Thirteen people were charged Wednesday for hazing a Florida A&M University drum major who was beaten to death last November. Robert Champion, 26, collapsed on a bus in Orlando after a football game against Bethune-Cookman University. A coroner ruled his death a homicide caused by internal bleeding from blunt-force trauma. Among those charged in a Florida court Wednesday, 11 received felony charges and two received misdemeanors. Police are still trying to arrest the suspects, whose names weren’t released in court Wednesdsay. More than 20 others faced misdemeanor charges for separate hazing incidents at A&M, with Champion’s death spotlighting a culture of hazing in marching bands and at the A&M, where two faculty members resigned last week in connection to other incidents.

Blind activist lawyer Chen Guangcheng, the Chinese dissident who fled to the U.S. embassy in Beijing last week and sparked an international debate, seemed unpleased by the deal struck by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the Chinese government. “We are in danger,” Chen said of his family, speaking to CNN. “If you can talk to Hillary, I hope she can help my whole family leave China.” Clinton was said to have struck a deal that allowed Chen to go free in China, but he feared for the safety of himself and his family. Chen said that he was “very disappointed” in the U.S. government and that he felt “a little” lied to by the embassy there, saying his wife had been tied to a chair by the police for two days and threatened to be beaten to death.

It’s not quite June, but Newt Gingrich is calling it quits. The onetime Republican hopeful suspended his campaign on Wednesday after announcing his decision in a video Tuesday. In his farewell speech, Gingrich assured his supporters that Romney would be better than Obama, who is "the most radical leftist president in American history." Gingrich's rambling, 26-minute remarks covered everything from autism, moon colonies, and brain research.

News Corp.’s board of directors is sticking by their big guy. The board announced Wednesday that they are fully standing behind Rupert Murdoch less than two days after a British parliamentary committee had called the chief executive “unfit” to run the corporation’s international business. The board said its “vote of confidence” stemmed from “Murdoch’s vision and leadership” and his “demonstrated resolve.” Murdoch said in a statement yesterday to staff that he regretted not looking deeper into the hacking scandal, adding that executives have “taken our share of responsibility for not rectifying the situation sooner.”

Google-owned YouTube doubled back on a decision Wednesday to ban a video of Sports Illustrated swimsuit model Kate Upton doing the “Cat Daddy” dance in a bikini. The video of the busty Upton shimmying and shaking went viral after Upton linked to it from her Twitter account. YouTube pulled the video for a spell on Tuesday, citing its community guidelines, then put it back online. “With the massive volume of videos on our site, sometimes we make the wrong call,” a YouTube spokesperson said in an email to The Daily Beast. “When it’s brought to our attention that a video has been removed mistakenly, we act quickly to reinstate it.” The move was made only after famed photographer Terry Richardson, who shot the clip, posted the video on Vimeo. “The video is just Kate being Kate,” an Upton spokesman said. “YouTube is a great company and we respect whatever their decision is on this.”

At least 20 people were killed Wednesday in Cairo and at least 160 injured in clashes when a group of armed “thugs” attacked protesters demanding an end to military rule. The violence came just weeks ahead of Egypt’s first post-Mubarak campaign, and resulted in two Islamist candidates suspending their campaigns. “Where is the Army? Why are they not stopping these people?” cried one bystander during the violence, which included unidentified men attacking protesters with batons and guns, with some protesters retaliating by beating their assailants. The military will hold a meeting Wednesday with political party leaders to defuse the violence, but Egypt’s largest political party, the Muslim Brotherhood, said it will boycott any meeting.

Much of the conservative media bashed presidential contender Mitt Romney throughout the primary. But now that it’s clear Romney will be the nominee–and he’ll need all the help he can get to unseat President Barack Obama–the candidate and his wife have extended an olive branch to several right-of-center publications. Journalists from the National Review, Daily Caller, WorldNetDaily, and the American Spectator to name just a few met with the Romneys for an off-the-record sit-down at a private Washington, D.C., club on Wednesday. The message? The primary’s over and Romney wants their support.

Federal authorities charged 107 people—doctors, nurses, and social workers among them—in seven different cities with Medicare fraud that cost the nation some $452 million. Agents raided businesses in Miami, Los Angeles, Houston, Detroit, and other locations, suspending payment to 52 providers as part of the investigations. The arrests on Wednesday were in a series of unrelated scams, the largest which totaled $225 million and operated in Baton Rouge, La. Fraud prevention became a “cabinet-level priority” when Attorney General Eric Holder took office, said Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who partnered with Holder on the investigations.

