Former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich has pleaded not guilty to revised corruption charges.
The charges include trying to sell President Barack Obama’s vacant Senate seat.
The revised charges were filed after concerns that the original charges were too vague.
Mr Blagojevich, who intends to take the witness stand, wants the court to hear 500 hours of taped phone conversations to prove his innocence.
Prosecutors say that in the conversations, recorded by the FBI, he attempted to sell or trade Mr Obama’s seat.
Mr Blagojevich, who was impeached last year, told reporters after a five-minute hearing on Wednesday in Chicago: “Let me cut right to the chase, today I’m laying down the gauntlet.
“I’m not just going to talk the talk, I’m going to walk the walk,” he added. “Play the tapes, play all the tapes.”
The trial is due to start on 3 June.
Other corruption charges relate to demanding donations from potential campaign contributors in exchange for favours.
Stammering has long been recognised to run in families, but scientists now say they have identified three genes which may cause the problem in some people.
They believe that mutations which have already been tied to metabolic disorders may also affect the way in which parts of the brain function.
The study involving sufferers from Pakistan, the US and England appears in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Stammering affects about one percent of all adults worldwide.
Those affected repeat or prolong sounds, syllables or words, disrupting the normal flow of speech.
With early intervention children who stammer can overcome the problem, while for adults therapies are based on reducing anxiety and regulating breathing to improve speech.
But the team from the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD) hopes its discovery may pave the way for new treatments.
Nearly one in ten of the sufferers examined were found to have a mutation in one of three genes.
Metabolic problems
Two of these, GNPTAB and GNPTG, have already been linked to two serious metabolic diseases in which components of cells are not effectively recycled.
In addition to finding new forms of treatment, we hope this may help us identifying those children at risk of persistent stammering as it is only through early intervention that they have a chance of recovering fluent speech
British Stammering Association
These disorders, known as lyposomal storage disorders, lead to a build-up of a potentially dangerous substance which can cause problems in almost every area of the body, including the brain.
People with this defective gene need two copies to develop the metabolic disorder, but one copy appears to be associated with stammering.
A third defective gene, which is closely related to the other two, was also found among stammerers but not among the controls.
“For hundreds of years, the cause of stuttering has remained a mystery for researchers and health care professionals alike, not to mention people who stutter and their families,” said James Battey, head of the NIDCD.
“This is the first study to pinpoint specific gene mutations as the potential cause of stuttering, and by doing so, might lead to a dramatic expansion in our options for treatment.”
The metabolic disorders pinpointed can be treated by injecting a manufactured enzyme into a person’s bloodstream to take the place of the enzyme the body fails to produce. It is possible stammering, if confirmed to be caused by the same defect, would respond to the same treatment.
The British Stammering Association welcomed the findings.
“It is just the latest in a string of recent discoveries highlighting the fact that the cause of stammering is physiological – a symptom that, for whatever reason, the brain’s neural circuits for speech are not being wired normally,” said its director Norbert Lieckfeldt.
“This puts into sharp relief the bullying and ridicule people who stammer often experience, as opposed to people experiencing for instance mobility disabilities.
“In addition to finding new forms of treatment, we hope this may help us identifying those children at risk of persistent stammering as it is only through early intervention that they have a chance of recovering fluent speech.”
Blizzards have hit cities in the north-eastern US, cutting power, disrupting travel, and closing schools, businesses and government offices.
In Washington DC and neighbouring Montgomery County conditions were considered so hazardous that snow-plough operations were suspended.
The National Guard announced it had called on 200 of its members to help clear streets in the capital.
Baltimore banned all but emergency vehicles from driving on city streets.
The National Weather Service (NWS) said heavy snow and winds gusting at up to 60mph from Virginia to New York could make attempts to travel life-threatening.
WASHINGTON SNOWSTORMS
More than 1ft of snow has fallen only 14 times since 1870
Heaviest on record is 28in in January 1922
Worst snowfall is believed to have hit in 1772, before records began, with as much as 3ft
The blizzards have come as the region is still dealing with days of heavy snow.
Washington DC’s winter snowfall total up to Wednesday morning of 54.9in (139cm) recorded at Reagan National Airport, had made the season the snowiest on record since 1899, the NWS said.
The Federal Aviation Authority said Dulles Airport near Washington DC would shut down for 24 hours due to the adverse conditions.
Schools closed in New York for only the third time in six years, and the United Nations said it had closed its headquarters in the city.
The storm arrived from the west, where as much as 17in of snow fell in the state of Iowa.
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As the storm closed in on the north-eastern US late on Tuesday, people raced to clear existing snow and stockpile food.
Thousands remained without power from the last storm a few days ago in parts of Pennsylvania, Maryland and other areas.
Philadelphia was expecting up to 19in of snow and Baltimore as much as 20in, according to the National Weather Service.
Baltimore was in the midst of its snowiest winter since records began, with Philadelphia forecast to also break its previous seasonal high of 65.5in.
In Washington, federal agencies are shut and the House of Representatives has called off all votes for this week.
The Senate is due to resume work on Thursday as the storm moves offshore.
The government closure is estimated to be costing $100m (£64m) a day in lost productivity and other costs.
Many of the region’s schools are closed, with some cancelling classes for the rest of the week.
Transport has been widely disrupted, with airports in Washington shutting early on Tuesday. Airlines cancelled hundreds of flights, but some relaxed ticket policies to allow passengers to change their plans without penalty.
Washington’s bus system has ground to a halt and its subway was partly suspended. Thousands of houses have remained without power in the Washington area.
Former US congressman Charlie Wilson has died at the age of 76, a hospital spokeswoman has said.
Mr Wilson represented Texas in the House of Representatives from 1973 to 1996 and was nicknamed “Good Time Charlie” for his party-loving ways.
The 2007 Hollywood film Charlie Wilson’s War told of his efforts to arm the Afghan mujahideen during the 1980s Soviet occupation.
Actor Tom Hanks portrayed Mr Wilson in the movie.
A hospital spokeswoman told the Associated Press news agency that Mr Wilson had been taken to hospital after he started having breathing difficulties while attending a meeting in Lufkin, Texas.
She said Mr Wilson was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital and cited “cardiopulmonary arrest” as the preliminary cause of death.
A Democrat, Mr Wilson started his political career at the age of 27 as a state representative for his home district in Texas, in the heart of the East Texas Bible Belt.
He then went on to become a state senator before being elected to the US Congress, where he served 12 terms until his retirement in 1996.
“Charlie was perfect as a congressman, perfect as a state representative, perfect as a state senator. He was a perfect reflection of the people he represented. If there was anything wrong with Charlie, I never did know what it was,” AP quoted his former chief-of-staff, Charles Schnabel, as saying.
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