Law firm Williams Mullen has signed a 75,000-square-foot lease to relocate to downtown Raleigh's RBC Plaza.

The building's owner, Raleigh's Highwoods Properties (NYSE: HIW), announced the lease Wednesday. It said the office space in 293,000-square-foot RBC Plaza, which is under construction, is now 95 percent preleased.

Williams Mullen will relocate from Highwoods Tower I in north Raleigh, where the law firm occupies 51,000 square feet. The company plans to move to RBC Plaza in the third quarter of 2009.

"We are excited to be moving to RBC Plaza and the heart of downtown Raleigh," Williams Mullen director Keith Kapp said in a statement. "This is a great opportunity for us to be in a central location in the newest office building in the city. We have been customers of Highwoods for many years and are very pleased to be able to extend this mutually beneficial relationship."

Triangle Business Journal first reported that Williams Mullen was looking to take space in the RBC Plaza.

The RBC Plaza, a 29-story tower that is the tallest building in the Triangle, is scheduled to open this fall with a mix of office, retail and condominium space. All 139 condominiums are under contract with non-refundable deposits, Highwoods says.

Cozen O'Connor has asked Commonwealth Court to reconsider its argument that the Ethics Board is wrong in requiring that donations to Brady's mayoral campaign committee, for the purpose of retiring his debt, comply with the city's limits on donor contributions.

Brady incurred nearly $450,000 in legal fees during his successful fight to stay on the ballot during last year's mayoral primary. He would be able to pay that debt off faster and easier if donors now were permitted to exceed the city caps in that race, which were $5,000 per individual, and $20,000 per political committee.

But in a ruling last month, Common Pleas Court Judge Gary F. DiVito dismissed Cozen O'Connor's lawsuit, saying the firm lacked the legal standing to challenge the city law

The decision by the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia is the latest twist in a decade-long legal battle over the Child Online Protection Act. The fight has already reached the Supreme Court and could be headed back there.

The law, which has not taken effect, would bar Web sites from making harmful content available to minors over the Internet. The act was passed the year after the Supreme Court ruled that another law intended to protect children from explicit material online — the Communications Decency Act — was unconstitutional in the landmark case Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union.

The ACLU challenged the 1998 law on behalf of a coalition of writers, artists, health educators and the publisher Salon Media Group.

ACLU attorney Chris Hansen argued that Congress has been trying to restrict speech on the Internet far more than it can restrict speech in books and magazines. But, he said, "the rules should be the same."

Indeed, the Child Online Protection Act would effectively force all Web sites to provide only family-friendly content because it is not feasible to lock children out of sites that are lawful for adults, said John Morris, general counsel for the Center for Democracy & Technology, a civil liberties group that filed briefs against the law.

The group said Monday it intends to ask a judge in Collin County, Texas, to postpone the shareholder meeting EDS has scheduled for July 31, when investors are scheduled to vote on whether to approve HP's takeover of the Plano, Texas-based company. A hearing is set for Thursday on the group's request.

The group believes that the EDS board agreed to sell the company for too little money.

HP is offering $25 per share for EDS, a nearly 33 percent premium over where EDS stock stood before the proposed acquisition was announced in May. Including debt held by EDS, HP values the acquisition at $13.9 billion.

Gun dealers will start selling the revolver this fall, with some profits going to the Second Amendment Foundation, a pro-gun legal-action group that is teaming with Smith & Wesson on the project.

“I think it’s a phenomenal idea. It’s going to be a collector’s item for sure,” said Jim Wallace, executive director of the Northboro-based Gun Owners’ Action League of Massachusetts. “I wouldn’t mind having it in my collection.”

Some see the special pistol as a shrewd move by Smith & Wesson to target gun enthusiasts, especially those who may still be sore about the company’s 2000 adoption of gun-safety measures to settle a federal lawsuit. That controversial capitulation sparked a National Rifle Association boycott.

“This commemorative gun, although seemingly tasteful, is clearly playing to the extreme gun-rights audience,” said John Rosenthal, the founder of Stop Handgun Violence Inc., a nonprofit group known for its gun-control billboard on the Massachusetts Turnpike near Fenway Park. “It’s less than an honorable move.”

The Model 442 revolver has a suggested retail price of $561 but the commemorative version would presumably cost more.

Tom Taylor, Smith & Wesson’s vice president of marketing, did not return calls for comment.

Last month’s 5-4 ruling was the Supreme Court’s first conclusive interpretation of the Second Amendment since it was ratified in 1791, according to constitutional scholars. The decision affirmed the right to keep guns in self-defense in the home but at the same time was not expected to affect existing federal gun restrictions.

Eric Hunt, 24, was convicted in San Francisco Superior Court of one felony charge of false imprisonment with a hate crime allegation. Hunt was also convicted of two misdemeanor counts — one for battery and one for elder abuse.

The jury dismissed charges of attempted kidnapping, stalking and a second false imprisonment charge.

He had withdrawn his original not guilty by reason of insanity plea, eliminating the need for a second trial to determine his sanity at the time of the crime.

Hunt shook in his seat after the verdict was read. He could face as long as three years in prison.

"We are pleased with the verdict," said his attorney, John Runfola. "I'm just saddened it took this long to get justice for this young guy who is mentally ill."

During the nine-day trial, Wiesel, 79, testified that he thought Hunt was trying to kidnap him when he was forcefully pulled off an elevator at San Francisco's Argent Hotel on Feb. 1, 2007.

On the witness stand, Wiesel read comments allegedly written on a Web site by Hunt calling Wiesel's accounts of the Holocaust "fictitious."

Wiesel's parents and younger sister died in Nazi death camps during World War II. He received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 and has written more than 40 books, many of them about the Holocaust and Judaism.