The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that victims of former Texas tycoon R. Allen Stanford's massive Ponzi scheme can go forward with class-action lawsuits against the law firms, accountants and investment companies that allegedly aided the $7.2 billion fraud.

The decision is a loss for firms that claimed federal securities law insulated them from state class-action lawsuits and sought to have the cases thrown out. But it offers another avenue for more than 21,000 of Stanford's bilked investors to try to recover their lost savings.

Federal law says class-action lawsuits related to securities fraud cannot be filed under state law, as these cases were. But a federal appeals court said the cases could move forward because the main part of the fraud involved certificates of deposit, not stocks and other securities.

The high court agreed in a 7-2 decision, with the two dissenting justices warning that the ruling would lead to an explosion of state class-action lawsuits.

A California man has been sentenced in federal court in South Dakota for his role in a conspiracy to distribute marijuana.

U.S. Attorney Brendan Johnson says 29-year-old Brett McFarland, of Korbel, Calif., was sentenced to five years in prison to be followed by four years of supervised release.

McFarland pleaded guilty last November to a drug distribution conspiracy charge. A money laundering conspiracy charge was dropped.

Johnson says McFarland has agreed to forfeit to the government his interest in proceeds from the sale of property in Petrolia, Calif., that was bought with drug proceeds.

A Russian court handed down prison sentences Monday of up to four years for seven people who took part in a 2012 protest against Vladimir Putin. An eighth defendant received a suspended sentence.

Hundreds of their supporters gathered outside the courthouse to condemn the trial and the Kremlin's crackdown on opposition. Police detained about 200 of them, accusing them of violating public order.

Among those detained were members of the punk band Pussy Riot who had spent nearly two years in prison as punishment for their own anti-Putin protest.

The defendants sentenced Monday were among 28 people rounded up after the May 6, 2012, protest on the eve of Putin's inauguration for a third presidential term. The rally turned violent after police restricted access to Bolotnaya Square, across the river from the Kremlin, where the protesters had permission to gather.

The eight defendants were found guilty last week, but sentencing was postponed until Monday. All have been in custody for nearly two years except for Anastasia Dukhanina, 20, who was under house arrest. She was given a suspended sentence.

A Spanish court has ruled that a man accused of being behind one of the world’s biggest money laundering businesses can be extradited to the U.S. to face charges there.

Arthur Budovsky, who founded currency transfer and payment processing company Liberty Reserves, can appeal the ruling, the National Court said late Friday. Spain’s government must also approve the decision for an extradition to happen.

It wasn’t immediately clear if Budovsky would appeal. The 40-year-old Costa Rican, who was arrested at Madrid airport in May 2013, has acknowledged founding Liberty Reserve in 2006, but says he sold his share to stay on only as a consultant.

U.S. officials accuse Budovsky of using Liberty Reserve as a kind of underworld bank which handled about $6 billion worth of illicit transactions.

The overturning of Virginia’s gay marriage ban places the legal fight over same-sex unions increasingly in the hands of federal appeals courts shaped by President Barack Obama’s two election victories.

It’s no accident that Virginia has become a key testing ground for federal judges’ willingness to embrace same-sex marriage after last year’s strongly worded pro-gay rights ruling by the Supreme Court. Judges appointed by Democratic presidents have a 10-5 edge over Republicans on the Richmond-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, formerly among the nation’s most conservative appeals courts.

Nationally, three other federal appeals courts will soon take up the right of same-sex couples to marry, too, in Ohio, Colorado and California. The San Francisco-based 9th circuit is dominated by judges appointed by Democratic presidents. The Denver-based court, home of the 10th circuit, has shifted from a Republican advantage to an even split between the parties, while the 6th circuit, based in Cincinnati, remains relatively unchanged in favor of Republicans during Obama’s tenure.

U.S. District Judge Arenda Wright Allen’s ruling Thursday, that same-sex couples in Virginia have the same constitutional right to marry as heterosexuals, represented the strongest advance in the South for advocates of gay marriage. She put her own ruling on hold while it is being appealed.

The Alaska Supreme Court on Wednesday handed Alaska municipalities a victory in a dispute over the value of the trans-Alaska pipeline, affirming that the structure for 2006 should have been valued at nearly $10 billion, not the $850 million claimed by pipeline owners.

The justices backed a Superior Court ruling that based the value of the pipeline on replacement costs, not fees paid to the owners for use of the pipeline.

The higher value means more tax revenue for municipalities through which the pipeline runs, especially the North Slope Borough, the Fairbanks North Star Borough and the city of Valdez, the parties in the lawsuit. The municipalities have long argued that pipeline owners have undervalued the 800-mile pipeline and tanker-loading facilities in Valdez.

"I've got a smile on my face today," Fairbanks North Star Borough Mayor Luke Hopkins said. "The Supreme Court validated what our position has been all along."

State Rep. Dave Guttenberg, D-Fairbanks, in a prepared statement praised the municipalities for seeking additional revenue and faulted the state for not intervening.