November 5, 1994

The job market improved in October as the unemployment rate eased to 5.8 percent, another four-year low, and hourly wages rose by the largest amount in more than a decade, the Labor Department reported today. Payroll gains were relatively modest, though, with the economy adding 194,000 jobs last month, well below the quarter of a million jobs added during a typical month this year. California, which has lagged far behind the rest of the country, was particularly impressive, with unemployment dropping to 7.7 percent from 8.3 percent. Employment in New York and New Jersey was virtually flat.

3 Suspended at West Point Three West Point football players who groped female cadets at a rally will be suspended from the team for the rest of the season. Page 25. More Confusion in California Further muddying state politics, officials said a housekeeper once employed by Senator Dianne Feinstein was in the country illegally. Page 11. Pilots Given New Guidelines Federal officials advised pilots of the type of commuter plane that crashed on Monday to adopt new procedures for icy weather. Page 12. Fast Food, Faster McDonald's will make home and office deliveries from 40 of its Manhattan restaurants, with orders phoned in to a computerized center. Page 25.

To cries of "Murderer!" and "Baby killer!" rising from an angry crowd, the woman who said a carjacker had abducted her two little boys was ushered away to jail today after being formally charged with their murders. The woman, Susan V. Smith, had waived her right to appear before a judge inside the vaulted, turn-of-the-century Union County courthouse to hear the charges read. She waited instead inside the sheriff's office next door. But as Mrs. Smith was driven away, her head buried in her lap, she could not escape the jeers and epithets hurled at her by about 200 townspeople who had gathered to condemn her.

Dwight Gooden, continuing to test positive for cocaine use, received a career-jeopardizing penalty yesterday. A free agent who is no longer a member of the Mets, Gooden was suspended for the entire 1995 season. The pitcher, whose career has been in decline, has 15 days left of a 60-day drug-related suspension that was interrupted by the players' strike and will serve an additional 168 days, the balance of the 1995 season, on the suspended list.

In his first race for the United States Senate 12 years ago, Frank R. Lautenberg raised the question of whether his 72-year-old opponent, Representative Millicent Fenwick, was past her political prime, questioning her "fitness" and "her ability to do the job." Six years later, in one of the most acrimonious political campaigns in New Jersey history, he sought to convince voters that his rival, Pete Dawkins, was out of touch.