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American Morning

Police Fight Spoofers; Documenting Hussein's Atrocities

Aired April 12, 2005 - 08:30   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.


SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back, everybody. It's just about half past the hour on this AMERICAN MORNING. Coming up, police surround a New Jersey building for hours in a standoff over absolutely nothing. One example of the new kind of crime, pranksters using the Internet to cover up elaborate hoaxes. We're going to talk about what the police are trying to do to catch these spoofers ahead this morning.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Also, a new approach to treating migraines that makes people look younger along the way. Sanjay explains this potential link between plastic surgery and pain relief. Intriguing.

O'BRIEN: You can imagine, people are like, suddenly plastic surgery.

HEMMER: Do it.

O'BRIEN: Let's get right to the headlines with Carol Costello. Good morning.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: I'm sticking around for that story. Thank you.

Serious news to begin with this morning. A car bomb attack in northern Iraq. New video just into us shows debris from the bombing. You see it here. The attack apparently targeting a U.S. convoy. Sources say at least five Iraqis were killed. Four U.S. soldiers were injured in a separate incident in Mosul.

The attack comes as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is making a surprise visit to Iraq. He took part in a re-enlistment ceremony for dozens of American soldiers. He's also meeting with Iraq's newly elected government officials. The defense secretary drew cheers from the troops when he said the U.S. doesn't have an exit strategy for Iraq, it has a victory strategy.

The mother of a boy accusing Michael Jackson of molestation could take the stand today. On Monday, the mother of another accuser testified Jackson sobbed and pleaded with her to let her son share his bed. The family later received a multimillion dollar settlement from Jackson. Prosecutors are trying to show Jackson has a history of inappropriate behavior with boys. Testimony resumes later this morning.

And Martha Stewart's ankle bracelet will stay right where it is, on her ankle. A federal judge has rejected Stewart's bid to end her five months of house arrest early. The judge says the sentence reflects the seriousness of the offense. Stewart, as you know, was convicted of lying to federal agents about a stock sale. She also spent five months in a federal prison and she wanted that ankle bracelet removed because it would interfere with her new television shows, because, you know, she has a reality TV show coming up and a talk show. But the judge said, I don't think so.

O'BRIEN: Those big bracelets just get in the way, you know. Clunking up to the set.

COSTELLO: Well, you can't wear a skirt.

O'BRIEN: Well, you could be in prison. I mean, I don't know. I'm sorry. I guess I should be sympathetic. I'm very sympathetic, Carol.

COSTELLO: I know you are, Soledad. I see it in your face.

O'BRIEN: Well, I mean, we'll move on. Thank you.

It's known as spoofing, or bombing. It's when a prank caller using the Internet is able to disguise his or her phone number and make a fake emergency call to police. It got a woman arrested in Texas after she allegedly faked an emergency call to New Jersey police last month. Dozens of police then surrounded a building in New Brunswick, New Jersey. It was a six-hour standoff. They were thinking that a hostage crisis was going on inside the building. Nothing was happening inside the building.

Just how prevalent is the problem? What are police doing about it? John Timoney is the chief of the Miami Police Department. Nice to see you, sir, thanks for talking with us this morning.

CHIEF JOHN TIMONEY, MIAMI POLICE DEPARTMENT: Good morning, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Have you had similar experiences in Miami?

TIMONEY: Not to date, that we're aware of. We are canvassing our 911 operators and also in two weeks, there's our spring meeting of PERF, the Police Executive Research Forum, where this question will be asked of chiefs across the nation. Because I can see, just from reading the papers over the last couple of weeks, that this is going to be a growing problem for us in policing, starting off in some cases as a joke in chat rooms.

But this can lead to more serious cases like the one in New Brunswick, New Jersey, where police resources are out of commission for almost six hours. It's also going be used not just as a joke, but to play revenge on neighbors or friends or settling old agendas. There are a whole variety of problems that this could create for police departments in the future and in the near future.

O'BRIEN: Do police departments like yours or any across the nation have the technology available to be able to block the spoofing technology? TIMONEY: Unfortunately, no. And the problem is we use the caller I.D., actually, if we need further information on a call to call that person back. Now, obviously, this will be a phony number, a third number that's used. And so there will be no way of verifying one way or the other for additional information or to find out if it's a spoof phone call.

We're going to have to look at this real hard, have our technical people, every police department, and maybe come up with some proposed legislation, for example, that wouldn't permit somebody using this mechanism for dialing 911.

