A tri-state dispute threatening metro Atlanta's water supply is heading to an appeals court.

A three-judge panel on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta plans to hear arguments Wednesday as Georgia seeks to overturn a judge's order that severely restricted the ability of metro Atlanta to withdraw water from Lake Lanier.

U.S. District Court Judge Paul Magnuson ruled in 2009 that Atlanta had little legal right to take water from Lake Lanier because the water body was built for hydroelectric power, not water supply. Magnuson signed an order that would severely restrict water withdrawals from the lake starting July 2012 unless Georgia strikes a political deal with Alabama and Florida.

Communities downstream from Atlanta want assurances they will have enough water for fisheries, farms, industry and towns.

The Supreme Court won't hear an atheist's latest challenge to the U.S. government's references to God.

The court on Monday refused to hear an appeal from Michael Newdow, who says government references to God are unconstitutional and infringe on his religious beliefs.

This appeal dealt with the inscription of the national motto "In God We Trust" on U.S. coins and currency. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco says the phrase is ceremonial and patriotic and "has nothing whatsoever to do with the establishment of religion."

The court refused to hear Newdow's appeal of that decision.

"In God We Trust" was first put on U.S. coins in the 1860s and on paper currency in the 1950s.

The Arkansas Supreme Court has upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit that challenged the state Game and Fish Commission's authority to lease public land to natural gas companies so they can drill.

The Thursday ruling affirmed a circuit court ruling turned away James Dockery's claim that proceeds from the wells should go to the Legislature instead of the commission.

The commission voted in 2008 to lease drilling rights to Chesapeake Energy Corp. of Oklahoma City for $32.2 million. Dockery sued in Pulaski County the following year.

The leased areas include include more than 7,500 acres in the Petit Jean River Wildlife Management Area in Yell County and nearly 4,000 acres in the Gulf Mountain Wildlife Management Area in Van Buren County.

A 63-year-old U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement analyst accused of misusing his diplomatic passport to travel to Jordan and filing bogus expense reports is due in a West Texas courtroom.

Ahmed Adil Abdallat is scheduled to appear for a detention hearing in El Paso on Wednesday. He faces eight counts of misuse of a diplomatic passport and one of conversion of public money.

Authorities say the ICE supervisory intelligence research specialist was issued a diplomatic passport to perform temporary duties at several U.S. embassies. He's accused of using it eight times since October 2007 to make personal trips to Amman, Jordan's capital.

Abdallat is also accused of collecting about $123,000 in travel reimbursements, using fabricated receipts for lodging and car rentals.

The U.S. Supreme Court refused to insulate the drug industry from having to pay overtime to thousands of sales representatives, turning away appeals from units of Novartis AG and Merck & Co.

The companies sought to overturn a federal appeals court’s conclusion that their salespeople are covered by a federal wage- and-hour law. The decision against the Novartis unit leaves the company with claims of as much as $100 million on behalf of 2,500 past and current employees.

Drugmakers are facing a wave of suits by sales representatives for overtime pay. More than a dozen suits have been filed, including cases against Johnson & Johnson, Bristol- Myers Squibb Co. and a GlaxoSmithKline Plc unit. Drug companies have long treated sales representatives as exempt from the overtime requirements, according to court papers filed by an industry trade group.

The lower court ruling “threatens untold costs in unforeseen liability,” the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America argued in the Novartis case.

The rulings by the New York-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals came in two separate

The state Supreme Court ruled Thursday that West Virginia courts aren't the place to challenge most decisions the Secondary School Activities Commission makes about high school sports, from calls on the field to the application of rules.

The SSAC's powers are clearly spelled out in state law, and as long as disputes fall within those powers, they "are not subject to judicial review," Justice Thomas McHugh said in his opinion for the court.

The ruling elaborates on a decision the court rendered last fall in a dispute over the Class AAA high school football championship game and is clearly intended to dissuade similar lawsuits.