It’s not the most expensive painting in history, but Edvard Munch’s The Scream ranks up there as one of the few works of art to fetch a nine-figure sum. The painting was sold on Wednesday evening in New York to an anonymous buyer who will pay $119.9 million for the masterpiece. The Scream depicts a man with his hands on his face, crying out in despair under a red sky. It was painted in 1895 and is one of the most famous paintings of all time.

NFL star Junior Seau has been found dead in his Oceanside, Calif., his former team, the San Diego Chargers confirmed Officials confirmed that Seau shot himself in the chest around 9:30 a.m. local time Wednesday Seau, 43, reportedly texted, “Love you,” to his three kids and ex-wife yesterday, who all texted him back and didn’t think anything was wrong. Seau, who played for the San Diego Chargers, Miami Dolphins, and New England Patriots in an illustrious career, drove his car off a California cliff in 2010 after he was arrested for allegedly attacking his girlfriend. While there was speculation that the accident was a suicide attempt, Seau reportedly told police that he had fallen asleep at the wheel.

A shooting at a home in Gilbert, Ariz., left five people dead, including the gunman, who killed himself. Jason “J.T.” Ready, a reputed neo-Nazi, has been identified as the shooter. Ready had recently launched a militia movement to patrol the border. A victim, Amber Mederos, was connected to one of Ready’s organizations. The other victims included Mederos’s boyfriend, her 18-month-old daughter, and her mother. At least one person survived the shooting and is currently being treated at a local hospital. A police spokesman said, “This is a domestic situation. We do have a witness that our investigators are interviewing."

Sarah Phillips, a columnist for ESPN’s Playbook, was fired Tuesday after Deadspin revealed that the writer had received money from a fan for betting on games as she sought to start her own online gambling site. The identity of Phillips, who was signed by ESPN to write for the site beginning in September of last year, has been called into question by a variety of outlets after a quick and mysterious rise from being a gambling Web site commenter to an ESPN columnist. ESPN said it had no connection to Phillips’s gambling, which had earned her $2,100 from a fan before she had asked for another $5,000. ESPN said it will review its process for verifying the identity of its contributors, though the company said she checked out by providing “the information necessary to contribute” for the outlet.

Both Scott Brown and Elizabeth Warren are using President Obama to advance their Massachusetts Senate campaigns. The Republican senator is promoting his work on a bipartisan bill that provides a tax incentive to businesses that hire veterans, and his Democratic opponent has a new ad highlighting a White House speech in which Warren is praised by the president. “She came up with the idea for a new independent agency that would have one simple overriding mission: standing up for consumers and middle-class families,” Obama says in the ad. 

Adis Medunjanin, 28, was convicted Tuesday of conspiring to bomb the New York City subways, and he was eventually nabbed in a high-stakes chase that lasted only a few days. According to court documents, an associate of Medunjanin named Najibullah Zazi, 24—they pledged allegiance to al Qaeda at the same New York City mosque—first tipped authorities off to a possible plot in September 2009 when he emailed an alleged handler for al Qaeda from a computer in Denver. Zazi left Denver on Sept. 8, driving cross-country to New York, with U.S. national-security agents on his trail. Port Authority agents stopped Zazi, but let him go—but he panicked anyway, telling Medunjanin “we are done.” Zazi was arrested shortly after arriving in Denver, and the FBI arrested Medunjanin and another former classmate of theirs, Zarein Ahmedzay, in January 2010.

President Obama made a surprise trip to Afghanistan Tuesday night, vowing to “finish the job” and saying U.S. troops will not stay “a single day longer” than necessary. Marking the one-year anniversary of the high-stakes raid that killed al Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden, Obama said, “This time of war began in Afghanistan, and this is where it will end.” Obama and Karzai signed the “strategic partnership agreement” to outline the cooperation between the two countries after NATO’s withdrawal of forces in 2014. After Obama’s exit, at least three explosions rocked Kabul, and the Taliban immediately claimed responsibility.

