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The Associated Press SANFRANCISCO An influ- ential federal appeals court judge says the nation's third lethal injection execution in six months to go awry un- derscores his call to bring back firing squads. In an interview Thurs- day, 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Chief Judge Alex Kozinski said lethal injec- tion was a dishonest at- tempt to disguise the bru- tal nature of capital pun- ishment. Kozinski first wrote of his distaste for lethal in- jection on Monday even while arguing against de- laying the execution of Jo- seph Rudolph Wood III in Phoenix. Wood gasped for breath for 90-minutes and took nearly two hours to die Wednesday after receiving a lethal injection for killing his estranged girlfriend and her father. Kozinski said properly trained firing squads are a foolproof" way to quickly execute an inmate and avoid complications sur- rounding lethal injection. DEATH PENALTY Judgearguesforreturn of firing squad executions The Associated Press NEWYORK The sentencing for a California wine col- lector convicted of selling fake wine was postponed on Thursday after his law- yers claimed that the gov- ernment inflated the size of the fraud. Prosecutors allege that Rudy Kurniawan sold at least $20 million in fake wine — a calculation meant to justify a longer sentence. The defense says the dollar amount is much lower. U.S. District Judge Rich- ard M. Berman said that he would need to settle the dis- pute before sentencing can go forward. He set a hear- ing for Tuesday. Kurniawan, 37, was con- victed in December of mail and wire fraud charges af- ter evidence was presented to a jury that he manufac- tured bogus bottles of wine in his Arcadia kitchen, and then peddled them as vin- tage wine. Although the charges carry a potential of up to 40 years in prison, federal sentencing guidelines call for him to serve at least 11 years. Defense lawyer Jerome H. Mooney has told the judge that Kurniawan, born of Chinese descent in Indo- nesia, should be sentenced to the two years and three months he has already served, since he will be de- ported anyway. Mooney said his client used millions of dollars of his family's money to build a large collection of rare wines from 2004 to 2012 as he was embraced by the wine-collecting community, which attended tastings he arranged. "Rudy liked the feeling of being the center of atten- tion. It gave him a feeling of achievement and belonging that he had never before ex- perienced," he wrote. At one party for Kurni- awan's mother's birthday, actor Jackie Chan was a special guest, the lawyer said. "The highlight of the eve- ning for Rudy was when Jackie Chan stood on a chair and applauded Rudy. It was the best night of his life," Mooney added. COURT Wi ne c ol le ct or s et f or sentencing for fraud The Associated Press SAN FRANCISCO The Cali- fornia Highway Patrol has taken down safety guide- lines for a sometimes criti- cized but legal driving ma- neuver in which motorcy- clists pass stalled traffic by driving between lanes. State officials were wor- ried the guidelines for so- called lane splitting could be misconstrued as en- forceable laws, the San Francisco Chronicle re- ported on Wednesday. The CHP took them down from its website about two weeks ago under orders from the state's Office of Adminis- trative Law. The tips have also been removed from materials distributed by the CHP, the Department of Motor Vehi- cles and the Office of Traf- fic Safety, the Chronicle re- ported. "People liked the guide- lines and appreciated them," CHP Officer Mike Harris, an agency spokes- man, said. "But some peo- ple had thought they were given as rules or laws that can be enforced by the de- partment." Lane splitting is legal in California, though car and truck drivers often com- plain it is dangerous. The guidelines — published on the CHP's website last year — were hailed as a way of imposing some order on the practice. They advised motorcy- clists to ride between ve- hicles at speeds no more than 10 miles-per-hour faster than the vehicles they were passing. They also suggested that mo- torcyclists not attempt the move at full freeway speeds, or in any traffic go- ing faster than 30 mph, and said it was typically safer to split between the lanes farthest to the left than be- tween other lanes. Nick Haris, with the American Motorcyclist As- sociation, said he was dis- appointed to see the guide- lines removed. "A lot of people put a lot of time and