A unit of Seiko Epson Corp agreed to plead guilty to one count of conspiring to fix prices for liquid crystal screens sold to mobile phone maker Motorola Inc, the U.S. Justice Department said on Tuesday.

Epson Imaging Devices Corp, which was known as Sanyo Epson Imaging Devices Corp at the time of the conspiracy, agreed to pay a $26 million fine for the conspiracy involving LCD panels that were used in Razr mobile phones from late 2005 through mid-2006, the government said.

The company was charged with agreeing with unnamed co-conpirators in Japan to charge certain prices for so-called Thin Film Transistor-Liquid Crystal Display panels and issuing price quotations in line with those agreements, the Justice Department said.

In addition to the guilty plea, which is subject to court approval, Epson also agreed to continue with the ongoing antitrust investigation.

An attempt to reach the company for comment was not immediately successful.

The suit, which was filed in Illinois, claims Wells Fargo failed to accurately assess the value of customers' houses before deciding to cut the size of their credit lines. San Francisco-based Wells Fargo is being accused of using unreliable computer models that wrongly valued home prices too low to justify cutting the size of customers' loans.

Home equity lines of credit are similar to credit cards in that a customer has a credit limit and can continue to borrow money until the limit is reached. Once a portion is paid off, it again becomes accessible to borrow. But, home equity lines of credit are backed by a borrower's property, whereas credit cares are unsecured.

Michael Hickman, who filed the lawsuit on behalf of himself and is seeking class action status for it, claims Wells Fargo also did not provide proper notice that the bank was reducing the size of the credit lines.

The bank's notice for reducing the lines also did not specifically provide a new estimated value for the property or the method used to determine the houses value. Hickman's lawsuit said that information was needed so a customer could challenge the change in the credit limit and try and reinstate the previous limit.

Hickman is being represented by KamberEdelson LLC, a Chicago-based law firm, which is also representing clients that have filed similar suits against JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc.

Nearly all banks have been hit hard by mounting loan losses tied to residential real estate over the past two years. Reducing lines of credit can limit exposure to the struggling sector.

A federal appeals court has revived a discrimination lawsuit brought by black employees who claim they worked in a racially hostile environment at a Nucor Steel mill in South Carolina, attorneys said Tuesday.

The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said in a decision issued Aug. 7 that the case against the Charlotte-based manufacturer can go forward with class-action status. It has been sent back to federal district court and will be tried in Charleston, S.C.

"While this class certification doesn't mean they've won ... the decision is a victory," lead attorney Robert L. Wiggins Jr. said in a statement. "Being involved in this case as a plaintiff has taken courage, but these individuals believed that it was important to change the horrific situation at Nucor for all black employees, and not just themselves."

The lawsuit, originally filed in December 2003, charged that racial slurs and monkey noises were broadcast over the radio system at the company's Huger, S.C. mill. The plaintiffs — seven black former and current Nucor employees — also claim that racially charged e-mails depicting blacks with nooses around their necks were circulated, some employees used racial slurs when referring to black workers and that the mill discriminated against blacks in making promotions.

Richmond, Va.-based Massey said in a statement Friday that the retirement of former Justice Larry Starcher last year prompted it to give up the suit.

Starcher was known for often harsh criticism of Massey chief Don Blankenship. At various times over the years, Starcher called Blankenship "stupid" and a "clown."

Massey filed the suit in U.S. District Court in 2006 after Starcher refused to recuse himself from an appeal involving the company.

A spokeswoman for the Supreme Court had no immediate comment Friday.

Opponents of General Motors Corp.'s plan to sell the bulk of itself to a new government-controlled company face a noon deadline to file appeals and find a way to get the sale halted.

But with their options dwindling and time running out, it's increasingly likely that U.S. Judge Robert Gerber's order approving the sale will go through at noon Eastern, paving the way for the automaker's speedy exit from Chapter 11.

GM's lawyers are working to get documents ready to close the sale quickly if the deadline passes and the sale is legally allowed to go through.

"We'll do it as quickly as possible," GM spokesman Tom Wilkinson said Thursday morning.

The sale is the centerpiece of Detroit-based GM's government-endorsed plan to emerge from court oversight. Once it becomes final, the automaker will be largely free to emerge from bankruptcy protection.

Gerber issued a ruling approving the sale late Sunday, but gave its objectors a four-day window to file appeals. The ruling followed a three-day hearing the week before during which attorneys for several groups including argued against its approval.

Some of the most vocal objectors included groups of people with product-related claims against the automaker. Under the current sale plan, liability for claims related to incidents that occurred before GM's bankruptcy filing won't carry over to "new GM."

That means that those people who claim they were injured as a result of a defective GM product before June 1 will be forced to seek compensation from "old GM," the collection of assets and liabilities leftover from the sale, where they will have to fight with the company's other creditors for a share of what's left.

One of the product liability groups filed papers to appeal Gerber's ruling and asked that the appeal be sent directly to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals for action.

The bankruptcy judge overseeing the Chrysler case had given approval for the company's most valuable assets, such as plants, dealerships and contracts, to become part of a new company in which Fiat would hold a significant stake.

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, in an order issued late Monday, granted a request for a delay of that approval sought by Indiana state pension funds, which had argued that they and other lenders deserved better treatment by the bankruptcy court.

No reason for the delay was given in the order, and there were no details about how quickly the issue could be resolved by the nation's highest court.