A former drug enforcement official employed by accused swindler Allen Stanford has pleaded not guilty to charges that he illegally ordered shredding of documents in the fraud case.

Thomas Raffanello entered the plea Friday in federal court in Fort Lauderdale. The 61-year-old Raffanello rose to became head of global security at Stanford Financial Group after leaving five years ago as chief of Miami's U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration office.

Prosecutors say Raffanello illegally supervised destruction of Stanford records despite a court order that they be preserved. The three charges against Raffanello carry a combined maximum prison sentence of 30 years.

Raffanello's attorney says his client is innocent and that the destroyed documents were only duplicates.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati on Tuesday denied 53-year-old Romell Broom's request to stay the execution and to allow an appeal to go before the full court.

A three-judge panel of the court had rejected the appeal late Monday.

Broom's attorney Tim Sweeney said there were no further appeals options.

The state had stopped its execution preparations pending the appeals court decision. A prisons spokeswoman says preparations have resumed and estimated the execution will take place about 1:30 p.m.

Broom was convicted in the 1984 slaying of Tryna Middleton after abducting her at knifepoint in Cleveland.

A federal judge in Los Angeles has ruled against Universal Music Group in a copyright lawsuit against online video site operator Veoh Networks Inc., although Universal says it will appeal.

U.S. District Judge Howard Matz on Friday dismissed the 2007 suit in which Universal accused Veoh of supporting and inducing copyright infringement.

Matz ruled that Veoh was taking reasonable steps to prevent and take down infringing videos uploaded by its users and that gave it protection from copyright suits in federal law.

Veoh CEO Dmitry Shapiro called the decision "a great victory." The company noted that with the ruling, it expects to become profitable within the next two quarters.

The lawsuit cost "many millions of dollars" to defend, money that would now be reinvested in the business, he said.

"We've been dragging a giant boulder on a chain. This frees us," Shapiro said. "This lawsuit was simply Universal's attempt to prevent innovation and shut down the company."

Privately held Veoh was founded in 2004 and to date has raised $70 million from such investors as Shelter Capital Partners, Michael Eisner, Goldman Sachs, Time Warner Inc., Intel Corp. and Adobe Systems Inc.

Universal, a unit of France's Vivendi SA, said it will appeal the decision to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, saying it runs counter to precedent and the intent of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act enacted in 1998.

The Rev. Bernice King and Martin Luther King III sued their brother, Dexter King, last year to force him to open the books of their father's estate. The lawsuit claims Dexter King, the estate's administrator, has refused to provide documents concerning the estate's operations. A hearing in the case was set Monday morning.

Dexter King also sued his sister, who administers their mother's estate. He asked a judge to force her to turn over Coretta Scott King's personal papers, including love letters central to a now-defunct $1.4 million book deal.

Monsignor Mark Plewka of the diocese confirmed the settlements with a man and his nephew, The Pueblo Chieftain said.

The man alleged Andrew Burke abused him from 1970-78. The lawsuits accuse Burke of establishing a similar relationship with the man's nephew.

Burke left the priesthood in 1973. He committed suicide in September 2005 at age 62, after reporters asked questions about the allegations.

The man had sought $1.8 million from the diocese and the release of Burke's personnel file.

Terms of the settlements weren't disclosed, but Burke's file was not released.

Another man who alleges Burke abused him previously won the right to look at Burke's personnel file, which may show how early the diocese was aware of allegations of abuse.

The Colorado Supreme Court recently affirmed a decision by a Pueblo District judge compelling the diocese to release Burke's file to the John Doe accuser.

Plewka and lawyer Adam Horowitz, who represents the accuser, said last week the diocese provided Burke's file to the plaintiff's lawyers.

Alvord pleaded guilty last month to drunken driving, third-degree assault and reckless driving in Multnomah County Circuit Court. He also pleaded no contest to hit-and-run driving.

On Thursday, Judge Michael McShane sentenced him to 22 months in prison.

Defense lawyer Jim O'Rourke told the court that Alvord booked himself into a 30-day residential treatment center. He pushed his insurance company to settle with his victim for $1.25 million. Once he is out of prison, he has agreed to sit beside the man he injured, Norman Larkin, and tell other drunken drivers what happened when he made the decision to drink and drive.

Larkin says he now considers Alvord "a new friend." The 51-year-old Larkin suffered a broken pelvis and broken legs when Alvord's car jumped onto the sidewalk Feb. 7 and pinned him against a utility pole.

Fourteen people saw the crash and some followed Alvord, 61, as he drove off. They boxed him in less than a mile away.

Alvord had a blood-alcohol level of 0.30 percent, approaching four times the legal intoxication threshold.

Larkin acknowledges he was angry and in a lot of pain for a few weeks but says he now believes Alvord is truly remorseful.

The White House plans to nominate the judge who presided over the Bernard Madoff case to the appeals court that Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor served on, Sen. Charles Schumer said Wednesday.

Schumer said in a statement that his office told the White House that U.S. District Judge Denny Chin "would be an outstanding choice" for an appointment to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan.

One of the four openings on the appeals court was created Sotomayor was elevated to the U.S. Supreme Court. She heard her first case as a justice on Wednesday.

Chin, 55, sentenced Wall Street swindler Madoff earlier this summer to 150 years in prison for cheating thousands of people out of billions of dollars.

Schumer praised Chin in his two-sentence statement, saying: "Even in the most high-profile of cases, he has been unflappable, erudite and steadily applied the law." Chin did not comment publicly on Schumer's statement Wednesday.

Chin was widely celebrated for his decision to jail 71-year-old Madoff immediately after he pleaded guilty to fraud charges in March and for sentencing him to the maximum prison term in June. Yet Chin also has gained respect for his compassion on the bench.

In November 2007, he cited then-83-year-old Oscar Wyatt Jr.'s age and military service during World War II as he sentenced the Texas oilman to a year and a day in prison for his role in the Iraqi oil-for-food scandal.

Nine months earlier, he reversed a jury verdict, saying evidence did not support the fraud conviction of a former New York Stock Exchange floor supervisor who once oversaw all trading in General Electric Co. stock.