A group of snowboarders who argue a ban on their sport at Utah's Alta Ski Area amounts to discrimination are set to present their case Tuesday to a federal appeals court in Denver.

The lawsuit, filed in early 2014, brought renewed attention to the long-festering culture clash on the slopes between skiers and snowboarders.

Alta lawyers have defended the ban, saying resort officials made a business decision to lure skiers to the private resort east of Salt Lake City with the promise of a snowboarder-free experience, and it's well within its rights to keep snowboards off the slopes.

The U.S. Forest Service, which approves a permit for Alta, has backed the ski area in the court battle.

The four snowboarders and their attorneys have countered that Alta doesn't have the right to keep snowboarders off public land designated by Congress for skiing and other sports. They point to 119 other ski resorts that operate on public land that allow snowboarding.

They take issue with Alta's claim that skiers find the slopes safer because they don't have to worry about being hit by snowboarders whose sideways stance leaves them with a blind spot. Alta's ban is irrational and based on stereotypes of snowboarders.

Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry wants the state's highest criminal court to dismiss felony charges against him that the Republican has partly blamed for his failed 2016 presidential bid.
 
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals will hear arguments Wednesday about whether Perry should stand trial on charges of abusing his power while still governor. He's called the case a politically motivated attack that dampened his short-lived run for the White House.

A grand jury indicted Perry last year for making good on a threat to veto local funds after the Travis County district attorney refused to resign following a drunken-driving conviction.

Perry was originally indicted on two felony counts, but a lower court has already thrown out one of the charges. The court is not expected to rule immediately.

Even though the state Supreme Court recently upheld a death sentence for the first time under the state’s 1994 capital punishment law, Kansas isn’t likely to see executions anytime soon or a shift in how the justices handle capital murder cases.

“Symbolically, there is something different,” said Robert Dunham, head of the anti-capital punishment, nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center. “But I wouldn’t read too much into it.”

Several prosecutors are encouraged by this month’s decision in the case of John E. Robinson Sr. ? who was sentenced to die for killing two women in 1999 and 2000 and tied by evidence or his own admission to six other deaths, including a teenage girl, in Kansas and Missouri ? saying it showed it is possible to preserve a death sentence on appeal in Kansas.

Two Kansas law professors said the 415-page decision in John E. Robinson’s case issued earlier this month suggests the Supreme Court’s examination of future capital cases will remain as thorough as it has been.

The high court’s past decisions overturning death sentences inspired a campaign that almost succeeded in ousting two justices in last year’s elections and handed republican Gov. Sam Brownback a potent issue in the final weeks of his race for re-election. And there are more capital cases before the justices.

Only four days after the Robinson decision, Frazier Glenn Miller Jr., an avowed anti-Semite, was sentenced to death for the fatal shootings of three people at Jewish sites in the Kansas City suburbs.

A case that has the potential to increase funding for Kansas schools goes before the state Supreme Court today, the same day that economists, legislative researchers and officials in Gov. Sam Brownback’s administration are expected to announce new, more pessimistic revenue projections.

Four districts that are suing the state have asked justices to lift a stay on a lower court ruling and release state funds to public school districts. A three-judge Shawnee County District Court panel found in June that the state’s newly enacted strategy for financing 286 school districts and cuts to state aid for low-income school districts were unconstitutional.

The Supreme Court approved Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt’s request for a stay on the order while he pursued an appeal. The state argues in court filings that “doomsday predictions” about students and the state suffering because of how schools are being funded “have proven to be pure hyperbole.”

Education, from K-12 through the collegiate level, is the state’s largest expenditure, accounting for 62 percent of its budget. Any increase in education spending has the potential to create budget havoc when the Legislature reconvenes in January.

Since the current fiscal year began in July, tax collections have fallen about 4.1 percent short of expectations, at $1.8 billion. The state has struggled to balance its budget since Republican legislators slashed personal income taxes in 2012 and 2013 at Brownback’s urging, in an effort to stimulate the economy.

A federal appeals court in New York has rejected the American Civil Liberties Union's effort to stop bulk collection of its phone records while a more limited collection system is put in place.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Thursday that Congress intended for data collection to continue during a six-month transition period before a new law takes effect. Earlier this year, the appeals court in Manhattan struck down the government's mass collection of Americans' phone records, finding Congress never authorized it.

Congress then approved a more limited collection method due to take effect Nov. 29.

The 2nd Circuit says an abrupt end to the current program would harm the public interest in surveilling terrorist threats.

An ACLU lawyer says the civil rights group disagrees with the ruling.

A Georgia man accused of killing his toddler son by leaving him in a vehicle on a hot day is set to appear in court for a hearing.

Cobb County Superior Court Judge Mary Staley is set to hear arguments on pretrial motions Monday in the case of Justin Ross Harris.

Police have said Harris left 22-month-old Cooper in an SUV for about seven hours on a day when temperatures reached at least the high 80s in the Atlanta area. He faces multiple charges, including malice murder, felony murder and cruelty to children.

Harris has been in custody since June 18, 2014, the day his son died. He was indicted in September 2014 and has pleaded not guilty. His attorneys have said the child's death was a tragic accident.