Critics seek to delay NYC sugary drinks size limit

NEW YORK (AP) — Opponents are pressing to delay enforcement of the city's novel plan to crack down on supersized, sugary drinks, saying businesses shouldn't have to spend millions of dollars to comply until a court rules on whether the measure is legal.

With the rule set to take effect March 12, beverage industry, restaurant and other business groups have asked a judge to put it on hold at least until there's a ruling on their lawsuit seeking to block it altogether. The measure would bar many eateries from selling high-sugar drinks in cups or containers bigger than 16 ounces.

"It would be a tremendous waste of expense, time, and effort for our members to incur all of the harm and costs associated with the ban if this court decides that the ban is illegal," Chong Sik Le, president of the New York Korean-American Grocers Association, said in court papers filed Friday.

City lawyers are fighting the lawsuit and oppose postponing the restriction, which the city Board of Health approved in September. They said Tuesday they expect to prevail.

"The obesity epidemic kills nearly 6,000 New Yorkers each year. We see no reason to delay the Board of Health's reasonable and legal actions to combat this major, growing problem," Mark Muschenheim, a city attorney, said in a statement.

Another city lawyer, Thomas Merrill, has said officials believe businesses have had enough time to get ready for the new rule. He has noted that the city doesn't plan to seek fines until June.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg and other city officials see the first-of-its-kind limit as a coup for public health. The city's obesity rate is rising, and studies have linked sugary drinks to weight gain, they note.

"This is the biggest step a city has taken to curb obesity," Bloomberg said when the measure passed.

Soda makers and other critics view the rule as an unwarranted intrusion into people's dietary choices and an unfair, uneven burden on business. The restriction won't apply at supermarkets and many convenience stores because the city doesn't regulate them.

While the dispute plays out in court, "the impacted businesses would like some more certainty on when and how they might need to adjust operations," American Beverage Industry spokesman Christopher Gindlesperger said Tuesday.

Those adjustments are expected to cost the association's members about $600,000 in labeling and other expenses for bottles, Vice President Mike Redman said in court papers. Reconfiguring "16-ounce" cups that are actually made slightly bigger, to leave room at the top, is expected to take cup manufacturers three months to a year and cost them anywhere from more than $100,000 to several millions of dollars, Foodservice Packaging Institute President Lynn Dyer said in court documents.

Movie theaters, meanwhile, are concerned because beverages account for more than 20 percent of their overall profits and about 98 percent of soda sales are in containers greater than 16 ounces, according to Robert Sunshine, executive director of the National Association of Theatre Owners of New York State.

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Follow Jennifer Peltz at http://twitter.com/jennpeltz

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Prosecutors move to revoke Chris Brown's probation

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Prosecutors have asked a judge to revoke Chris Brown's probation, saying there is no credible evidence he completed his community service sentence for beating Rihanna, and citing several other incidents that they say point to anger management issues.

The motion filed Tuesday by the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office focuses heavily on issues with Brown's community labor in Virginia, citing numerous discrepancies and claiming the R&B singer essentially was unsupervised.

The motion also notes several incidents in which Brown has lost his temper, including throwing a chair through a window after a "Good Morning America" interview in which he was asked about his beating of Rihanna on the eve of the 2009 Grammy Awards. The report also cites Brown's Jan. 27 fight with R&B singer Frank Ocean, including Ocean's claim that Brown threatened to shoot him in the brawl over a parking space.

Brown is due in court Wednesday for a probation hearing. His attorney Mark Geragos and publicists did not return messages seeking comment.

Sheriff's officials have said they are unlikely to seek charges against Brown for the recent fight with Ocean, since Ocean has posted online that he does not intend to seek criminal or civil penalties. Ocean told investigators that Brown shouted that he and his entourage "can bust on you too," which authorities wrote was a street slang term for shooting someone.