effort into cre- ating those guidelines," Ha- ris told the Chronicle. "It's a pity to see it so quickly removed." Research suggests lane splitting could be less dan- gerous to motorcyclists than forcing them during traffic jams to stay in their lane, where even minor contact with a distracted driver could be disastrous, according to the American Motorcyclist Association. But some drivers say motorcyclists should fol- low the same rules as ev- eryone else. Manu Khosla, of San Francisco, said he has seen motorcyclists scrape cars as they drive by. "It's not just about the cars, though," Khosla, 33, told the Chronicle. "It seems like somebody could easily get hurt." TRAFFIC St at e re mo ve s la ne s pl it ti ng g ui de li ne s The Associated Press SACRAMENTO A state ap- peals court has upheld a proposed route for Cali- fornia's bullet train project connecting the San Fran- cisco Bay Area to the Cen- tral Valley. The decision issued Thursday is a short-term win for Gov. Jerry Brown, who has made the $68-bil- lion project a priority. The original lawsuit filed by Bay Area cities had ar- gued that a planned path through the Pachecho Pass hurts the environment. The state argued the project was exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act because of federal over- sight. Thursday's court deci- sion left the project open to other environmental law- suits. The appeals court is ex- pected to rule on two other high-speed rail challenges. COURT Pr op os ed bullet train route upheld The Associated Press SAN FRANCISCO Ground- water losses from the Col- orado River basin appear massive enough to chal- lenge long-term water sup- plies for the seven states and parts of Mexico that it serves, according to a new study released Thursday that used NASA satellites. Researchers from NASA and the University of Cal- ifornia, Irvine say their study is the first to quan- tify how much groundwa- ter people in the West are using during the region's current drought. Stephanie Castle, the study's lead author and a water resource specialist at the University of Cali- fornia, Irvine, called the extent of the groundwa- ter depletion "shocking." "We didn't realize the magnitude of how much water we actually de- pleted" in the West, Cas- tle said. Since 2004, research- ers said, the Colorado River basin — the largest in the Southwest — has lost 53 million acre feet, or 17 trillion gallons, of wa- ter. That's enough to sup- ply more than 50 million households for a year, or nearly fill Lake Mead — the nation's largest water reservoir — twice. Three-fourths of those losses were groundwater, the study found. Unlike reservoirs and other above-ground wa- ter, groundwater sources can become so depleted that they may never re- fill, Castle said. For Cali- fornia and other western states, the groundwater depletion is drawing down the reserves that protect consumers, farmers and ecosystems in times of drought. "What happens if it isn't there?" Castle said during a phone interview. "That's the scary part of this anal- ysis." The NASA and Univer- sity of California research used monthly gravity data to measure changes in wa- ter mass in the basin from December 2004 to Novem- ber of last year, and used that data to track ground- water depletion. "Combined with declin- ing snowpack and popu- lation growth, this will likely threaten the long- term ability of the ba- sin to meet its water-al- location commitments to the seven basin states and to Mexico, Jay Fami- glietti, senior author on the study and senior wa- ter-cycle specialist at NA- SA's Jet Propulsion Labo- ratory, said in a statement. The Colorado River ba- sin supplies water to about 40 million people and 4 million acres of farm- land in seven states — California, Arizona, Col- orado, New Mexico, Ne- vada, Utah and Wyoming — as well as to people and farms in part of Mexico. California, one of the nation's largest agricul- tural producers, is three years into drought. While the state has curtailed use of surface water, the state lacks a statewide system for regulating — or even measuring — groundwa- ter. COLORADO BASIN Satellites show major groundwater loss $ 11,995 2003 GMC SIERRA 4X4,LEATHER,TUNEAU COVER, STEPSIDE. ALL PRICES PLUS SALES TAX, LICENSE FEES, DOC FEES, ANY FINANCE CHARGE, ANY DEALER PREPARATION CHARGE, ANY EMISSION CHARGE, ANY DOCUMENTATION PREPARATION CHARGE, ANY SMOG FEES AND ANY TIRE FEES. ALL VEHICLES SUBJECT TO PRIOR SALE & CREDIT APPROVAL. 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