MILWAUKEE -- Three more homicide charges were filed against Jeffrey Dahmer Thursday, bringing the total to 15, and the confessed serial killer waived his right to a preliminary hearing prior to being bound over for trial.
In a nine-minute hearing, Milwaukee County District Attorney E. Michael McCann amended the criminal complaint against Dahmer, 31, to include two first-degree murder counts and one of first-degree intentional homicide.
Dahmer is expected to enter a plea at his arraignment, which was scheduled for Sept. 10 before Circuit Judge Laurence C. Gram Jr. Dahmer's attorney, Gerald Boyle, declined to say what plea Dahmer will make and whether insanity will be used as a defense.
'I think all those questions will be answered at the arraignment,' Boyle said.
Security was tight in the courtroom as bomb-sniffing dogs searched the courtroom before the hearing. About 50 members of victims's families were escorted into a reserved section of the courtroom before the hearing. News media and all members of the public were patted down and searched electronically before being allowed into the courtroom.
Milwaukee County Court Commissioner Audrey Brooks accepted Dahmer's waiver of his right to a preliminary hearing and said she found probable cause to bind him over for trial.
McCann also said Dahmer's parole on a 1989 felony conviction of child molestation had been revoked. Brooks continued Dahmer's bond of $5 million.
The three new counts are for the slayings of Jamie Doxtator, 14, of West Allis in 1988; Richard Guerrero, 23, of Milwaukee in 1988; and Eddie Smith, 28, of Milwaukee in 1990.
The complaint said Dahmer lured Doxtator and Smith to his apartment and Guerrero to his grandmother's house for sex, gave them drugged drinks and then strangled and dismembered them, disposing of all remains. He identified the victims largely through photographs.
Asked if he understood the proceedings, Dahmer, clad in an orange prison jumpsuit and slippers, replied, 'Yes I do, your honor.'
The complaint said Dahmer met Doxtator in January 1988 in Milwaukee while the boy was waiting for a bus, asked him if he would like to make money by posing in the nude, watching videos, and having a drink at Dahmer's apartment.
The complaint said they had sex and Dahmer gave the boy a sleeping potion to drink before strangling him.
'He dismembered him and smashed the bones with a sledgehammer and disposed of them,' the coplaint said. 'He did not keep any portion of this individual.'
The complaint said Dahmer met Guerrero in March 1988 at the Phoenix Bar in Milwaukee and took him to his grandmother's house in West Allis, where they had sex. Dahmer also drugged Guerrero, killed him and disposed of his body, the complaint said.
The complaint said Dahmer also met Smith at the Phoenix Bar during the summer of 1990, offered him money for sex and to pose for pictures, and then they went to Dahmer's apartment by cab.
They had oral sex, Dahmer gave him a drink containing sleeping pills, strangled him, dismembered the body and took four or five photos.
The difference between the murder and homicide charges stems from a change in wording in Wisconsin law in 1989. The old murder charge also allowed for parole while the homicide charge carries the possibility of life in prison without parole.
Dahmer also was charged with habitual criminality on all of the counts. If convicted, he faces 15 life terms in prison plus 10 years for each of 15 counts as a habitual criminal -- a total of life plus 150 years in prison.
Dahmer has confessed to 17 slayings. He has not been charged with the 1978 slaying of Steven Hicks, 19, at his boyhood home in Bath Township, Ohio, nor the 1987 death of Steven Tuomi, 28, Milwaukee.
Boyle said Dahmer made the decision to waive the preliminary hearing based on his counsel because it would be 'a waste of time.'
Dahmer told the judge he understood the waiver did not mean he gave up his right to a trial.
Boyle stressed Dahmer continued to meet with psychologist Ken Smail, who has again indicated Dahmer is competent to continue to make decisions regarding his defense.
After the hearing, the father of one of Dahmer's alleged victims said he was trying to understand how the killings could have happened.
'I look at him but somehow I feel he was demonized to have so few emotions,' Roland Thomas Sr., 54, of Milledgeville, Ga. 'What he was doing was like his daily way of life.'
Thomas's son, David C. Thomas, 23, is one of the 15 people Dahmer is charged with killing.
'I have no deep thoughts to explain how I feel down in my heart,' Thomas said. 'I'm a religious man. I believe we're just living in times when it's nearing the end.'