Wednesday’s hearing is to determine whether Vick and three co-defendants have secured legal counsel or need the court to provide lawyers.

“It’s just going to be a routine day,” Poindexter said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press.

Trial dates for Vick and the others on the state charges will be set Nov. 27, he said.

Vick was indicted last week in the rural county where he built a massive home on 15 acres that had been home to a dogfighting enterprise since 2001. He’s charged with beating or killing or causing dogs to fight other dogs and engaging in or promoting dogfighting. Each felony is punishable by up to five years in prison.

Lawyers for Vick have indicated they will fight the state charges on the grounds that he can’t be convicted twice of the same crime. In pleading guilty to the federal charge on Aug. 27, Vick admitted helping kill six to eight dogs, among other things. He faces up to five years in prison. Co-defendants Tony Taylor, Purnell Peace and Quanis Phillips also pleaded guilty to the same federal charge.

On Tuesday, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals announced Vick completed an eight-hour class in empathy and animal protection Sept. 18 at the group’s Norfolk headquarters. The organization said Vick took the course during his second visit to their headquarters and returned a third time to take a written test.

PETA did not reveal his score on the test, which spokesman Dan Shannon said includes an essay and long-answer questions.

Vick, suspended indefinitely by the NFL without pay, did himself no favors last month when he tested positive for marijuana, a violation of U.S. District Court Judge Henry Hudson’s order that he stay clean in exchange for being allowed to be free.

After that positive test, Hudson ordered Vick confined to his home address between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m., with electronic monitoring and random drug testing.

State Supreme Court Justice Thomas Farber said he would not release Colliton until he had imposed the sentence. The judge scheduled sentencing for Oct. 11.

Colliton, 43, admitted he had sex numerous times with one girl younger than 15 and another under 17 between Dec. 25, 2000, and March 1, 2005. He also admitted he visited a prostitute younger than 17 between August 2000 and February 2004.

Colliton's lawyer, Howard Greenberg, said his client faced 30 years in prison if he had been convicted at trial on a 43-count indictment that charged him with numerous counts of rape and sodomy.

Prosecutor Rachel Hochhauser said she was ready for trial but Colliton had agreed to "take responsibility for his actions" and plead guilty. She said the victims were told of the disposition of the case and "supported it."

Colliton, formerly of the prestigious Manhattan law firm Cravath, Swaine & Moore, fled the country in February 2006 after learning that police wanted to talk to him.

The 38-year-old mother, whose name was withheld to protect her daughters' identities, pleaded guilty in April 2006 to endangering the welfare of a child. She admitted she allowed her girls to have sex with Colliton and knew he was giving them money and gifts.

Granting class-action status allows blind people throughout the country who have tried to access Target.com to become plaintiffs in the suit, which alleges violations of the Americans With Disabilities Act.

Judge Marilyn Hall Patel also on Friday approved a separate class, made up of blind California residents who have attempted to use the site, to address the suit's charges that Target is violating state laws governing civil and disabled rights.

"This is a tremendous step forward for blind people throughout the country who for too long have been denied equal access to the Internet economy," said Dr. Marc Maurer, president of the National Federation of the Blind. "All e-commerce businesses should take note of this decision and immediately take steps to open their doors to the blind."

The federation filed the suit - which originally was filed in California state court in February 2006 and moved at Target's request to San Francisco federal court the following month - on behalf of federation member and northern California resident Bruce Sexton. The suit alleged that "blind individuals have been and are being denied equal access to Target stores" and the "service and benefits offered to the public through Target.com."

Judge Patel's order Friday noted that Target has modified its Web site some since the suit's filing to make the site more accessible to the blind. Target claimed the suit should therefore be dismissed, but Judge Patel ruled against that argument.

Ackermann said the results meant it was on track to reach it $11.9 billion annual pretax profit target.

The results come two days after Switzerland's UBS said it would post a pretax loss of up to $690 million when it announces its third-quarter earnings at the end of October.

