Court throws out 'three-strike' sentence

SAN FRANCISCO -- A federal appeals court Friday threw out a shoplifter's 50-year sentence under California's "three strikes" law as "grossly disproportionate" -- a ruling that could lead to hundreds of challenges from defendants who received near-life terms for petty crimes.

In a 2-1 ruling, a panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Leonardo Andrade's sentence violated the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Andrade got 50 years in prison for stealing nine videotapes, valued at $153, from a Kmart. The court noted that kidnappers and murderers could receive less time than Andrade, who had a record of several nonviolent, petty crimes.

Had Andrade's prior convictions not made him subject to the three strikes law, he would have faced six months at most.

Virginia court tosses cross-burning law

RICHMOND, Va. -- A sharply divided Virginia Supreme Court on Friday ruled that a state law against cross burning is unconstitutional.

In a 4-3 ruling, the court threw out convictions against three people in two cross-burning cases. One involved the burning of a cross at a Ku Klux Klan rally and the other involved the attempted burning of a cross in the back yard of a black person.

"Under our system of government, people have the right to use symbols to communicate," said the ruling written by Justice Donald W. Lemons.

"While reasonable prohibitions upon time, place, and manner of speech, and statutes of neutral application may be enforced, government may not regulate speech based on hostility -- or favoritism -- towards the underlying message expressed," Lemons wrote.

Surgeon general says he will leave in February

WASHINGTON -- Surgeon General David Satcher, a Clinton appointee who drew the anger of the Bush White House last summer with a medical report on sexuality, says he will leave the government in February.

"My term ends on Feb. 13 and I don't plan to stay on," Satcher said Friday in an interview with The Associated Press.

Asked if he would like to stay on, Satcher said, "That's not an issue for me."

Satcher rankled the White House last summer when his office released a report that found there was no evidence showing that teaching sexual abstinence in schools was successful. It called for schools to encourage abstinence among students but to also teach birth control techniques.

Jurors get case of rabbi whose wife was killed

CAMDEN, N.J. -- The jurors deciding whether a rabbi arranged his wife's killing seven years ago asked the judge Friday what would happen if they can't reach a unanimous verdict.

The judge told jurors it would be premature to answer, and the six men and six women resumed their second day of deliberations in the case of Rabbi Fred J. Neulander.

Authorities say Neulander, 60, paid two men to kill his wife, Carol, on Nov. 1, 1994.

If the jury convicts Neulander of capital murder, it will reconvene to consider whether to impose the death penalty or sentence Neulander to as long as life in prison with no chance of parole for 30 years.

Mysterious gift atones for smashed pumpkin

SANDWICH, Mass. -- Cliff Nelson has been wondering for a year why vandals would roll a prize 150-pound pumpkin out of his back yard and smash it in front of his house.

To the 91-year-old Nelson, it was a waste of a summer's work.

"I put an ad in the local paper," he said. "I made it known that I just wanted to talk about it. No retribution, no reprisal. I just wanted to know more."

On Wednesday, Halloween, Nelson got his answer and a peace offering.

More than 20 pumpkins were laid out in front of his house with this note: "Dear Sir -- I hope these pumpkins make up for last year. Sorry."

--From wire reports

Nelson said that while he was happy about the gift, he had to wonder if the collection might have been pilfered from his neighbors.

-- From wire reports