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CNN Live Saturday

D.C. Police Interview Cab Drivers

Aired July 21, 2001 - 17:04   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
STEPHEN FRAZIER, CNN ANCHOR: In Washington today several new developments in the Chandra Levy investigation, including new information about the whereabouts of Congressman Gary Condit the day Levy disappeared.

From Washington, here's CNN's Jonathan Aiken.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JONATHAN AIKEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): About a half dozen police officers and detectives met with Washington cabbies asking if any of them might have picked up Chandra Levy on or about May 1, the last day police have any clue as to her whereabouts.

DET. BRIAN MCALLISTER, D.C. METROPOLITAN POLICE: You guys see more and hear more than most other people. You're on the street all the time. It's amazing what you guys know what nobody else knows. And you're a very valuable intelligence resource base. And that's why we're stepping to you today.

AIKEN: Police have already obtained passenger logs from cab drivers who were working around the time of Levy's disappearance and some drivers working in Levy's northwest Washington neighborhood have already been interviewed by investigators.

In another development Saturday, a spokeswoman for Vice President Dick Cheney confirms Cheney was meeting with California Congressman Gary Condit at 12:30 on the afternoon of May 1. The 20-minute meeting requested by Congressman Condit was held in the vice president's offices at the Capitol and dealt with California's energy problems.

While police insist Condit is not a suspect in the former intern's disappearance, the time is notable: 12:30 is about when police think Chandra Levy wrapping up more than three hours of Web surfing in her apartment after visiting various newspaper and travel sites and one for Baskin Robbins ice cream. There's one not far from Levy's apartment.

A Secret Service source tells CNN the agency helped Washington police in tracing the sites Levy visited. There's no indication of her whereabouts after she went offline about 1:00 p.m..

Police will resume their search of Rock Creek Park and other sites on Monday hoping for clues that might lead them to Chandra Levy. It's been almost 3 months since she logged off the Web and dropped out of site.

Jonathan Aiken for CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FRAZIER: As Jonathan reported, more than 11 weeks since Chandra Levy disappeared. So where does the case stand? Joining us with some insight, former District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Detective Mike Brooks, now a CNN consultant. Welcome back, good to have you back with us.

MICHAEL BROOKS, FMR. D.C. POLICE DETECTIVE: Thank you.

FRAZIER: What Jonathan didn't say, but what some of the reports are indicating is that there's a sense of frustration moving into the police ranks because of their difficulties with this. Is that reasonable to expect after this much time?

BROOKS: There would be some frustration. It's natural to have some frustration, especially investigators after all the interviews and they still don't have that many leads. But they still have a number leads they are working with and they haven't run those out yet.

FRAZIER: You mentioned that these cab drivers are actually very, very helpful in a lot of investigations. Why is that?

BROOKS: Absolutely. They are out there 24 hours a day, seven days week 365 days a year. They see everything and see a lot that other people don't see. And also -- they talked about the manifests -- by law, they have to keep a manifest of when they pick someone up, what time they pick them up, the location. And they are going to go back and already they are now in the process of reviewing those manifests to see exactly if anyone was picked up in her neighborhood and if they were, what time.

FRAZIER: And the Web sites, some them have been held back by authorities saying they're evidentiary. So there's more out there on the computer than we're hearing in our reports.

BROOKS: I'm sure there is. And again, the police can't give everything out to the media and they are following up on a number of leads right now.

FRAZIER: And they are interested in a fourth meeting now with Congressman Gary Condit. What does that tell you?

BROOKS: If I were an investigator after going through a lot of the leads and some of the newest developments with Representative Condit, I would again, want to interview him and, if possible, I'd want to polygraph him.

Again, the polygraph that was given to him by his attorney and by the polygraph examiner hired by his attorney, as far as I'm concerned, it was worthless. And law enforcement also feels it was worthless. So they would like to administer their own.

FRAZIER: They have made that worthlessness clear in their public statements.

BROOKS: Yes they have.

FRAZIER: You're also joining us now as police detective who was assigned to worked with the FBI closely for years on a lot of investigations. We would like to mine some of that experience now in talking about the FBI problems with its inventory controls as released this week.

To your mind, is that anything really to be concerned about? It's a big outfit, it's like a large corporation. Have you seen this before?

BROOKS: It is a large corporation. And they are getting ready to transition into new leadership and with that -- they were just doing a rudimentary inventory of all the property that they have, computers, guns those kinds of things. And again, major corporations, you have thefts of computers you have thefts of other things that belong to the employees and with this I don't think it's that unusual.

Somebody -- some of the people are concerned because of the guns. Again...

FRAZIER: Were weapons missing as well as laptops?

BROOKS: Exactly, and with some of the guns, you have an agent who carries the same gun, a revolver for 25, 30 years, they are not using revolvers any more. They go ahead and they give them to the agents. That's not unusual. And also thefts, there are guns that are stolen. FBI agents sometimes are also the victims of crime.

We had -- they have had FBI agents houses broken into, weapons stolen, even thought they secured them in a safe place. And also, back a number of years ago at a large S.W.A.T. exercise where a van was broken into and a lot of automatic weapons were taken. So again I don't think this is unusual. And again the FBI was also being up front. They were being forthright saying, here's what we're missing. So I don't think they were trying to hide anything.

FRAZIER: When something like that break into the van is discovered, is there any kind of paper trail, saying, we had a break in, we lost 11 automatic weapons. Or are those just sort of vaporized and only the people involved in the exercise know what?

BROOKS: No, not at all. It's not vaporized, nothing's hidden. They make a police report like anyone else would. Those serial numbers of those particular guns are entered into the NCIC system, the National Crime Information System, which if someone finds a gun in the commission of a robbery, they run that particular serial number and it will come back and tell them if it was stolen or not.

FRAZIER: So wouldn't that then say that those weapons are at least accounted for internally, that somebody took them out of the system illegally, but at least there's a registration of that fact and we know that it's not in my pocket or your pocket?

BROOKS: Absolutely. Again, the FBI was trying hide nothing by that.

FRAZIER: In your sense of the technology, you mentioned radios, that if one radio was missing you're stuck then having to reprogram all of the other two-way radios. Why is that?

BROOKS: Absolutely. Whenever -- if an FBI radio is stolen in New York, when I was assigned to the Washington field office, we would have to come in and recode the radios in our cars and also the portable radios because there is a common bureau channel. And the FBI operates with a secure net radio and again, those are the kinds of thing that you have to do because we don't want people listening in on the radio communications. So if something is stolen, it has to get recoded Bureau-wide.

FRAZIER: This is a government agency. Is it the state-of-the- art electronics and computer techniques or are they running a little behind the private sector?

BROOKS: They have -- law enforcement in general, not only the FBI, but law enforcement in general, seems to always run behind the private sector when it comes to technology. But on the private laptops I think they are starting to catch up and especially on some of the scientific research and those kind of things into crime scene analysis. I think we are way ahead with technology on that side of things.

FRAZIER: Detective Mike Brooks, thanks for joining with us with those insights.

BROOKS: Thanks you, Stephen.

FRAZIER: Talk to you later on.

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