Children categories
ATLANTA (AP) — A judge in Atlanta has granted a news media request to unseal the autopsy report for Bobbi Kristina Brown.
Local news media report that Fulton County Superior Court Judge Henry Newkirk on Thursday granted a motion filed by media organizations.
WXIA-TV reports the judge will likely sign an unsealing order in the coming days. The state is appealing.
Media lawyers argued the September sealing order violated the state and federal constitutions and court rules because it was entered without public notice and without an opportunity for a hearing. The state argued the law exempts records sealed by court order.
The 22-year-old daughter of singer Whitney Houston was found face-down and unresponsive in a bathtub in her suburban Atlanta townhome Jan. 31, 2015, and died in hospice care July 26.
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — NASA space champ Scott Kelly is finally back home in Houston with his family and the swimming pool that he craved throughout his yearlong absence from Planet Earth.
Before he could go home to his own bed Thursday, Kelly had to endure more medical tests to measure his body's adaptation to gravity.
Kelly's girlfriend and his two daughters, ages 20 and 12, rushed into his arms after he exited the NASA jet that brought him back to Houston from Kazakhstan in the wee hours of Thursday. His identical twin, retired astronaut Mark Kelly, and their father were next in line to greet him.
This last leg of his journey, by plane, took a whole day because of weather delays.
Kelly's 340-day space station mission set a NASA record.
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — Florida is overhauling the death penalty in a bid to resume executions after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the state's current sentencing law was unconstitutional.
The Florida Legislature on Thursday sent to Gov. Rick Scott a bill that would require that at least 10 out of 12 jurors recommend execution in order for it be carried out. Florida previously only required that a majority of jurors recommend a death sentence.
The Legislature rewrote the law because the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in January that the current method is unconstitutional. The court noted the current law allows judges to reach a different decision than juries, which has only an advisory role in recommending death.
In the aftermath of the ruling the state Supreme Court has halted two pending executions. Courts cases across the state have been halted until the Legislature acted.