Thirty-two states that either allow gay marriage or have banned it asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday to settle the issue once and for all.

Fifteen states that allow gay marriage, led by Massachusetts, filed a brief asking the justices to take up three cases from Virginia, Utah and Oklahoma and overturn bans. And 17 other states, led by Colorado, that have banned the practice asked the court to hear cases from Utah and Oklahoma to clear up a "morass" of lawsuits, but didn't urge the court to rule one way or another.

The filing came as a three-judge panel of the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago ruled that same-sex marriage bans in Wisconsin and Indiana are unconstitutional. The unanimous decision Thursday criticized the justifications both states gave, several times singling out the argument that marriage between a man and a woman is tradition. There are, the court noted, good and bad traditions.

The experience of Massachusetts — the first state to legalize gay marriage — shows that allowing same-sex couples to wed has only benefited families and strengthened the institution of marriage, said Attorney General Martha Coakley.

A U.S. appeals court on Thursday upheld 10 convictions against an Indianapolis financier but overturned two wire fraud counts, saying the government failed to enter into the record key documentary evidence.

Timothy Durham and co-defendants Jim Cochran and Rick Snow were convicted in 2012 of swindling thousands of investors out of $200 million. Durham was convicted on 12 counts and sentenced to 50 years; Cochran was convicted on eight counts and sentenced to 25 years; Snow was convicted on five counts and sentenced to 10 years.

The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago rejected most of the appeals but overturned two involving the transfer of $250,000 and $50,000.

The appeals court said the government's failure to enter the documentary evidence "was clearly an oversight, but the mistakes leaves a crucial gap in the evidence in those counts." It said the government used single-page printouts to establish the wire transfers were made in furtherance of the fraudulent scheme.

A federal appeals panel in Denver on Monday suggested that a partisan stalemate in Congress may mean that Republicans in Kansas and Arizona will be unable to force federal election officials to impose proof-of-citizenship requirements on voter registration forms.

Those two states sued the Elections Assistance Commission after the agency refused to adjust the federal voting registration forms it distributed in Kansas and Arizona to reflect those states' requirements that voters present documentation that proves they are citizens.

A lower court found the commission needed to include the more stringent state language. But on Monday, a three-judge panel of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals noted that Congress has not approved a single commissioner to sit on the commission in three years.

The judges were skeptical the agency could decide whether to change the federal form, one way or the other, without any commissioners.

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Massachusetts Eviction Process

November 8, 2004: Massachusetts Law providing important rights to tenants facing eviction/have been evicted has went into effect. A Massachusetts Eviction lawyer can help with most aspects of the Massachusetts eviction process.

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The California Supreme Court has ruled that the silence of suspects can be used against them.

Wading into a legally tangled vehicular manslaughter case, a sharply divided high court on Thursday effectively reinstated the felony conviction of a man accused in a 2007 San Francisco Bay Area crash that left an 8-year-old girl dead and her sister and mother injured.

Richard Tom was sentenced to seven years in prison for manslaughter after authorities said he was speeding and slammed into another vehicle at a Redwood City intersection.

Prosecutors repeatedly told jurors during the trial that Tom's failure to ask about the victims immediately after the crash but before police read him his so-called Miranda rights showed his guilt.

Legal analysts said the ruling could affect future cases, allowing prosecutors to exploit a suspect's refusal to talk before invoking 5th Amendment rights against self-incrimination.

The Alabama Supreme Court is standing by a decision that business sees as a defeat.

The court on Friday issued an opinion that mostly parallels its ruling last year in a generic drug case.

A divided court says the original decision isn't as broad as some are claiming. But a majority stuck by a 2013 decision saying a brand-name drugmaker can be held responsible by someone who took a generic medication made by a different company.

The Business Council of Alabama says it's disappointed. So is Wyeth, the drug manufacturer sued by Danny and Vicki Weeks over the man's use of a generic form of the brand-name medicine Reglan.

The Weeks filed suit in federal court, and a judge asked the Supreme Court to clarify state law.