MILWAUKEE -- A suspected serial killer has been charged in the slayings of five more women in Milwaukee.
Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm said Thursday that he filed the additional charges against Walter E. Ellis, who now faces five counts of first-degree intentional homicide and two counts of first-degree murder -- the equivalent charge that was state law when the deaths occurred.
Ellis is suspected in a string of killings from 1986 to 2007. Police said the 49-year-old's DNA was found on the bodies of nine women ages 16 to 41.
Prison term upheld in Cuba
HAVANA -- A Cuban appeals court upheld a two-year prison sentence for "public dangerousness" against a man who became an Internet celebrity after his drunken rant about hunger on the island was captured by a film crew.
The court rejected Juan Carlos Gonzalez Marcos' plea for leniency in central Havana on Thursday, according to Richard Rosello, who observed the hearing on behalf of the Havana-based Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation, a leading rights group.
Gonzalez Marcos, known by the nickname Panfilo, appeared obviously inebriated when he burst into an interview for a documentary on Cuban music, waving his arms and screaming, "What we need here is a little bit of chow!"
ACORN fires 2 after video airs
BALTIMORE -- The group ACORN has fired two employees who were seen on hidden-camera video giving tax advice to a man posing as a pimp and a woman who pretended to be a prostitute.
Fox News Channel broadcast excerpts from the video Thursday. On the video, a man and woman visiting ACORN's Baltimore office asked about buying a house and how to account on tax forms for the woman's income. An ACORN employee advised the woman to list her occupation as "performance artist."
The pair also claimed they planned to employ teenage girls from central America as prostitutes, and an ACORN employee suggested that up to three of the girls could be claimed as dependents, according to transcripts of the video posted online by conservative activist James O'Keefe.
In a statement, ACORN Maryland board member Margaret Williams said the video was an attempt to smear ACORN, and that undercover teams attempted similar setups in at least three other ACORN offices.
ACORN -- which stands for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now -- advocates for poor people.
Pizza shop must pay for surgery
INDIANAPOLIS -- An Indiana court has ruled that a pizza shop must pay for a 340-pound employee's weight-loss surgery to ensure the success of another operation for a back injury he suffered at work -- raising concern among businesses bracing for more such claims.
The Indiana Court of Appeals decision, coupled with a recent Oregon court Boston's The Gourmet Pizza must pay for lap-band surgery for Adam Childers, a cook at the store in Schererville, under last month's Indiana ruling that upheld a 4-3 decision by the state's workers' compensation board.
-- From wire reports
