Almost 600 dogs and cats were rescued from a suspected puppy mills. The owner denied mistreatment of the animals and wants them returned to her. Federal and state law may apply when someone raises animals and sells them. Read more about this case and the regulation of animal breeding businesses.

Some states, including California, continue to consider legalization of controlled substances. Some drugs have medicinal uses, such as marijuana. Patients could benefit from legal use of such drugs, and legalization could mean tax revenue for state governments. Read about the legal issues involved.

The Los Angeles County Coroner has ruled that Michael Jackson's death was a homicide, caused by a lethal combination of prescription drugs. Find out what this ruling means for Jackson's doctor.

In the recent shooting at a Pennsylvania gym, the shooter blogged about his plans. Usually, there's no duty to report plotted crimes if you see something posted on the Internet. However, morals still apply, and you can report your concerns to the police to help avoid a crime from being committed.

If your property is seized as a part of a criminal investigation, don't expect it to be returned quickly, or intact. Property can be kept for an indefinite time as evidence in a case. Do keep records, including pictures, of any seized items. Legal action may not ensure return of your items.

The company that I work for has not been depositing my 401K monies; what can I do?

We are looking for a lawyer for my mother-in-law. She is trying to collect her deceased husband's pension. What area of law does that fall under?

To build a case against YouTube, Viacom turned to a Silicon Valley company to sniff out pirated clips on the popular video- sharing site. Viacom, which last week sued YouTube and parent company Google Inc. for publishing its videos on the Web without its permission, hired BayTSP Inc. in October and asked the Los Gatos technology company to scour the site and find the offending clips. By the time Viacom filed its $1 billion lawsuit, BayTSP had amassed more than 160,000 unauthorized videos, snippets from "South Park," "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart," "SpongeBob SquarePants" and other popular shows owned by MTV, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon and other Viacom networks. YouTube says it took all those videos down.

AT&T Inc.'s mobile phone unit agreed to pay $30.6 million to settle an investigation by California regulators over early-termination fees charged to wireless customers.

Student loan providers are engaged in widespread illegal and deceptive practices, including kickbacks to colleges for directing students to lenders, New York Atty. Gen. Andrew Cuomo said Thursday. A nationwide investigation by his office revealed all-expense-paid trips to luxury Caribbean resorts for college financial aid officers and their spouses as well as college call centers secretly manned by lenders, Cuomo said. He did not single out specific lenders or schools. "A student's first lesson in college should not be in consumer fraud," Cuomo said. "The school-lender relationships are often for the benefit of the school at the expense of the student."