The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit accusing Decatur Hotels of exploiting foreign workers it hired after the August 2005 storm scattered many of its employees.

The suit claims Decatur Hotels violated the Fair Labor Standards Act when it refused to reimburse foreign workers for recruitment, transportation and visa expenses. Decatur's foreign workers spent up to $5,000 apiece to relocate to New Orleans.

A three-judge panel concluded the law doesn't require an employer to cover any of those expenses.

The judge said last week she was inclined to throw out those results unless someone could directly testify to collecting the slugger's urine samples. The likeliest candidate to be able to do so is Bonds' former trainer, Greg Anderson. A lawyer for Anderson has said his client won't testify at Bonds' upcoming trial.

In a court filing Monday, prosecutors included snippets of Bonds' grand jury testimony saying Anderson collected the samples. It also included testimony from a former BALCO executive saying Anderson dropped off urine samples labeled with Bonds' name.

Bonds is charged with lying to a grand jury about alleged steroid use.

Court officials compiled their first ever tally of bail jumpers in the city at the request of The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Before the newspaper raised the issue, the magnitude of the problem was unknown. Court officials initially told the Inquirer that only $2 million was owed.

A criminal defendant in Philadelphia is usually freed after paying 10 percent of the bail. Defendants who show up for trial get that money back, minus a small fee.

People who don't show up forfeit the 10 percent and owe the remaining 90 percent, but the city has made little effort to collect that money.

During a question-and-answer session Wednesday after an address at the University of Arizona's law school, Roberts was asked whether growing partisanship in the confirmation process poses a significant threat to the independence of the judiciary.

"The courts as a whole are very concerned about partisanship, politicization, seeping into the judicial branch," he said.

Roberts said he thought he was treated fairly during his confirmation hearings, receiving "significant support from both sides of the aisle. But that's not always the case, and what do we do about it?

"I think we need to have a broader recognition that we are not part of the political process, that we are not representatives of either an administration or a confirming Senate on the court," Roberts added. "Your perspective on everything changes the moment you take the judicial oath."

Roberts' lecture focused on his predecessor, the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist.

Roberts called Rehnquist one of the two or three most significant Supreme Court chief justices in history — responsible for a "seismic shift" away from political science and public policy "to the more solid grounds of legal arguments" in case presentations before the court.

"Today, for the first time in its history, every member of the court was a federal court of appeals judge before joining the court — a more legal perspective and less of a policy perspective," Roberts said.

Roberts was named to the high court in September 2005 to succeed Rehnquist. He gave the college's third annual Rehnquist Center Lecture.

Roberts said that during Rehnquist's 33-year tenure on the Supreme Court, he argued 39 cases before him. "Each of those arguments was a lesson, sometimes a hard one in lawyering," he said.

Rep. Jeffrey Wood, an independent from Bloomer, is scheduled to make his initial appearance on charges of third-offense operating while intoxicated, possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia.

Wood was arrested in December while making a 200-mile drive home after a night of drinking in Madison.

Drivers called 911 to report Wood's erratic driving, which included smashing into a highway sign. A state trooper found Wood urinating on the shoulder of Interstate 39-90 and arrested him. A search of his vehicle turned up two bags of marijuana.

Wood has apologized for poor judgment but resisted calls to resign.

Namir Daman of Southfield was sentenced Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Detroit. He pleaded guilty last year to marriage fraud.

He faced up to five years in prison but the government requested leniency because of his cooperation with investigators.

Daman's attorney says he helped prosecutors investigating Roy M. Bailey, a former federal immigration official in Detroit. Bailey pleaded guilty to corruption charges last September and will be sentenced March 9.

Daman, who emigrated from Iraq in 1980, says he naively trusted the wrong people.

The high court on Monday said it will consider allowing prosecutors in Maryland to use a confession from convicted child molester Michael Shatzer that he sexually abused his son.

Shatzer was imprisoned at the Maryland Correctional Institution in Hagerstown for child sexual abuse in 2003 when police started investigating allegations concerning his son. Shatzer requested an attorney and the investigation was soon dropped.

Three years later, the boy was old enough to offer details. According to court documents, when police questioned Shatzer again about the case, he was advised of his rights and signed a form waiving them before confessing.

After Shatzer was charged, he filed a motion to suppress his statements, arguing that he had asked for an attorney in the case before. A lower court said the confession could be used, but the Maryland Court of Appeals agreed with Shatzer and threw out the confession.