Nathan Johnson pleaded guilty Tuesday in Denver federal court to possession of a firearm by a prohibited person. He faces up to 3 years, 1 month in prison at his March 20 sentencing.

Johnson and two others were arrested in Aurora on Aug. 24, the day before the convention began. Authorities said they had methamphetamine, bulletproof vests and guns with them when arrested.

Witnesses said the three had discussed killing Obama because he's black. But prosecutors determined they posed no credible threat and did not charge them with making threats.

Securities and Exchange Commission enforcement attorneys were in federal court on Friday to seek emergency relief for investors, including an asset freeze and the appointment of a receiver for Madoff's firm, in an alleged $50 billion fraud that could be the largest ever pinned on an individual.

A federal judge granted the agency's request, enabling it to seize the assets of Madoff's 48-year-old company, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities.

Federal prosecutors in Manhattan charged Madoff with a single count of criminal fraud, while the SEC accused him of civil fraud.

Madoff, a former chairman of the Nasdaq Stock Market, was influential and his self-named securities firm cut a high profile in Wall Street circles. SEC inspectors would have performed regular inspections of his securities brokerage operations as part of the agency's oversight program.

SEC officials stress that it was Madoff's separate and secretive investment-adviser business that was used to perpetrate the alleged scheme, and that examinations of the securities operations wouldn't necessarily have detected irregularities. The hedge fund business didn't register with the SEC until September 2006.

"If the SEC didn't come in and inspect (the Madoff hedge fund), then they have a hell of a lot to answer for," said James Cox, a Duke University law professor and securities law expert.

Other SEC critics questioned how Madoff could pull off, without the agency's notice, such an audacious fraud that prosecutors said amounted to a giant Ponzi scheme.

"The agency can't help but look bad," said Barbara Roper, director of investor protection at the Consumer Federation of America. "It does raise questions ... about the quality of the enforcement division generally. It's obviously something that the new (Obama) administration has to get to the bottom of."

The SEC said in a statement Friday that staff in its New York office conducted two inquiries — in 2005 and 2007 — into Madoff's company. Inspectors examined the securities brokerage operation in 2005, finding three violations of rules requiring brokers to obtain the best possible price for customer orders. In 2007, enforcement staff completed an investigation and did not refer the matter to the SEC commissioners for legal action, the statement said.

Most recently, as family members turned Madoff in after he confessed his deceit to them, the SEC said, the staff reopened its investigation of his company and the civil fraud action resulted on Thursday.

The SEC wasn't the only regulator to be criticized over the Madoff affair. Bill Singer, a securities lawyer in New York who represents investors and firms, cited the role of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, the securities industry's self-policing organization.

The organization, known as FINRA, only has authority to inspect and discipline securities firms and brokers; its jurisdiction doesn't extend to investment advisory firms.

The justices did not comment Monday in turning down Hatfill's appeal of a unanimous ruling by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, based in Richmond, Va. A three-judge panel affirmed a lower court's dismissal of the libel claims on the grounds that Hatfill is a public figure and failed to prove that columns written by Nicholas Kristof were malicious.

Circumstantial evidence led the FBI to suspect Hatfill was involved in the anthrax attacks that killed five people and sickened 17 just weeks after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Then-Attorney General John Ashcroft publicly identified Hatfill, who worked at the Army's infectious diseases laboratory at Ft. Detrick, Md., from 1997 to 1999, as a "person of interest" in the investigation.

In June, the Justice Department agreed to pay Hatfill $5.8 million to settle a lawsuit claiming officials violated his privacy rights by speaking with reporters about the case.

No one has been charged in the attacks, although the government now believes another Army scientist, Bruce Ivins, was responsible. Ivins killed himself in July.

Thomas Tamm, whose suburban Washington home was searched by federal agents last year, told the magazine he leaked the existence of the secret program to The New York Times 18 months before the newspaper broke the story.

"I thought this was something the other branches of the government and the public ought to know about. So they could decide: do they want this massive spying program to be taking place?" Tamm told Newsweek in what the magazine said were a series of recent interviews that he granted against the advice of his lawyers.

"If somebody were to say, who am I to do that? I would say, 'I had taken an oath to uphold the Constitution.' It's stunning that somebody higher up the chain of command didn't speak up," the magazine quoted Tamm as saying.

Tamm, 56, told the magazine he called the Times from a subway station pay phone in Washington.

In December 2005 the Times published a story exposing the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping program to eavesdrop on international phone calls and e-mails of U.S. residents without court warrants.

The story cited multiple anonymous sources. Newsweek said the Times reporters who wrote the story refused to say whether Tamm was one of them.

The eavesdropping had been conducted without public knowledge and without any court approval. It has since been put under the authority of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

Tamm, who left the Justice Department in 2006, had worked in the department's Office of Intelligence Policy and Review, a secretive unit that oversees surveillance of terrorist and espionage targets, according to Newsweek.

He told the magazine he has since struggled to make a living in private practice. Tamm has not been charged with any crimes, though the magazine said his friends and relatives have been questioned by federal agents.

The Illinois attorney general has filed a motion with the state's highest court asking justices to remove scandal-plagued Gov. Rod Blagojevich bluh-GOY'-uh-vich) from office.

Lisa Madigan took the action Friday as pressure on the governor intensified to step down. The motion challenges his fitness to serve and asks that the Supreme Court oust him.

Madigan scheduled a news conference in Chicago Friday morning to discuss the motion.

The move came as the governor prayed with several ministers in his home before heading to his office, telling them he is innocent and will be vindicated "when you hear each chapter completely written," according to one of the pastors.

Dr. Rudra Sabaratnam, who ran City of Angels Medical Center, faces up to 10 years in federal prison after pleading guilty to paying a recruiter nearly $500,000 to find Skid Row homeless people with Medi-Cal or Medicare cards and transport them to the hospital.

In his plea agreement, which remains under seal, Sabaratnam also agreed to pay more than $4.1 million in restitution to Medicare and Medi-Cal.

Sabaratnam, 64, is scheduled to be sentenced June 8 on two counts of illegal patient referrals.

Messages left with City of Angels and Sabaratnam's attorney were not immediately returned Friday.

U.S. Attorney Thomas P. O'Brien said the doctor masterminded a sophisticated scheme to cheat the government out of millions of dollars from about August 2004 to October 2007.

The investigation was sparked in 2006 as Los Angeles police looked into reports that hospitals were dumping homeless patients on Skid Row streets.

Munich-based Siemens would not comment on the report.

"We're hoping on an agreement with the SEC before Christmas," a Siemens supervisory board member told the newspaper, referring to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. "If necessary, we'll meet December 23rd."

Siemens is subject to fines in the U.S. because it's also listed on the New York Stock Exchange.

Siemens, which makes everything from trains to light bulbs, was first rocked by claims of corruption in 2006. Evidence began to surface in 2007 and the company has since acknowledged dubious payments to secure business around the world of up to euro1.3 billion ($1.7 billion).

In November, Siemens said it had set aside approximately euro1 billion to be booked in the last quarter of its 2008 fiscal year for any settlements related to the case. The company's fiscal year ended in September.

Siemens has said including the provision last fiscal year, the total cost of the corruption scandal is about euro2.5 billion to date.