By Allan Lengel

Attorney Gen. Eric Holder came to Afghanistan on Wednesday to talk to officials about the justice system and public corruption, which seems to be running rampant, the Associated Press reported.

AP reported that Holder’s visit comes in wake of Afghan’s top prosecutor’s denial that he was being pressured to look the other way when it came to pursuing cases against high ranking officials.

“Fighting corruption and supporting the rule of law in Afghanistan are top priorities for this administration, and we will continue to assist the Afghan government in creating and sustaining the effective criminal justice system to which the Afghan people are entitled,” Holder said in a statement issued by the U.S. Justice Department in Washington, AP reported.

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John Stamos

A northern Michigan man busted by the FBI on charges of trying to extort $680,000 from actor John Stamos, said his plan was to sell unflattering photos of the actor as part of a legit business transaction. He said it was not part of any extortion plot as the government claims, the Associated Press reported.

The claims came in court filings in Michigan on Tuesday. The defendant, Scott Sippola also claimed in court papers that the FBI destroyed the unwholesome photos of Stamos, AP reported.

The FBI said no pictures that would have embarrassed Stamos even existed, the AP reported.

The government says they tried to get $680,000 from Stamos. Assistant U.S. Attorney Maarten Vermaat says Sippola’s claims are a “standard defense in blackmail cases.”

Stamos’ TV credits include “ER” and “Full House.”

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Yes, the Cold War is colder than you thought.  AOL News’ Andrea Stone looks into a practice many thought was a thing of the past between the U.S. and Russia.

By Andrea Stone

WASHINGTON– The news of a suspected suburban spy ring couldn’t have come at a worse time. Just days before, President Barack Obama stood beside Russian President Dmitry Medvedev at the White House and declared they had “succeeded in resetting” the relationship between the two former Cold War rivals.

Perhaps something got lost in the translation.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, a former KGB agent, condemned the arrests and said he hoped “that all the positive gains that have been achieved in our relationship will not be damaged by the recent event.”

Just because relations have thawed between the two countries, though, is no reason to stop spying on each other.

“Espionage is a fixture of international politics, for better or worse,” said Charles Kupchan, former director of European Affairs at the National Security Council. The presence of the spies “is disturbing and comes at a very awkward moment, … but this news is hardly a bombshell or a sign that Russia is behaving in a way that constitutes a dramatic departure from the norm.”

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An El Savador man illegally living in Houston was sentenced Tuesday to 55 months in prison for assaulting a Border Patrol agent with his vehicle  near Laredo, Tex. while trying to transport 10 illegal aliens, authorities said.

Authorities said that on Feb. 15, 2009, at approximately 10 p.m., Border Patrol agents spotted 10 suspected undocumented aliens running out of the brush and into the the Isuzu Rodeo of Rigoberto Torres-Gomez, 30.

A Border Patrol agent approached the vehicle and tried apprehending the illegal aliens and started struggling with one of them in front of the vehicle, authorities said.

The agent drew his service weapon, ordered Torres to turn off the vehicle and directed all the occupants to get out.

At that point, Torres accelerated and hit the agent with the vehicle, authorities charged.

The agents tried to get out of the wayand fired his service weapon, wounding Torres, authorities said. Both Torres and the agent were treated at the hospital.

By Allan Lengel

The FBI is finally stepping into the 21st Century when it comes to things like paying informants.

The website Main Justice reports that the FBI plans to issue agents debit cards to pay informants. Currently, agents have to cash  bureau-issued checks to pay an informant.

The site also reported that the agency is looking into automating requests for telephone records and using voice recognition software for agents to dictate interviews.

“We’ve been looking at what takes people away from their investigative work,” David Schlendorf, acting Assistant Director of the FBI’s Resource Planning Office told Main Justice.

“A lot of that is administrative work. We’ve been asking: What we can do to eliminate that? How can we make this more efficient?”

To read more click here.

By Allan Lengel

There are lies. And then there are big fat lies that can land you behind bars.

Daniel Gerald Peterson, 26, told one of those big fat lies, and on Monday he pleaded guilty in Minneapolis federal court to providing the FBI with false information about a bomb threat he made up, authorities said.

Peterson admitted that on September 13, 2009, he told the FBI that someone was planning to bomb the Bank of Oklahoma Center, a sports arena, in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

The FBI conducted an extensive investigation and determined the story was made up, the FBI said.

He faces up to five years in prison.