The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday added another wrinkle to Ohio's debate over how strictly the state's lethal injection procedures should be followed.

The court without comment refused to allow the execution of a condemned killer of an elderly couple to proceed, an execution delayed by federal courts over concerns that the state continues to deviate too often from its written rules for lethal injection.

Both the state and the inmate's attorneys were trying Wednesday to determine what comes next, but the decision is likely to further delay executions even though Ohio's procedures have never been ruled unconstitutional.

The court denied the state's appeal of decisions in inmate Charles Lorraine's case that said Ohio had strayed too far from its execution policies to be trusted to carry out the death sentence for now.

Federal courts must monitor every Ohio execution "because the State cannot be trusted to fulfill its otherwise lawful duty to execute inmates sentenced to death," the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last month.

The court upheld an earlier decision by U.S. District Court Judge Gregory Frost that chided Ohio for not following his warnings to adhere strictly to their policies.

Supporters and opponents of California's ban on same-sex marriage were anxiously awaiting a federal appeals court decision Tuesday on whether the voter-approved measure violates the civil rights of gay men and lesbians.

A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that considered the question plans to issue its long-awaited opinion 18 months after a trial judge struck down the ban following the first federal trial to examine if same-sex couples have a constitutional right to get married.

The 9th Circuit does not typically give notice of its forthcoming rulings, and its decision to do so Monday reflects the intense interest in the case.

Even if the panel upholds the lower court ruling, it could be a while before same-sex couples can resume marrying in the state. Proposition 8 backers plan to appeal to a larger 9th Circuit panel and then to the U.S. Supreme Court if they lose in the intermediate court. Marriages would likely stay on hold while that process plays out.

The three-judge panel, consisting of judges appointed by presidents Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, heard arguments on the ban's constitutional implications more than a year ago. But it put off a decision so it could seek guidance from the California Supreme Court on whether Proposition 8 sponsors had legal authority to challenge the trial court ruling after California's attorney general and governor decided not to appeal it.

Utah's Supreme Court is deciding whether a sperm donor contract is proof that a man wanted to be a father, even after his death.

The question stems from a dispute between Gayle Burns and the Social Security Administration, which denied survivor benefits to the son Burns conceived after her husband died from cancer.

Oral arguments are set Tuesday in Salt Lake City.

Michael Burns had contracted with medical providers to preserve his sperm before he died of cancer in 2001. Gayle Burns became pregnant in 2003.

Social Security denied a 2005 benefits petition, saying federal law doesn't allow for payments to posthumously-conceived children.

Gayle Burns challenged the ruling in Utah's federal court.

A federal judge asked Utah's Supreme Court to address the issue first.

Georgia's top court struck down a state law that restricted assisted suicides, siding on Monday with four members of a suicide group who said the law violated their free speech rights.

The Georgia Supreme Court's unanimous ruling found that the law violates the free speech clauses of the U.S. and Georgia constitution. It means that four members of the Final Exit Network who were charged in February 2009 with helping a 58-year-old cancer-stricken man die won't have to stand trial, defense attorneys said.

Georgia law doesn't expressly forbid assisted suicide. But lawmakers in 1994 adopted a law that bans people from publicly advertising suicide, hoping to prevent assisted suicide from the likes of Dr. Jack Kevorkian, the late physician who sparked the national right-to-die debate.

The law makes it a felony for anyone who "publicly advertises, offers or holds himself out as offering that he or she will intentionally and actively assist another person in the commission of suicide and commits any overt act to further that purpose."

The court's opinion, written by Justice Hugh Thompson, found that lawmakers could have imposed a ban on all assisted suicides with no restriction of free speech, or sought to prohibit all offers to assist in suicide that were followed by the act. But lawmakers decided to do neither, he said.

An Army officer ordered a court-martial for a low-ranking intelligence analyst charged in the biggest leak of classified information in U.S. history.

Military District of Washington commander Maj. Gen. Michael Linnington on Friday referred all charges against Pfc. Bradley Manning to a general court-martial, the Army said in a statement.

The referral means Manning will stand trial for allegedly giving more than 700,000 secret U.S. documents and classified combat video to the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks for publication.

The 24-year-old Crescent, Oklahoma, native faces 22 counts, including aiding the enemy. He could be imprisoned for life if convicted of that charge.

A judge who is yet to be appointed will set the trial date.

Manning's lead defense counsel, civilian attorney David Coombs, didn't immediately return a call Friday evening seeking comment on the decision.

Defense lawyers say Manning was clearly a troubled young soldier whom the Army should never have deployed to Iraq or given access to classified material while he was stationed there from late 2009 to mid-2010.

A threatened wave of class actions against American law schools became a reality last week after plaintiffs' lawyers sued a dozen more schools over their allegedly misleading use of salary and employment data. But this trend in "consumer protection" is potentially damaging, not only to U.S. law schools, but to higher education in general, said two attorneys for the national law firm LeClairRyan.

"If the goal of these suits is securing transparency on jobs data, then the plaintiffs and their counsel are going about this in entirely the wrong way," said veteran class action defense attorney  Michael Haratz, a Newark-based partner in LeClairRyan's Business Litigation team.  "While there is nothing wrong with working toward clear, consistent and coherent reporting standards, such matters are best addressed via the regulatory process—not by bending higher education to fit a consumerist paradigm more appropriate to a purchaser of traditional consumer goods."

The trend shows every sign of expanding to other institutions across the country, added Haratz. "According to a prominent legal journalist, for example, one of the plaintiffs' lawyers—someone who previously declared 2012 'the year of law school litigation'—hopes to sue up to 25 new schools every few months," he said.

The new complaints come in the wake of highly publicized class actions filed last year against Thomas M. Cooley Law School, New York Law School and Thomas Jefferson School of Law. The latest schools to be targeted reportedly are: Albany Law School, Brooklyn Law School, Hofstra Law School, Widener Law, Florida Coastal School of Law, Chicago-Kent College of Law, DePaul University College of Law, John Marshall Law School, California Western School of Law, Southwestern Law School, University of San Francisco School of Law, and Golden Gate University School of Law.

The complaints allege that U.S. law schools artificially boost enrollments by exaggerating or misrepresenting graduates' employment and salary statistics. "The problem with such litigation is that it runs contrary to the purpose and spirit underlying the class-action lawsuit as a vehicle for consumer redress," said Robert B. Smith a Boston-based LeClair Ryan partner and leader of the firm's Education Industry team. "Why? Because the consumerist paradigm does not fit higher education. Just as law degrees should not come with guarantees of 'gainful employment or your money back,' law students should not regard themselves as consumers entitled to same. After all, they are individuals with varying degrees of talent, motivation, discipline and intelligence. Their futures are their own responsibilities."  

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As a trusted advisor, LeClairRyan provides business counsel and client representation in corporate law and litigation. In this role, the firm applies its knowledge, insight and skill to help clients achieve their business objectives while managing and minimizing their legal risks, difficulties and expenses.  With offices in California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Washington, D.C., the firm has approximately 350 attorneys representing a wide variety of clients throughout the nation.  For more information about LeClairRyan, visit www.leclairryan.com.