in U.S. District Court in Denver said DiBlasio planned to plead guilty to one count of each charge. A change of plea hearing was scheduled for Thursday.

A former sheriff's deputy who suffered a career-ending back injury when shocked by a Taser stun gun during training has lost an attempt to revive his product liability lawsuit.

The Arizona Court of Appeals on Monday upheld a Maricopa County Superior Court jury's verdict for Scottsdale-based Taser International Inc. in a lawsuit filed by Samuel Powers, a former county sheriff's deputy.

A three-judge Court of Appeals panel ruled unanimously that a trial judge was correct to rule that Powers wasn't entitled to have jurors instructed they could hold Taser liable for dangers that the company didn't learn of until Powers' injury.

Arizona has not adopted a so-called "hindsight" test for strict liability product claims involving allegations of failing of defects, the Court of Appeals said.

Employing the hindsight test in warning defect cases "would be tantamount to imposing a duty on manufacturers to warn of unknowable dangers," Judge Daniel A. Baker wrote for the panel.

Powers, a 16-year veteran of the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office, was shocked July 16, 2002, while participating in an MCSO training and certification course on Taser's M-26 stun gun.

According to court papers, he suffered a compression fracture of a spinal disc and, during treatment, was discovered to have severe osteoporosis, a condition that weakens bones. His doctor ordered him restricted to light duty, and Powers resigned as a deputy on June 2003.

Powers' suit alleged that Taser's M-26 stun gun was unreasonably dangerous and defective because it lacked adequate instructions and warnings, but Taser argued that it did not know that the muscle contractions produced by the weapon were strong enough to cause a fracture.

The ruling also upheld the trial court's order that Powers reimburse Taser for its expert witness fees and costs because Powers had rejected a pretrial settlement offer that would have been more favorable to him than the eventual outcome of the case.

Powers argued that the payment order was improper because the settlement offer was conditioned on its terms being kept confidential, but the Court of Appeals said that requirement didn't violate state court rules.

Thomas C. Wilmer, one of Powers' attorney, said he hadn't seen the Court of Appeals ruling but that it was likely that Powers would ask the Arizona Supreme Court to review it.

Property-casualty insurer Travelers Cos. Inc. said Monday it settled a class action lawsuit for an undisclosed amount, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The lawsuit, brought by certain shareholders of the company, alleged violations of federal securities laws, saying the company failed to disclose its practice of paying brokers commissions on a contingent basis, among other things.

Additionally, the St. Paul, Minn.-based company reached an agreement with the attorneys general of Florida, Hawaii, Maryland, Michigan, Oregon, Texas, West Virginia, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia -- as well as the chief financial officer of Florida and the Office of Insurance Regulation of Florida -- settling their industrywide investigations into insurance placement practices.

Both settlements are subject to court approval. Travelers said the settlements will not affect its financial results. Details of the agreements were not released.