The Supreme Court has refused to hear former Qwest CEO Joseph Nacchio's appeal of his insider trading conviction.

The court said Monday it would not entertain Nacchio's request that he either be acquitted of the charge or granted a new trial.

Prosecutors said Nacchio sold $52 million worth of stock in 2001 while knowing that Denver-based Qwest Communications International Inc. would have trouble meeting its sales goals. Nacchio began serving a six-year sentence on April 14.

He contended the jury was given improper instructions about what internal information had to be disclosed publicly. He also argued that the trial judge improperly barred testimony from an expert who could have explained Nacchio's trading patterns.

The high court on Monday left in place a federal appeals court ruling that state officials were within their rights in trying to keep viewpoints on abortion off of Illinois license plates. Choose Life Illinois, Inc. sued to force the state to issue the plates.

The Supreme Court will consider throwing out a human rights lawsuit against a former prime minister of Somalia who is accused of overseeing killings and other atrocities.

The court said Wednesday it would review an appeals court ruling allowing Somalis to sue Mohamed Ali Samantar of Fairfax, Va., who was defense minister and prime minister of Somalia in the 1980s and early 1990s under dictator Siad Barre.

The lawsuit alleges that Samantar was responsible for killings, rapes and torture, including waterboarding, of his own people while in power, particularly against disfavored clans. The lawsuit was filed in 2004 at federal court in Alexandria under the Torture Victim Protection Act.

U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema tossed out the case in 2007, ruling that Samantar was entitled to immunity under a separate U.S. law, the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act.

But the appellate court ruled that the law does not extend immunity to individuals, only to foreign states themselves and their agencies.

The high court will consider whether Samantar is immune from the lawsuit. The case will be argued early next year.

The New Jersey Supreme Court has reinstated a ban on exit polls, surveys taken of people as they leave their voting places.

It also has kept in place a ban on distributing leaflets or other materials within 100 feet of polling places. It said Wednesday prohibiting such activities will ensure voters feel no obstructions to casting their ballots.

The ban on approaching voters was created in 1972. It was changed in 2007 by the state attorney general to allow for exit polling by journalists.

The state branch of the American Civil Liberties Union argued it also should be allowed to approach voters so it could give them cards explaining their rights and telling them how to report problems.

But the state said if the ACLU were allowed past the 100-foot border, other groups would be permitted also.

A former investigator involved in the Jayson Williams manslaughter case on Tuesday described how he used a racial slur to describe the former NBA star, while his boss explained why he chose not to disclose the incident before Williams' 2004 trial.

The testimony occurred during a hearing in state Superior Court, where Williams' defense team is attempting to show that racial bias tainted the investigation and prosecution.

Williams, who retired in 2000 after nine seasons with the Philadelphia 76ers and New Jersey Nets, was acquitted of aggravated manslaughter in 2004 in the shooting two years earlier of hired driver Costas "Gus" Christofi at Williams' central New Jersey mansion.

He was convicted on four counts of attempting to cover up the crime, and a jury deadlocked on a reckless manslaughter count for which Williams faces a retrial scheduled for January.

Tuesday's hearing, and another scheduled for Wednesday, were prompted by Hunterdon County Prosecutor J. Patrick Barnes' disclosure of the racial epithet in 2007, more than three years after the trial.

Barnes said Tuesday he was notified about the slur in early 2003 from an employee who had been in the room when Hunt, who is white, said it in 2002. Barnes said although he reacted with "anger and disappointment," he chose not to inform the trial judge or Williams' defense team.

The state of Wyoming has asked a federal appeals court to give a judge authority to block a proposal reducing the number of snowmobiles allowed in Yellowstone National Park.

The National Park Service has said it intends to release a plan that could limit snowmobile traffic into Yellowstone and neighboring federal lands to 318 trips a day — less than half of last season's daily limit of 720.

The Wyoming Attorney General's Office argued Friday that the plan would violate U.S. District Judge Clarence Brimmer's order that set the daily limit at 720 snowmobiles a day.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals in Denver heard arguments Friday in Laramie on an appeal by the National Parks Conservation Association, which wants Brimmer's order invalidated.

Snowmobile management issues in Yellowstone have been in turmoil over the last few years as federal courts in Wyoming and Washington, D.C. both have presided over lawsuits on the issue.

Conservation groups have sued seeking lower daily limits while Wyoming, Park County and snowmobile groups have pushed to maintain access.

In letters written to her mother, the woman charged in the 2002 kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart has sought forgiveness for any pain she has caused and says she expects to spend the rest of her life in prison.

Wanda Eileen Barzee, 63, however, makes just one reference to Smart in the 12 letters obtained by The Associated Press. And she doesn't provide details about the nine months the girl allegedly spent with her and her now-estranged husband Brian David Mitchell.

The couple is charged with multiple felonies in state court and last year was indicted by a federal grand jury.

But Barzee writes of repentance only when discussing her desire to be re-baptized in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In a June 21 letter, she recounts talking to a local church leader about the steps necessary to regain her membership, which includes making a full confession.