O'BRIEN: There are some people who create this spoofing technology, who actually encourage it. They call it -- it's the ultimate prank. They'll offer money for people who can pull off what they call the ultimate prank. Are there legal remedies? Can you good after the people just for making these phone calls and pretending to be somebody else?

TIMONEY: Well, I think you can, particularly in the area where it's a call to 911. If it's a local prank where kids are playing a prank on a neighbor, that's a whole other matter. In the area where you're using police resources, where you're calling in a phony call to 911, that can become dangerous, not just for the individual whose home the police respond to.

But you know, when a call goes over the radio, man with a gun, a rape in progress, hostage situation, the police officers' adrenaline is also going. They may be going lights and sirens. They could have an accident en route to the locations. So there are all sorts of problems endemic to this so-called joke.

O'BRIEN: I got to imagine it's also going to cost money. I mean, you waste, basically, police resources.

TIMONEY: Absolutely.

O'BRIEN: Not only the people and their time and their energy, but also just cold hard cash in sending off officers to respond to things that are fakes. Do you have any idea, have you run any numbers on what potentially this could cost departments like yours?

TIMONEY: Well, we're going to, as I say. This is something new. It's just come across the landscape in the last few months. My sense is, it's going to grow and I would only get an idea of the magnitude of this problem when we begin to canvass the other police chiefs at two conferences coming up.

One, the PERF conference at the end of April and then the IACP conference, which incidentally, will be held here in Miami in September. We'll get a better idea of the magnitude of this problem and then maybe propose certain pieces of legislation.

O'BRIEN: It will be interesting to see just how many other police chiefs are struggling with the same problem. Miami police chief John Timoney joining us. Always nice to see you, sir. Thanks for your time.

TIMONEY: Thank you, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Bill?

HEMMER: This just in from Germany, too, Soledad. Getting word now through wire services, the A.P. and Reuters, saying a man with a knife apparently took children hostage, forcing them off of a school bus in northwestern Germany, holding them hostage now in a nearby house.

The man forced between four and seven kids, ages 10 and 11, off the bus, 1:00 local time there in Europe. Police surrounded the house on the edge of town, 40 miles northwest of Cologne. That's what we have for now. Again, this story just in to us from Germany. We'll get back to that in a moment.

We want to get back now to Iraq. And there is yet to be a trial date set for Saddam Hussein. And the new president, Jalal Talabani, says that as soon as a new cabinet is formed, trials for war criminals can be talked about. Here in the U.S., meanwhile, an Iraqi exile has been compiling evidence of Saddam's atrocities for more than a decade.

Dan Lothian has that story from Boston.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAN LOTHIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This Iraqi exile Kanan Makiya wants his people and the world to know the depths of Saddam Hussein's atrocities.

KANAN MAKIYA, IRAQ MEMORY FOUNDATION: Some people have witnessed horrors that look like they came out of the deepest, darkest depths of hell.

LOTHIAN: Collecting and documenting those horrors against dissidents and other innocent Iraqi people is now his mission, in black and white and on videotape, like this testimony his team recorded.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): They took me to the torture chambers. They tied both my hands and blindfolded me and they tied my arms behind my back. And I was hung between heaven and earth.

LOTHIAN: And there's the testimony of Najida Al Rama (ph), once Iraq's most prominent actress and hated for her influence.

MAKIYA: She was chased by the secret police until her life became totally unbearable.

LOTHIAN: She said they had sworn to torture, rape and kill me, so I put a razor blade and a Valium 10 in my bag. If they arrested me, I would swallow the pill and slit my wrists rather than let anyone touch me. In the late '70s, she fled Iraq.

Makiya can relate to her fears. The M.I.T.-educated architect- turned-author wrote a book in 1989 exposing Saddam's brutality. After that, he says, it became positively suicidal to stay in Iraq.

(on camera): So he returned to the United States, taught at Harvard. Now, on leave from a post at Brandeis University, Makiya's Iraq Memory Foundation is working tirelessly on what he says is a painful, but necessary, effort.

MAKIYA: The past is something you have to acknowledge, you have to accept in order to move on. We want to move on. We do not want to stay stuck in the past.

LOTHIAN (voice-over): The foundation is in the process of sifting through and digitizing 11 million pages of Baath party documents and other records. Graphic, disturbing and unusually meticulous details, including lists of people ordered for execution. And he's videotaping 50 oral testimonies. Plans are to broadcast them across the Arab world.

