* Mobile phones can make their way into state prisons in hollowed-out books and hidden inside tennis balls tossed over fences.

Often, they're smuggled in to inmates by prison employees looking to make quick cash.

Now guards caught smuggling mobile phones or cigarettes to inmates could find themselves locked up. A new law signed Friday by Gov. Beverly Perdue makes it a crime to sell or give state inmates wireless communications devices or tobacco products, punishable by up to 120 days in jail.

Correction Secretary Alvin W. Keller Jr. was among several leaders across the country who recently signed a petition to the Federal Communications Commission, seeking permission to scramble mobile phone signals in prisons. (N&O)

* A two-day hearing for a Cary man who claims he's innocent of killing a Raleigh prostitute nearly 18 years ago will be open to the public.

Nash County Superior Court Judge Quentin Sumner, the chairman of the N.C. Innocence Inquiry Commission, decided to grant a request to open a hearing concerning the 1993 murder conviction of Greg F. Taylor.

Taylor, convicted of charges in the death of a prostitute, maintains his innocence. The hearing is the third case to come before the state's innocence commmission. (N&O)

* Perdue says the state has not ruled out Las Vegas-style card games at Harrah's Cherokee Casino.

The state and the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians have no ongoing negotiations, said Perdue, who was in Jackson County on Monday for the grand opening of Sequoyah National Golf Club.

The Eastern Band has long sought state approval for live gambling. The casino is limited to video gambling machines and digital blackjack with a live dealer. A bitter exchange between then-Gov. Mike Easley and Hicks in 2006 followed an abrupt end to negotiations between the tribe and state.

The tribe estimates an expansion would bring $35 million in state taxes and an annual payroll of $100 million a year. (AC-T)

U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan has submitted recommendations for two federal judgeships in North Carolina.

Hagan, a Greensboro Democrat, has submitted three names to President Barack Obama to be a U.S. District Court judge in the Eastern District and three names to considered for a judgeship in the Middle District.

Hagan's nominees for the Eastern District are: Allen Cobb, senior resident Superior Court Judge for New Hanover and Pender counties; Jennifer May-Parker, assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District handing criminal appellate cases; and Quentin Sumner, senior resident Superior Court Judge in Nash County.

Hagan's nominees for the Middle District are: Catherine Eagles, senior resident Superior Court Judge in Guilford County; Anita Earls, executive director for the Southern Coalition for Social Justice in Durham; and Edwin Wilson, senior resident Superior Court Judge in Rockingham County.