Carnival Corp. reached a settlement Monday with federal prosecutors in which the world’s largest cruise line agreed to pay a $20 million penalty because its ships continued to pollute the oceans despite a previous criminal conviction aimed at curbing similar conduct.

Senior U.S. District Judge Patricia Seitz approved the agreement after Carnival CEO Arnold Donald stood up in open court and admitted the company’s responsibility for probation violations stemming from the previous environmental case.

“The company pleads guilty,” Arnold said six times in a packed courtroom that include other senior Carnival executives, including company chairman and Miami Heat owner Micky Arison.

“We acknowledge the shortcomings. I am here today to formulate a plan to fix them,” Arnold added

“The proof will be in the pudding, won’t it?” the judge replied. “If you all did not have the environment, you would have nothing to sell.”

Carnival admitted violating terms of probation from a 2016 criminal conviction for discharging oily waste from its Princess Cruise Lines ships and covering it up. Carnival paid a $40 million fine and was put on five years’ probation in that case, which affected all nine of its cruise brands that boast more than 100 ships.

Now Carnival has acknowledged that in the years since its ships have committed environmental crimes such as dumping “gray water” in prohibited places such Alaska’s Glacier Bay National Park and knowingly allowing plastic to be discharged along with food waste in the Bahamas, which poses a severe threat to marine life.

The company also admitted falsifying compliance documents and other administrative violations such as having cleanup teams visit its ships just before scheduled inspections.

Seitz at an earlier hearing threatened to bar Carnival from docking at U.S. ports because of the violations and said she might hold executives individually liable for the probation violations.

“The concern I have is that senior management has no skin in the game,” Seitz said, adding that future violations might be met with prison time and criminal fines for individuals. “My goal is to have the defendant change its behavior.”

Under the settlement, Carnival promised there will be additional audits to check for violations, a restructuring of the company’s compliance and training programs, a better system for reporting environmental violations to state and federal agencies and improved waste management practices.

Sporting a gray suit and glasses, Kevin Spacey appeared Monday at a Massachusetts courthouse where a judge is set to hold a hearing in the case accusing the disgraced actor of groping a young man at a Nantucket bar in 2016.

Spacey’s appearance comes somewhat as a surprise as he was not required to attend the hearing and has stayed away from the courthouse except for a brief hearing in January, which he also tried to avoid.

The 59-year-old former “House of Cards” actor, who has pleaded not guilty to a charge of indecent assault and battery, did not comment as he walked in with his lawyers. Spacey faces up to 2 ½ years in jail if convicted.

Spacey’s attorneys have stepped up their attacks on the credibility of the man who brought the allegations. In court documents filed Friday, defense attorney Alan Jackson accused the man of deleting text messages that support Spacey’s claims of innocence.

It’s the only criminal case that has been brought against the two-time Oscar winner since his career fell apart amid a flurry of sexual misconduct allegations in 2017.

The case first came to light that year when former Boston TV anchor Heather Unruh said Spacey got her son drunk and then sexually assaulted him at the Club Car, a popular restaurant and bar on the resort island off Cape Cod.

A missing mother of five's estranged husband and his girlfriend are set to make their first court appearances in Connecticut after being charged with evidence tampering and hindering prosecution .

Fotis Dulos and Michelle Troconis are scheduled to be arraigned Monday at Norwalk Superior Court.

Both were arrested Saturday night in connection with the investigation into the May 24 disappearance of 50-year-old Jennifer Dulos in New Canaan. She was last seen dropping off her children at school and is still missing.
Details of the charges have not been released.

Jennifer and Fotis Dulos have been embroiled in a contentious divorce and child custody case for the past two years. It wasn't clear if Dulos and Troconis have criminal court lawyers who could respond to the allegations.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange should not be extradited to Sweden for a revived rape investigation, but should still be questioned in the case while he is imprisoned in Britain, a Swedish court ruled Monday,

The ruling by the Uppsala District Court doesn't mean the preliminary investigation must be abandoned, only that Assange doesn't face extradition to Sweden any time soon.

Eva-Marie Persson, Sweden's deputy director of public prosecutions, said she has not decided whether to appeal.

"I will also issue a European Investigation Order in order to interview Julian Assange," Persson said, adding that she hasn't picked a possible date for the questioning in England.

Assange's lawyer in Sweden, Per E. Samuelsson, said his client would "be happy, we are happy" to learn he won't be extradited to Sweden.

The 47-year-old Assange was evicted on April 11 from the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he had been holed up with political asylum since 2012. He was immediately arrested by British police and is currently serving a 50-week sentence for jumping bail in 2012.

He is also fighting extradition to the United States, which accuses him of violating the Espionage Act by publishi

A Pennsylvania judge plans to rule in a couple weeks about whether and how a five-year consent decree that’s about to expire between two mammoth health care providers and the attorney general’s office can be modified.

Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson on Friday scheduled a two-day hearing about the future of the fraught business relationship Highmark and UPMC.

The state Supreme Court earlier this week asked for the proceedings, and it’s all but certain that the justices will review whatever Simpson determines.

The consent decree the companies signed in 2014 is set to expire at the end of June, triggering higher costs for Highmark insurance customers who get treatment at UPMC’s vast network in western Pennsylvania. Simpson says he hopes to rule by June 14.

A civil rights group says JPMorgan Chase has agreed to pay $5 million to settle a class-action lawsuit filed by male employees who say they were denied additional paid parental leave between 2011 and 2017.

The settlement was announced Thursday by the American Civil Liberties Union and the national law firm Outten & Golden.

Chase employee Derek Rotondo filed an equal opportunity claim in 2017 when he tried to get 14 additional paid weeks after his son was born. He was told by Chase that while mothers are eligible for 16 weeks as primary caregivers, non-primary caregivers were only eligible for two weeks.

Chase adopted a gender neutral policy after Rotondo made his claim.

A Chase spokesman welcomed the agreement and thanked Rotondo for raising the issue.

The Senate majority leader says if there’s a vacancy on the Supreme Court during next year’s election cycle, the Republican-controlled Senate would likely confirm a nominee selected by President Donald Trump.

In an appearance Tuesday in Paducah, Kentucky, Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., told a questioner that if a Supreme Court justice died next year, creating a vacancy on the nine-member court, “Oh, we’d fill it.”

McConnell’s comments appeared to mark a reversal from his stance three years ago, during President Barack Obama’s final year in office, when he orchestrated a blockade of Obama’s choice of Merrick Garland to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia. McConnell blocked hearings for Garland, a federal appeals court judge, saying that the choice should be left to voters in an election year.

McConnell’s change of heart drew attacks from Democrats still smarting from his success in cementing the high court’s conservative majority. The vacancy created by Scalia’s death was filled by conservative Neil Gorsuch while swing vote Anthony Kennedy, who retired, was replaced by Justice Brett Kavanaugh after an acrimonious brawl last year.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York said McConnell was a “hypocrite” and tweeted that his colleague “lives for GOP judges because he knows the GOP agenda is so radical & unpopular they can only achieve it in courts.”