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Nancy Grace

BTK Suspect Pleads Not Guilty to 10 Counts of Murder; Michael Jackson Trial Continues

Aired May 03, 2005 - 20:00   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.


NANCY GRACE, HOST: Tonight, "Bind, Torture, Kill": The BTK serial killer, Dennis Rader, pleads not guilty to 10 murders that we know of.
And tonight, we need your help. A missing college student, 22-year- old Patrick Welsh, last seen April 15 at a train station headed for New York City. Patrick, where are you?

And we go live to California and the Michael Jackson child sex trial. Testimony that Jackson`s ex-wife labeled Jackson a sociopath.

Good evening, everybody. I`m Nancy Grace. Thank you for being with us tonight.

Sociopath, that is how Michael Jackson`s ex-wife described Jackson, says a detective under oath. So why did Debbie Rowe change her story?

Plus, college student Patrick Welsh is missing tonight. Patrick, last seen at a train station in Pennsylvania two weeks ago, headed to New York City.

But first, BTK, "Bind, Torture, Kill," it`s a not guilty plea. BTK serial killer suspect Dennis Rader entered by the judge. The former dog catcher set for trial on multiple murders.

With us tonight from Memphis, Tennessee, Jeff Davis. You remember Jeff. His mother believed to have been a BTK murder victim in 1991. Also, in Denver, defense attorney Lisa Wayne; in West Palm Beach, Florida, defense attorney Michelle Suskauer; in New York, psychotherapist Lauren Howard.

But first, let`s go to Wichita, Kansas. KAKE-TV reporter Larry Hatteberg is with us.

Hi, friend. Bring us up-to-date.

LARRY HATTEBERG, KAKE-TV REPORTER: Well, I`ll tell you what happened in court today. Dennis Rader stood mute and the judge entered the plea of not guilty today.

And there`s one other thing that happened in court that was very interesting, Nancy. For the first time in any of Dennis Rader`s court appearances, as he walked into the courtroom, as the video you showed just a few seconds ago would indicate, as he walked into the courtroom, for the first time, he looked at the gallery and acknowledged the people in it. He`s never done that in court before. You saw that little nod right there.

And I was sitting on the front row there in court and caught his eye, and for just a moment, that`s a very -- it`s a very momentous feeling when that happens. Kind of little scary feeling. But that`s the first time that he`s ever acknowledged the people who were looking at him.

GRACE: Larry Hatteberg, I think you`re holding back. People that were in the courtroom said he looked at you specifically and nodded.

HATTEBERG: Some people have said that. I will tell you that we did make eye contact. Whether or not he was looking at me, I think we would have to ask Dennis Rader that particular question. But we did make eye contact.

And then I think his eyes slid past me, perhaps to see who else was in the gallery there, perhaps looking at some of the relatives of some of the victims who were sitting over to my left. But whether or not he made eye contact with me, I think that`s a question we still have to ask Dennis Rader.

GRACE: Larry Hatteberg, for our viewers that are not familiar with BTK, "Bind, Torture, Kill," why have police decided on Rader? Why do they believe Rader is the serial killer?

HATTEBERG: Well, through a series of things that happened. They caught pictures of his truck at a Home Depot, this following a package being left there that contained parts from another murder. They also traced in his last communication -- they traced a floppy disk to the church where he was president of his church.

Plus, they had a DNA sample from his daughter. And that matched in the familia segment. And so all these things put together, they were apparently able to use those to trace and go directly to Dennis Rader. Big story in...

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Larry, if you could describe for us the method of the BTK`s killings. We know of 10 killings that span several decades. Describe.

HATTEBERG: Well, bind, torture, kill. That`s what he liked to be known as, and that`s exactly what he did. What he liked and what he enjoyed most of all, this man we call BTK, was the power that he held over the victim. As he was killing the victim, he had incredible power over them. And he certainly enjoyed using that power.

And that gave him some sort of sexual satisfaction, to the best of our knowledge, as when he killed. He was a ritual killer. He would go through a little ritual before he actually made the killing.

And one of the people who he admired was a guy by the name of Harvey Glatman who was a serial killer who was executed in the 1950s. Harvey Glatman used to take pictures before...

GRACE: Oh, God.

HATTEBERG: ... before, during and after.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: You know what, Larry? I almost wish I hadn`t asked you. But I know I had to.

To Lauren Howard, psychotherapist, does that fit hand-in-glove with the way Rader acted in court today? Walking in and looking out to see what press was there, who was there, what family members of his alleged victims were there watching him?

LAUREN HOWARD, PSYCHOTHERAPIST: Well, you have this dichotomy between someone who is enacting this power play, which can only happen from someone who feels completely disempowered. So it`s not surprising to me that he wants to make eye contact. He wants you to see him.

In fact, the behavior of a serial killer of this nature is someone who wants to be seen, which is why he`s been sending these packages and notices to the newspaper. He wants to be seen. He screaming out, "See me. Contain me. Find me. Stop me."

GRACE: I want to go to a very special guest joining us tonight. Jeff Davis is joining us from Memphis, Tennessee. His mom, Dolores is believed to have been one of the victims of the BTK killer.

