Moe Gibbs, 35, pleaded guilty to six felony counts involving five inmates at the Barnes County Jail.

Last month, a jury found him guilty in the death of Valley City State University Mindy Morgenstern. His first murder trial on the charge, in July in Minot, ended in a deadlocked jury.

Defense attorney Ross Brandborg would not say why Gibbs changed his pleas to guilty. The plea deal calls for a 25-year prison sentence with 10 years suspended.

Prosecutor Jonathan Byers Byers said Gibbs' "acceptance of responsibility" figured into the lower sentence. "There has to be some benefit to him for doing that," Byers said.

Authorities say the assaults took place from May to September last year. Under questioning from Byers on Friday, Gibbs said he had sexual contact with two inmates while they were either asleep or waking up.

The judge agreed to Brandborg's request to delay sentencing on the assault charges. Gibbs is to be sentenced on the murder conviction Monday and for a 2004 rape next Thursday.

Prosecutors accused Mark Serrano, 30, and Charles Gilleo Jr., 32, of killing Tina and Manuel "Tony" Morey and their three young sons in the early hours of Jan. 19, setting the family's house on fire and stealing cocaine from Tony Morey. Prosecutors said Serrano and Gilleo had previously bought drugs from Manuel Morey.

A Dutchess County jury deliberated for five hours before returning its guilty verdict against Serrano on all charges except first degree arson. Serrano was found guilty of 20 counts of first-degree murder, 11 counts of second-degree murder, six counts of robbery, one count of third-degree arson, two counts of conspiracy and one count of perjury.

Gilleo has pleaded not guilty to the same 42 charges Serrano faced and is set to be tried early next year.

According to an autopsy, Manuel Morey died of a gunshot wound to the neck. Tina Morey, 30, died of gunshot wounds to the chest and head. Manuel "Tony Jr." Morey, 13, and Adam, 10, died of multiple stab wounds. Ryan, 6, died from blunt-force trauma to the head.

A state district court jury in Amite on Monday convicted Austin "Trey" Bernard III in the rape of his daughter as well as the rape of a 12-year-old boy, prosecutor Scott Perrilloux said.

Bernard, 39, denied the charges, but three earlier confessions and a journal that seemed to detail the practices of the group were too much to overcome, said Al Bensabat, the public defender who represented him.

"Once the jury read that it was all over," Bensabat said Tuesday.

Bernard, who faces a mandatory life prison term without parole when he is sentenced on Jan. 12, was being held in jail on Tuesday.

No trial date has been set for the remaining six defendants. Perrilloux said he anticipates bringing the former minister of Hosanna Church, Louis Lamonica, to trial in early 2008. Lamonica has pleaded not guilty.

The allegations have rocked the small town of Ponchatoula, about 40 miles northwest of New Orleans.

The activities at the church became known when Lamonica walked into the Livingston Parish Sheriff's Department and asked to speak with a detective in 2005, Chief of Detectives Stan Carpenter said.

For almost two hours, Lamonica, 49, told investigators how he and other church members had molested children, and taught them to have sex with each other, as well as with a dog, authorities said.

Lamonica told the detectives that he drank cat blood and poured it on the bodies of his young victims.

Robb, 57, testified Monday that he argued with his wife about a trip she and their daughter were taking over the holiday break. He did not want the 12-year-old to miss any school.

"We started a discussion about that. The discussion was tense," Robb said. "We were both anxious about it. We both got angry. At one point, Ellen pushed me. ... I just lost it."

Robb said he picked up the chin-up bar, which was lying nearby, and struck his wife with it repeatedly.

He later threw the weapon in a trash bin in Philadelphia and tried to make their home look as if it had been burglarized. Detectives were suspicious from the start, though, because the scene was poorly staged and nothing was missing.

The 49-year-old homemaker was found dead in the kitchen, near the partially wrapped presents.

Robb's trial had been scheduled to start Monday. He could have faced a life sentence if convicted of first-degree murder, but prosecutors felt there were no guarantees given the circumstantial evidence.

The professor pleaded guilty to one count of voluntary manslaughter, which is defined as an intentional, unlawful killing, with provocation, in the heat of passion.

Montgomery County prosecutor Bruce Castor called the case "a classic heat-of-passion killing."

