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Inmate Set to Die by Firing Squad Asks High Court to Stay Execution

Washington (CNN) -- A Utah death row inmate who would become only the third person to die by firing squad in the United States in 33 years appealed to the Supreme Court on Wednesday, seeking a last-minute stay of execution.

Ronnie Lee Gardner's lawyers filed the first of what are expected to be several appeals to the justices. He is scheduled to be put to death early Friday for the shooting death of attorney Michael Burdell during a botched escape attempt from custody in 1985 at a Salt Lake City, Utah, courthouse.

Among the claims the 49-year-old prisoner raises in his appeals is that he has been a death row inmate too long.

"He asserts that executing him now, after nearly 25 years on death row in Utah, so lacks retributive or deterrent value that it violates the Eighth Amendment," Andrew Parnes, Gardner's lawyer, told the high court. He did not return phone calls from CNN seeking comment.

Custody Battle Keeps Arizona Mom and Daughter Stuck in Bahrain

Yazmin Maribel Bautista wants desperately to get out of Bahrain, but she says she won't return home to the U.S. without her 5-year-old daughter -- and that's something her ex-husband says will never happen.

Bautista, 43, of Phoenix, is locked in a bitter child custody dispute with her 28-year-old ex-husband, Sadiq Jaffar Al-Saffar, over their daughter Fatima, who was born in 2004 when her parents lived in Arizona.

Fatima wasn't even 2 years old when her father left her mother and went home to his native Bahrain, where he got engaged to a much younger woman. But despite having been abandoned, Bautista traveled to visit with her ex-husband in Bahrain last year, lured by the promise of a new job and a chance for her daughter to spend time with her father -- an information technology worker -- in his native country.

But now that his ex-wife and daughter are in Bahrain, Al-Saffar has filed for custody of the little girl -- and a judge in the small Mideast country has ruled that the little girl, a native-born American, cannot go home with her mom.

Webby Awards Red Carpet

Webby Awards Red Carpet

Van der Sloot Confesses to Peru Killing

Dutchman Joran van der Sloot, long the prime suspect in the 2005 disappearance of a U.S. teen in Aruba, has confessed to killing a young Peruvian woman in his Lima hotel room last week, a police spokesman said.

Peru's chief police spokesman, Col. Abel Gamarra, told The Associated Press that Van der Sloot admitted under police questioning Monday that he killed 21-year-old Stephany Flores on May 30.

According to La Republica newspaper, Van der Sloot told officials he broke Flores' neck in a rage after he discovered she had used his notebook computer without permission and learned he was involved in the disappearance of Holloway.

"I did not want to do it," La Republica quoted him as saying. "The girl intruded into my private life."

Carl Sagan discusses nuclear self-destruction

No mosque at Ground Zero

Stacy Peterson Search Suspended As Authorities Need 'More Sophisticated Equipment'

Following up on a "credible lead," police spent the day Saturday digging at a farm near Peoria, Illinois, looking for the remains of the missing Stacy Peterson.

After a full day's search turned up nothing, authorities said they would return later in the week with "more sophisticated equipment."

The development comes as Drew Peterson, Stacy's husband and a former Bolingbrook police officer, prepares to stand trial for the murder of his third wife, Kathleen Savio. Savio was found drowned in a bathtub in 2004, a death that was initially ruled an accident. But when Stacy Peterson went missing, the Savio investigation was re-opened and ruled a murder.

Prosecutors have long alleged that Peterson murdered Stacy because of what she knew about his previous wife's death. But without a body, the ex-cop can't be charged in that case.

This latest flurry of activity in the search for Stacy Peterson comes just a month before the Savio trial is set to begin, a fact which angers the defense. From the Chicago Tribune:
"They're trying to dirty up the defendant with an irrelevant search," attorney Joel Brodsky said. "It's a despicable tactic."

Brodsky, who spoke to Peterson on Saturday, described his client as "upbeat, confident and looking forward to trial."

But police say the lead they're pursuing is credible. TMZ.com reported that Peterson told a fellow inmate where he buried Stacy's body, but both the authorities and the Peterson defense team deny that story, pointing out that Peterson has been held in isolation.

Van der Sloot Remains Jailed as Murder Investigation Continues

Lima, Peru (CNN) -- A judge has extended the investigation into murder suspect Joran van der Sloot, accused of killing a Peruvian woman, for another week, a spokeswoman for Peru's Interior Ministry said Sunday.

Van der Sloot, a Dutch citizen, will remain jailed in Lima, Peru, during that time, spokeswoman Rut Cardenas told CNN.

Cardenas said a judge has given investigators another week to gather information about van der Sloot's alleged involvement in the death of a young Peruvian woman last week.

Carlos Neyra, an official with the Peruvian National Police criminal investigation division, said van der Sloot, the sole suspect named in the case, has not been formally charged. Neyra added that van der Sloot now has a lawyer, assigned by the Dutch Embassy.

The Dutch Consulate has told Peruvian authorities that it is not comfortable with the way van der Sloot has been presented to the media, Neyra said. The Peruvian interior minister is asking authorities not to talk about the case without his authorization.

Holloway suspect detained in Peru killing

SANTIAGO, Chile - A Dutch man long suspected in the disappearance of an Alabama teen in Aruba was detained Thursday in Chile in the murder of a young woman in Peru.

Stephany Flores, 21, was killed in a Lima hotel on Sunday, five years to the day after Holloway disappeared.

The suspect, Joran van der Sloot, was in a taxi apparently headed to Vina del Mar, a coastal city in central Chile, when he was taken into custody, the El Comercio newspaper in Peru reported. He was brought back to Santiago, the newspaper said.