Brown's time serving community service in Virginia has been under scrutiny for months, and Tuesday's motion asked a judge to order the singer to repeat his entire 180-day service sentence in Los Angeles. Brown had been given permission to perform cleanup and manual labor duties in Virginia, but LA prosecution investigators found no evidence that he completed his work as ordered.

Richmond, Va., Police Chief Bryan Norwood was supposed to be supervising Brown and submitted paperwork last year indicating the singer had completed his sentence.

But prosecutors cite numerous shortcomings and possible misstatements in those records, which show the singer performing double shifts in the city and at a day care center where his mother once worked.

"This inquiry provided no credible, competent or verifiable evidence that defendant Brown performed his community labor as presented to this court," Deputy District Attorney Mary Murray wrote.

The records submitted by Norwood are "at best sloppy documentation and at worst fraudulent reporting."

Richmond Police spokesman Gene Lepley declined to discuss the allegations.

"We believe it would inappropriate to comment on a matter that's before the court," Lepley said.

According to the motion, officials with Virginia's probation office told investigators that Brown's arrangement to be supervised by Norwood was "extremely unusual" and had not been approved by the agency. No one from Virginia's probation department oversaw Brown's hours, the filing states.

The motion notes that the only records the department has to indicate Brown was supervised were officers' overtime sheets. Five of 21 days that officers logged overtime for Brown were spent providing security for the singer's concerts.

One-third of Brown's hours were logged at a daycare center where the singer spent time as a child and where his mother once served as director, an analysis performed by The Associated Press in September showed.

The center is an hour's drive from Richmond, and the prosecution motion says a detective checked on Brown on only nine occasions when he was working there. Each time, the singer was found at the center, accompanied by his mother and a bodyguard but no law enforcement personnel.

The hours Brown recorded as working at the center were done overnight when children were not present. Some of the records stated Brown waxed floors or did "general cleaning."

"Claims that the defendant cleaned, stripped and waxed floors at that location have been credibly contradicted," the prosecution motion states. A professional floor cleaner contracted to work at the daycare center told investigators he had been cleaning the floors throughout the months Brown reported working at the facility.

Brown's mother, Joyce Hawkins, no longer had a formal role at the Tappahannock Children's Center, but had her own set of keys and coordinated her son's work at the facility, the motion states.

The filing also alleges Brown violated his probation with several violent outbursts that haven't resulted in arrests or charges. In addition to the fight between Brown and Ocean, the motion cites a 2012 incident in Miami in which Brown allegedly took a woman's cellphone and the March 2011 incident in which Brown threw a chair through a window after appearing on "Good Morning America."

Brown and Ocean are both nominated for the Best Urban Contemporary Album category at Sunday's Grammys. Ocean, who has said his first love was a man, told authorities that someone may have shouted a gay slur during the fight, but he wasn't sure.

Ocean suffered cuts on his right index finger and minor cuts to his left temple.

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Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

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Deficit hits 5-year low, but cuts drag economy

WASHINGTON -- The federal deficit will drop to less than $1 trillion for the first time in five years, but massive spending cuts that have improved the budget outlook are also slowing the economy, according to a report released Tuesday by the Congressional Budget office.

The nonpartisan arbiter of federal budgets said the combination of new tax revenue from the "fiscal cliff" deal as well as looming cuts that kick in March 1 will push the deficit down to $845 billion for fiscal 2013. Deficits have topped $1 trillion in recent years.

The projections will fuel the coming budget debates, which started Tuesday as President Obama was calling on Congress to steer around the coming budget cuts.

The budget office said the cuts will contribute to an economy that lags in 2013. The unemployment rate likely will remain above 7.5% through the year. It predicted that the gross domestic product will be well below its potential, growing by just 1.4%, more than half a percentage point slower than would happen if the spending cuts were averted.

At the same time, the nation's debt load is expected to fluctuate but ultimately rise to record levels this decade, largely because of increased spending on healthcare and the federal safety net for older Americans with the aging of the baby boom population.