Robb adored his daughter Olivia and feared he would see less of her in a divorce, both sides agreed.

University spokesman Ron Ozio said a Penn official spoke to Robb's lawyer after Monday's hearing and asked for his resignation.

Ellen Robb's brothers, Art Gregory of Haddonfield, N.J., and Gary Gregory of Boston, said their sister suffered verbal abuse throughout the marriage, eroding her self-esteem.

"What kept them there was their undying love for their daughter Olivia," said Art Gregory, who is now raising the girl. "Both of them put Olivia first, beyond anything else, unfortunately to a very tragic end."

Rafael Robb apologized to Olivia, who was not in court, and said he was "very remorseful."

"I know she liked her mother. ... And now she doesn't have a mother," he said, stifling tears.

Robb, who has been held without bail, talked to his daughter by phone over the weekend and admitted that he was responsible for her mother's death. They have not seen each other since his arrest in January.

Sentencing will likely take place in a few months. Guidelines call for a prison term of 4 1/2 to seven years, but Castor said the statute allows for anything from probation to 10 to 20 years.

Rafael Robb, once a tenured economics professor at the University of Pennsylvania, faces a prison sentence of no more than seven years for bludgeoning his wife, Ellen, on Dec. 22.

Robb, 57, said Monday that he got into an argument with his wife about a trip she was taking with their daughter and whether they would be returning in time for the daughter to return to school.

"We started a discussion about that. The discussion was tense," Robb said. "We were both anxious about it. We both got angry. At one point, Ellen pushed me. ... I just lost it."

An indictment unsealed Thursday in U.S. District Court accuses Clinch County Sheriff Winston Peterson of perjury, obstruction of justice, using forced labor and extorting former jail inmates.

Peterson, 62, pleaded not guilty to the charges Thursday and was released on $10,000 bond.

Investigators say the sheriff charged jail inmates $18 per day for room and board. County officials agreed in April 2006 to return $27,000 to hundreds of inmates who paid the fees between 2000 and 2004. Peterson also used an inmate to do work at a business run by his wife, investigators say.

The sheriff is charged with obstructing justice by alerting an unindicted co-conspirator about the identity of an FBI informant he believed was part of a criminal investigation into courthouse activities. He is also accused of lying during a grand jury investigation of a Superior Court judge.

Neither Peterson nor his attorney could be reached for comment Thursday night. An after-hours call to his attorney's home went unanswered, and the sheriff could not be reached through the dispatcher.

Peterson is the latest Clinch County official to be caught up in investigations into the rural county's practices.

Superior Court Judge Brooks E. Blitch III and Chief State Court Judge Berrien Sutton face allegations by the Judicial Qualifications Commission, a state agency that investigates Georgia judges and has power to recommend removing them from office. They have not been charged with any crimes.

Blitch, 72, is accused of ordering illegal payments to county employees, ordering the early release of imprisoned felons and presiding over a case involving his son.

Blitch's attorneys have said an investigation will prove he is innocent.

Sutton is accused of appointing non-lawyers to hear criminal cases, pressing a magistrate judge to help one of his business associates and signing an illegal order to collect court fees that were later distributed to county officials.

Thomas Whithers, an attorney for Sutton, said Wednesday the judge looks forward to his day in court. "Judge Sutton has done nothing wrong and will vigorously defend these allegations," he said.

Deandre Witherspoon, 24, pleaded guilty Monday to second-degree murder in the killings of Orlando Herron, 13, and Darren Johnson, 11. The two were found shot in the head inside their ransacked home in February.

Authorities have said the boys were the victims of a drug-related robbery of their older cousin, an admitted drug dealer who survived being shot at the home.

Witherspoon, the sixth and final suspect in the case, avoided a potential life sentence by agreeing to the plea. His trial was set to begin Tuesday.

He now faces 22 to 40 years when he is sentenced Nov. 12.

Separate juries earlier this month returned guilty verdicts against Sonya O'Neal, 38, and Robert Reed, 36. They face mandatory sentences of life in prison when they are sentenced Wednesday.

Prosecutors said Witherspoon hatched the plan to rob the boys' cousin of drugs and money, and O'Neal did the shooting. Three others have pleaded guilty.