AT&T Inc will offer refunds to customers who have been charged for third-party cellphone content, including ringtones, news and other alerts, as part of a settlement of a group of class-action lawsuits, court papers available online show.

The top U.S. phone company's wireless unit AT&T Mobility agreed to refund third-party mobile content fees that it billed from Jan. 1, 2004 through May 30 this year, the papers show.

The plaintiffs had accused AT&T Mobility of charging its wireless subscribers for unauthorized third-party mobile content. Similar lawsuits are pending in state and federal courts nationwide, the papers show.

In a unanimous decision, Justice Clarence Thomas said that a money laundering case cannot be proven merely by showing that funds were concealed while being transported.

In a separate 5-4 decision, the court said that money laundering refers to profits of an illegal operation, not gross receipts. The court's interpretation is a narrow one opposed by law enforcement agencies.

Justice Antonin Scalia said the narrow definition will not unduly burden authorities, who must show only that a single instance of unlawful activity was profitable.

Providing the crucial tie-breaking vote, Justice John Paul Stevens refused to go as far as Scalia, saying Congress favored a broader interpretation of the law in cases involving the operation of organized crime syndicates.

Separately, an appeals court in New Jersey sharply reduced a verdict in another Vioxx case. The court ruled that the jury should not have been allowed to award punitive damages against Merck or to find that Merck had committed consumer fraud. Only compensatory damages of $4.5 million were permitted, the court said.

The rulings on Thursday leave lawyers for plaintiffs with just three victories, all with relatively small awards, in the nearly 20 Vioxx cases that have reached juries. Mark Lanier, a plaintiffs’ lawyer who was involved in both cases decided Thursday, criticized the decisions and promised appeals. But plaintiffs face an uphill battle.

Bruce Kuhlik, Merck’s general counsel, said the company was pleased with the rulings.

“Our faith in the judges and the fairness of the process has been well placed,” he said.

Thursday’s ruling may further discourage lawyers from pursuing lawsuits against drug makers. Already, plaintiffs’ lawyers are nervously awaiting a Supreme Court ruling in a case that will be heard this fall and could bar most lawsuits against companies for injuries said to be caused by prescription medicines approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

Dustin Turner is hoping to overturn his conviction based on a confession by a fellow trainee who also went to prison for the crime. A hearing was to resume Thursday morning in Virginia Beach Circuit Court.

On Wednesday, Billy Joe Brown testified that he alone killed Jennifer Evans in 1995. He said he became a Christian in prison and realized he had to come clean.

Brown also gave a sworn statement taking full responsibility for the killing in 2003.

After a judge determines whether Brown's confession is credible, the state appeals court must decide whether it would have changed the outcome of Turner's trial.

In two employment cases, one involving race and the other, age, the court took an expansive view of workers' rights and avoided the narrow, ideology-based decisions that marked its previous term.

The justices read parts of an 1860s civil rights act and the main anti-age bias law to include the right to sue over reprisals even though neither provision expressly prohibits retaliation.

Justice Stephen Breyer, writing for the court in a case involving a black employee at a Cracker Barrel restaurant who was fired, said that previous Supreme Court decisions and congressional action make clear that retaliation is covered.

The idea that a provision of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, known as section 1981, "encompasses retaliation claims is indeed well-embedded in the law," Breyer said in the 7-2 ruling.

The court said in a 7-2 ruling that retaliation is another form of intentional, unlawful discrimination that is barred by the Civil Rights Act of 1866. It was enacted to benefit newly freed blacks.

Business groups objected that the law does not expressly prohibit retaliation and said employees should have to file suit under another law, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. That law has a shorter deadline for filing suit and caps the amount of money that a successful plaintiff may recover.

The Bush administration was on the side of the workers.

The provision of the 1866 law, known as section 1981, does not explicitly mention retaliation.

But Justice Stephen Breyer, in his majority opinion, said that previous Supreme Court decisions and congressional action make clear that retaliation is covered.

Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas dissented.

The case grew out of the firing of a black associate manager at a Cracker Barrel restaurant in Bradley, Ill. Hedrick Humphries claimed he was fired after he complained about race discrimination by other Cracker Barrel supervisors.

The latest tussle over who has legitimate claim to what's "sexy" in tresses came late Friday, when Victoria's Secret filed court papers challenging a federal Trademark Trial and Appeal Board ruling in favor of Sexy Hair Concepts LLC.

The board concluded in April 2007 that consumers were likely to confuse the lingerie giant's "So Sexy" trademark for hair-care items with Sexy Hair Concepts' various trademarks using the word "sexy" for its own coiffure line.

In papers filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, Victoria's Secret said it wants the court to consider a study it conducted. The survey found only five of 308 people who bought hair-care products associated the word "sexy" with a single company and made any reference to Sexy Hair Concepts and its offerings.

The Columbus, Ohio-based company that also introduced the Very Sexy bra said its study proves "that the word `sexy' has not acquired distinctiveness among purchasers of hair care products."

Thus, it added, Sexy Hair Concepts "is not the owner of a family of trademarks in the word 'sexy.'"

In court papers filed earlier this month, Sexy Hair Concepts said it had used "Sexy Hair" to describe hair-care items since 1998. The company said it packages and promotes the "sexy" family of products to give "sexy" a distinctive commercial impression.

Sexy Hair Concepts applied to protect its trademarks for the "sexy" product line in November 2001, well before Victoria's Secret began testing some of its "So Sexy" coiffure products in April 2003, said Sexy Hair Concepts, based in Chatsworth, Calif.

Victoria's Secret has appealed the trademark board's ruling to a federal judge, who is considering only whether the board ruled correctly.

Sexy Hair said it sells tens of millions of dollars' worth of "Sexy Hair" products annually.

Earlier this year, Victoria's Secret chief executive Sharen Turney said her company might have become "too sexy" for its own good.

"We've so much gotten off our heritage ... too sexy, and we use the word sexy a lot and really have forgotten the ultra feminine," Turney told industry analysts.