Tech consultant Nima Momeni pleaded not guilty Thursday to a murder charge in the stabbing death of Cash App founder Bob Lee on the streets of San Francisco.

San Francisco Superior Court Judge Victor Hwang ordered Momeni, 38, kept in jail without bail, saying he posed a public safety risk if released. Momeni, who appeared in an orange sweatshirt and pants, did not speak, and his attorney Paula Canny entered the plea on his behalf.

The case has drawn national attention, partly given Lee’s status in the tech world. Lee was found with three stab wounds, including one to the heart, shortly after 2:30 a.m. April 4 and was taken to a hospital where he later died. He was found in the Rincon Hill neighborhood in downtown San Francisco, which has tech offices and condominiums but little activity in the early morning hours.

Lee, 43, created Cash App, a mobile payment service, and was the chief product officer of the cryptocurrency MobileCoin. He was mourned as a loving father of two who made friends wherever he went.

Prosecutors have not provided a motive but say Momeni stabbed Lee after a dispute related to Momeni’s sister, who appeared in court Thursday alongside their mother.

Assistant District Attorney Omid Talai argued Thursday to detain Momeni without bail, saying that the defendant drove Lee to a secluded spot and used a knife that was part of a unique kitchen set belonging to his sister. Police recovered a knife with a 4-inch (10-centimeter) blade at the scene.

Talai said that analysis showed Momeni’s DNA on the handle of the knife and Lee’s DNA on the bloody blade and no evidence that Lee had touched the handle, contradicting Canny’s claim of self-defense for her client.

But Canny said that Momeni did not drive Lee to a secluded spot with the aim of killing him. Instead, she said, Lee directed him to pull over after calling an Uber because the two had argued. The last time Momeni saw Lee, Canny said, Lee was standing upright and walking away.

The Supreme Court seemed inclined Monday to rule against a man convicted of violating immigration law for offering adult adoptions he falsely claimed would lead to citizenship.

Attorneys for Helaman Hansen told the justices during approximately 90 minutes of arguments that the law he was convicted of violating was too broad. But the court’s conservative majority in particular seemed willing to side with the government and conclude that it is not.

Justice Neil Gorsuch noted that the law “has been on the books for 70 years” without some of the issues Hansen’s lawyers worried about. He also expressed no sympathy for Hansen himself, who he said was “taking advantage of very vulnerable people.”

“He had every intent in the world to keep these people here to take their money with no prospect they’d ever” actually get citizenship, Gorsuch said.

The case involves a section of federal immigration law that says a person such as Hansen who “encourages or induces” a non-citizen to come to or remain in the United States illegally can be punished by up to five years in prison. That’s increased to up to 10 years if the person doing the encouraging is doing so for their own financial gain.

The federal government says that from 2012 to 2016 Hansen — who lived in Elk Grove, California, near Sacramento — deceived hundreds of non-citizens into believing that he could guarantee them a path to citizenship through adult adoption.

Based on Hansen’s promises, officials say, people either came to or stayed in the United States in violation of the law, even though Hansen knew that the adult adoptions he was arranging would not lead to citizenship. The government says at least 471 people paid him between $550 and $10,000 and that in total he collected more than $1.8 million.

Hansen was ultimately convicted of encouragement charges as well as fraud charges. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison for the encouragement charges and another 20 years on the fraud charges. But a federal appeals court ruled that the law on encouragement is overbroad and violates the free speech clause of the First Amendment and overturned just those convictions.

The court’s three liberal justices seemed more concerned about the reach of the law. Justice Elena Kagan asked “what happens to all the cases” where a lawyer, doctor, neighbor, friend or teacher “says to a non-citizen: ‘I really think you should stay.’” Kagan wanted to know whether those people could or would be prosecuted under the law.

Mexico’s Supreme Court deemed constitutional Thursday a controversial energy law pushed by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador that gives government-owned power plants preference over private competitors.

The law took effect in March 2021, but a number of private energy companies sought injunctions blocking enforcement. With the law ruled constitutional, the injunctions will now have to be resolved.

The law establishes that electricity must be bought first from government power plants, which use primarily coal, oil and diesel to produce energy. If demand requires it, additional electricity could be purchased from private wind, solar and natural gas plants.

Jesús Ramírez, presidential spokesman, celebrated the court’s decision. “History will judge those who betray the country and the interests of Mexican people,” he said via Twitter.

Critics, including the United States government, maintain the law will undermine competition in the sector, hurt the environment and violate free trade agreements.

Gangs inside a Mississippi jail often determine whether other inmates receive meals, a court-appointed monitor testified in a federal court hearing.

Elizabeth Simpson testified Tuesday that staffing shortages are so severe at Hinds County’s Raymond Detention Center that gangs and “inmate committees” control certain aspects of life, including whether some inmates get to eat, WLBT-TV reported.

A former administrator of the jail, Maj. Kathryn Bryan, learned staff would put food on carts to take to the jail’s housing units and would let the inmates distribute it, Simpson said. In two cases this January, detainees in a mental health unit were suffering severe weight loss as a result, Simpson said.

U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves issued a civil contempt order Feb. 4, saying officials in Mississippi’s largest county have failed to fix problems at the jail. He started holding hearings last week to determine whether to order a receivership in which the federal government would take over operation of the jail, with Hinds County paying the tab.

Simpson testified Tuesday that inmate committees determined whether certain detainees could remain in housing units known as pods.

Democrats sued Kansas officials on Monday over a Republican redistricting law that costs the state’s only Democrat in Congress some of the territory in her Kansas City-area district that she carries by wide margins in elections.

A team of attorneys led by Democratic attorney Marc Elias’ firm filed the lawsuit in Wyandotte County District Court in the Kansas City area. Elias has been involved in lawsuits in multiple states, including Georgia, North Carolina and Ohio, and he promised that the new Kansas map would be challenged when the GOP-controlled Legislature on Wednesday overrode Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto of it.

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of five voters and a Kansas voting-rights group, Loud Light. The defendants are the elections commissioner for Kansas City, Kansas, and Kansas Secretary of State Scott Schwab, the state’s top elections official.

Kansas is part of a broader national battle over redrawing congressional districts. Republicans hope to recapture a U.S. House majority in this year’s elections, and both parties are watching states’ redistricting efforts because they could help either pick up or defend individual seats.

The Kansas redistricting law removes the northern part of Kansas City, Kansas, from the 3rd District that U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids represents and puts it in the neighboring 2nd District, which includes the state capital of Topeka but also rural communities across eastern Kansas. Kansas City is among Republican-leaning Kansas’ few Democratic strongholds.

Elias has said the GOP map for Kansas is “blatantly unconstitutional.” Democrats argued that it amounts to partisan gerrymandering aimed at costing Davids’ her seat, while diluting the clout of Black and Hispanic voters by cutting their numbers in her district. They also have argued that the map is unacceptable because it fails to keep the core of the state’s side of the Kansas City area in a single district.

A circuit judge has been appointed to a temporary seat on the West Virginia Supreme Court after the resignation of Justice Evan Jenkins.

Chief Justice John Hutchison on Monday appointed Alan D. Moats to the high court. Moats has served in the judicial circuit covering Barbour and Taylor counties since 1997.

Moats will serve on the Supreme Court until Gov. Jim Justice appoints someone to the seat. That person then would serve until a election can be held for the remainder of Jenkins’ term through 2024.

Jenkins announced Friday that he is resigning to return to private law practice.

Jenkins was appointed and then elected to the seat of retired Justice Robin Davis following the Supreme Court’s 2018 impeachment scandal.