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CNN Live Today
California Girls Arrested for False Accusations of Assault
Aired February 12, 2004 - 11:18 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.
DARYN KAGAN, ANCHOR: It started out as a lie concocted by three schoolgirls. It ended with an innocent man in jail for months. And now the girls are in legal hot water of their own.
Our national correspondent Frank Buckley reports from Garden Grove, California.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FRANK BUCKLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The three 11- year-old girls said they were walking through this park when they were attacked by a man. This man, two of the girls said, when they were shown a photo lineup.
In box number five, Eric Nordmark, a transient who had been arrested a day earlier on charges of public intoxication. But attacking girls at this park? Nordmark denied it.
ERIC NORDMARK, FALSELY ACCUSED OF ASSAULT: I was nowhere near there.
BUCKLEY: But he was arrested and charged, and he sat in jail for eight months until trial, when one of the girls revealed they made it all up. They agreed to pick the suspect in box number five.
LT. MIKE HANDFIELD, GARDEN GROVE POLICE DEPARTMENT: They weren't -- you know, going to be late home from school, and wanted to make some kind of excuse so they wouldn't get into trouble.
BUCKLEY: That's when police began investigating the girls, who are now 12 years old and students at this school and this one. And that's where police arrested them, at school.
SHIRLEY MACDONALD JUAREZ, GIRLS' ATTORNEY: To make an impression and to send the message that, you know, we're not going to treat this lightly.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is, to me, akin to a preteen perp walk.
BUCKLEY: Police say it was the safest way to arrest girls whose actions had led to the incarceration of an innocent man.
HANDFIELD: These little girls lied. They were sophisticated in how they lied. They showed no remorse about lying, that he was in custody. And they need to be dealt with.
BUCKLEY: Now the girls face trial on charges that could keep them in custody.
(on camera) Eric Nordmark, meanwhile, has moved on. The self- described nomad is in Seattle now.
But he has an attorney here in California, and the two of them are seeking money from the city of Garden Grove: compensation, they say, for eight months behind bars for a crime that never happened.
Frank Buckley, CNN, Garden Grove, California.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Assault>
Aired February 12, 2004 - 11:18 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, ANCHOR: It started out as a lie concocted by three schoolgirls. It ended with an innocent man in jail for months. And now the girls are in legal hot water of their own.
Our national correspondent Frank Buckley reports from Garden Grove, California.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FRANK BUCKLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The three 11- year-old girls said they were walking through this park when they were attacked by a man. This man, two of the girls said, when they were shown a photo lineup.
In box number five, Eric Nordmark, a transient who had been arrested a day earlier on charges of public intoxication. But attacking girls at this park? Nordmark denied it.
ERIC NORDMARK, FALSELY ACCUSED OF ASSAULT: I was nowhere near there.
BUCKLEY: But he was arrested and charged, and he sat in jail for eight months until trial, when one of the girls revealed they made it all up. They agreed to pick the suspect in box number five.
LT. MIKE HANDFIELD, GARDEN GROVE POLICE DEPARTMENT: They weren't -- you know, going to be late home from school, and wanted to make some kind of excuse so they wouldn't get into trouble.
BUCKLEY: That's when police began investigating the girls, who are now 12 years old and students at this school and this one. And that's where police arrested them, at school.
SHIRLEY MACDONALD JUAREZ, GIRLS' ATTORNEY: To make an impression and to send the message that, you know, we're not going to treat this lightly.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is, to me, akin to a preteen perp walk.
BUCKLEY: Police say it was the safest way to arrest girls whose actions had led to the incarceration of an innocent man.
HANDFIELD: These little girls lied. They were sophisticated in how they lied. They showed no remorse about lying, that he was in custody. And they need to be dealt with.
BUCKLEY: Now the girls face trial on charges that could keep them in custody.
(on camera) Eric Nordmark, meanwhile, has moved on. The self- described nomad is in Seattle now.
But he has an attorney here in California, and the two of them are seeking money from the city of Garden Grove: compensation, they say, for eight months behind bars for a crime that never happened.
Frank Buckley, CNN, Garden Grove, California.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Assault>
