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CNN Live Today

Presidential Privacy Versus Public Scrutiny

Aired April 27, 2004 - 11:00   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, CNN ANCHOR: It is 11:00 a.m. on the East Coast and 8:00 a.m. on the West Coast. From CNN Center in Atlanta, good morning once again. I'm Daryn Kagan.
Up first this hour on CNN, presidential privacy versus public scrutiny. That is at the center of a case before the U.S. Supreme Court this morning. The case involves the records from Vice President Dick Cheney's Task Force on National Energy Policy.

Critics say the panel wasn't properly influenced by energy companies. The lawsuit seeks records from the closed door meetings from the task force. The administration says that would undermine the President's ability to receive advice from his aides.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DICK CHENEY, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We start down that road; we're setting a terrible precedent. We're saying the vice president cannot have confidential meetings.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: Let's get some insight on this legal and constitutional issue. Mary Chay is a professor of constitutional law at George Washington University Law School. She is in our D.C. Bureau this morning. Professor, good morning.

MARY CHAY, LAW PROFESSOR: Good morning.

KAGAN: Looks like the main issue we're looking at is the limits of executive power.

CHAY: Well, you know this case exhibits two features that critics of the Bush White House say characterize their operations. One is secrecy, but the other is not willing to answer to anybody but themselves.

The White House has fought this case for years, trying to prevent information from being disclosed, saying that the courts shouldn't even hear it. But on the secrecy end of it, what the White House did was it set up a task force to study what should be energy policy and apparently invited outside persons into that task force. People from the energy industry, including for example Ken Lay of Enron.

KAGAN: Which could be embarrassing for more of that to come out politically. CHAY: That's right. And even though it's true, and the White House is correct, they should have the ability to have confidential with their own aides and this sort of thing, once they invite outsiders in there's a statute that says you have to tell people who these folks are, what their role was, and what they contributed.

And that's what's at stake here, not general secrecy, but whether these participants from outside have to disclose their involvement.

KAGAN: You've mentioned this has been working its way through the appeals court. The White House has lost the last two rounds of appeals.

CHAY: That's right; they have lost the last two rounds. And it remains to be seen what will happen here, even if the Supreme Court says, okay go forward, it still is unclear exactly what information will have to be disclosed.

So there will be more to this, even if the Supreme Court says go ahead and release some information. We have to determine what information.

KAGAN: Well, interesting this being before the Supreme Court, an institution that values privacy itself. Later this hour, we expect to hear some audiotapes coming out of these arguments.

It seems since 2000, we're seeing more and more of this come out of the Supreme Court. Do you think one day we'll see cameras in the Supreme Court?

CHAY: The justices are opposed to that and there's no higher authorities then themselves so I doubt we'll see cameras very soon.

KAGAN: Professor Chay, thank you so much for your insight today. And as we mentioned we should have those audio recordings coming to us later this hour. You'll hear them right here on CNN.

The battle for Najaf, more time for Fallujah. Let's get latest on these two Iraqi hot spots. Our Ben Wedeman is live in Baghdad -- Ben.

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Daryn, serious clash took place north of Najaf, between U.S. forces and members of the so-called Mehdi army, last evening. That Mehdi army being the militia of the renegade Shi'ite cleric Muqtada Sadr, who the United States say they want to kill or capture.

In those clashes, more than 60 Iraqi insurgents were killed by U.S. forces. Those U.S forces deploying helicopter gun ships, as well as an AC-130 gunship, which reportedly took out an anti-aircraft weapon in the area.

There are about 2,500 U.S. troops deployed around Najaf. They've not gone into the city. And we are told by senior military officers here in Baghdad that they do not plan to do so. But obviously what they would like to do is calm the situation down somewhat. The city has been basically under the control of the Mehdi army of Muqtada Sadr.

