WASHINGTON

SUPREME COURT REJECTS MOUSSAOUI PRETRIAL APPEAL

WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court yesterday rejected terrorism suspect Zacarias Moussaoui’s attempt to directly question three Al Qaeda prisoners and cleared the way for a trial of the only American defendant charged in connection with the September 11 attacks.

The ruling allows the government to proceed with plans to seek the death penalty if Mr. Moussaoui is convicted of participating in an Al Qaeda conspiracy that included the 2001 airplane hijackings.

The Justice Department said it would file a motion as early as today, suggesting a trial date in Alexandria, Va.

The government had told the nation’s highest court that national security would be compromised if Mr. Moussaoui, an acknowledged Al Qaeda loyalist, was given access to Al Qaeda captives.

Mr. Moussaoui’s lawyers had asserted that defendants have a constitutional right to witness statements that might exonerate them, and argued that if this right is taken away, the government should not be allowed to seek Mr. Moussaoui’s execution.

Prosecutors, defense lawyers, and U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema in Alexandria will have months of pretrial work ahead of them before Mr. Moussaoui could go on trial.

– Associated Press

C-SPAN’S BOOK TV MUM ON AIRING OF HOLOCAUST DENIER SPEECH

C-Span has not yet announced whether it will cancel plans to air a speech by author David Irving, who has argued that Adolf Hitler did not directly order the extermination of Europe’s Jews. The airing on the C-Span show “Book TV” was first meant to accompany a lecture by a professor of history at Emory University, Deborah Lipstadt, who wrote about being sued for libel in an English court by Mr. Irving, whom she called a Holocaust-denier.

Ms. Lipstadt won the case. After hearing that C-Span would be airing a talk by Mr. Irving, Ms. Lipstadt refused to allow C-Span to record her March 16 lecture at Harvard Hillel, a Jewish organization at Harvard University where she was promoting her book, “History on Trial: My Day in Court with David Irving.” On its Web site, C-Span said the network’s “interest in covering David Irving was to hear the plaintiff’s story of the trial.” C-Span is still trying to cover Ms. Lipstadt’s book, but would not give any further details, a spokeswoman, Peggy Keegan, said.

A group of 200 historians signed a petition last week condemning C-Span’s invitation to Mr. Irving, saying in the letter that “falsifiers of history cannot ‘balance’ histories.” The Anti-Defamation League, which also sent a letter criticizing C-Span, has not yet received a response from the cable network, a spokeswoman said.

– Special to the Sun

SOUTH

SEX OFFENDER CHARGED IN FLORIDA GIRL’S DEATH

INVERNESS, Fla. – A sex offender was charged yesterday with capital murder and three other crimes in the disappearance and death of a 9-year-old Florida girl, authorities said.

John Evander Couey was also charged with burglary with battery, kidnapping, and sexual battery on a child under the age of 12. He will be arraigned on those charges today, officials said. Authorities said he confessed to kidnapping and killing Jessica Marie Lunsford after taking a lie-detector test in Georgia. The girl’s body was found Saturday, more than three weeks after she vanished from her bedroom. Mr. Couey, 46, was brought back to Florida and booked early Sunday on a probation violation and failure to register his change of address as required as a sex offender. He has been held without bond. Sheriff’s officials and the girl’s father, Mark Lunsford, have said they will urge prosecutors to seek the death penalty.

– Associated Press

WEST

THREE CHILDREN PRESUMED DEAD IN LODGE BLAST

PAONIA, Colo. – Three children missing since a powerful blast leveled a secluded mountain lodge in western Colorado are presumed dead, the sheriff said yesterday, as searchers began combing the rubble for their bodies.

The three children, ages 3, 12, and 16, were from the same extended family that owned the Electric Mountain Lodge, Delta County sheriff, Fred McKee, said.

Sixteen other people were injured in the blast. Names of the victims were not released. Despite heavy snowfall overnight, searchers got one piece of heavy equipment up a rugged mountain trail yesterday to start clearing the charred remains of the lodge. The rubble had been too hot Sunday for fire investigators and search crews to enter.

– Associated Press