Additionally, the outlook shows how difficult it will be for House Republicans to accomplish their goal of balancing the budget in 10 years with potentially deep austerity measures.

Even though revenue is rising and spending is decreasing, the overall budget outlook remains stark. By the end of the decade, public debt is set to rise to 77% of GDP, a decade of highs on par with debt levels in World War II.

"The projected path of the federal budget remains a significant concern," the CBO wrote.

Follow Politics Now on Twitter and Facebook

Lisa.mascaro@latimes.com

Twitter: @LisaMascaroinDC

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Judge who shoved deputy found not guilty by reason of insanity

Cook County Judge Cynthia Brim, on trial for shoving a sheriff's deputy at the Daley Center last year, has been found not guilty of battery by reason of insanity.

The verdict was handed down this afternoon by Will County Judge Liam Brennan.

Brim will now have to report to the state Department of Health for an evaluation of her mental health and treatment. She is due back in court in March.

She remains free on bond, and her lawyer said she wants to return to the bench.

Brim had approached deputies in the Daley Center last March and, without identifying herself, asked if they had found any keys, authorities have said previously. Deputies showed her three sets of keys and Brim claimed a set and walked away.

About 10 minutes later, the judge returned and, without explanation, tossed the keys toward one deputy and shoved another in the chest with both hands, according to authorities. She was then handcuffed and arrested.

Her attorney James Montgomery said during his opening statement at the Daley Center this morning that his client was legally insane at the time.

He said Brim ended up at the Daley Center last March after a confused trek there from 47th street after taking the wrong bus. Montgomery said she threw her keys as a protest against the justice system.

Brim has been hospitalized five times since her 1994 election after going off her anti-psychotic meds, according to testimony.

In 2004, firefighters removed her from a courtroom and took her to a hospital, said psychiatrist Matthew Markos.

Brim was hospitalized for 20 days after her arrest last year, he said. Markos said at the time Brim was hospitalized, she was catatonic, confused, irrational and showing signs of paranoia and psychosis.

Brim was re-elected to another six-year term as a judge in November. She was backed by the Cook County Democratic Party as well as the Committee for Retention of Judges in Cook County, a campaign committee funded by judges.

In his closing argument her attorney James Montgomery said prosecutors had "not produced a scintilla of evidence" to contradict Markos' testimony that Brim was legally insane at the time.

"This is not the action of a rational human being, this is someone acting pursuant to the symptoms of a mental disorder," he said.

Prosecutors said Brim made the decision to go off her meds and that she was "criminally responsible" for what happened.

Judge Brennan said during closings that "this court is completely convinced a battery occurred" so a prosecutor said the only issue was brim's mental state.

sschmadeke@tribune.com

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Dell closer to buyout as price talks narrow: source

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Dell Inc moved closer to a nearly $24 billion buyout deal, with price negotiations narrowing to $13.50 to $13.75 a share in what would be the biggest leveraged buyout since the financial crisis.

Talks between Dell, the world's No. 3 computer maker, and a consortium led by its founder and chief executive, Michael Dell, to take the company private were in the final stages on Monday, a person familiar with the matter said.

An outcome is expected soon, the person said, cautioning that no final agreement had been reached and negotiations could still break down.

Dell shares fell 2.6 percent to $13.27 in afternoon trading.

Microsoft Corp, which provides its Windows software for Dell computers and is also part of the investment consortium, is expected to invest around $2 billion in the deal, while private equity firm Silver Lake is expected to put in about $1 billion, the source said.

Michael Dell is expected to roll over his roughly 16 percent stake and put in some of his own money so he has control of the company, the source added.

Dell and Silver Lake declined to comment and Microsoft did not immediately respond to a request for a comment.

The $13.50 to $13.75 per share price range being negotiated translates into an equity valuation for Dell of between $23.5 billion to $23.9 billion.

The $13.75 per share is a premium of about 23 percent to the average of $11 per share Dell traded before news of the deal talks broke and is far below the $17.61 that the shares were trading a year ago."