But now the U.S. is backing away a little bit, saying what it wants to do is restore order. They would like to get their hands on Muqtada Sadr who they believe an Iraqi judge, in fact, believes may have been involved in the killing of another senior Shi'ite cleric in April of 2003.

So they do seem to be taking a very careful approach toward this very sensitive city, the most holy Shi'ite city in Iraq, and, in fact, throughout the Shi'ite world.

Meanwhile, the situation in Fallujah, that troublesome Sunni town to the west of Baghdad, seems to have calmed down somewhat. No major clashes occurring there today. That, after yesterday's very violent clash in which one U.S. Marine was killed and at least eight Iraqi insurgents lost their lives as well.

Today, it was expected the coalition hoped, that some of the insurgents would begin to turn in their weapons, that there would be joint Iraqi police U.S. Marine patrols in the streets of Fallujah. That didn't happen. U.S. commanders saying that they'll basically take it day by day.

They may begin those patrols as early as Thursday. But it's not clear whether that's going to happen even then. But also in Fallujah, the United States forces are taking a somewhat more cautious approach, allowing, they believe the diplomatic process, negotiations to go ahead, in the hopes of avoiding the kind of massive blood shed that took place in Fallujah earlier this month -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Ben Wedeman in Baghdad. Let' get the military angle of things. More on that and the military trying to avoid all-out urban combat in Fallujah. Our Barbara Starr is at the Pentagon this morning with more on those plans. Barbara, good morning.

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Daryn. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, General Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, are expected to be in this briefing room in just over two hours, answering some of those key questions about what is going on in Najaf and Fallujah.

Just a few days ago of course all the talk about Fallujah was about deadlines, deadlines for the insurgents to turn in their heavy weapons, deadlines for those joint U.S Iraqi patrols to begin.

But now from Baghdad today, no talk of deadlines, as Ben Wedeman says, the coalition giving every indication that it's going to let things sit for just a while and see if they cool off. But on the question of joint U.S. Marine Iraqi security patrols, once again, the coalition says the Iraqi security forces are not ready.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRIG. GEN. MARK KIMMITT, U.S. ARMY: We would have liked to have seen those joint patrols happen today as well. But as you can imagine, the commanders on the ground took an assessment of the training status of the Iraqi police service, as well as the Iraqi civil defense corps personnel, looked at how they were operating, along with the coalition forces, made the judgment that those forces weren't ready to enter, to operate together.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STARR: Now, all of this, presenting a dilemma for officials here at the Pentagon and the Bush administration. How long do they let the situation sit? They do not want to let the insurgents in Fallujah gain further strength, but the question of going into that city going in to Najaf, having a street battle, having that all-out urban warfare, is not something that the Bush administration appears to want to rush into.

They know that if it comes to that type of heavy fighting there will be heavy damage. There will be civilian Iraqi casualties. In both of those cities. A lot of concern about how that would play across Iraq and, indeed, across the Arab world -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Barbara Starr at the Pentagon. Barbara, thank you. Live CNN coverage this afternoon when Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Joint Chief Chairman Richard Myers update reporters on the fight for Iraq, their news briefing is scheduled to begin at 1:15 Eastern.

We're waiting to hear the latest from the Supreme Court as it ponders a dilemma at the center of it, Vice President Dick Cheney. We'll take you live to Washington, D.C. Just ahead.

We're also live in Eagle, Colorado where another legal debate is going on, and this one over the sexual history of Kobe Bryant's accuser.

And will we soon see a verdict in the Jayson Williams trial? CNN LIVE TODAY is coming right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: More now on the arguments in front of the U.S. Supreme Court involving Vice President Cheney and the fight by some to get more information on his National Energy Commission. With more on that, Bob Franken on the inside with some arguments. Good morning.

BOB FRANKEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Daryn. And of course, this has to be put in the context. It's an election year. And these challenges have political implications.

From a legal point of view, what was before the justices was a fundamental, Constitutional separation of powers question, which is, does the administration even have to claim the executive privilege of not having to say everything that went on in its deliberations?

