If you read this after 10 a.m. on Tuesday, January 20, the day after Martin Luther King Day, witnesses may already be on the stand in a federal courtroom in yet another Birmingham trial with civil rights implications. Barring a last-minute settlement, the Southern Poverty Law Center's suit against the
Birmingham Police Department over officers using mace on city students
will go forward, and lawyers representing the city and the police are promising a vigorous defense. WBHM's Dan Carsen has more.