In his new job, Jenkins must periodically face the voters, but he reaped one immediate benefit — a 20 percent jump in his annual salary.

Jenkins' case highlights what Chief Justice John Roberts and many other federal judges have identified as an emerging crisis — the failure to pay judges enough to keep them on the job and lure talented lawyers from private practice to the federal bench.

Not everyone sees it the way Roberts does. Committees in the House and Senate this year voted nearly 30 percent salary hikes for federal judges, but neither house of Congress acted on the measure.

Judges last received a substantial pay raise in 1991, although they have been given increases designed to keep pace with inflation in most years since then.

For 2009, though, judges are alone among federal workers — members of Congress included — in not getting a cost-of-living adjustment. Lawmakers get their COLA (cost-of-living allowance) automatically — $4,700 for 2009 — but they refused to authorize the same 2.8 percent bump for judges.

"Federal judges are currently under-compensated because Congress has repeatedly failed to adjust judicial salaries in response to inflation," said James C. Duff, director of the Administrative Office of the U.S Courts. "By its failure to do so once again, Congress only exacerbates a long-standing problem it must someday address."

Duff acknowledged that the current economic turmoil makes the judges' case harder. After all, federal trial judges are paid $169,300 a year, have lifetime job security and can retire at full salary at age 65 if they have 15 years in the job. Appellate judges make more, ranging up to Roberts' salary of $217,400.

But those salaries, large as they are, are much smaller than what judges' peers make in private practice. Attorney General-designate Eric Holder said his partnership at the law firm of Covington & Burling earned him $2.1 million this year. Attorney General Michael Mukasey, who retired as a federal judge in 2006 after 18 years, made nearly $2 million in 21 months at a New York law firm.

The Navy said Saturday the deal reached with the Natural Resources Defense Council and other groups requires it to continue to research how sonar affects whales and other marine mammals.

It doesn't require sailors to adopt additional measures to protect the animals when they use sonar.

The agreement comes one month after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Navy in another sonar lawsuit the NRDC filed.

"The Navy is pleased that after more than three years of extensive litigation, this matter has been brought to an end on favorable terms," Frank R. Jimenez, the Navy's general counsel, said in a statement.

NRDC officials could not immediately be reached for comment. The plaintiffs asked the judge to dismiss the case on Friday.

The NRDC and five other plaintiffs filed the lawsuit in federal court in the Central District of California on October 19, 2005.

The complaint sought a court order to curb mid-frequency sonar, the Navy's preferred method for detecting enemy submarines, on the grounds the sonar disturbs and sometimes kills whales and dolphins.

Bruce Turnidge, 57, and his 32-year-old son, Joshua, appeared in back-to-back hearings Friday on multiple counts of aggravated murder. A grand jury indictment released Friday alleges that the bomb that exploded Dec. 12 was part of a bank-robbery attempt, but it does not say how the men allegedly intended to get the money.

Authorities had not previously specified a motive for the bombing in Woodburn, about 30 miles south of Portland. Prosecutors have refused to talk about details outside the courtroom.

"As for getting into the specifics, I can't say anything more than what's alleged in the indictment," said Matt Kemmy, a deputy district attorney who's been handling the case.

Investigators previously disclosed that a caller to a Wells Fargo office in Woodburn on Dec. 12 made a threat and said that further instructions would come from a cell phone near a garbage can. Officers said they determined that the phone was not part of an explosive device.

Later in the day, investigators turned their attention to the West Coast Bank office next door, and a green metal box was found outside.

Ed Genson told the Chicago Sun-Times for a story published Thursday that testimony from Rahm Emanuel, Valerie Jarrett — and Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. — would help Gov. Rod Blagojevich's claim that he did no wrong in trying to fill Obama's vacant Senate seat.

Messages left for Genson, the Obama transition team and Jackson were not returned to The Associated Press Thursday.

Blagojevich was arrested Dec. 9 and charged for allegedly trying to sell Obama's vacant Senate seat to the highest bidder. He has denied any wrongdoing.

South Korea's opposition parties and thousands of people petitioned the Constitutional Court to try to block U.S. beef from entering the country by claiming the notice violated their constitutional rights.

The nine-member court rejected the petition, saying that measures in the legal notice intended to protect consumer safety could not be ruled insufficient.

The government issued the notice in late June — the final administrative step required to allow shipments to resume — despite weeks of violent protests by South Koreans concerned about the health risks of eating U.S. meat.

South Korea banned American beef in 2003 after a case of mad cow disease was discovered in the U.S.

In November, South Korea's supermarket chains resumed selling U.S. beef from cattle younger than 30 months, believed less susceptible to mad cow disease.

Eating meat products contaminated with mad cow disease is linked to variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a rare and fatal human malady.

Pelham Chief Edward Fleury owns COPS Firearms & Training, which promoted the October show where Christopher Bizilj (bah-SEEL') shot himself in the head.

Fleury's lawyer, David Kuzmeski, also entered not guilty pleas on Fleury's behalf to four counts of furnishing a machine gun to a person under 18. Fleury did not appear at the arraignment in Hampden Superior Court.

Fleury could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted of involuntary manslaughter and up to 10 years if convicted of furnishing the weapon to a minor.

"We're very disappointed that he's been indicted," Kuzmeski said after the arraignment. "We're optimistic with our defenses. Of course, everybody is just feeling terrible about this accident. Mr. Fleury's sympathies go out to the family."

The boy, from Ashford, Conn., was killed Oct. 26 when he lost control of the 9mm micro submachine gun as it recoiled while he was firing at a pumpkin at the Machine Gun Shoot and Firearms Expo. Christopher's father was 10 feet behind him and reaching for his camera when the child fired the weapon.

Pelham has appointed an acting police chief while Fleury remains on sick leave until Jan. 6.

District Attorney William Bennett has said Fleury wrongly assured two men who brought the weapon to Westfield Sportsman's Club that it was legal for children to use under Massachusetts law.

The issue was whether $5.2 million transferred from Colombia to the accounts of attorney Ben Kuehne were exempt from criminal prosecution because they were essentially legal fees. Kuehne's lawyers and defense attorneys' groups argued that the conspiracy charge against him violated the Sixth Amendment's guarantee that a person charged with a crime has a right to a lawyer.

U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke agreed, rejecting the U.S. Justice Department's contention that the payments were not necessary for the defense of Colombian drug baron Fabio Ochoa, who was eventually convicted and sentenced to prison.

"Congress has explicitly exempted from the money-laundering statute transactions necessary to preserve a person's right to representation," Cooke said in a 13-page ruling. "If I were to construe the statutory exemption as the government suggests, the exemption for such transactions would amount to no exemption at all."

The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, which filed briefs in the case, had argued that the conspiracy charge against Kuehne could deter lawyers around the country from representing numerous clients whose legal fees might stem from questionable sources.