Eventually, all the evidence will be placed in a museum to be built on this Baghdad site, alongside artwork created by victims and collaborators with the Saddam regime, an attempt to show how oppression impacted art.

MAKIYA: Saddam Hussein has put seeds of distrust in the psyche of every individual Iraqi. And it will take another generation to get rid of it.

And documenting the past, he hopes, will be part of the cure.

Dan Lothian, CNN, Boston.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HEMMER: Kanan Makiya is also trying to get the U.S. government to restore funding for the memory foundation.

Another check of the weather.

(WEATHER REPORT)

O'BRIEN: Well, aquarium officials in Hawaii are happy as a clam this morning. Seven rare and colorful clams were found on Monday after being stolen from an exhibit in Waikiki. The clams were discovered in a plastic container in the aquarium's theater. The clams, members of a threatened species, had been missing for nine days. A few lost some of their color because of exposure to improper conditions.

Why would anybody steal a clam? Why would anybody return the clam once they stole the clam?

HEMMER: They are good looking clams, though, aren't they?

O'BRIEN: Yes, and rare. And yet, what do you do when a clam when you steal it? Weird.

HEMMER: In a moment on AMERICAN MORNING, paging the good doctor. For millions of Americans, migraines are nothing short of debilitating.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was having an aneurysm or something, and the pain would just make me cry.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HEMMER: Now a new treatment may promise relief, but there's controversy, too. We'll page the good doctor after this, on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HEMMER: We are paging Dr. Sanjay Gupta now about this controversial remedy for migraines. It involves plastic surgery. And as Sanjay reports today, the treatment can help headache sufferers feel better and possibly look younger.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The agony she was enduring every week was crippling, almost insufferable.

KATHY KRAMER, FMR. MIGRAINE SUFFERER: I was pretty sure I had a brain tumor, or I was having an aneurysm or something, and the pain sometimes would just make me cry sometimes.

GUPTA: Forty-eight-year-old Kathy Kramer is describing migraine headaches that ruled her life since college. The pressure days she wasn't bedridden or writhing in pain were spent worrying about the next headache.

KRAMER: You don't live your life normally like other people do. It's debilitating, yes, and then you worry every day whether it's going to happen.

GUPTA: Then, through the painful haze, a glimmer of hope.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was some kind of promo, like we have a cure that will even actually make you look younger.

GUPTA: A promise to relieve migraines through plastic surgery. Dr. Bahman Guyuron, the surgeon in Ohio, is the man behind the promise. He noticed an interesting side effect in patients undergoing plastic surgery. Their migraines were vanishing as rapidly as their wrinkles.

DR. BAHMAN GUYURON, OHIO SURGEON: They said not only am I happy with what I see, I haven't had migraine headaches for a while.

GUPTA: After several studies, he an colleagues devised a surgical technique targeting muscle groups the septum, in the forehead, or frowning muscles, in the temple and base of the skull, places Guyuron he says pressure nerve, which in turn causes migraines. The surgery's premise, remove the muscles and nerves to alleviate that pain.

The consequence of surgery, according to Guyuron's most recent study, 92 percent of patients saw at least a 50 percent dip in the frequency and intensity of their migraines. But some neurologists, like Dr. Seymour Solomon, question those findings.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These numbers are accurate, but the methodology makes them meaningless. It's completely contrary to what we know about the mechanism of migraine. Cutting a couple of muscles here should have no effect.

GUPTA: Dr. Guyuron is not claiming his surgery is a total cure, but believes it has potential.

GUYURON: We really are not eliminating the tendency for migraine headaches. For practical purposes, if patients are symptom-free and continue to be symptom-free, we have cured them from the condition.

KRAMER: You're doing tricks.

GUPTA: Two and a half years after her operation, Kramer experiences minor headaches infrequently, but...

KRAMER: Basically, I would tell you I've had zero migraines. You realize there is a freedom that I had never had in my life and you go, this is life altering.

GUPTA: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, reporting.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HEMMER: We're told that estimated 28 million Americans suffer from migraines, and Sanjay reports that much more study is needed to determine how many can get relief through plastic surgery.

In a moment, Andy's back "Minding Your Business," telling us why Tiger Woods' win at the Masters on Sunday was perfect timing for his friends at Nike.

Back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: Welcome back, everybody.

JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: Tiger Woods' dramatic shot at the 16th hole on Sunday during the Masters paid off handsomely for the company that makes the golf ball.

With that and a preview of the markets, Andy Serwer's "Minding Your Business."

Good morning.