Does it even have to make that claim before it gets to the court? Or, as the Solicitor General Ted Olson said, does the very fact there will be a court hearing, quote, "invasive to the President's prerogatives and responsibilities?" Now, there's been a subtext in this case, and that was the fact that Justice Antonin Scalia had refused to remove himself, legal term, recuse himself, after he had gone duck-hunting with Vice President Cheney.

Saying he had no need to do that, so people were watching to see how active he would be. As usual, he questioned sharply both sides, asking the solicitor general, for instance, representing the Vice President, why would this be intrusive?

To which Solicitor General Olson said, because it would require each and every time this came up for the President and Vice President to determine executive privilege claims and to spend hour upon hour going through, quote, "every scrap of paper."

On the other side, the Sierra Club and an organization called Judicial Watch, arguing for the Sierra Club, which is an environmental organization. The paraphrase would be, as Alan Morrison the attorney just said outside, "Mr. Vice President, what are you trying to hide?"

His argument was that the public has a right to input from such people as the chief executive officers of energy companies. The plot seems to be a suggestion that there was a conflict of interest. Morrison made it a point to suggest and point out that among the people that Vice President talked to was Ken Lay, who has of course been removed now as the chief executive of Enron.

Again, his claim, Mr. Vice President, what do you have to hide? The Vice President's claim, that under the Constitution, he really doesn't have to show this -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Bob we're going to be able to hear all of this for ourselves in just a few minutes. Isn't that right?

FRANKEN: Yes, we are as a matter of fact they'll release audiotapes once again. In recent days, on very very important Constitutional cases, the justices have been putting out audiotapes right after the arguments. We should be hearing those within the hour.

KAGAN: And when we do we'll be going back to you live in Washington, D.C. Bob Franken, thank you for that, for now.

KAGAN: more closed door testimony today about Kobe Bryant's accuser. Will jurors hear details about the woman's sex life once the trial begins? Our Adrian Baschuk joins us from Eagle, Colorado with more on the hearings. Adrian, good morning.

ADRIAN BASCHUK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Daryn. In punctual fashion, not in Michael Jackson fashion, Kobe Bryant arrived about 15 minutes early to his court appearance.

Since then proceedings have been going on for about an hour behind closed doors. And what we've seen is presumably friends and or acquaintances of the accuser coming in and out of the courtroom after testifying. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BASCHUK (voice-over): This week's hearings remain closed to the public and the media. Cameras can only capture Kobe Bryant entering and exiting the courtroom.

CRAIG SILVERMAN, FORMER DENVER DEPUTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY: We don't know what's going on behind closed doors. It could be real exciting inside the courtroom.

BASCHUK: The defense, barred from accessing the accuser's medical records during trial, is relying on testimony from multiple friends, family and even sexual partners of the accuser, to convince the judge to make exceptions to Colorado's rape shield law.

SILVERMAN: Who knows a person better than her own friends? Perhaps they know things or have heard things that are damaging to this young woman. Even if you are a friend, it's quite another thing to go along and see an innocent man convicted of rape.

BASCHUK: The defense claims the alleged victim had sex with multiple partners in the days before and one day after allegedly being raped by Bryant. Victim advocacy groups in Colorado argue it's irrelevant.

KATHIE KRAMER, RAPE ASSISTANCE AND AWARENESS PROGRAM: Law makers understand that just because a person has consented to sex in the past does not mean that they consent on every occasion.

BASCHUK: Consent is also key to Kobe Bryant. His attorneys will argue today that he was not legally in police custody when detectives questioned him and that his statements they secretly recorded must be thrown out.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BASCHUK: These are key issues that the judge must consider carefully. But the public is also very interested in. However, don't expect a ruling on these pivotal hearings anytime soon. The judge is taking one to two weeks to issue his orders -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Adrian Baschuk in Eagle Colorado.