But Deutsche Bank hasn't emerged unscathed from the credit malaise. It's taking a total charge of 2.2 billion euros ($3.1 billion); that's a writedown of 1.5 billion euros ($2.1 billion) on structured credit products and securities backed by residential mortgages, along with a 700 million euro ($993 billion) charge on leveraged loans and loan commitments.

Ackermann said that other businesses in the corporate banking and securities unit had produced strong results for the quarter, but overall the division would post a loss of 250 million euros ($355 million) to 350 million euros ($496 million).

Deutsche Bank is perhaps fortunate to not be saddled with the legacy costs of a closed-down hedge fund as is the case at UBS. The ongoing charges to Dillon Read Capital Management, an in-house fund that it closed in July, is one of the main reasons why UBS is now hemorrhaging profits in the midst of a rise in subprime mortgage defaults in the United States and the rising cost of lending.

Deutsche's investors had been concerned it might have been in a similar boat after reports in September said its third-quarter profit could fall as much as 1.7 billion euros ($2.4 billion), because it hadn't been able to find buyers for the risky debt it was holding.

Meanwhile on Wednesday, French lender BNP Paribas said that its risk exposure to the American subprime crisis was below 100 million euros ($142 million).

Analysts said the spat, which revived European fears over stability of gas flows, was politically motivated. Moscow issued the threat as votes were being counted from a parliamentary election in Ukraine that showed gains for pro-Western parties.

"We have reached an agreement to avoid such problems in the future," Dmitry Medvedev, Russian First Deputy Prime Minister and chairman of gas export monopoly Gazprom, said after meeting Ukraine Energy Minister Yuri Boiko.

Gazprom said Boiko had pledged to repay the debt before November to avoid a reduction in supply and to guarantee stable deliveries to Europe.

"European consumers won't suffer. European customers are in an absolutely comfortable situation," Medvedev was quoted by Russian agencies as saying. Gazprom's stock fell by 0.7 percent, in line with the broader market.

Sales at Ford fell 18.2 percent in September, closing out its 2007 model year on a disappointing note, and analysts say the carmaker's immediate future does not look much brighter. Its biggest new product, the Edge, is already on sale, and its most critical redesign, the F-series pickup, is still a year away from arriving at dealerships.

The Edge, a crossover vehicle that executives said would lead Ford through its turnaround, has surpassed expectations, but almost everything else seems to be coming up short. The chief sales analyst at Ford, George Pipas, said September sales fell short of targets in the company's overhaul plan, known as "the way forward."

"We're not where we want to be," Pipas said Tuesday. But he insisted that the shortfall "doesn't throw us off track for the full year."

Ford's sales have been down every month this year, largely because of planned cutbacks in deliveries to rental car companies. But sales at dealerships have fallen off, too, raising questions about whether the carmaker needs to speed up its turnaround.

"Their market share levels are disappointing," said Bruce Clark, an analyst with Moody's Investors Service in New York. "2008 is going to be challenging from an operating standpoint, and their cash burn will not be inconsequential."

September sales of the Ford Taurus sedan, which Ford introduced this summer with high expectations, were 30 percent lower than those of its predecessor, the Five Hundred. And sales of Ford's sport-utility vehicles have fallen so sharply that the Edge outsold them all last month.

Yet the Edge is not winning many new customers for Ford, because nine out of 10 vehicles most commonly traded in for it are other Ford models, said Tom Libby, senior director of industry analysis at the Power Information Network of J.D. Power and Associates.

Ford is preparing to resume contract talks this week with the UAW, which reached a tentative deal with GM last week after a two-day nationwide strike. The deal, which workers are voting on through Oct. 10, is expected to make GM significantly more competitive with foreign manufacturers like Toyota and Honda.

But as details of the GM deal continue to emerge, analysts are increasingly concerned that a similar deal may not go far enough to help Ford and, to a lesser extent, Chrysler.

GM is in a much healthier position than Ford, Libby said, as September sales illustrated. GM's sales rose 4.5 percent, and its market share jumped to 25.3 percent, from 24.4 percent a year ago, according to the Autodata Corp., an industry statistics firm. Ford's market share fell to 13.3 percent, from 16.5 percent.