ANDY SERWER, "FORTUNE" MAGAZINE: Good morning, Jack. It's the day after the day after the Masters, and Madison Avenue advertising executives still talking about "the shot." And when we run the shot, maybe you can see why. And they're talking about it in Beaverton, Oregon, as well, which is where Nike is headquartered.

Now watch as the camera goes in, goes in, and you can focus right on the ball. This is one of those Nike One Platinum Balls. Look at this moment. This is a swoosh moment. Could not have been choreographed any better. And now listen to this. That was a Nike One Ball, $54 a dozen, they're going to be priced at when they come out in May, which is, what, three times, two times...

CAFFERTY: Golfers are the most gullible people on the planet. They'll spend $500 for a driver and $54 for a dozen balls, go out and shoot 120.

SERWER: There's no question if you have those balls, you'll be able to make that shot, don't you think?

CAFFERTY: Yes, I mean, that's the point. If you don't have a golf swing, it doesn't matter. You can buy $2 balls and play with your grandmother's clubs and still shoot 120.

SERWER: And it was funny because the company yesterday, Jack, was saying that the shot was sort of in part due to that ball.

CAFFERTY: Yes, right.

SERWER: They were saying the ball sort of helped, you know -- yes, right, I think. And but the one wrinkle is that the footage is owned by Augusta, so I'm sure they're going to be charging Nike nicely.

CAFFERTY: And in a couple days, there will be no more fair use on the part of the news networks, so that stuff will disappear from view, until the next Nike commercial.

SERWER: That's right, going to be paying a lot for it.

Let's talk about the markets quickly. Some news crossing the tape about the economy. First of all, yesterday, you can see here, by the way, the S&P 500 was up .01 points. You can't be up any less than that and still be up, if you follow, the way the decimals work.

CAFFERTY: The markets are just depressing. It's just depressing.

SERWER: Yes, and probably not good news today. The trade deficit number just came out for the month of February, $61 billion, an all-time high. And the reason, of course, higher oil prices, but also surging textiles from China. The country's being flooded now because of a change in the laws with Chinese textiles.

CAFFERTY: But Congress is going to work out this Daylight Savings Time thing, so...

SERWER: We have important business to take care of, yes.

CAFFERTY: Unbelievable. Thanks, Andy.

SERWER: You're welcome.

CAFFERTY: Here's some encouraging news, depending on your point of view, a majority of young adults say that religion and spirituality are important in their lives. A survey of 1,300 generation-wide Catholics, Protestants, Jews and Muslims, ages 18 to 25, found that 44 percent of young adults follow a religious establishment, another 35 percent see themselves as spiritual and express their faith by praying before meals, talking with friends or reading religious publications. The survey also found 53 percent of young support same-sex marriage; 63 percent think abortion should remain illegal.

Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher made a rare public appearance at a London strip club. The 79-year-old Thatcher, known as the "Iron Lady" for her uncompromised right-wing politics, turned up Sunday at Stringfellow's Nightclub in London for a Torry fund-raising event ahead of the May 5th elections. Actually, 400 conservatives showed up at the lap dance club, but the club's owner, Peter Stringfellow, said he gave the dancers the night off. He did tell "The London Daily Telegraph," though, quote, "I got the distance feeling that Thatcher would have loved to have seen them."

SERWER: Mr. Stringfellow.

CAFFERTY: I don't have much today.

A singing parrot in Ohio is tuning up for baseball season. Check this out.

All right, that's enough. This is Baby, a 6-year-old quaker parrot. Unfortunately, Baby's singing wasn't good enough to help the Cleveland Indians win their home opener on Monday. They lost to the Chicago White Sox, 2-1.

I'm sorry.

SERWER: That's one of the quaker parrots.

CAFFERTY: The File wasn't very good.

O'BRIEN: I thought that parrot was pretty very good. I mean, at first it started off flow.

SERWER: The quaker parrots.

CAFFERTY: You're very kind, trying to make up for what was a very lame "Cafferty File."

(CROSSTALK)

HEMMER: Don't beat yourself up.

SERWER: Margaret Thatcher and the parrot. CAFFERTY: You know what, check's exactly the same; whether you hit it out the park or strikeout, check's the same.

O'BRIEN: That's what I love about you, Jack, you're not cynical.

SERWER: Nary a lick.