Dell has steadily ceded market share in PCs to nimbler rivals such as Lenovo Group and is struggling to re-ignite growth. That's in spite of Michael Dell's efforts in the five years since he retook the helm of the company he founded in 1984, following a brief hiatus during which its fortunes waned rapidly.

Any deal that Michael Dell negotiates would need the approval of a majority of the shareholders. Deals that involve the considerable stake of a founder who is also the chief executive of the company are also likely to come in for extra scrutiny over whether the board exercised its fiduciary duty.

Dell has formed a special committee to take a close look at any potential deals on the table, multiple sources with knowledge of the matter told Reuters earlier.

(Reporting by Greg Roumeliotis in New York; Additional reporting by Poornima Gupta; editing by Carol Bishopric and Kenneth Barry)

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Cause of Super Bowl power outage remains unclear

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — As the Superdome's energy provider and stadium management try to determine what caused a 34-minute power outage at Sunday's Super Bowl, local officials are hoping the incident won't leave a black eye on the city or prevent the league's big game from coming back to town.

Larry Roedel, a lawyer for the state board that oversees the Superdome, said Monday that the outage did not appear to be related to work done on the stadium's electrical system in December. The work, approved by the Louisiana Stadium and Exposition District last fall, replaced feeder equipment connecting the stadium to power provider Entergy New Orleans.

Entergy and the company that manages the Superdome, SMG, said Sunday that an "abnormality" occurred where stadium equipment intersects with an Entergy electric feed, causing a breaker to create the outage. It remained unclear Monday exactly what the abnormality was or why it occurred.

But Doug Thornton, manager of the Superdome, said called the outage an equipment error, not a human one. He said that when the power outage hit, meters indicated the stadium was drawing less power than it does during a typical New Orleans Saints game. The air conditioning system was running, he said, but on less power than it does in September.

Thornton said millions of dollars have been spent upgrading electrical equipment in the building since Hurricane Katrina hit in 2005, and none of it failed. He said it was working properly when power was restored.

He also said there is no evidence that the halftime show had anything to do with the outage, which struck early in the third quarter. He said the show used its own dedicated generator and wasn't using the Superdome's power supply.

Mayor Mitch Landrieu told WWL-AM (www.wwl.com) on Monday that the city still wants to make a bid to host the NFL's championship game again in 2018 and that the outage won't hurt its chances.

Landrieu said league owners were impressed with the city's performance as host and even joked that the game got better after the blackout. ""People were leaving and the game was getting boring, so we had to do a little something to spice it up," he said.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said New Orleans was a terrific Super Bowl host and that the outage won't affect future bids.

"I fully expect that we will be back here for Super Bowls," NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said. "And I hope we will be back. We want to be back."

Goodell also said the Superdome had a backup power system ready to go, and it was about to be used when the power started coming back on.

The Superdome sits on a 52-acre former railroad yard in the business district. Though only a block from City Hall, the 76,000-seat stadium and the adjacent New Orleans Arena are owned by the state, and the seven-member commission that oversees them is appointed by Gov. Bobby Jindal.

The Superdome was built at a cost of $134 million and opened in 1975. It has been the home to the NFL's New Orleans Saints since then. The first Super Bowl was played there in 1978.

Sunday's game was the seventh Super Bowl at the stadium, and the 10th overall for New Orleans.

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina ripped off the Superdome roof as an estimated 30,000 people huddled inside. They waited, rain-drenched, for days in the severe heat that followed the storm.

On Sunday, officials were eager to show off how the city had been rebuilt since Katrina, and the week of activities leading up to the game was nearly perfect.

New Orleans also is home to one of the largest convention centers in the country. Dr. Bjorn Hanson, dean of New York University's Center for Hospitality and Sports Management, said Monday that the power outage shouldn't hurt the city's reputation as a convention destination.

"I think people view it for what it was: An unusual event with a near-record power draw," he said. "It was the equivalent of a circuit breaker flipping."