Pop star Michael Jackson says he alone made the decision to drop his lead attorneys . On Sunday, he fired renowned defense lawyers Benjamin Brafman and mark Geragos.

Yesterday, Jackson released a statement declaring his life is at stake and that he deserves his defense team's full attention . Jackson family spokesman Firpo Carr tried to explain the star's actions.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FIRPO CARR, JACKSON FAMILY SPOKESMAN: The Jackson family as a whole particularly Jermaine, was kind of surprised by this to a certain extent . But then on the other hand although it seems contradictory, was not surprised.

I suppose I can put it in more clear terms. And that is to say, they were surprised that Brafman, probably was relieved of duty, for lack of a better expression, but not so surprised that Mark Geragos was.

Now, I happen to know Mark. We've spoken several times. And I'm not saying we're close friends, but I've spoken over the months on several occasions with him. He's a good guy. He's a nice guy. But apparently, this separation has taken place because the -- because of the -- I should say what is it -- the schedule or the case load of both Mark Geragos, as well as Benjamin Brafman.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: Jackson replaced Brafman and Geragos with high-profile defense attorney Thomas Mesereau. On Friday Jackson faces his second arraignment in his child sex abuse case.

While it still might feel like winter in some parts of the country, it is still summer and then some in southern California. The heat is on. More with Rob Marciano when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: Get ready to head for the beach. California is sizzling. It's a spring heat wave. It's pushing temperatures around 100 degrees along the West Coast and inland valleys. Ninety-nine in downtown L.A., 98 in Sacramento. Even 91 in usually cool San Francisco.

Officials are keeping a close eye on dry brush, due to the increased risk of fire, which is always the other side of the story of the heat when you talk about southern California. Great beach time, but wildfires are a big problem.

(WEATHER REPORT)

KAGAN: Coming up next, we're going to have more from the Supreme Court where Vice President Dick Cheney is taking center stage.

Plus the great debate over John Kerry's Vietnam medals. A complete political wrap up is up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com


Aired April 27, 2004 - 11:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: It is 11:00 a.m. on the East Coast and 8:00 a.m. on the West Coast. From CNN Center in Atlanta, good morning once again. I'm Daryn Kagan.
Up first this hour on CNN, presidential privacy versus public scrutiny. That is at the center of a case before the U.S. Supreme Court this morning. The case involves the records from Vice President Dick Cheney's Task Force on National Energy Policy.

Critics say the panel wasn't properly influenced by energy companies. The lawsuit seeks records from the closed door meetings from the task force. The administration says that would undermine the President's ability to receive advice from his aides.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DICK CHENEY, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We start down that road; we're setting a terrible precedent. We're saying the vice president cannot have confidential meetings.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: Let's get some insight on this legal and constitutional issue. Mary Chay is a professor of constitutional law at George Washington University Law School. She is in our D.C. Bureau this morning. Professor, good morning.

MARY CHAY, LAW PROFESSOR: Good morning.

KAGAN: Looks like the main issue we're looking at is the limits of executive power.

CHAY: Well, you know this case exhibits two features that critics of the Bush White House say characterize their operations. One is secrecy, but the other is not willing to answer to anybody but themselves.

The White House has fought this case for years, trying to prevent information from being disclosed, saying that the courts shouldn't even hear it. But on the secrecy end of it, what the White House did was it set up a task force to study what should be energy policy and apparently invited outside persons into that task force. People from the energy industry, including for example Ken Lay of Enron.

KAGAN: Which could be embarrassing for more of that to come out politically. CHAY: That's right. And even though it's true, and the White House is correct, they should have the ability to have confidential with their own aides and this sort of thing, once they invite outsiders in there's a statute that says you have to tell people who these folks are, what their role was, and what they contributed.

And that's what's at stake here, not general secrecy, but whether these participants from outside have to disclose their involvement.