O'BRIEN: Well, still to come this morning, we've got a pretty remarkable sports story for you. We're going to meet a 10-year-old boys wrestling champ. We'll meet her -- that's right, her -- a little later on AMERICAN MORNING.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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Aired April 12, 2005 - 08:30   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back, everybody. It's just about half past the hour on this AMERICAN MORNING. Coming up, police surround a New Jersey building for hours in a standoff over absolutely nothing. One example of the new kind of crime, pranksters using the Internet to cover up elaborate hoaxes. We're going to talk about what the police are trying to do to catch these spoofers ahead this morning.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Also, a new approach to treating migraines that makes people look younger along the way. Sanjay explains this potential link between plastic surgery and pain relief. Intriguing.

O'BRIEN: You can imagine, people are like, suddenly plastic surgery.

HEMMER: Do it.

O'BRIEN: Let's get right to the headlines with Carol Costello. Good morning.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: I'm sticking around for that story. Thank you.

Serious news to begin with this morning. A car bomb attack in northern Iraq. New video just into us shows debris from the bombing. You see it here. The attack apparently targeting a U.S. convoy. Sources say at least five Iraqis were killed. Four U.S. soldiers were injured in a separate incident in Mosul.

The attack comes as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is making a surprise visit to Iraq. He took part in a re-enlistment ceremony for dozens of American soldiers. He's also meeting with Iraq's newly elected government officials. The defense secretary drew cheers from the troops when he said the U.S. doesn't have an exit strategy for Iraq, it has a victory strategy.

The mother of a boy accusing Michael Jackson of molestation could take the stand today. On Monday, the mother of another accuser testified Jackson sobbed and pleaded with her to let her son share his bed. The family later received a multimillion dollar settlement from Jackson. Prosecutors are trying to show Jackson has a history of inappropriate behavior with boys. Testimony resumes later this morning.

And Martha Stewart's ankle bracelet will stay right where it is, on her ankle. A federal judge has rejected Stewart's bid to end her five months of house arrest early. The judge says the sentence reflects the seriousness of the offense. Stewart, as you know, was convicted of lying to federal agents about a stock sale. She also spent five months in a federal prison and she wanted that ankle bracelet removed because it would interfere with her new television shows, because, you know, she has a reality TV show coming up and a talk show. But the judge said, I don't think so.

O'BRIEN: Those big bracelets just get in the way, you know. Clunking up to the set.

COSTELLO: Well, you can't wear a skirt.

O'BRIEN: Well, you could be in prison. I mean, I don't know. I'm sorry. I guess I should be sympathetic. I'm very sympathetic, Carol.

COSTELLO: I know you are, Soledad. I see it in your face.

O'BRIEN: Well, I mean, we'll move on. Thank you.

It's known as spoofing, or bombing. It's when a prank caller using the Internet is able to disguise his or her phone number and make a fake emergency call to police. It got a woman arrested in Texas after she allegedly faked an emergency call to New Jersey police last month. Dozens of police then surrounded a building in New Brunswick, New Jersey. It was a six-hour standoff. They were thinking that a hostage crisis was going on inside the building. Nothing was happening inside the building.

Just how prevalent is the problem? What are police doing about it? John Timoney is the chief of the Miami Police Department. Nice to see you, sir, thanks for talking with us this morning.

CHIEF JOHN TIMONEY, MIAMI POLICE DEPARTMENT: Good morning, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Have you had similar experiences in Miami?

TIMONEY: Not to date, that we're aware of. We are canvassing our 911 operators and also in two weeks, there's our spring meeting of PERF, the Police Executive Research Forum, where this question will be asked of chiefs across the nation. Because I can see, just from reading the papers over the last couple of weeks, that this is going to be a growing problem for us in policing, starting off in some cases as a joke in chat rooms.

But this can lead to more serious cases like the one in New Brunswick, New Jersey, where police resources are out of commission for almost six hours. It's also going be used not just as a joke, but to play revenge on neighbors or friends or settling old agendas. There are a whole variety of problems that this could create for police departments in the future and in the near future.

O'BRIEN: Do police departments like yours or any across the nation have the technology available to be able to block the spoofing technology? TIMONEY: Unfortunately, no. And the problem is we use the caller I.D., actually, if we need further information on a call to call that person back. Now, obviously, this will be a phony number, a third number that's used. And so there will be no way of verifying one way or the other for additional information or to find out if it's a spoof phone call.

We're going to have to look at this real hard, have our technical people, every police department, and maybe come up with some proposed legislation, for example, that wouldn't permit somebody using this mechanism for dialing 911.

