SAN DIEGO -- Several floors of a Hilton hotel under construction in downtown San Diego have been badly damaged in an apparent explosion, and authorities say a dozen workers have been injured.

The incident was reported shortly after 2 p.m. Monday.

The fire spokesman say it is still not known what happened, but there is no fire.

About four lower floors of the waterfront skyscraper near the San Diego Convention Center show serious damage and debris litters a driveway beneath the area.

PHILADELPHIA -- Philadelphia's police commissioner said Monday that four officers will be fired and four others disciplined for their roles in the beatings of three shooting suspects, an encounter that was captured on videotape and drew widespread outrage.

Another eight officers who had physical contact with the suspects will undergo additional training on the department's policies concerning the use of force, Commissioner Charles Ramsey said. He said the police department made the disciplinary decisions after reviewing frames from enhanced tape of a video shot by a television news helicopter on May 5.

The video, shot by WTXF-TV, shows the suspects being pulled from their car on the side of the road and groups of officers kicking, punching and beating the men. A total of 19 officers -- 18 city police and one transit officer -- were involved.

Two of the officers being fired are relatively new to the force and can be terminated immediately, Ramsey said. Two others are being suspended without pay for 30 days with intent to dismiss.

Three other officers are being suspended and one sergeant is being demoted. A criminal investigation is continuing.

WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon on Monday announced upcoming deployments of more than 42,000 troops, including 25,000 active duty Army soldiers who would be sent to Iraq beginning in the fall to replace troops scheduled to come home by year's end.

The deployments would maintain a level of 15 brigades in Iraq, or roughly 140,000 troops -- the number military leaders expect will remain on the warfront at the end of July, once the currently planned withdrawals are finished.

Under the new Pentagon policy effective in August, those active duty Army units will serve for 12 months, rather than the 15-month tours that units in Iraq now are serving. The bulk of the soldiers deploying later this year returned from Iraq late last year, and will have gotten about a year at home to rest and retrain.

As part of the announcement, The Pentagon alerted four National Guard Army brigades, or about 14,000 troops, to begin preparing for deployments to Iraq beginning next spring, and one National Guard Army brigade, with about 3,100 soldiers, to prepare to deploy to Afghanistan in the spring of 2010.

The Guard announcements, said Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman, are being made far in advance so that soldiers and their families can begin training and other preparations for their service.

MIAMI -- South Florida residents were warned to stay indoors and a state prison and federal detention center were evacuated Monday as smoke from a massive wildfire in Everglades National Park billowed their way.

No structures were in danger, though officials said the fire was burning in the only known habitat for the endangered Cape Sable seaside sparrow.

The 56-square-mile blaze was about 30 percent contained. The smoke was blowing to the northeast, said U.S. Forest Service spokeswoman Nina Barrow. Smoke and fog advisories were issued for Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Glades counties.

Moderate to unhealthy air quality conditions were expected throughout the week, according to the Miami-Dade County Department of Environmental Resource Management.

ABILENE, Texas -- A 7-year-old boy died after he was apparently attacked by two pit bulls along a road, and deputies summoned to the scene had to shoot the dogs before they could reach him, authorities said.

A driver saw Tanner Joshua Monk lying beside a road near Breckenridge on Sunday with two dogs nearby, Stephens County Sheriff Jim Reeves said. She got out of the car to help him, but the dogs became aggressive so she called 911, he said.

Two sheriff's deputies who came to the scene shot the dogs to death when they also became aggressive toward them. The deputies then found that Tanner was dead, Reeves said in Monday's edition of the Abilene Reporter-News.

Tanner was found alone about 150 yards from his house and 50 to 75 yards from a neighbor's house where he had been playing with some friends, Reeves told The Associated Press on Monday. The two pit bulls, along with two others seized at the scene by law enforcement, belonged to those neighbors, Reeves said.

WAYNE, N.J. -- The family of a boy who suffered brain damage after he was struck by a line drive off an aluminum baseball bat sued the bat's maker and others on Monday, saying they should have known it was dangerous.

The family of Steven Domalewski, who was 12 when he was struck by the ball in 2006, filed the lawsuit in state Superior Court. It names Hillerich Bradsby Co., maker of the 31-inch, 19-ounce Louisville Slugger TPX Platinum bat used when Steven was hit.

The lawsuit also names Little League Baseball and Sports Authority, which sold the bat. It claims the defendants knew, or should have known, that the bat was dangerous for children to use, according to the family's attorney, Ernest Fronzuto.

"People who have children in youth sports are excited about the lawsuit from a public policy standpoint because they hope it can make the sport safer," Fronzuto said after filing the suit Monday morning. "There are also those who are skeptical of the lawsuit and don't see the connection between Steven's injury and the aluminum bat."

MORRIS, Ill. -- Got milk?

Police say a trailer loaded with 14 tons of double-stuffed Oreos has overturned, spilling the cookies still in their plastic sleeves into the median and roadway.

Illinois State Police Sgt. Brian Mahoney says the truck's driver was traveling from Chicago to Morris on Interstate 80 around 4 a.m. Monday when he fell asleep at the wheel and slammed into the median.

"The boxes came out of the trailer and boxes were ripped open," he said.

The crash about 50 miles southwest of Chicago remains under investigation.

Mahoney says no charges have been filed but both lanes of traffic remain closed while authorities remove the cookies.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- A large animal attacked a 5-year-old boy hiking with his family, seriously injuring him with puncture wounds to the head, neck and back, authorities said.

Jose Salazar Jr. was hiking near Sandia Peak east of Albuquerque and had run ahead of his parents on Saturday evening when they heard a scream, Bernalillo County Sheriff Darren White said.

The boy's parents, Jose and Charlotte Salazar, saw the animal emerge from the brush and start dragging their son, White said. The father tried to jump on the animal's back, and it let go of the boy and fled.

The state Game and Fish Department said in a news release Monday that the child and his father identified the animal as a mountain lion from pictures shown to them.

SEATTLE -- More than six decades after they were forced to leave college, some 450 Japanese-Americans interned during World War II have been awarded honorary degrees from the University of Washington.

Relatives wept during the ceremony Sunday to honor the students, who were among 120,000 ethnic Japanese who were relocated in 1942 under the executive order signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The degrees were presented to at least 65 surviving former students, mostly in their 80s, and 110 relatives representing others who had died or were unable to attend.

"It still seems like a nightmare to me," said recipient Teru Nakata Kiyohara. Like many other former internees, she later earned a degree at another school.

The UW Board of Regents voted in February to award the honorary diplomas.

HACKENSACK, N.J. -- A man arrested in Southern California has been charged with murdering three people whose bodies were found in a northern New Jersey home last week.

Kang-Hyuk Choi was arrested Sunday in Commerce, Calif. New Jersey authorities are seeking his extradition.

Authorities say the 32-year-old man from Valley Stream, N.Y., quarreled with his first victim over money after socializing with him on May 3 and 4.

Their argument led to a fight. Prosecutors say Choi used a knife to stab Hang Il Kim multiple times in his bedroom in Tenafly (ten-a-FLY'), N.J.

Prosecutors say Choi stabbed Kim's mother Yoo Bok Kim the next morning as she came to check on her son. Choi also is accused of killing another man who lived in the home, 70-year-old Doo Soo Seo.