A federal judge on Friday delayed a decision on whether to approve a plan to distribute the money, part of a $40 billion lawsuit alleging that financial institutions that worked with Enron participated in the accounting fraud that led to the company's downfall.

U.S. District Judge Melinda Harmon also held off on whether to approve $688 million in attorneys' fees being requested by San Diego-based Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins LLP, the law firm for the lead plaintiffs in the case. If approved, the attorneys' fees would be the largest in a securities fraud case.

After a 4 1/2 hour hearing during which attorneys, Enron investors and former Enron employees argued both for and against the distribution plan and the attorney fees, Harmon said she would make decisions on both issues as soon as possible.

Patrick Coughlin, attorney for the regents of the University of California, who are the lead plantiffs, called the plan to distribute the $7.2 billion "fair and reasonable."

"The plan is doing whatever it can to help employees get whatever they can," he said.

In general, the plan is calculating shares of the settlement fund using a formula that factors in such things as when a security was bought or sold, the purchase price paid and the type of stock that was bought.

Enron stock sold for as much as $90 per share before plummeting to as low as $1 right before the company declared bankruptcy. But under the plan, shareholders and investors are set to get only a fraction of what they lost after the once mighty energy giant spiraled into bankruptcy.

To be eligible for the settlement, investors and shareholders needed to have bought Enron or Enron-related securities between Sept. 9, 1997, and Dec. 2, 2001.

About 1.5 million individuals are eligible to receive money from the settlement fund.

Coughlin also asked Harmon to approve the $688 million in attorneys' fees, saying the amount is part of an agreement his law firm signed with the regents when it first took the case six years ago to be given 9.5 percent of any settlement.

In justifying the fees, he cited several reasons, including that the 9.5 percent was far lower than the standard 33 percent most lawyers get in similar cases; the complexity of the lawsuit; and the risk involved in taking on a case that offered no guarantee of any settlements.

"This is the largest class (action) settlement ever. There is no case comparable to this result," he said.

But attorneys for several investors objected to the distribution plan and the attorneys' fees.

Avi Garbow, an attorney for former Enron workers who lost money through the company's savings plan and employee stock ownership plan, said the distribution plan was unfair because it doesn't treat all investors and shareholders equally and some will be compensated more than they should be at the expense of others.

Lawrence Schonbrun, who represents another investor, called the attorney fees being requested exorbitant and "an affront to every working person in this country."

The $7.2 billion comes mostly from settlements made with such financial institutions as Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup.

There are still several financial institutions that remain as defendants in the Enron case, including Merrill Lynch & Co., Credit Suisse First Boston and Barclays Bank PLC. Several former Enron officers also remain, including former chief executive Jeffrey Skilling.

But the lawsuit has been on hold since an appeals court last year ruled shareholders and investors could not sue as a class, which would have allowed them to pool their resources to sue as a group and have more leverage to settle the case out of court.

The U.S. Supreme Court in January refused to hear arguments in the lawsuit. The high court in a similar case gave a measure of protection from securities lawsuits to suppliers, banks, accountants and law firms that do business with corporations engaging in securities fraud.

Attorneys for Merrill Lynch & Co., Credit Suisse First Boston and Barclays Bank PLC have said they will again ask Harmon to drop their clients from the lawsuit in light of the Supreme Court's ruling in the similar case.

Enron, once the nation's seventh-largest company, entered bankruptcy proceedings in December 2001 after years of accounting tricks could no longer hide billions in debt or make failing ventures appear profitable. The collapse wiped out thousands of jobs, more than $60 billion in market value and more than $2 billion in pension plans.

Enron founder Kenneth Lay and Skilling were convicted in 2006 for their roles in the company's collapse. Skilling is serving a sentence of more than 24 years. Lay's convictions for conspiracy, fraud and other charges were wiped out after he died of heart disease in 2006.

A convicted sex offender who was forced to move by a state law can't return home. He has no rights to the property because his wife owns it, a judge ruled.
 
The man, identified in court records as John B. Doe, had filed a lawsuit challenging a state law that prohibits convicted sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of a school, public park or youth program center.

Doe, who was convicted of child seduction in 2000 and released from probation the following year, was forced to move from his home near a church that offers youth programs. He argued that the law violated his rights by unfairly punishing him again.