O'BRIEN: There are some people who create this spoofing technology, who actually encourage it. They call it -- it's the ultimate prank. They'll offer money for people who can pull off what they call the ultimate prank. Are there legal remedies? Can you good after the people just for making these phone calls and pretending to be somebody else?

TIMONEY: Well, I think you can, particularly in the area where it's a call to 911. If it's a local prank where kids are playing a prank on a neighbor, that's a whole other matter. In the area where you're using police resources, where you're calling in a phony call to 911, that can become dangerous, not just for the individual whose home the police respond to.

But you know, when a call goes over the radio, man with a gun, a rape in progress, hostage situation, the police officers' adrenaline is also going. They may be going lights and sirens. They could have an accident en route to the locations. So there are all sorts of problems endemic to this so-called joke.

O'BRIEN: I got to imagine it's also going to cost money. I mean, you waste, basically, police resources.

TIMONEY: Absolutely.

O'BRIEN: Not only the people and their time and their energy, but also just cold hard cash in sending off officers to respond to things that are fakes. Do you have any idea, have you run any numbers on what potentially this could cost departments like yours?

TIMONEY: Well, we're going to, as I say. This is something new. It's just come across the landscape in the last few months. My sense is, it's going to grow and I would only get an idea of the magnitude of this problem when we begin to canvass the other police chiefs at two conferences coming up.

One, the PERF conference at the end of April and then the IACP conference, which incidentally, will be held here in Miami in September. We'll get a better idea of the magnitude of this problem and then maybe propose certain pieces of legislation.

O'BRIEN: It will be interesting to see just how many other police chiefs are struggling with the same problem. Miami police chief John Timoney joining us. Always nice to see you, sir. Thanks for your time.

TIMONEY: Thank you, Soledad.

O'BRIEN: Bill?

HEMMER: This just in from Germany, too, Soledad. Getting word now through wire services, the A.P. and Reuters, saying a man with a knife apparently took children hostage, forcing them off of a school bus in northwestern Germany, holding them hostage now in a nearby house.

The man forced between four and seven kids, ages 10 and 11, off the bus, 1:00 local time there in Europe. Police surrounded the house on the edge of town, 40 miles northwest of Cologne. That's what we have for now. Again, this story just in to us from Germany. We'll get back to that in a moment.

We want to get back now to Iraq. And there is yet to be a trial date set for Saddam Hussein. And the new president, Jalal Talabani, says that as soon as a new cabinet is formed, trials for war criminals can be talked about. Here in the U.S., meanwhile, an Iraqi exile has been compiling evidence of Saddam's atrocities for more than a decade.

Dan Lothian has that story from Boston.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAN LOTHIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This Iraqi exile Kanan Makiya wants his people and the world to know the depths of Saddam Hussein's atrocities.

KANAN MAKIYA, IRAQ MEMORY FOUNDATION: Some people have witnessed horrors that look like they came out of the deepest, darkest depths of hell.

LOTHIAN: Collecting and documenting those horrors against dissidents and other innocent Iraqi people is now his mission, in black and white and on videotape, like this testimony his team recorded.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): They took me to the torture chambers. They tied both my hands and blindfolded me and they tied my arms behind my back. And I was hung between heaven and earth.

LOTHIAN: And there's the testimony of Najida Al Rama (ph), once Iraq's most prominent actress and hated for her influence.

MAKIYA: She was chased by the secret police until her life became totally unbearable.

LOTHIAN: She said they had sworn to torture, rape and kill me, so I put a razor blade and a Valium 10 in my bag. If they arrested me, I would swallow the pill and slit my wrists rather than let anyone touch me. In the late '70s, she fled Iraq.

Makiya can relate to her fears. The M.I.T.-educated architect- turned-author wrote a book in 1989 exposing Saddam's brutality. After that, he says, it became positively suicidal to stay in Iraq.

(on camera): So he returned to the United States, taught at Harvard. Now, on leave from a post at Brandeis University, Makiya's Iraq Memory Foundation is working tirelessly on what he says is a painful, but necessary, effort.

MAKIYA: The past is something you have to acknowledge, you have to accept in order to move on. We want to move on. We do not want to stay stuck in the past.

LOTHIAN (voice-over): The foundation is in the process of sifting through and digitizing 11 million pages of Baath party documents and other records. Graphic, disturbing and unusually meticulous details, including lists of people ordered for execution. And he's videotaping 50 oral testimonies. Plans are to broadcast them across the Arab world.

Eventually, all the evidence will be placed in a museum to be built on this Baghdad site, alongside artwork created by victims and collaborators with the Saddam regime, an attempt to show how oppression impacted art.

