Pfizer Inc. said Thursday that a federal appeals court has overturned a lower court decision that upheld the patent protecting its widely-prescribed hypertension drug Novasc, a move that opens the door to early generic competition.

In a statement, Pfizer said the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed a lower court ruling in favor of Pfizer, which found the Norvasc patent to be valid and enforceable. The appeal was brought by Apotex, which has been seeking to have the Pfizer patent nullified in order to put out a generic version of the drug.

Pfizer added that it is "reviewing the decision and is considering all its options, including seeking reconsideration."
Other generic drugmakers have also been seeking to put out generic versions of the drug, including Mylan Laboratories (MYL) . Norvasc is slated to lose patent protection later this year.

Prudential analyst Timothy Anderson said in his note Thursday that the appeals ruling could allow for the introduction of generic versions of Norvasc as soon as next week.

"We did not anticipate this ruling, but it will probably only have a muted impact on Pfizer which is already a washed-out, low valuation name," wrote Anderson.

"Earlier generic entry is a negative and could cost the company $1 billion in sales or so in 2007, but given Pfizer's size and cash generation this it not very material to the company's future outlook, in our opinion," Anderson added.

Vonage uses VoIP, which involves converting the sound of a voice into packets of data and reassembling them into sound at the other end of the call. In 2003, Minnesota's Public Utilities Commission tried to register Vonage as a phone company, which would have subjected it to state tariffs and rate regulations, the report said. A federal judge barred Minnesota from doing so, and a year later at Vonage's request the FCC ruled that the company's services could not be regulated by the states.

Regulatory agencies in a number of states, including Minnesota, appealed that ruling, the report said. In the decision authored by Fargo, N.D.-based 8th Circuit Judge Kermit Bye, the court agreed with the FCC's determination that the nature of VoIP telephone calls allows customers to place "home" phone calls from nearly anywhere, irrespective of state lines, the report added.

When the FCC issued its ruling in 2004, officials with the agency indicated that they believed streamlined regulation was key to the growth of the fledgling industry.

The report further quoted Vonage CEO Mike Snyder as saying that the decision was good news for the company's 2.2 million subscribers.

P&G won the $19M lawsuit when the court concluded that the four had spread a false accusation that P&G subsidised Satanic cults.

The rumour had proved popular with evangelicals in the US. During the 1960s, a story began circulating that the corporation was controlled by Satan worshipers. A moon-star symbol was used by the company on many of its products from 1882 to 1985, which was considered suspect.

The stars in fact stand for the thirteen original American colonies. But the arrangement of stars in the symbol was said to secretly spell out the Revelation 13:18 "number of the beast": 666.

Without examining the facts, many people, most notably evangelicals, signed petitions against Procter & Gamble and boycotted their products in the 1980s and 1990s.

This latest case is one of several unfair competition suits P&G has brought refuting the Satanism slurs.

According to P&G, the four distributors had passed on to customers the notion that its logo - featuring a bearded man looking over a field of 13 stars - was a symbol of Satan.

"This is about protecting our reputation," said Jim Johnson, P&G's chief legal officer.

Amway pointed out that it had successfully defended itself in an earlier case brought by P&G that had been connected with the rumours.

It had also, it said, done everything it could to get the rumour stamped out.

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.

The city of Modesto has agreed to pay $3.25 million to settle allegations of sex discrimination, harassment and retaliation filed by a Sacramento law firm on behalf of three female employees.

The settlement was confirmed by Stanislaus County Superior Court Judge Roger Beauchesne on Monday. The women were represented by Susan Kirkgaard, a trial attorney at Diepenbrock Harrison who specializes in employment law.

  City employees Karin Rodriguez, Jocelyn Reed and Debra Eggerman alleged that high-level managers in the city created a workplace that discriminated against and was hostile to women.

The women complained they were denied promotions and pay equal to their male counterparts, in violation of state law. When they reported the problems to city officials, the city did nothing to stop the discrimination and harassment; instead retaliating against them, the women alleged.

"Unfortunately, gender disparity has historically been a systemic problem within the city," Kirkgaard said in a prepared statement. "During the time we have been fighting this war, we have seen the city attorney, city manager and a number of deputy directors leave the city's employment -- and I believe it to be caused in part by the claims we were raising."

The city settled the case to avoid complex and protracted litigation, said litigation counsel Shelline K. Bennett. The city did not admit liability.

"This resolution provides an opportunity to conclude a difficult chapter so that the organization can move forward," city manager George Britton said in a prepared statement.

Nacchio and other executives also face a class action lawsuit and civil charges brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Another former Qwest employee, ex-Vice President Marc Weisberg, pleaded guilty to wire fraud in December 2005 and agreed to help prosecutors build a case against Nacchio.

- In Vermont, middle school student Zachary Guiles wore a T-shirt that used images of cocaine use and a martini glass to criticize President Bush. The shirt also called Bush "chicken-hawk-in-chief" and said he was on a "world domination tour."

School authorities said the shirt violated a dress code that bans clothing that promotes use of alcohol or drugs. Guiles taped over the images, sued and won rulings from lower federal courts. The Supreme Court has yet to act on the school district's appeal.

- In suburban San Diego, Tyler Harper was pulled from his class for wearing a T-shirt bearing the words "homosexuality is shameful." Harper said he wore the shirt after his school backed an event meant to show support for homosexuals, bisexuals and trans-gender students.

Harper sued the Poway Unified School District for violating his civil rights, contending he was suspended for expressing "sincerely held religious beliefs." The school said its dress code is designed to prevent disruption.

A federal judge upheld the policy and the same federal appeals court that sided with Frederick now is considering the case.

- A national Christian legal group sued a suburban Philadelphia school district on free-speech grounds, saying the district censors prayer club members and threatens discipline if students speak out against homosexuality.

The lawsuit filed by the Alliance Defense Fund accuses the Downingtown Area School District of improperly forcing a student group to drop explicitly Christian or Scriptural references from its literature, and to meet as the "Prayer Club" instead of the preferred "Bible Club."