Comcast has agreed to pay up to $23 million to Oregon customers who were charged late fees from July 15, 2003, through Nov. 22, 2010, to settle a class-action lawsuit.

Comcast also agreed to donate a total of $75,000 to the Oregon Food Bank and United Way of the Columbia and Willamette and to pay Portland lawyer David Sugerman’s legal fees of up to $5 million. Sugerman was appointed by the court to represent Comcast customers.

The lawsuit, filed in Multnomah County Circuit Court, involved claims “that late fees and/or administrative fees charged by Comcast to delinquent cable television subscribers...failed to comply with the requirements of Oregon law,” according to the settlement website.

Comcast did not admit to any wrongdoing in the settlement. An Oregon spokeswoman for Comcast said in a written statement Wednesday that the company “denies liability and maintains that the late fees are legal.”

Judges of a top Italian court began deliberating Thursday on whether to uphold a law shielding Premier Silvio Berlusconi from two trials in Milan.

The Constitutional Court must decide if the legislation complies with the constitution, including the principle that all are equal under the law. It is expected to issue its ruling later Thursday.

If the court rejects the law, Berlusconi's two trials, on corruption and tax fraud charges respectively, will resume.

Berlusconi insisted this week that his government's stability will not be affected by the decision, and that he is "totally indifferent as to whether the trials are suspended or not." He called the trials "ridiculous."

But any decision will be fraught with political repercussions, and a rejection would deal a blow to a premier already weakened by sex scandals, a fight with an ex-ally and a shaky parliamentary majority.

The legislation suspends court proceedings for up to 18 months if the defendant has a "legitimate impediment" stemming from being premier or a member of government.

The law drew accusations that it was tailor-made for the premier, but Berlusconi's lawyer told the Constitutional Court in a hearing this week that the legislation is necessary to safeguard the right to a fair defense and that the Italian criminal code already envisages cases of legitimate impediment, such as grave sickness.

A panel of federal appeals court judges expressed doubts Thursday that former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and three former military officers can be sued for allegedly allowing torture in U.S. military prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In courtroom arguments, two of the three judges were skeptical that Rumsfeld and three U.S. military officials could face damage claims for exercising command responsibility over subordinates accused of torturing prisoners. Nine prisoners have filed suit.

"You are turning two centuries of Supreme Court jurisprudence on its ear," David Sentelle, the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, told an attorney for the detainees.

Sentelle and Judge Harry Edwards suggested that the defendants should be immune from the suit because it wasn't clear that the U.S. Constitution applied overseas when the detainees say they were tortured.

Rumsfeld and the officers shouldn't be allowed to escape accountability, Cecillia Wang, an American Civil Liberties Union attorney for the prsioners, told the judges.

There is no question that Rumsfeld knew that permitting torture violates the U.S. Constitution and he should have to answer the accusations in the lawsuit, said Wang.

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The Justice Department's Public Integrity Section has a storied 34-year history of pursuing corruption in government and safeguarding the public trust.

That trust was breached, however, when some of the unit's prosecutors failed to turn over evidence favorable to the defense in their high-profile criminal trial of Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, who died earlier this month in a plane crash.

Now Jack Smith, a 41-year-old prosecutor with a love for courtroom work and an impressive record, has been brought in to restore the elite unit's credibility.

Before Stevens, Public Integrity's renown was built on large successes — like the prosecution of the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal and convictions of federal and state judges, members of Congress and state legislators, military officers, federal lawmen and bureaucrats and their state counterparts over the years.

But its stumble — not disclosing exculpatory evidence as Supreme Court precedent requires — was equally large. It was so serious that Attorney General Eric Holder, one of Public Integrity's distinguished alums, stepped in and asked a federal judge to throw out Stevens' convictions.

Nobody disputes that driving under the influence of alcohol is dangerous. In fact, it's one of the most deadly crimes. You won't get any serious arguments from anybody that people should be allowed to drive while impaired. Nobody would dispute that you are far more likely to die at the hands of a DUI driver than at the hands of a serial killer or by gang violence.

The dispute is not about the problem of impaired driving, but rather about what to do about it. Every year, many states increase the jail time, fines and other penalties for DUI offenders. There is little evidence that increased punishment deters impaired driving. In fact, there's no conclusive evidence that suggests that the average would-be drunk driver even considers the penalties before turning on the ignition and hitting the road.

Most state lawmakers increase the penalties because it is politically popular to do so, and it’s the only thing they can think of doing. In most states, the average DUI convict spends no more than a day or two in jail for a first offense, and no longer than a year for a third offense. After that, the states have a tremendous range.

It seems for most offenders, a first, second or third DUI arrest is the wake-up call they need, and very few people get caught more than three times in their lifetime. In states such as Washington that have systems that treat and educate for alcohol and drug issues, there is a ray of hope that recidivism may be reduced. In states such as Arizona, where the focus is on punishment rather than treatment, DWI convictions often do little for a would-be repeat offender than take them off the road temprarily while they are incarcerated.

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