MAKIYA: Saddam Hussein has put seeds of distrust in the psyche of every individual Iraqi. And it will take another generation to get rid of it.

And documenting the past, he hopes, will be part of the cure.

Dan Lothian, CNN, Boston.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HEMMER: Kanan Makiya is also trying to get the U.S. government to restore funding for the memory foundation.

Another check of the weather.

(WEATHER REPORT)

O'BRIEN: Well, aquarium officials in Hawaii are happy as a clam this morning. Seven rare and colorful clams were found on Monday after being stolen from an exhibit in Waikiki. The clams were discovered in a plastic container in the aquarium's theater. The clams, members of a threatened species, had been missing for nine days. A few lost some of their color because of exposure to improper conditions.

Why would anybody steal a clam? Why would anybody return the clam once they stole the clam?

HEMMER: They are good looking clams, though, aren't they?

O'BRIEN: Yes, and rare. And yet, what do you do when a clam when you steal it? Weird.

HEMMER: In a moment on AMERICAN MORNING, paging the good doctor. For millions of Americans, migraines are nothing short of debilitating.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was having an aneurysm or something, and the pain would just make me cry.

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HEMMER: Now a new treatment may promise relief, but there's controversy, too. We'll page the good doctor after this, on AMERICAN MORNING.

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HEMMER: We are paging Dr. Sanjay Gupta now about this controversial remedy for migraines. It involves plastic surgery. And as Sanjay reports today, the treatment can help headache sufferers feel better and possibly look younger.

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DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The agony she was enduring every week was crippling, almost insufferable.

KATHY KRAMER, FMR. MIGRAINE SUFFERER: I was pretty sure I had a brain tumor, or I was having an aneurysm or something, and the pain sometimes would just make me cry sometimes.

GUPTA: Forty-eight-year-old Kathy Kramer is describing migraine headaches that ruled her life since college. The pressure days she wasn't bedridden or writhing in pain were spent worrying about the next headache.

KRAMER: You don't live your life normally like other people do. It's debilitating, yes, and then you worry every day whether it's going to happen.

GUPTA: Then, through the painful haze, a glimmer of hope.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was some kind of promo, like we have a cure that will even actually make you look younger.

GUPTA: A promise to relieve migraines through plastic surgery. Dr. Bahman Guyuron, the surgeon in Ohio, is the man behind the promise. He noticed an interesting side effect in patients undergoing plastic surgery. Their migraines were vanishing as rapidly as their wrinkles.

DR. BAHMAN GUYURON, OHIO SURGEON: They said not only am I happy with what I see, I haven't had migraine headaches for a while.

GUPTA: After several studies, he an colleagues devised a surgical technique targeting muscle groups the septum, in the forehead, or frowning muscles, in the temple and base of the skull, places Guyuron he says pressure nerve, which in turn causes migraines. The surgery's premise, remove the muscles and nerves to alleviate that pain.

The consequence of surgery, according to Guyuron's most recent study, 92 percent of patients saw at least a 50 percent dip in the frequency and intensity of their migraines. But some neurologists, like Dr. Seymour Solomon, question those findings.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These numbers are accurate, but the methodology makes them meaningless. It's completely contrary to what we know about the mechanism of migraine. Cutting a couple of muscles here should have no effect.

GUPTA: Dr. Guyuron is not claiming his surgery is a total cure, but believes it has potential.

GUYURON: We really are not eliminating the tendency for migraine headaches. For practical purposes, if patients are symptom-free and continue to be symptom-free, we have cured them from the condition.

KRAMER: You're doing tricks.

GUPTA: Two and a half years after her operation, Kramer experiences minor headaches infrequently, but...

KRAMER: Basically, I would tell you I've had zero migraines. You realize there is a freedom that I had never had in my life and you go, this is life altering.

GUPTA: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, reporting.

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HEMMER: We're told that estimated 28 million Americans suffer from migraines, and Sanjay reports that much more study is needed to determine how many can get relief through plastic surgery.

In a moment, Andy's back "Minding Your Business," telling us why Tiger Woods' win at the Masters on Sunday was perfect timing for his friends at Nike.

Back after this.

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O'BRIEN: Welcome back, everybody.

JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: Tiger Woods' dramatic shot at the 16th hole on Sunday during the Masters paid off handsomely for the company that makes the golf ball.

With that and a preview of the markets, Andy Serwer's "Minding Your Business."

Good morning.