KAGAN: You've mentioned this has been working its way through the appeals court. The White House has lost the last two rounds of appeals.

CHAY: That's right; they have lost the last two rounds. And it remains to be seen what will happen here, even if the Supreme Court says, okay go forward, it still is unclear exactly what information will have to be disclosed.

So there will be more to this, even if the Supreme Court says go ahead and release some information. We have to determine what information.

KAGAN: Well, interesting this being before the Supreme Court, an institution that values privacy itself. Later this hour, we expect to hear some audiotapes coming out of these arguments.

It seems since 2000, we're seeing more and more of this come out of the Supreme Court. Do you think one day we'll see cameras in the Supreme Court?

CHAY: The justices are opposed to that and there's no higher authorities then themselves so I doubt we'll see cameras very soon.

KAGAN: Professor Chay, thank you so much for your insight today. And as we mentioned we should have those audio recordings coming to us later this hour. You'll hear them right here on CNN.

The battle for Najaf, more time for Fallujah. Let's get latest on these two Iraqi hot spots. Our Ben Wedeman is live in Baghdad -- Ben.

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Daryn, serious clash took place north of Najaf, between U.S. forces and members of the so-called Mehdi army, last evening. That Mehdi army being the militia of the renegade Shi'ite cleric Muqtada Sadr, who the United States say they want to kill or capture.

In those clashes, more than 60 Iraqi insurgents were killed by U.S. forces. Those U.S forces deploying helicopter gun ships, as well as an AC-130 gunship, which reportedly took out an anti-aircraft weapon in the area.

There are about 2,500 U.S. troops deployed around Najaf. They've not gone into the city. And we are told by senior military officers here in Baghdad that they do not plan to do so. But obviously what they would like to do is calm the situation down somewhat. The city has been basically under the control of the Mehdi army of Muqtada Sadr.

But now the U.S. is backing away a little bit, saying what it wants to do is restore order. They would like to get their hands on Muqtada Sadr who they believe an Iraqi judge, in fact, believes may have been involved in the killing of another senior Shi'ite cleric in April of 2003.

So they do seem to be taking a very careful approach toward this very sensitive city, the most holy Shi'ite city in Iraq, and, in fact, throughout the Shi'ite world.

Meanwhile, the situation in Fallujah, that troublesome Sunni town to the west of Baghdad, seems to have calmed down somewhat. No major clashes occurring there today. That, after yesterday's very violent clash in which one U.S. Marine was killed and at least eight Iraqi insurgents lost their lives as well.

Today, it was expected the coalition hoped, that some of the insurgents would begin to turn in their weapons, that there would be joint Iraqi police U.S. Marine patrols in the streets of Fallujah. That didn't happen. U.S. commanders saying that they'll basically take it day by day.

They may begin those patrols as early as Thursday. But it's not clear whether that's going to happen even then. But also in Fallujah, the United States forces are taking a somewhat more cautious approach, allowing, they believe the diplomatic process, negotiations to go ahead, in the hopes of avoiding the kind of massive blood shed that took place in Fallujah earlier this month -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Ben Wedeman in Baghdad. Let' get the military angle of things. More on that and the military trying to avoid all-out urban combat in Fallujah. Our Barbara Starr is at the Pentagon this morning with more on those plans. Barbara, good morning.

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Daryn. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, General Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, are expected to be in this briefing room in just over two hours, answering some of those key questions about what is going on in Najaf and Fallujah.

Just a few days ago of course all the talk about Fallujah was about deadlines, deadlines for the insurgents to turn in their heavy weapons, deadlines for those joint U.S Iraqi patrols to begin.