The American Association of Neurological Surgeons will hold meetings in New Orleans from April 27 to May 1. Patty Anderson, director of meetings for the group, said she was unconcerned about the outage.

"It doesn't matter," she said. "I never even gave it a second thought. To me, the city is bigger, stronger and more vibrant than it's ever been."

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Associated Press writers Beth Harpaz, Brett Martel and Barry Wilner contributed to this report.

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NFL says no indication Beyonce show caused Super Bowl outage

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) – The National Football League was still working with New Orleans officials on Monday to determine what caused the power outage at Sunday’s Super Bowl at the Superdome, so far dismissing any connection with the Beyonce halftime show.

With a record U.S. television audience watching along with viewers in 180 countries, about half the stadium lights went dark early in the second half of the game, in which the Baltimore Ravens defeated the San Francisco 49ers, 34-31.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell told reporters on Monday an investigation was under way to determine the cause of the 35-minute disruption but one possible explanation had already been eliminated.

“There’s no indication at all that this was caused by the halftime show,” Goodell said. “I know that’s out there, that Beyonce’s halftime show had something to do with it. That is not the case from anything we have at this point.”

Entergy Corp, the utility providing power to the Superdome, said its distribution and transmission feeders were serving the Superdome at all times.

Early indications were that the outage resulted from an abnormality in the Superdome’s power system but it was too early to speculate on what went wrong, said Doug Thornton, senior vice president of the Superdome’s management company, SMG.

A piece of equipment designed to monitor electrical load sensed an abnormality in the system where the Superdome equipment intersects with Entergy’s feed into the building, triggering an automatic cut in power, SMG and Entergy said in a joint statement.

There was never any concern the power could not be restored, but it took time because of the size of the stadium and the complexities of the power system, Thornton said.

“We had people in place that could quickly work to restore power. We had experts on site, as we normally do when we have big events like this, our electrician, our electrical consultants were there and we were able to quickly work on that,” Thornton said.

“There were no injuries, people remained calm, we had a pre-programmed announcement that was actually played. These are things that we actually drilled for.”

None of the players or coaches said the stoppage had any impact on the game, and Goodell said the power problem would not adversely affect future bids by New Orleans to stage the Super Bowl, the United States’ most-watched sports event.

“I fully expect that we will be back here for Super Bowls,” Goodell said. “I hope we will be back. We want to be back … I don’t think this will have any impact at all on what I think will be remembered for one of the greatest Super Bowl weeks.”

(Editing by Daniel Trotta and Dale Hudson)

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Bullying study: It does get better for gay teens

CHICAGO (AP) — It really does get better for gay and bisexual teens when it comes to being bullied, although young gay men have it worse than their lesbian peers, according to the first long-term scientific evidence on how the problem changes over time.

The seven-year study involved more than 4,000 teens in England who were questioned yearly through 2010, until they were 19 and 20 years old. At the start, just over half of the 187 gay, lesbian and bisexual teens said they had been bullied; by 2010 that dropped to 9 percent of gay and bisexual boys and 6 percent of lesbian and bisexual girls.

The researchers said the same results likely would be found in the United States.

In both countries, a "sea change" in cultural acceptance of gays and growing intolerance for bullying occurred during the study years, which partly explains the results, said study co-author Ian Rivers, a psychologist and professor of human development at Brunel University in London.

That includes a government mandate in England that schools work to prevent bullying, and changes in the United States permitting same-sex marriage in several states.

In 2010, syndicated columnist Dan Savage launched the "It Gets Better" video project to encourage bullied gay teens. It was prompted by widely publicized suicides of young gays, and includes videos from politicians and celebrities.

"Bullying tends to decline with age regardless of sexual orientation and gender," and the study confirms that, said co-author Joseph Robinson, a researcher and assistant professor of educational psychology at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. "In absolute terms, this would suggest that yes, it gets better."

The study appears online Monday in the journal Pediatrics.

