California courts are partnering with communities to finalize adoptions, uplift kinship care, and support children’s paths to permanent homes.

Div. Three of the Fourth District Court of Appeal has held that an order in marital dissolution proceedings requiring that an elderly husband establish a $3 million trust to provide for the support of his wife, 13 years his junior, after he dies is authorized under the Family Code and is not precluded by a separate provision that specifies that alimony obligations terminate upon the death of either party.

Prosecutors in three Southern California counties have charged more than 13,000 people under Proposition 36, the tougher-on-crime law passed overwhelmingly a year ago this week, according to data collected by the Southern California News Group. The new law contributes to overcrowding in jails and increased caseloads across the state without providing the alternatives to incarceration that California voters expected, opponents say.

After being closed for months due to significant water damage, the second floor of the Shasta County Superior Court building in Redding is reopening on Monday. The second floor of the six-story courthouse, including criminal courtrooms, was closed in May for repairs. As a result, some courtroom services had been temporarily reassigned to alternate courtrooms.