Plaintiffs

One of two young men at the heart of a criminal rape and conspiracy case has sued the Archdiocese of Philadelphia in connection with his alleged sexual abuse as a 10-year-old altar boy in 1999. Using the pseudonym "Billy Doe," the plaintiff, now 23, says church officials put him in harm's way by assigning a known abuser, the Rev. Edward Avery, to his parish, St. Jerome's in Northeast Philadelphia. There he was raped and sodomized by Avery, another priest, and a teacher, according to the lawsuit filed Monday in Common Pleas Court.

WASHINGTON - If you were hoping for a quick and simple end to the NFL lockout that started back on March 12, based on reports that the sides had agreed on all the important points, well, no such luck. The spotlight moves on to Atlanta today, where owners are meeting, and where NFL general counsel Jeff Pash told reporters yesterday he still hopes the league will have an agreement voted on by players and owners by the end of the day. The NFLPA began damping down expectations almost as soon as the media cavalcade formed in front of the association's 20th Street headquarters yesterday morning, in anticipation of a possible vote of player reps on a new CBA. NFLPA president Kevin Mawae declared that only the membership could vote to accept the terms, that the player reps were not there to give final approval, and he cautioned that the players were not going to be stampeded into approving a deal by today, just because that's what the league wants.

NFL owners and players were said to be on the verge of a deal Tuesday night that could soon end the league's lockout, but the final details were still not completed by 9 p.m. Lawyers for the two sides were said to plan working into the night in the hopes of having a proposal to show the players' executive committee Wednesday. If the 32 team representatives recommend the deal Wednesday, a vote the same day is possible. Owners could then vote on a new collective-bargaining agreement Thursday when they meet in Atlanta, a move which would end the lockout that began March 12. But first, the final details must be ironed out and the NFL Players Association's executive committee must approve of them before an agreement can move forward to full votes.

The clunky words civil union can't do justice to the bond between Karen and Marcye Nicholson-McFadden. Together for 21 years and raising two children, the women are married in every sense . . . but one. "The words matter," says Karen, 45, an executive recruiter who lives in Monmouth County. "Marriage matters. " The Nicholson-McFaddens are among seven same-sex couples fighting to enable New Jerseyans like myself to legally marry whom we love. "If this isn't a marriage," said Louise Walpin, a mother of four who's been partnered with Marsha Shapiro for 21 years, "then I don't know what is. " Lambda Legal is suing the State of New Jersey on behalf of seven couples, their children, and the Garden State Equality organization.

By Walter Olson In the run-up to the Supreme Court's opinion this week in Wal-Mart v. Dukes , the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals had given the go-ahead to a lawsuit on behalf of a vast number of female Wal-Mart employees, each of whom had supposedly suffered harm as a result of the giant retailer's way of doing business. In the minds of some advocates, the only question remaining was whether the Supreme Court would stand in the way of justice. Prejudging Wal-Mart's guilt without so much as a trial, the left-leaning Alliance for Justice asked: "Will the Supreme Court Protect Wal-Mart's Discrimination Against Women?"

A federal judge Thursday threw out a case filed by a group of Section 8 landlords against the Philadelphia Housing Authority and senior staffers, including former Executive Director Carl R. Greene. In a complaint last November, the landlords alleged that PHA forced them to take a $200 training course and then channeled the funds into an illegal lobbying fund. In a decision Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Ronald Buckwalter shot down all of the landlords' arguments, including that their civil rights had been violated.

TWENTY-SIX YEARS ago today, Philadelphia police dropped a bomb on what had once been a quiet leafy neighborhood on Osage Avenue, near Cobbs Creek Park. But Milton Williams is tired of talking about the bomb that started a fire that killed 11 people in the MOVE house and destroyed 61 homes. "I want to know what the city is going to do now," said Williams, 62. "What are they going to do with all of these empty houses?" Williams' community is still home to people who once worked as teachers, nurses, clerical workers, carpenters, police officers, roofers and truck drivers.

HARRISBURG - Nowhere has the battle over drilling for natural gas in the Marcellus Shale been uglier than in the rural community of Dimock (pop. 1,400) in the far northeast corner of the state. Last year in Dimock, a gun was pulled on an employee of Houston-based Cabot Oil & Gas, prompting the company to send its crews out with armed escorts. It wasn't exactly the shootout at the O.K. Corral, but on Wednesday, some of that vitriol spilled over into a federal courtroom here.