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CNN Live Today

Interview With Marc Klaas

Aired May 23, 2002 - 11:06   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.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: And now to a familiar face to many of our viewers this morning. Marc Klaas lost a child back in 1993. His daughter, Polly, was kidnapped and killed. She was 12 years old at the time. Well, Klaas currently serves as executive director of the Klaas Kids Foundation, and he joins us from San Francisco this morning.

Good morning, Marc. Good to see you again. I hope you're doing well today.

MARC KLAAS, DAUGHTER WAS ABDUCTED AND MURDERED: I am, and it's nice to see you again, Leon.

HARRIS: Listen -- you know it's been a while since you and I have talked, and I want to -- I know that you spoke with our network yesterday about -- you know, about (UNINTELLIGIBLE) that the Levy family had just found out -- you were saying at the time that, you know, it probably hadn't sunk in yet, but how about that -- this morning. What do you -- give us an idea of what it must be like to wake up this morning.

KLAAS: Well, I doubt if they even slept last night, and if they did, it was a very fitful sleep. They're devastated, Leon. My goodness, they have just been thrown to the depths of emotion and psychology.

I mean, good Lord, it's like they're going to have to almost learn how to live and certainly learn how to enjoy life all over again.

The one thing, though, is that they're no longer afraid. They're no longer afraid for their daughter. They knew that -- they know where she is, and they know that nobody can hurt her anymore.

HARRIS: Yeah, but, you know, when they found that out -- most of us are at a loss for words, like I am right now. They're trying to figure out exactly what that moment must be like. Can you imagine -- can you explain that to us?

KLAAS: Well, you know what, Leon? If it ever comes to trial, they're going to have many months to relive the last few moments of her life. That's what we did in the trial for Polly's killer, and, to this day, I can't imagine it. It's the one place that I find it very, very difficult to go to because, you know, they say that losing a child is a parent's worst nightmare. Well, you know what, Leon? that's the wrong focus because it's nothing for the parents like it must have been for that child. The horror of being taken down by a predator must just be so unimaginable.

HARRIS: Yeah. How about the fact that, you know, they've been waiting for so long and they had to have some idea in the back of their minds that the news was not going to be good when they did find her actually. Can you in any way describe what -- that moment when they did hear from the police, what that was like?

KLAAS: Well, I don't imagine it really sunk in immediately. I know that with me it didn't, and we had, you know, fought against hope that we would get Polly back alive, and you trick yourself into believing that, so when you do hear news as devastating as the fact that your child has been found and they've been found dead, it takes a little bit of time for that to sink into the depth of your soul, and when it finally does -- and I know for me it took a couple of hours -- it came screaming out, and if there had not been a lot of male members of mine and my wife's family near me, I probably would have destroyed everything within my path at that time. It was just a hideous, horrible revelation.

HARRIS: Yeah. That's one that only the rest of us can just imagine what that must be like to go through. Well, can you imagine what this next phase is going to be like for them? Right now, as we were saying coming into this, they're now...

KLAAS: Yeah.

HARRIS: The police are going out into the investigation phase here. I mean, what is it that the family can actually do to help them get through this period?

KLAAS: Well, they can channel their anger in positive ways, and, boy, must they have a lot of anger. First of all, they can put together a memorial service that, certainly, they need and, I think, the country probably needs. We were all so invested in Chandra's safe return.

And then I think they've got a 90-day window of opportunity to do something in their daughter's name that will be beneficial to other young women who might find themselves in a similar kind of situation, and I say 90 days because we are a fickle population and because there will be another crime and there will be another cause du jour.

So you have to almost run after it.

HARRIS: That's interesting that you say that, Marc, because, you know, I was amazed at just how quickly the interest level picked up again on this particular story when this new development came in because we hadn't talked about it for months, and the war has been absorbing people's minds in the last, what, seven, eight months now. KLAAS: Well, exactly. And, in fact, you know, this was the story prior to 9/11, and probably the only individual in America who gained as a result of the 9/11 tragedies was Gary Condit because, all of a sudden, we went from the top of the fold to the classified ads.

HARRIS: Yeah. He...

KLAAS: So, yeah, the people were very interested, and, of course, we're interested.

HARRIS: All right. Let me ask you finally. You say the family does have a lot of anger. They're going to have to direct it someplace, and you do hope that they could do it in this positive way. But is it unreasonable to expect that some of that anger will be directed at Gary Condit or at the police still?

KLAAS: Is it negative to direct that anger at Gary Condit? Does he not deserve a little bit of anger the way he's been behaving over the course of the last year? Very, very bad behavior. Very bad.

The D.C. police -- let's hope the D.C. police have learned from any mistakes that they've made. They've been under the microscope as well. It's very, very difficult for all of the parties involved. There's no question.

HARRIS: Yeah. No question whatsoever. Well, we sure do thank you for coming in and sharing that with us this morning. Marc Klaas, always good to talk with you, and glad to see you look well and, hopefully, are doing well.

KLAAS: Thank you, Leon.

HARRIS: Take care.

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