But now from Baghdad today, no talk of deadlines, as Ben Wedeman says, the coalition giving every indication that it's going to let things sit for just a while and see if they cool off. But on the question of joint U.S. Marine Iraqi security patrols, once again, the coalition says the Iraqi security forces are not ready.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRIG. GEN. MARK KIMMITT, U.S. ARMY: We would have liked to have seen those joint patrols happen today as well. But as you can imagine, the commanders on the ground took an assessment of the training status of the Iraqi police service, as well as the Iraqi civil defense corps personnel, looked at how they were operating, along with the coalition forces, made the judgment that those forces weren't ready to enter, to operate together.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STARR: Now, all of this, presenting a dilemma for officials here at the Pentagon and the Bush administration. How long do they let the situation sit? They do not want to let the insurgents in Fallujah gain further strength, but the question of going into that city going in to Najaf, having a street battle, having that all-out urban warfare, is not something that the Bush administration appears to want to rush into.

They know that if it comes to that type of heavy fighting there will be heavy damage. There will be civilian Iraqi casualties. In both of those cities. A lot of concern about how that would play across Iraq and, indeed, across the Arab world -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Barbara Starr at the Pentagon. Barbara, thank you. Live CNN coverage this afternoon when Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Joint Chief Chairman Richard Myers update reporters on the fight for Iraq, their news briefing is scheduled to begin at 1:15 Eastern.

We're waiting to hear the latest from the Supreme Court as it ponders a dilemma at the center of it, Vice President Dick Cheney. We'll take you live to Washington, D.C. Just ahead.

We're also live in Eagle, Colorado where another legal debate is going on, and this one over the sexual history of Kobe Bryant's accuser.

And will we soon see a verdict in the Jayson Williams trial? CNN LIVE TODAY is coming right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: More now on the arguments in front of the U.S. Supreme Court involving Vice President Cheney and the fight by some to get more information on his National Energy Commission. With more on that, Bob Franken on the inside with some arguments. Good morning.

BOB FRANKEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Daryn. And of course, this has to be put in the context. It's an election year. And these challenges have political implications.

From a legal point of view, what was before the justices was a fundamental, Constitutional separation of powers question, which is, does the administration even have to claim the executive privilege of not having to say everything that went on in its deliberations?

Does it even have to make that claim before it gets to the court? Or, as the Solicitor General Ted Olson said, does the very fact there will be a court hearing, quote, "invasive to the President's prerogatives and responsibilities?" Now, there's been a subtext in this case, and that was the fact that Justice Antonin Scalia had refused to remove himself, legal term, recuse himself, after he had gone duck-hunting with Vice President Cheney.

Saying he had no need to do that, so people were watching to see how active he would be. As usual, he questioned sharply both sides, asking the solicitor general, for instance, representing the Vice President, why would this be intrusive?

To which Solicitor General Olson said, because it would require each and every time this came up for the President and Vice President to determine executive privilege claims and to spend hour upon hour going through, quote, "every scrap of paper."

On the other side, the Sierra Club and an organization called Judicial Watch, arguing for the Sierra Club, which is an environmental organization. The paraphrase would be, as Alan Morrison the attorney just said outside, "Mr. Vice President, what are you trying to hide?"

His argument was that the public has a right to input from such people as the chief executive officers of energy companies. The plot seems to be a suggestion that there was a conflict of interest. Morrison made it a point to suggest and point out that among the people that Vice President talked to was Ken Lay, who has of course been removed now as the chief executive of Enron.

Again, his claim, Mr. Vice President, what do you have to hide? The Vice President's claim, that under the Constitution, he really doesn't have to show this -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Bob we're going to be able to hear all of this for ourselves in just a few minutes. Isn't that right?

FRANKEN: Yes, we are as a matter of fact they'll release audiotapes once again. In recent days, on very very important Constitutional cases, the justices have been putting out audiotapes right after the arguments. We should be hearing those within the hour.

KAGAN: And when we do we'll be going back to you live in Washington, D.C. Bob Franken, thank you for that, for now.

KAGAN: more closed door testimony today about Kobe Bryant's accuser. Will jurors hear details about the woman's sex life once the trial begins? Our Adrian Baschuk joins us from Eagle, Colorado with more on the hearings. Adrian, good morning.

