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CNN Live Today
Mitchell Crooks' Lawyers Discuss His Case
Aired July 12, 2002 - 09:02 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.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: "Up Front" this morning, the surprising turn of events in the case of Mitchell Crooks. The man who shot the videotape of a teenage suspect being roughed up by an Inglewood police officer was arrested outside the CNN building in Los Angeles yesterday. As he was led away, you could hear his pleas for help.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MITCHELL CROOKS: Hey help! Help! Help! Help!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ZAHN: Crooks was later taken to a hospital after complaining of being injured while in police custody. He is now out of a hospital.
Dean Masserman and Ralph Harrison II are attorneys for Mitchell Crooks.
Welcome, gentlemen, glad to have you with us this morning.
DEAN MASSERMAN, MITCHELL CROOKS ATTORNEY: Thank you.
RALPH B. HARRISON II, MITCHELL CROOKS ATTORNEY: Thank you.
ZAHN: So, Dean, there has been a little bit of a confusion about where your client has been this morning. Where is he right now? Is he -- has he been moved from the hospital back to a jail cell?
MASSERMAN: Our client was in L.A. County USC Medical Center. He has been moved over to the men's central jail, is the latest information that we have, approximately 2:00 or 3:00 this morning. And after being booked, hopefully they will finally let us see him, because up to this point in time, they've refused to let us speak to him for anything whatsoever.
ZAHN: Has anybody related to your team seen him since he was taken outside that CNN studio building?
MASSERMAN: Mr. Harrison and I were allowed to briefly see him as he was being transferred from the lockup facility at the medical center to be taken downstairs to have X-rays taken. Our view was blocked by a number of deputies intentionally putting up a human wall to prevent us from seeing him. However, we were able to catch a glimpse. ZAHN: And what did you see when you caught a glimpse of him? Did he appear to be a man who had been injured while under D.A. supervision?
HARRISON: Well we know one thing, we know that when they picked him up he was awful lively and in good condition. When we seen him, he was rather despondent. He seemed as though he had been tranquilized or something. He had a white sheet covering his body. We could see his face and his arms. There didn't appear to be any bruises on his face or his arms. We couldn't see what was underneath the sheet, so we have no idea of what condition he's in except he seemed like he was tranquilized.
ZAHN: Do you have any idea why he was taken to the hospital in the first place after that very brief encounter that you had after he was locked up?
HARRISON: Well I don't know how brief the encounter was. What happened is he was taken from CNN and then he spent some time over at the grand jury where he authenticated a tape, is our understanding. And then there was some time between him leaving the grand jury and ending up at the hospital. We were not able to see him for several hours after we got to the hospital because the police authorities and someone from the D.A,'s office came out and spoke with us and told us that we could not see him. So...
ZAHN: But...
HARRISON: ... not exactly sure what's...
ZAHN: But that was the point at which you were allowed to, like you said, see him with a bunch of people standing around him?
HARRISON: We were able to observe him, but we were not able to speak with him.
ZAHN: Dean, what's your fear about your client right now? He made it abundantly clear when he was talking on a radio show about how scared he was to be out in public, he thought people might hurt him. And why don't we just quickly review that exchange that he had with a deputy D.A. who happened to call in to that local program.
Let's listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CURT LIVESAY, DEPUTY D.A.: Mitchell. Mitchell, this is Livesay, D.A.'s office. We want you before the grand jury. We don't want you in a cell somewhere. We want you before the grand jury, and we want that original tape.
CROOKS: OK. Wonderful. I mean that's -- I already talked to you about that. I don't know why we have to go on air to talk about this sort of thing. I totally told you that and I told everybody that I've talked to that I'm willing to cooperate with everybody. This is not -- you know I want the best possible outcome, except for Jeremy Morse, I don't want...
LIVESAY: OK, Mitchell, off the air, I want you to tell my investigators, who are standing by at this station, where you are right now. If you want to cooperate, off the air, you tell one of my -- D.A. investigators the address where you are right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ZAHN: All right, at that point your client, Dean, hung up. What happened between the time that your client said he wanted to cooperate with the D.A.'s office and then refused to tell him -- tell them where he was?
MASSERMAN: Well there's two very important points that are illuminated in that conversation. No. 1 is he clearly states he wants to fully cooperate with the district attorney's office, testify in front of the grand jury and authenticate that tape. No 2, he's indicated that they can just -- that he has a legitimate concern for his safety, and that's why he hung up the phone. The only reason that he ever said he would not go down there and the reason that he was scared and concerned is because he had a legitimate concern for his safety, he had a legitimate concern about death threats that he says he had received.
And the answer to your question is nothing had changed from the time that he hung up that phone call until this morning. There's no reason that the D.A. had whatsoever to believe that he wasn't going to cooperate. Their tactics of moving in and bringing in three trucks and plain-clothes officers to take him off the street screaming was completely uncalled for.
ZAHN: What is not clear and seems to be lost in some murky reporting right now is whether he was officially ever served a subpoena, was he?
MASSERMAN: No, I think that's also very clear from the conversation. He was not ever served with a subpoena. And Mr. Livesay from the district attorney's office would not call that radio show and say will you cooperate, please tell us where you are because we need you to come down. If -- that was at approximately 4:00 p.m. the previous day. They can't come out later and say he was compelled to be here at 8:30 this morning and didn't show up. They never had him under subpoena.
When they arrived at CNN's building yesterday, it was with the initial intent to serve the original subpoena on him. But then they decided to just pick him up when they subsequently discovered that he had a misdemeanor warrant out of Placer County.
ZAHN: Yes, and these were charged, obviously, completely unrelated to this case. This involved, what, petty theft, potential hit-and-run. What was the third prong of that?
MASSERMAN: I believe it was a DUI, a petty theft with a prior and a hit-and-run related to the DUI. And there's no -- you're right, they're completely unrelated. And it seems to be nothing more than an effort by the district attorney's office to somehow taint Mr. Crooks, which makes no sense, because supposedly the Office of Integrity, with the district attorney's office, was created by Steve Cooley to expedite the investigation of misconduct by police officers.
I don't under why the district attorney's office would then turn on their best witness and the person who videotaped this crime committed by Officer Morse instead of focusing their attention on Officer Morse. It's horrible that Mr. Crooks is in custody and Mr. Morse is not.
ZAHN: Ralph, I need a quick yes or no, will you advise your client, once he's out of the lockup, to appear before a grand jury?
HARRISON: Well he's already appeared before the grand jury, and the only thing that he had to do before the grand jury was to authenticate the tape. That's been done, as far as we know now, so there's no reason for him to go back before the grand jury. But if there is some reason for him to go back before the grand jury, we have absolutely no problem with him appearing before the grand jury.
ZAHN: All right, Ralph Harrison, Dean Masserman, thank you both for your time and clearing up some of the confusion because there have been a lot of changes in this story overnight. Appreciate your time.
MASSERMAN: Thank you.
HARRISON: Thank you.
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