Eliza Byard, executive director of the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network, said the results mirror surveys by her anti-bullying advocacy group that show bullying is more common in U.S. middle schools than in high schools.

But the researchers said their results show the situation is more nuanced for young gay men.

In the first years of the study, gay boys and girls were almost twice as likely to be bullied as their straight peers. By the last year, bullying dropped overall and was at about the same level for lesbians and straight girls. But the difference between men got worse by ages 19 and 20, with gay young men almost four times more likely than their straight peers to be bullied.

The mixed results for young gay men may reflect the fact that masculine tendencies in girls and women are more culturally acceptable than femininity in boys and men, Robinson said.

Savage, who was not involved in the study, agreed.

"A lot of the disgust that people feel when you bring up homosexuality ... centers around gay male sexuality," Savage said. "There's more of a comfort level" around gay women, he said.

Kendall Johnson, 21, a junior theater major at the University of Illinois, said he was bullied for being gay in high school, mostly when he brought boyfriends to school dances or football games.

"One year at prom, I had a guy tell us that we were disgusting and he didn't want to see us dancing anymore," Johnson said. A football player and the president of the drama club intervened on his behalf, he recalled.

Johnson hasn't been bullied in college, but he said that's partly because he hangs out with the theater crowd and avoids the fraternity scene. Still, he agreed, that it generally gets better for gays as they mature.

"As you grow older, you become more accepting of yourself," Johnson said.

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Online:

Pediatrics: http://www.pediatrics.org

It Gets Better: http://www.itgetsbetter.org

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

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Super Bowl falls short of ratings record

NEW YORK (AP) — With a partial power outage, an overly excited quarterback and a game that suddenly turned from snoozer to sizzler, CBS had its hands full at the Super Bowl. The game fell short of setting a viewership record, but it stands as the third most-watched program in U.S. television history.

The Nielsen Co. said an estimated 108.4 million people watched the Baltimore Ravens' 34-31 victory over the San Francisco 49ers. The most-watched events in U.S. TV history were last year's game, seen by 111.3 million, and the 2010 game, with 111 million viewers.

CBS had hoped to make it the fourth year in a row that football's ultimate game broke the record for most-watched event in American television history. But pro football ratings in general have been down slightly this year.

When the Ravens' Jacoby Jones returned the opening kickoff of the second half for a touchdown and gave his team a 28-6 lead, CBS' dream of a ratings record surely became even more distant. And then half the lights went out. CBS' ratings immediately dipped by two full ratings points in the overnight measurement of big cities.

When the lights returned, so did the 49ers. They quickly jumped back in the game and CBS' audience, no doubt fueled by social media chatter, came back, too. CBS was blessed with the dream of every network that telecasts the Super Bowl: a game that isn't decided until the final play.

CBS had a moment of dead air when the field darkened, since power was lost in the control booth where Jim Nantz and Phil Simms worked. After a commercial break, sideline anchor Steve Tasker appeared to say there had been a power outage. CBS then filled time with its football pregame team, showing highlights and speculating on how the delay would affect the teams.

At the precise moment the lights went out, CBS' Armen Keteyian was in the NFL's control booth, conducting an interview with Frank Supovitz, senior vice president of the NFL in charge of events.

"In the NFL control room, there was no panic, but there was an undeniable amount of uncertainty about the cause," Keteyian said Monday on "CBS This Morning." Keteyian was filming for a "60 Minutes Sports" report scheduled to be aired Wednesday on Showtime. CBS News did not participate in live coverage of the power outage.

The power outage was an immediate hot topic for quips and questions online. There were an estimated 47.7 million social media posts during the game, according to the company Trendrr TV, which tracks activity on Twitter, Facebook and other social networks. That compares with 17 million during last year's game and 3 million in 2010, Trendrr said.

Baltimore had the highest rating of any individual city, Nielsen said. San Francisco was not among the top 10 cities in ratings.