Scientists said on Wednesday that they had found red blood cells around the wounds of Oetzi, a 5,300-year-old body found in the Italian Alps in 1991. Blood cells tend to degrade quickly—and initial searches had come up empty—but a new study has been able to find the blood that Oetzi shed before dying—the oldest blood cells ever recorded. Since Oetzi’s body was discovered more than 20 years ago, scientists have been able to discover important details about health and nutrition of the time period—and also Oetzi's last meal and the cause of death: an arrow in his back. This may be one of the world’s oldest murder mysteries.

A four-alarm fire broke out at Tyler Perry’s film studios in Atlanta late Tuesday night. Firefighters quickly extinguished the blaze and are now searching for clues to the cause. More than 100 firefighters responded to the fire, which was first reported at 8:41 p.m. and caused the fascia of the main building on the 30-acre complex to collapse. No one was injured.

Blind Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng broke his silence on Wednesday, telling the Associated Press that he did not want to stay in China, and a friend of Chen’s said he had told her that he feared for his family’s safety. By 11 p.m. local time, activists who had spoken to Chen at the hospital said he had been told his family members would be beaten to death if he did not leave the U.S. Embassy. While Chinese officials have said they will grant Chen and his family freedom, many have questioned the validity of those statements. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in Beijing for previously scheduled talks, said she is “pleased” with the deal struck for Chen’s freedom—if China sticks to its end of the deal.

A monthly report from the payroll giant ADP said Wednesday that U.S. hiring slowed in April, marking the second straight month that job growth disappointed forecasters. Companies hired 119,000 people in April after hiring 201,000 in March. The slowed growth was spread across a broad range of sectors. Analysts say the unusually warm winter may have stimulated hiring over the past few months and then led employers to cut back later.

Facebook's long-anticipated initial public offering has reportedly been set for May 18, sources told The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday. The social-networking company will hit the road on Monday to start pitching the stock to investors. Mark Zuckerberg will attend some of the meetings but isn't expected to be at all of them. Analysts estimate Facebook, which has about 900 million monthly users, could raise as much as $10 billion by going public, which would make it one of the largest tech IPOs of all time. The company recently posted its first-quarter earnings, hauling in $1 billion so far this year, though seeing a small snag in its growth.

The wife of a former aide of John Edwards—considered one of the star witnesses at the former presidential candidate’s trial—testified on Tuesday that her husband’s judgment was impaired by a sleeping disorder, insisting that it affected his memory. Cheri Young’s husband, Andrew, had initially claimed paternity of Edwards’s daughter with Rielle Hunter, and Cheri Young said she had allowed herself to “swallow” her husband’s claim because electing Edwards was “Andrew’s dream.” Cheri Young insisted she does not have a desire to “take down” her husband’s former employer, but the couple faces claims by the defense that they used a majority of the $1.2 million given to Edwards that he allegedly used to cover up the affair with Hunter.

The hacking scandal might be spilling over to the U.S. Following the British Parliament’s censure of News Corp. head Rupert Murdoch on Tuesday, a U.S. ethics watchdog group has targeted Murdoch’s immensely profitable Fox News, calling on the Federal Communications Commission to revoke Fox’s 27 broadcasting licenses. The director of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) declared that “if they [News Corp.] are not passing character standard under British law, it seems to me that they are not going to meet the character standard in America.” Meanwhile, satellite broadcaster BSkyB—of which News Corp. holds a 39 percent ownership stake—insisted to British regulators that its practices are “fit and proper,” and insisted will be “better and stronger” following the hacking scandal.

Blind Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng, who fled house arrest last month, has left the U.S. embassy and is at a medical facility in Beijing, a U.S. official said Wednesday—the first public acknowledgment by the U.S. that his whereabouts are known. The official statement from the office of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton came just six hours after she arrived in Beijing for previously scheduled talks about economic and security matters. The statement did not specify if Chen would be granted asylum in the U.S., but Chen has said his goal is to live in China as a free citizen.

Now that’s one way to send a message. The NFL came down hard on four football players for the New Orleans Saints’ “Bountygate” scandal, suspending linebacker Jonathan Vilma for all of the 2012 season. Three other players were banned for eight games, four games, and three games. From 2009 to 2011, the Saints used a bounty system to pay players cash bonuses for vicious hits aimed at opposing players. Aside from suspending coach Sean Payton for next season, the Saints were fined $500,000.