Judge Thomas Busch of Tippecanoe Superior Court ruled against Doe on Tuesday, noting that the home was owned by Doe's wife, not Doe, so his property rights were not violated.
Busch also noted similar challenges that had been defeated in other states.

"Under the circumstances, the court finds that injunctive relief forbidding the prosecutor and sheriff from enforcing this law in this case is not in the public interest," Busch wrote in his 11-page ruling.

Doe's lawsuit was one of three filed in Tippecanoe County challenging the law that forced 28 offenders in the area to move or be charged with a Class D felony. None of the three has succeeded in court.

Doe's attorney, Earl McCoy, did not immediately return a message seeking comment left by the Journal & Courier of Lafayette.

Faust Villazan of Western Springs pleaded guilty in May to one count of wire fraud and one count of mail fraud.

Villazan is the former owner of the since-dissolved Faustech Industries. The company qualified as a minority-owned business and allegedly posed as a 30% partner with the Siemens subsidiary when the larger company sought the $49 million contract.

The Siemens subsidiary was also ordered to pay $2.5 million in fines and restitution.

The Michigan Supreme Court unanimously upheld two lower court rulings ordering the release of documents. They were made public hours after the ruling.

The papers pertain to an $8.4 million settlement between the city and two former police officers who alleged they were fired or forced to resign for investigating claims that Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick used his security unit to cover up extramarital affairs.

They include the initial settlement agreement between the city and the former officers, which makes reference to embarrassing and sexually explicit text messages between Kilpatrick and former Chief of Staff Christine Beatty. The unsealed documents do not include transcripts of the actual messages.

They also include a transcript of a Jan. 30 deposition of attorney Michael Stefani, who represented the two former officers in their lawsuit, by lawyers for two newspapers that sued to get the sealed documents, The Detroit Free Press and The Detroit News. In the deposition, Stefani said he thought Kilpatrick rejected an Oct. 17 settlement agreement because the Free Press had filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the settlement.

"I'm presuming, but don't know for a fact, that they — that is, Mayor Kilpatrick and perhaps Beatty, did not ... want the reference to the text messages in the settlement agreement," Stefani said.

After the mayor rejected that agreement, a separate confidentiality agreement detailing how the text messages would be kept secret was reached Nov. 1 between all parties.

City Corporation Counsel John Johnson said the city is disappointed by the ruling.

"Opening up settlement information to public view will most certainly put a chilling effect on parties trying to settle cases," Johnson said in a statement. "This ruling discourages the city from entering into the time honored and cost effective process of mediation."

The Detroit Free Press and The Detroit News sued the city to get the sealed documents. The city argued the documents should remain sealed because they involved communications between attorneys during court-ordered mediation, but the high court ruled "there is no FOIA exemption for settlement agreements," referring to the state's Freedom of Information Act.

The Free Press first reported last month about the text messages between the married mayor and Beatty, who also was married at the time. The newspaper has not said how it obtained the messages.

Both denied under oath having a physical relationship during the former officers' lawsuit, and the unsealed documents could be used in an ongoing perjury investigation of Kilpatrick. Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy is investigating and has said she expects to have a decision by mid-March.

"This is complete vindication for the idea that public officials cannot lie under oath and go behind closed doors in secrecy to make decisions with so much public money in the balance," Free Press Editor Paul Anger said in a story posted on the paper's Web site. "The public's right to know has been upheld."

James E. Stewart, attorney for the News, said the public will soon "have access to their own records. These are public records involving the expenditure of millions of dollars of public money that the mayor has attempted to keep from the public and the City Council."

The victims' families clamored for a trial, and prosecutors felt there was plenty of evidence for one. So they moved to rescind the deal.

They were rebuked Wednesday by a judge, who said their regrets weren't grounds for them to renege on an agreement reached weeks ago.

The judge's order means Michael Mastromarino, 44, will go to prison for 18 to 54 years for his ghoulish crimes — possibly putting him behind bars for the rest of his life.

"Mr. Mastromarino may never see the light of day," said Brooklyn Judge Albert Tomei, whose words brought Mastromarino's mother to tears.

Prosecutor Monique Ferrell said there had been a "change in circumstance" and a trial was needed to reveal the full "scope of harm he caused." She said prosecutors became fully aware of his activities only in the last year.

In a statement e-mailed after the hearing, a spokesman for the Brooklyn district attorney's office provided a clearer explanation of why prosecutors sought a trial.