CBS showcased its freshman drama, "Elementary," to an estimated audience of 20.8 million people after the game. That was markedly down from the 37.6 million who watched "The Voice" on NBC after the 2011 game or the 26.8 million who saw "Glee" on Fox in 2010. CBS noted that the drama did not begin until 11:11 p.m. on the East Coast because of the Superdome power outage.

CBS drew criticism from the Parents Television Council for not editing out a profanity said by Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco shortly after the game. Flacco was caught by microphones describing his team's victory as "f------ awesome."

"No one should be surprised that a jubilant quarterback might use profane language while celebrating a career-defining win, but that is precisely the reason why CBS should have taken some precautions," said Tim Winter, president of the lobbying group, asking for the Federal Communications Commission to rebuke CBS.

The network had no immediate comment Monday on the complaint.

CBS has said it was airing the pregame, postgame and halftime portions of the show on tape delay to guard against the use of bad language or wardrobe malfunctions. The postgame delay does not begin until the first block of commercials after the game, which hadn't happened before Flacco's expletive.

CBS' Craig Ferguson was quick to poke fun at the power outage on his comedy show, which aired after "Elementary." He was shown plugging actress Lucy Liu's cellphone charger into a power outlet at the Superdome, despite instructions not to use it.

"It's one outlet," Ferguson said. "What could possibly go wrong?"

The picture switched to the lights going out in half the dome.

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S&P says US to sue over ratings

Standard & Poor's on Monday said it expects to be the target of a U.S. Department of Justice civil lawsuit over its ratings of mortgage bonds prior to the recent financial crisis.

The lawsuit against the McGraw-Hill Cos unit focuses on its ratings in 2007 of various U.S. collateralized debt obligations (CDO), S&P said.

It would be the first federal enforcement action against a credit rating agency over alleged illegal behavior tied to the financial crisis.

"A DOJ lawsuit would be entirely without factual or legal merit," S&P said in a statement. "The DOJ would be wrong in contending that S&P ratings were motivated by commercial considerations and not issued in good faith."

The Justice Department was not immediately available for comment.

Several state attorneys general are expected to join the case, The Wall Street Journal said, citing people familiar with the matter. The expected charges follow the breakdown of talks between the department and S&P, the newspaper said, citing the people.

In afternoon trading, McGraw-Hill shares were down $2.39, or 4.1 percent, at $55.95.

S&P and its main rivals, Moody's Corp's Moody's Investors Service and Fimalac SA's Fitch Ratings, have long faced criticism from investors, politicians and regulators for assigning high ratings to thousands of subprime and other mortgage securities that quickly turned sour.

The rating agencies are paid by issuers for ratings, a standard industry practice that has nonetheless raised concern about potential conflicts of interest.

In January 2011, the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission called the agencies "essential cogs in the wheel of financial destruction" and "key enablers of the financial meltdown."

McGraw-Hill had acknowledged last July that the Justice Department and SEC were probing potential violations by S&P tied to its ratings of structured products, and that it was in talks to try to avert a lawsuit.

The New York-based company had previously disclosed an SEC probe into its ratings of a $1.6 billion CDO known as Delphinus CDO 2007-1. It was not immediately clear whether that CDO is a focus of the potential lawsuits.

Last July, Mizuho Financial Group Inc agreed to a $127.5 million settlement to resolve SEC allegations that a U.S. unit obtained false credit ratings for Delphinus.

In a variety of lawsuits brought by investors, S&P has maintained that its ratings constitute opinions protected by the 1st Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Last August, a Manhattan federal judge refused to dismiss one such case, brought by Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, King County in Washington state, and other investors against S&P, Moody's and Morgan Stanley over losses in Cheyne, a structured investment vehicle.

Cheyne went bankrupt in August 2007. A trial is scheduled to begin on May 6, court records show.

In its statement, S&P said it "deeply regrets" how its CDO ratings failed to anticipate the fast-deteriorating mortgage market conditions, and that it has since spent $400 million to help bolster the quality of its ratings.

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