Conveniently, a California treasure hunter has chosen the anniversary of Osama bin Laden’s death to announce that he has “found” the terrorist’s corpse. In fact, Bill Warren—who claims he has discovered more than 200 shipwrecks during his immensely successful treasure-hunting career—told the Spanish newspaper El Mundo that he knows the precise location of bin Laden’s body: “200 miles to the west of the Indian city of Surat.” Warren reassured El Mundo that he’s “the only one with this information,” and that bin Laden’s body is exactly where the U.S. Navy dropped it last spring, only it’s on the ocean floor now, of course, since the body bag was weighted down. According to El Mundo, he’s working on renting some high-tech Russian diving equipment to recover the cadaver. He needs only $200,000 to finance his mission. Despite recovering 200 shipwrecks, apparently he’s never struck gold. Donations, anyone?

British M.P. Tom Watson, the man who has led the investigation into hacking allegations at News Corp., fired back Wednesday at critics of the findings that Murdoch is not “fit and proper” to run the media conglomerate. While some Conservative members of the committee have claimed Watson “hijacked” the report and made it “partisan,” Watson dismissed the criticism, saying “that’s exactly what they said when we did the report in 2009. So it’s no surprise that they’ve repeated the line this time around.” Meanwhile, satellite broadcaster BSkyB scrambled to prove to British regulators that it is “fit and proper” following Murdoch’s censure, and a U.S. watchdog group called for a review of Murdoch’s immensely profitable Fox News.

The Department of Justice announced Tuesday that it will be investigating Montana police, prosecutors, and the University of Montana at Missoula after complaints that authorities have not taken the allegations of sexual assault seriously. The Justice Department said that at least 80 rapes had occurred in the past three years in Missoula, and at least 11 of those involved University of Montana students in an 18-month period. Officials said they will investigate all sexual assaults in Missoula, not just the ones involving students. The two-prong investigation will also look into allegations of a pattern of gender discrimination relating to the sexual assaults.

A 24-year-old student at the University of California, San Diego, was found April 26 in a jail cell where he had been left without food or water for five days. Daniel Chong was arrested when he and his friends were smoking marijuana, and placed in a holding cell by DEA agents. “They never came back, ignored all my cries, and I still don’t know what happened,” he said. “I’m not sure how they could forget me.” He drank his own urine to remain hydrated, and after he began hallucinating, tried to kill himself by breaking his glasses and cutting himself. He allegedly found a bag of meth in the holding cell and took it to stay awake. A DEA worker finally heard his cries, and he spent three days in intensive care.

Burmese human-rights activist Aung San Suu Kyi took her seat in Parliament Wednesday, the first time the Nobel laureate has held public office and the result of reforms made by military-backed rulers. Suu Kyi’s political party, the National League for Democracy, won a sweeping victory in the country’s by-elections last month. NLD had considered not taking their seats after a disagreement with the ruling party about the wording of oath of office, but they agreed to compromise on Monday. Suu Kyi said it did not “bother” her to have to sit in Parliament with the military despite spending years under house arrest.

A coroner’s report declared that British spy Gareth Williams, who was found locked inside a large suitcase in a bathtub in 2010, was either poisoned or suffocated, though findings will never be satisfactory. Williams’s body was partially decomposed when he was discovered, making it harder for a definitive cause of death to be declared. Coroner Fiona Wilcox said Williams’s death was “unnatural and likely to have been criminally meditated.” Wilcox said Williams was likely alive when he entered the bag and that someone put the bag in the dry bathtub. The case has gripped Britain since Williams, who was 31, was discovered dead in August 2010.

John Edwards’s daughter Cate rushed from the courtroom in tears on Wednesday during a former aide’s testimony referencing an argument between her deceased mother and father. Former Edwards aide Christina Reynolds was testifying about an argument Elizabeth Edwards had with her husband on the day that a tabloid published a story about his affair with Rielle Hunter. John Edwards was overheard saying to his daughter, “I don’t know what’s coming, do you want to leave?” Cate whispered an inaudible response and left the courtroom in tears, returning only after a recess. After Cate left, Reynolds recalled seeing Elizabeth Edwards pull off her shirt and bra and say to her husband, “You don’t see me anymore.” The disturbing confrontation was the tipping point for Reynolds, who then quit working for Edwards.