ANDY SERWER, "FORTUNE" MAGAZINE: Good morning, Jack. It's the day after the day after the Masters, and Madison Avenue advertising executives still talking about "the shot." And when we run the shot, maybe you can see why. And they're talking about it in Beaverton, Oregon, as well, which is where Nike is headquartered.

Now watch as the camera goes in, goes in, and you can focus right on the ball. This is one of those Nike One Platinum Balls. Look at this moment. This is a swoosh moment. Could not have been choreographed any better. And now listen to this. That was a Nike One Ball, $54 a dozen, they're going to be priced at when they come out in May, which is, what, three times, two times...

CAFFERTY: Golfers are the most gullible people on the planet. They'll spend $500 for a driver and $54 for a dozen balls, go out and shoot 120.

SERWER: There's no question if you have those balls, you'll be able to make that shot, don't you think?

CAFFERTY: Yes, I mean, that's the point. If you don't have a golf swing, it doesn't matter. You can buy $2 balls and play with your grandmother's clubs and still shoot 120.

SERWER: And it was funny because the company yesterday, Jack, was saying that the shot was sort of in part due to that ball.

CAFFERTY: Yes, right.

SERWER: They were saying the ball sort of helped, you know -- yes, right, I think. And but the one wrinkle is that the footage is owned by Augusta, so I'm sure they're going to be charging Nike nicely.

CAFFERTY: And in a couple days, there will be no more fair use on the part of the news networks, so that stuff will disappear from view, until the next Nike commercial.

SERWER: That's right, going to be paying a lot for it.

Let's talk about the markets quickly. Some news crossing the tape about the economy. First of all, yesterday, you can see here, by the way, the S&P 500 was up .01 points. You can't be up any less than that and still be up, if you follow, the way the decimals work.

CAFFERTY: The markets are just depressing. It's just depressing.

SERWER: Yes, and probably not good news today. The trade deficit number just came out for the month of February, $61 billion, an all-time high. And the reason, of course, higher oil prices, but also surging textiles from China. The country's being flooded now because of a change in the laws with Chinese textiles.

CAFFERTY: But Congress is going to work out this Daylight Savings Time thing, so...

SERWER: We have important business to take care of, yes.

CAFFERTY: Unbelievable. Thanks, Andy.

SERWER: You're welcome.

CAFFERTY: Here's some encouraging news, depending on your point of view, a majority of young adults say that religion and spirituality are important in their lives. A survey of 1,300 generation-wide Catholics, Protestants, Jews and Muslims, ages 18 to 25, found that 44 percent of young adults follow a religious establishment, another 35 percent see themselves as spiritual and express their faith by praying before meals, talking with friends or reading religious publications. The survey also found 53 percent of young support same-sex marriage; 63 percent think abortion should remain illegal.

Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher made a rare public appearance at a London strip club. The 79-year-old Thatcher, known as the "Iron Lady" for her uncompromised right-wing politics, turned up Sunday at Stringfellow's Nightclub in London for a Torry fund-raising event ahead of the May 5th elections. Actually, 400 conservatives showed up at the lap dance club, but the club's owner, Peter Stringfellow, said he gave the dancers the night off. He did tell "The London Daily Telegraph," though, quote, "I got the distance feeling that Thatcher would have loved to have seen them."

SERWER: Mr. Stringfellow.

CAFFERTY: I don't have much today.

A singing parrot in Ohio is tuning up for baseball season. Check this out.

All right, that's enough. This is Baby, a 6-year-old quaker parrot. Unfortunately, Baby's singing wasn't good enough to help the Cleveland Indians win their home opener on Monday. They lost to the Chicago White Sox, 2-1.

I'm sorry.

SERWER: That's one of the quaker parrots.

CAFFERTY: The File wasn't very good.

O'BRIEN: I thought that parrot was pretty very good. I mean, at first it started off flow.

SERWER: The quaker parrots.

CAFFERTY: You're very kind, trying to make up for what was a very lame "Cafferty File."

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HEMMER: Don't beat yourself up.

SERWER: Margaret Thatcher and the parrot. CAFFERTY: You know what, check's exactly the same; whether you hit it out the park or strikeout, check's the same.

O'BRIEN: That's what I love about you, Jack, you're not cynical.

SERWER: Nary a lick.

O'BRIEN: Well, still to come this morning, we've got a pretty remarkable sports story for you. We're going to meet a 10-year-old boys wrestling champ. We'll meet her -- that's right, her -- a little later on AMERICAN MORNING.

Stay with us.

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