Attorneys for former Texas Gov. Rick Perry urged the state's highest criminal court Wednesday to dismiss felony abuse-of-power charges that the Republican blames in part for foiling his short-lived 2016 presidential run.

After two hours of arguments, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals gave no timetable for ruling whether Perry should face trial in the case that has dragged on since August 2014 — about five times longer than his second unsuccessful White House bid.

Perry didn't attend the crowded hearing in a courtroom behind his old Texas Capitol office, but his high-powered lawyers told judges that enough was enough.

"The danger of allowing a prosecutor to do this is mind-boggling," Perry attorney David Botsford said.

Perry is accused of misusing his power in 2013 when he vetoed funding for local prosecutors after Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg, an elected Democrat, refused calls to resign following a drunken driving arrest. He was indicted a year later by a grand jury in liberal Austin and faces up to life in prison if convicted.

Perry has denounced the charges as a partisan attack. But in a lively back-and-forth with an eight-judge panel, all but one of whom is an elected Republican, Perry's legal team didn't raise claims of political retribution and instead framed the veto as a rightful constitutional power.

Special prosecutors say that's for a trial to determine — and not for the court to settle now. Judges met that with a tone of skepticism, with Republican Judge Kevin Yeary pressing at one point whether going through with a trial would be "wasting everyone's time."

Perry was originally indicted on two counts, but a lower court has already thrown out the other charge of coercion of a public servant. Prosecutors are asking the court to not only order a trial on the remaining charge but also reinstate the other one.

The Mississippi Supreme Court voted to allow a lesbian couple to seek a divorce, even as two justices questioned the U.S. Supreme Court ruling legalizing same-sex marriage and suggested that landmark ruling has no constitutional basis.
 
The decision Thursday came after DeSoto County Chancery Judge Mitchell Lundy Jr. ruled in 2013 that the Mississippi Constitution and state law prevented him from granting a divorce to Lauren Czekala-Chatham and Dana Ann Melancon because the state didn't recognize same-sex marriage.

Czekala-Chatham appealed, and it was initially opposed by Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood, a Democrat. However, Hood asked the court to allow the divorce after the June 26 ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court.

On Friday, same-sex couples will be in federal court seeking to overturn Mississippi's last-in-the-nation ban on adoption by gay couples.

In the Mississippi court's divorce ruling, five of nine justices said in a two-page order that because Hood had reversed his position, "we find no contested issues remain" and sent the case back to DeSoto County for further action.

Justices Leslie King and James Kitchens agreed with the outcome, but dissented, calling for the court to issue a full opinion. King and Kitchens called for Mississippi to overturn its ban on same-sex marriage and grant the divorce in February.

Czekala-Chatham and Melancon were married in San Francisco in 2008 and bought a house in Mississippi before separating in 2010. Czekala-Chatham said she hopes to soon be divorced from her wife, who now lives in Arkansas.

A federal appeals court has reinstated a lawsuit challenging the New York Police Department's surveillance of Muslim groups following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Tuesday's 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals ruling reverses the decision of a New Jersey federal judge who dismissed the case last year.

The appellate panel found the Muslim plaintiffs had raised sufficient allegations of equal-protection violations to warrant the case going forward.

The judges compared the NYPD's alleged practices to blanket scrutiny of Japanese-Americans during World War II and blacks during the civil rights movement

The city blamed The Associated Press, whose reporting exposed the surveillance program, for any harm to the plaintiffs.

The lower court judge agreed with that argument, but the appeals panel said the city was the cause of any harm.

Idaho's highest court says the state must enforce legislation banning lucrative instant horse racing terminals after ruling that Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter's veto of the bill was invalid.

The decision is a blow to Idaho's horse racing industry, where officials have pleaded that the machines are vital to keeping their businesses afloat.

In a unanimous decision issued Thursday, the court ruled that the ban must go into effect because Otter did not complete the veto within the required five-day time span. In Idaho, a bill automatically becomes law — even if the governor doesn't sign it — unless it is vetoed within the legal timeframe.

"This pivotal decision reaffirms that even Idaho's highest elected officials must follow the Constitution," said Coeur d'Alene Tribe Chief James Allan, chairman of the tribe that filed the lawsuit against the state, prompting the court's ruling. The tribe, which profits from its own video gaming on the reservation and faced competition from the new horse racing versions, said it was "extremely happy" with the ruling.

Secretary of State Lawerence Denney must now certify the law, which will make the machines illegal. He did not immediately return calls from The Associated Press on when he will certify it. There are currently about 250 machines installed in three locations across Idaho.

An appeals court has reduced the prison sentence for a self-described sovereign citizen who was convicted of assaulting two police officers during a traffic stop.

Tabitha Gentry was convicted in April 2014 of two counts of aggravated assault and one count of evading arrest in an automobile.

The judge sentenced Gentry to consecutive prison sentences of six years on each assault charge and two years on the evading arrest charge, totaling 14 years.

Tennessee's Court of Criminal Appeals ruled Monday that the judge should have ordered that the sentences run at the same time, reducing her sentence in that case to six years.

Gentry also is serving a 20-year sentence for illegally taking over a Memphis mansion. The appeals court ruling cuts her total prison time from 34 years to 26 years.

The federal health care law doesn't infringe on the religious freedom of faith-based nonprofit organizations that object to covering birth control in employee health plans, a federal appeals court in Denver ruled Tuesday.

The case involves a group of Colorado nuns and four Christian colleges in Oklahoma.

Religious groups are already exempt from covering contraceptives. But the plaintiffs argued that the exemption doesn't go far enough because they must sign away the coverage to another party, making them feel complicit in providing the contraceptives.

The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed. The judges wrote that the law with the exemption does not burden the exercise of religion.

"Although we recognize and respect the sincerity of plaintiffs' beliefs and arguments, we conclude the accommodation scheme ... does not substantially burden their religious exercise," the three-judge panel wrote.

The same court ruled in 2013 that for-profit companies can join the exempted religious organizations and not provide the contraceptives. The U.S. Supreme Court later agreed with the 10th Circuit in the case brought by the Hobby Lobby arts-and-crafts chain.