ALLENTOWN, Pa., June 29 (UPI) -- A judge Tuesday ordered the suspect in the killings of four people in Pennsylvania held without bail.
Michael Eric Ballard, 36, was arraigned in Allentown on four counts of homicide in the stabbing deaths last week of four people, including his ex-girlfriend, at a home in Allen Township.
Northampton County District Attorney John Morganelli said he would seek the death penalty.
The Allentown Morning Call said Ballard had been released from a hospital earlier in the day after police found him in his wrecked car 2 miles from the crime scene. The newspaper said that, according to police, the injured Ballard confessed at the scene when officers asked him what had happened.
The victims were identified as Ballard's former girlfriend, Denise Merhi, her father and 87-year-old grandfather. The fourth victim was a neighbor who had heard the commotion and gone to the house to help.
The Morning Call said Ballard had been living in a halfway house following a prison term for another fatal stabbing in 1992.
