A former New Jersey lawmaker who championed legislation fighting child pornography pleaded guilty Monday to distributing nude images of underage girls.

Neil Cohen, 59, acknowledged viewing and printing images meant for sexual gratification from a computer in his former legislative office. He left at least one image at a receptionist's desk, leading to the investigation and charges.

Cohen pleaded guilty to endangering the welfare of a child by distributing child pornography and could be sent to state prison for five years when he is sentenced on July 12.

Under terms of a plea agreement, Cohen will have to register as a sex offender under Megan's law and be subject to lifetime supervision by the Parole Board when he is released from prison. He agreed never to seek public office again and to pay at least $1,800 in fines. His use of social networking Web sites also will be restricted.

Cohen, an attorney who now lives in Paramus, likely will be disbarred.

Cohen and his lawyers left court without commenting. Prosecutors also declined to comment.

Looking gaunt and sporting a full beard, Cohen answered the judge's questions succinctly in a low, barely audible voice.

• Drunk Driving (DUII, DUI, DWI) - including underage drinking and driving, refusing a breathalyzer test, driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol, and other drug or alcohol related driving offenses
• Criminal Driving Offenses - including manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, assault, hit & run, attempting to elude police, reckless driving and licensure issues
• Drug Crimes - including possession, delivery, and manufacturing of marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin, designer drugs and prescription drugs
• Property Crimes - including theft, embezzlement, forgery, fraud, computer crimes and burglary
• Violent Crimes - including menacing, stalking and assault
• Stalking - including criminal offenses and civil actions

Gun control advocates are hoping they can win by losing when the Supreme Court rules on state and local regulation of firearms.

The justices will be deciding whether the right to possess guns guaranteed by the Second Amendment — like much of the rest of the Bill of Rights — applies to states as well as the federal government. It's widely believed they will say it does.

But even if the court strikes down handgun bans in Chicago and its suburb of Oak Park, Ill., that are at issue in the argument to be heard Tuesday, it could signal that less severe rules or limits on guns are permissible.

The Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence is urging the court not to do anything that would prevent state and local governments "from enacting the reasonable laws they desire and need to protect their families and communities from gun violence."

By some estimates, about 90 million people in the U.S. own a total of some 200 million guns.

Roughly 30,000 people in the United States died each year from guns; more than half of them are suicides. An additional 70,000 are wounded.

The new lawsuits were begun almost immediately after the court's blockbuster ruling in 2008 that struck down the District of Columbia's handgun ban. In that case, the court ruled for the first time that individuals have a right keep guns for self-defense and other purposes. Because the nation's capital is a federal enclave, that ruling applied only to federal laws.

Oklahoma City Council members hired a private law firm Tuesday to lead upcoming contract negotiations with the city’s police and firefighter unions.

The firm, McAfee and Taft, was hired in part because negotiations with the unions have gone poorly in recent years.

"It’s just broken,” Ward 4 Councilman Pete White said of recent negotiations with the public safety unions.

Two of the firm’s labor attorneys will be paid $225 an hour each to lead negotiations with the unions for the next fiscal year, according to a contract council members unanimously approved Tuesday.

City officials hope the arrangement helps improve a damaged relationship with the public safety unions.

"It’s just to put a new face on it,” White said. "The people that do the hardest jobs we have in this city are the police department and fire. For the relationship to be this acrimonious ... is not acceptable.”

City attorneys handled past negotiations and will assist with the upcoming negotiations.

Goodwin Liu, 39, the son of Taiwanese immigrants, learned English in kindergarten and later became an honors graduate at Stanford and a Rhodes Scholar. He has taught at Berkeley since 2003 and was named associate dean of the law school in 2008.

He also worked as a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and as a special assistant to the deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Education.

Liu is one of two Asian Americans nominated by Obama to the federal appeals courts, which now have no active Asian American judges. The Ninth Circuit handles federal cases from California and eight other Western states and has three vacancies among its 29 authorized judgeships.

"Goodwin Liu is an outstanding teacher, a brilliant scholar and an exceptional public servant," said the law school's dean, Christopher Edley.

The nomination also won praise from Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and from Tom Campbell, a UC Berkeley business professor and former congressman who is seeking the Republican nomination to run against Boxer.

Campbell said Liu would bring "scholarly distinction and a strong reputation for integrity, fair-mindedness and collegiality to the Ninth Circuit."

But Senate confirmation may not be routine. Some of Liu's positions could draw conservative opposition, which has held up other judicial nominees.

Liu testified in January 2006 against President George W. Bush's nomination of Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court, saying Alito's judicial opinions were well-reasoned but indicated a tilt in favor of prosecutors and the government. He did not testify against Chief Justice John Roberts but told a reporter before the 2005 confirmation hearing that he thought Roberts would move the court to the right.

The former owner of two failed companies was the person in “de facto” charge of Cheadle-based law firm Wolstenholmes prior to its collapse in December, Crain's has discovered.

Ex-staff who spoke on condition of anonymity said that Wasim Saddique, who was brought in by former managing partner Nasser Ilyas as consultant to advise the firm, was effectively running it. Saddique is also said to have brought in his own people to head key functions in the firm, such as accounts and IT.

Saddique and another consultant, Mario Cardinali, conducted interviews with potential new recruits and instructed money to be transferred from client accounts to the office account. It is not clear whether the firm carried out background checks on either of them.

The state Finance Department has refused to pay the legal fees of a Montgomery law firm that was hired by a legislative oversight committee to stop the state from proceeding with an unbid $13 million computer contract.

State Comptroller Thomas White has written to House Clerk Greg Pappas saying the committee didn't have the authority to hire the firm of Thomas, Means, Gillis & Seay. White said the state can't pay the $26,740 bill submitted by the law firm

The Legislature's Contract Review Committee hired the firm to represent the panel in a lawsuit seeking to stop the unbid contract signed by Gov. Bob Riley with Paragon Source LLC. The lawsuit was dismissed by a Jefferson County judge.