John Schwartz New York Times

• Murder accused covers tattoos to get fair trial

  When John Ditullio goes on trial on Monday, jurors will not see the large swastika tattooed on his neck. Or the crude insult tattooed on the other side of his neck. Or any of the other markings he has acquired since being jailed on charges related to a double stabbing that wounded a woman and killed a teenager in 2006.Mr. Ditullio's lawyer successf...

• US to drop colour-coded terror alerts

  There goes another punch line. The US Department of Homeland Security is planning to get rid of the colour-coded terrorism alert system. Known officially as the Homeland Security Advisory System, the five-colour scheme was introduced by the Bush administration in March 2002. Red, the highest level, meant "severe risk of terrorist attacks." The lowe...

• Superheroes in Court at Yale show

  The case of "The People vs Superman" is not found in the hornbooks that are scoured by the nation's law students. But if they had been youngsters in 1967, when Action Comics No 359 first came out, they might have been amazed to see the Man of Steel in an unusual situation. Instead of zooming through the sky or confronting talkative archvillains, he...

• Confessing to crime, but innocent

  Eddie Lowery lost 10 years of his life for a crime he did not commit. There was no physical evidence at his trial for rape, but one overwhelming factor put him away: he confessed. At trial, the jury heard details that prosecutors insisted only the rapist could have known, including the fact that the rapist hit the 75-year-old victim in the head wit...