Former Barcelona president Joan Laporta defended Lionel Messi against allegations of tax fraud on Thursday, a case that experts say could carry a prison sentence for the Argentina star.

A Spanish state prosecutor filed a fraud complaint on Wednesday alleging that Messi and his father Jorge avoided paying 4 million euros ($5.3 million) in back taxes through illegal overseas tax havens.

Germany forward Andre Schurrle is close to completing his protracted switch from Bayer Leverkusen to Chelsea, in what would be Jose Mourinho's first signing since returning as manager of the Premier League club.

Chelsea said Thursday that it had reached an agreement with Leverkusen over the transfer of Schurrle, who must now complete personal terms and pass a medical.

More than half of Americans polled in a survey released Thursday said they agreed with the statement "We are really in the era of Big Brother."

The survey from the University of Southern California was conducted last year, before recent revelations of large-scale, secret U.S. government surveillance programs. It found that some 35 percent of respondents agreed that "There is no privacy, get over it."

The head of AEG Live LLC told jurors Wednesday that he knew Michael Jackson as a sophisticated, forceful businessman and not the drugged-up performer who's been described throughout an ongoing civil trial filed over the singer's untimely death.

Jackson was a far more complex figure than has been portrayed during the trial of a case filed by the singer's mother against AEG Live over her son's death, said Randy Philips, the company's president and CEO.

Jennifer Lopez says Latinos in the United States are starting to realize their power in politics and media, and that makes the timing good for her latest undertaking: Lobbying for greater diversity in TV programming.

The entertainer spoke Wednesday at the Cable Show, a communications convention, ahead of new programming set to launch July 18 on the NUVOtv network. Lopez serves as chief creative officer of the English-language Latino channel.

The Duchess of Cambridge will officially name the new "Royal Princess" cruise liner at a gala ceremony.

The former Kate Middleton plans to board the vessel for the naming ceremony, which will include a blessing and the traditional smashing of a bottle across the hull.

Is it a bike? Is it a plane?

Three Czech companies have teamed up to make a prototype of an electric bicycle that successfully took off Wednesday inside an exhibition hall in Prague and landed safely after a remote-controlled, five-minute flight.

Drug traffickers back in Colombia must be going bananas over how their shipment ended up at Danish supermarkets and not on the streets.

Police say employees at the supermarket chain Coop got a big surprise when they opened banana boxes from the South American country and found about 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of what police believe is cocaine.

Five tries. Five failures.

Australian Chloe McCardel became the latest endurance athlete undone by the warm waters and fierce jellyfish of the Florida Straits, abandoning on Wednesday night her attempt to become the first person to swim across nonstop without a shark cage.

NASCAR driver Jason Leffler died after an accident Wednesday night at a dirt car event at Bridgeport Speedway.

The 37-year-old Leffler, a two-time winner on the Nationwide Series, was pronounced dead shortly after 9 p.m. local time, New Jersey State Police said.