As the nation's largest electricity company prepares to plead guilty to violating the federal Clean Water Act, Duke Energy has started delivering bottled water to people with tainted wells close to its North Carolina coal ash pits.

Duke has long denied its 32 dumps in the state have contaminated the drinking water of its neighbors, suggesting any worrying chemicals found in the wells is likely naturally occurring.

But recent state-mandated tests found that more than 150 residential wells tested near Duke's dumps have failed to meet state groundwater standards, and residents have been advised not to use their water for drinking or cooking.

Many of the results showed troublesome levels of toxic heavy metals like vanadium and hexavalent chromium — both of which can be contained in coal ash. And some of the residents have retained lawyers.

Duke spokeswoman Erin Culbert told The Associated Press that any homeowner who gets a state letter warning of a tainted well will get safe bottled water from Duke, if they request it.

While denying responsibly for the problem, Culbert said Duke simply wants to provide the homeowners "peace of mind."

Duke is scheduled to plead guilty Thursday to nine environmental crimes as part of a negotiated settlement with federal prosecutors requiring it to pay $102 million in fines and restitution. The proposed settlement over years of illegal pollution leaking from ash dumps at five of Duke's plants has been sealed, so it wasn't clear before the hearing whether people with contaminated well water will benefit.

The lines separating government powers have been blurred among Ferguson's court staff, police and prosecutor, raising concerns about potential conflicts of interest, according to a report released Monday by Missouri's judiciary.

The state report examining Ferguson's municipal court system comes as a follow-up to a highly critical U.S. Justice Department report released earlier this year, which asserted that the city's police and courts had been used as a revenue-generating machine.

The Justice Department review was prompted by the fatal shooting last August of 18-year-old Michael Brown, who was black, by a white Ferguson police officer.After the federal review, the Missouri Supreme Court in March appointed appeals Judge Roy Richter to take over the Ferguson court and asked court administration experts to take a look at how things were working.

The new report summarizes the observations and recommendations of those unnamed experts, noting several potential conflicts of interest that caused concern.

Until very recently, the report said, court staff were required to report to the police chief. That structure "potentially compromises the separation our government is to have" between the judicial and executive branches, the report said.

The normally defiant sheriff for metro Phoenix responded meekly and shifted blame Wednesday as he was questioned in court about why he violated a judge's orders to stop carrying out his signature immigration patrols.

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio said he accepts responsibility for disobeying the 2011 order, but he repeatedly added that he delegated the enforcement of the injunction to his lawyers and staff. He was asked whether he remember getting an attorney's opinion on carrying the order's key section.

"Not that I can recall," said Arpaio.

The sheriff could face fines if he's found in contempt of court for his acknowledged violations of the injunction and two other orders issued in a racial-profiling case that Arpaio eventually lost. Rank-and-file officers who were never told about the injunction violated the order for about 18 months.

The sheriff also has accepted responsibility for his agency's failure to turn over traffic-stop videos in the profiling case and bungling a plan to gather such recordings from officers once some videos were discovered.

Arpaio made the acknowledgments in an unsuccessful bid to get the hearing called off. The contempt hearing marks the boldest attempt to hold the sheriff personally responsible for his actions.

His voice wasn't booming in court as it often is before TV cameras. Instead, he was hoarse, looked tired and often answered questions by saying he didn't recall. Arpaio's attorney hasn't yet had a chance to question him in court.

The sheriff, whose testimony is scheduled to resume Thursday, was questioned about a former supervisor on his smuggling squad who said Arpaio ordered him to violate the 2010 order.

A day earlier, Sgt. Brett Palmer had described a tense encounter with Arpaio about a month after the 2011 order was issued in which federal immigration authorities refused to accept immigrants who hadn't committed a violation of state law. Palmer said he planned to bring the immigrants to another federal immigration agency, but he was ordered to first call Arpaio, who ordered him not to release them. Palmer said the sheriff eventually backed down.

It's a court decision that required knowledge of both law and grammar.

In a decision Tuesday, a divided state Appeals Court ordered a new trial for a former High Point University student who had a Ruger pistol and three knives in a car she parked on campus.

Judges said the trial court should have told the jury to consider whether prosecutors proved Anna Laura Huckelba was knowingly on educational property at the time.

The judges said they were ruling for the first time on whether the word "knowingly" in the law modifies both possessing weapons and being on educational property. In a 2-1 decision, the majority said it does.

Huckelba received suspended sentences when she was found guilty of three misdemeanors and one felony in October 2013.

Panama's Electoral Tribunal has lifted former President Ricardo Martinelli's immunity from prosecution, clearing the way for authorities to investigate him for alleged corruption.

The lifting of Martinelli's immunity as a member of the Central American parliament had been requested by Panama's Supreme Court and frees it to proceed with his prosecution. The decision was made Tuesday and announced the following day.

The billionaire supermarket magnate faces accusations that he inflated contracts worth $45 million to purchase dehydrated food for a government social program.

Martinelli has denied the charges and says he is the target of persecution by his successor, Juan Carlos Varela. He has left the country and his whereabouts are unknown.

Martinelli governed Panama from 2009-2014, a period of high economic growth but also of corruption, his critics say.

A real estate developer on trial for fraudulent bankruptcy fired 13 shots inside the Milan Tribunal on Thursday, killing his lawyer, a co-defendant and a judge, eluding court security before being captured 25 kilometers away.

The shooting raised concerns about security at Italy's courthouses, where much of the surveillance has been outsourced to private contractors, and about Italy's ability to protect visitors during the Milan Expo 2015 world's fair, which opens May 1 and is expected to attract 20 million visitors over six months.

Premier Matteo Renzi pledged a robust investigation into how the gunman, identified as Claudio Giardiello, managed to bring a pistol into the monumental Fascist-era tribunal, where defendants and other visitors are required to pass through metal detectors, but accredited court officials, including lawyers, are not.

"Our commitment is that this never happens again, and that those responsible pay," Renzi said.

The chief federal prosecutor in Milan, Edmondo Bruti Liberati, told reporters it appeared Giardiello may have used a fake document to enter through the only pedestrian entrance not equipped with a metal detector and intended only for use by accredited court officials. He said the metal detectors at the other entrances were in good working order.

Bruti Liberati praised law enforcement, who apprehended Giardiello at a shopping center more than an hour after the shooting. They had identified the license plate on his motor bike with video surveillance cameras and tracked his arrival in Vimercate, some 25 kilometers (15 miles) from the scene in the heart of Milan.

Prosecutors said Giardiello, 57, was still armed with a loaded pistol and intended to kill another business partner whom he blamed for a failed real estate venture.