Inmate Kenneth Biros had waited for the decision hours past his 10 a.m. scheduled execution time at Ohio's death house.

Prisons director Terry Collins said the execution would not happen Tuesday.

The execution team had been waiting in a holding pattern while the court decided, ready to administer the lethal injection if the court had granted to the state's request to go ahead with the execution.

The justices' one-sentence decision agreed with two lower courts that had ruled to delay the execution, including the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that refused earlier Tuesday to allow a hearing before the full court to consider a state appeal.

During arguments, the Missouri Attorney General argued that while the prosecutor's statements may have been improper, they did not influence the fairness of the guilt phase of Weaver's trial. Justice Souter seemed to agree with Weaver's counsel, indicating that some of the statements made by the prosecutor had no relationship to the facts and evidence presented during Weaver's trial; Justice Scalia noted that the guilt and sentencing phases of trials are "quite different."

The law firm of Dilworth Paxson LLP has signed a 16-year lease for 72,000 sf in the East Tower of Centre Square. Executives of Comcast Corp. currently occupy the space on the three top floors and will vacate on completion of Comcast Center, now under construction at 1600 JFK Blvd.

Comcast now occupies approximately 400,000 sf in the 1.8-million-sf, two-tower Centre Square property, which is located at 1500 Market St. The Dilworth Paxson lease absorbs nearly 20% of that pending vacancy. The aggregate value and rent rate of the new lease are undisclosed. According to a report from the local office of CB Richard Ellis, the average asking rent rate in the Market West submarket closed 2006 at $25.10 per sf.

"The Center City office market is rapidly changing in a positive direction," Christian Dyer, a first VP in the local CBRE office, tells GlobeSt.com. He, EVP David Jarjisian, and first VP Nick Gersbach, represented the owner, HRPT Properties Trust, in the lease negotiations.

Of the entire Center City office market, Dyer adds, "In contrast to a couple of years ago, there are now very few large blocks of space available. Overall rent rates have increased about 10% within the past 12 to 18 months, and we expect another 10% increase over the next 12 months."

He says Center Square is currently 85% occupied, which includes the Comcast occupants. "Net, net, we’re already doing deals for that space," he says. Lincoln Financial, which now occupies two floors aggregating 58,000 sf in the complex, has announced that it will relocate some offices to suburban Radnor, but Dyer says the net loss is still unknown.

Newton, MA-based HRPT acquired Centre Square from Met Life for $183.5 million in 2002. A $25-million renovation is reaching completion at the complex, which is often called "the clothespin building," in reference to the Claus Oldenburg Clothespin sculpture at the front plaza that links the 40-story and 32-story, class A properties. They were built in 1973.

Dilworth Paxson will relocate from its current quarters at Mellon Bank Center, which is also owned by HRPT. Dave Campoli, HRPT VP, who is located here, says the law firm "has always been an important tenant in our Center City portfolio. We’re pleased that they elected to relocate to another HRPT building."

A law firm that is suing the tobacco industry over the marketing of "light" cigarettes said Wednesday it will not oppose plans by Philip Morris USA''s parent company, Altria Group Inc., to spin off its Kraft Foods business.

The law firm Cohen, Milstein, Hausfeld and Toll has filed a class action suit against several tobacco companies in Federal District Court in Brooklyn, alleging they deceived smokers about the safety of their "light" cigarettes.

Attorney Michael Hausfeld previously said he would consider filing an injunction to stop Altria from divesting Kraft if it would leave the company unable to pay the $200 billion in damages he is seeking for his clients.

Hausfeld''s firm said Wednesday that the spinoff could actually strengthen Altria financially, and thus "may prove in the best interests of our clients."
New York City-based Altria Group Inc. plans to spin off packaged food maker Kraft next week. Altria currently owns 88.9 percent of Kraft''s outstanding shares.

Dell Inc., the world's second- biggest personal-computer maker, said it plans to buy companies to boost its services unit, expanding sales outside its main business of selling PCs.

"I expect to see acquisitions there and significant investment to enable us to build capability in the software and services area," Michael Dell, chief executive officer of the Round Rock, Texas-based company, said today at a press conference in Shanghai. He didn't identify countries or target companies.

Dell is also investing in emerging markets as it lost the top spot in global PC sales to Hewlett-Packard Co. last year and earnings growth slowed, prompting founder Michael Dell to return as chief executive officer in January. The company began selling a cheaper PC in China today, expanding in a market where more than 90 percent of 1.3 billion people don't own computers.

"Faster sales growth in China could really give Dell a boost because of how big the market is and how much potential it has," William Bao Bean, an analyst with Deutsche Securities Co. in Hong Kong, said before the briefing. "Smaller cities and towns are really where the growth is in China because incomes are rising and people are shopping for their first computers.''

He has a "buy" rating on Lenovo Group Ltd., Dell's biggest rival in China.

Dell said the services unit, whose operations include setting up computer networks and providing customer support, has annual sales of about $6 billion. That's about 11 percent of its $55.9 billion revenue in the fiscal year ended Feb. 3.

Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Preston Gates Ellis LLP (K&L Gates) welcomes partner Andrew Petersen to the firm’s banking and finance group. Petersen will be joined by two associates. All three join the firm from Dechert LLP.

Petersen focuses his practice on real estate financing, advising lenders on secured and structured domestic and international debt, including corporate restructuring. He has experience in both U.S. and European secondary loan markets, acting for high-yield investors purchasing subordinated CMBS pieces, loan tranches, notes and mezzanine loans. His experience also includes acting for loan originators advising on CMBS origination through to securitization.

Tony Griffiths, K&L Gates’ London Administrative Partner, said: “Securitisation and structured finance is a complementary discipline to our existing strengths in finance and real estate. To recruit Andrew, who has published the leading work on European CMBS, is a tremendous step forward for our banking and finance group in London and worldwide and will enhance the firm's fast-growing securitisation, structured finance and banking capabilities.”

The hiring of Petersen’s team follows the September 2006 addition of Trevor Beadle, who also joined K&L Gates from Dechert.

Trial lawyers armed with anti-corporate lawsuits are still a threat despite recent courtroom victories for business, writes a prominent legal commentator.

Recent courtroom results like the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to bounce a punitive-damages case against Philip Morris have spurred optimism in boardrooms and business schools. BusinessWeek recently celebrated with a "How business trounced the trial lawyers" cover.

Yet despite the hubris, class action lawsuits targeting business are still alive and kicking across the country, warned Walter Olson in an editorial in yesterday's Chicago Tribune.

Olson edits the legal blogs Overlawyered.com and PointOfLaw.com and is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

He points out that in Louisiana and Mississippi, damage caused by Hurricane Katrina has sparked a feeding frenzy amongst some citizens and their lawyers. The New Orleans municipal government alone recently claimed $77 billion in losses caused by levee breaks.

Nor can tobacco companies in some states afford to breathe easier, as it were. California and Massachusetts recently made it simpler to bring tobacco-addiction suits while Louisiana left part of a huge punitive damages award stand, Olson pointed out.

States like Texas and Alabama have recently seen a sharp decline in lawsuits, Olson conceded, particularly out-of-state asbestos filings. But the effect has been similar to squeezing a balloon - the suits have popped up again in unreformed states like Illinois.

He warns business that, despite contrary media reports, nightmare class action suits are still kicking. "To call this a high-water mark is going to require more evidence than we've seen so far," he concluded.