ADRIAN BASCHUK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Daryn. In punctual fashion, not in Michael Jackson fashion, Kobe Bryant arrived about 15 minutes early to his court appearance.

Since then proceedings have been going on for about an hour behind closed doors. And what we've seen is presumably friends and or acquaintances of the accuser coming in and out of the courtroom after testifying. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BASCHUK (voice-over): This week's hearings remain closed to the public and the media. Cameras can only capture Kobe Bryant entering and exiting the courtroom.

CRAIG SILVERMAN, FORMER DENVER DEPUTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY: We don't know what's going on behind closed doors. It could be real exciting inside the courtroom.

BASCHUK: The defense, barred from accessing the accuser's medical records during trial, is relying on testimony from multiple friends, family and even sexual partners of the accuser, to convince the judge to make exceptions to Colorado's rape shield law.

SILVERMAN: Who knows a person better than her own friends? Perhaps they know things or have heard things that are damaging to this young woman. Even if you are a friend, it's quite another thing to go along and see an innocent man convicted of rape.

BASCHUK: The defense claims the alleged victim had sex with multiple partners in the days before and one day after allegedly being raped by Bryant. Victim advocacy groups in Colorado argue it's irrelevant.

KATHIE KRAMER, RAPE ASSISTANCE AND AWARENESS PROGRAM: Law makers understand that just because a person has consented to sex in the past does not mean that they consent on every occasion.

BASCHUK: Consent is also key to Kobe Bryant. His attorneys will argue today that he was not legally in police custody when detectives questioned him and that his statements they secretly recorded must be thrown out.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BASCHUK: These are key issues that the judge must consider carefully. But the public is also very interested in. However, don't expect a ruling on these pivotal hearings anytime soon. The judge is taking one to two weeks to issue his orders -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Adrian Baschuk in Eagle Colorado.

Pop star Michael Jackson says he alone made the decision to drop his lead attorneys . On Sunday, he fired renowned defense lawyers Benjamin Brafman and mark Geragos.

Yesterday, Jackson released a statement declaring his life is at stake and that he deserves his defense team's full attention . Jackson family spokesman Firpo Carr tried to explain the star's actions.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FIRPO CARR, JACKSON FAMILY SPOKESMAN: The Jackson family as a whole particularly Jermaine, was kind of surprised by this to a certain extent . But then on the other hand although it seems contradictory, was not surprised.

I suppose I can put it in more clear terms. And that is to say, they were surprised that Brafman, probably was relieved of duty, for lack of a better expression, but not so surprised that Mark Geragos was.

Now, I happen to know Mark. We've spoken several times. And I'm not saying we're close friends, but I've spoken over the months on several occasions with him. He's a good guy. He's a nice guy. But apparently, this separation has taken place because the -- because of the -- I should say what is it -- the schedule or the case load of both Mark Geragos, as well as Benjamin Brafman.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: Jackson replaced Brafman and Geragos with high-profile defense attorney Thomas Mesereau. On Friday Jackson faces his second arraignment in his child sex abuse case.

While it still might feel like winter in some parts of the country, it is still summer and then some in southern California. The heat is on. More with Rob Marciano when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAGAN: Get ready to head for the beach. California is sizzling. It's a spring heat wave. It's pushing temperatures around 100 degrees along the West Coast and inland valleys. Ninety-nine in downtown L.A., 98 in Sacramento. Even 91 in usually cool San Francisco.

Officials are keeping a close eye on dry brush, due to the increased risk of fire, which is always the other side of the story of the heat when you talk about southern California. Great beach time, but wildfires are a big problem.

(WEATHER REPORT)

KAGAN: Coming up next, we're going to have more from the Supreme Court where Vice President Dick Cheney is taking center stage.

Plus the great debate over John Kerry's Vietnam medals. A complete political wrap up is up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com