Welcome, Jeff. Jeff, you know that he did not speak in court today. But he obviously was thrilled there were media there, that there were family members of the alleged victims there all looking at him. What do you have to say to that?

JEFF DAVIS, MOTHER KILLED BY BTK: Well, first of all, I`m not surprised that he didn`t say anything. I think it`s fitting. The one thing we know about that cockroach is that the one time he`s not telling lies when his mouth`s shut. So that really didn`t surprise me.

I didn`t know that about trying to make some kind of quasi-eye contact with the audience. I would certainly like to have been there, because I have sure been thinking about making eye contact with him.

GRACE: You know, Jeff, the death of your mom affected your life in so many ways. Do you plan to go to the trial?

DAVIS: Oh, yes. I can`t go through the whole laborious, drawn-out process because I`m trying to manage a life and a career here, but I`ll be back there at least for her portion of the trial. And I`ll definitely be back to hear -- for him to hear my victim`s impact statement. I suspect it will be pretty powerful.

GRACE: To Lisa Wayne, defense attorney, joining us. Lisa, the reality is, under the law, when a defendant refuses to enter a plea in court, the judge will automatically enter a not guilty plea for them.

This is not a death penalty case. The state cannot seek the death penalty in that jurisdiction for the crime that occurred at the time that it did. So what`s the point? What is the point? This is a mind game, Lisa.

He`s just dragging it all out. He`s playing a big game with the victims` families because he doesn`t want to get shipped to the penitentiary. He wants to stay there in the county jail so his friends and his relatives can visit him until he gets a guilty verdict.

LISA WAYNE, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Nancy, you have got to remember something, and this is the most important thing that we have in the Constitution and in our system, OK? That`s the presumption of innocence. So no matter how grizzly and ugly the facts are, how many alleged victims you may have out there, he is presumed to be innocent.

And until and unless the state can prove him guilty, he has a right to a trial. So even as ugly and as horrendous as it may seem to us, this is a man who may be innocent. He may not have done all the things that he is alleged to do. And that`s why we have a trial, because we want those safeguards in place.

And I know we don`t like it all the time. But that`s the best system in the world.

GRACE: Well, I`m certainly not fighting with the founding fathers of the Constitution.

But Larry Hatteberg, let me ask you this. What is the evidence against him? I understand that there is DNA. He had possession of one of the victim`s driver`s license that he then sent to police about a decade later after it was taken.

You know what that means, Larry? This guy held on to this dead victim`s driver`s license for all these years. And then, just torture the rest of us, or the victim`s family, sent the driver`s license to the cops.

HATTEBERG: Well, Nancy, I want to tell you, they have rooms full of evidence, not drawers, not boxes, but rooms full of evidence. Because, as you know, this case has been going on now for some 30 years in Wichita, Kansas. That`s been three decades. That`s an incredibly long time for any case to go on.

So the prosecuting attorneys here, the district attorney, Nola Foulston, they have some powerful evidence at their disposal. The person who doesn`t have that evidence yet, of course, is the defendant, the attorney who`s been appointed as his public defender. It`s an uphill battle for him.

GRACE: Well, they will have the evidence under the discovery rule, so they`ll have all of the state`s evidence.

Very quickly, Michelle Suskauer, we are headed to break, but, you know, this guy, Dennis Rader, had basically gotten away with murder, according to the police. Why make himself known now? Why use the church disk, for Pete`s sake, that fits in the church computer? Why send the driver`s license via the mail? They got DNA off the stamp on the mail. Why now?

MICHELLE SUSKAUER, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: You know, Nancy, again -- and I agree with Lisa -- that you know, we cannot convict him before his arraignment. He has just been arraigned here. He is presumed innocent.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Yes. That`s not what I asked you. I asked you...

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: ... known now, all these years later. He had beaten the rap.

SUSKAUER: You know, Nancy, I can`t get into his mind and say what he wants to do. But the killer, the real killer, whether it`s him or somebody else, always wanted publicity here. So if it was him, this is something that he was always seeking. He was always seeking publicity and was angry when he didn`t get it.

GRACE: OK, we are taking a quick break. As you know by now, "Bind, Torture, Kill," a serial killer that terrorized a community for three decades has now been brought to justice, according to police. Today, a not guilty plea in a court of law. Stay with us.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your honor, we have received a copy of the information. We will waive a formal reading. At this time, the defendant would stand mute as to the plea and ask the court to enter the appropriate plea and set the matter for trial.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Very well. On the defendant standing mute, the court will enter a plea of not guilty. I will set this matter for jury trial on June 27th, 9 o`clock in the morning. Thank you very much.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHIEF NORMAN WILLIAMS, WICHITA POLICE DEPARTMENT: Dennis L. Rader has been arrested in connection with 10 homicides that span 31 years in the city of Wichita, in Sedgwick County. Dennis Rader`s currently in the Sedgwick County Detention Facility being held on a $10 million bond, $1 million per victim.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: A not guilty plea in a court of law today. The BTK suspect, "Bind, Torture, Kill," Dennis Rader, a former dogcatcher, has a not guilty plea.

To psychotherapist Lauren Howard. Dogcatcher, wants power over his victims, his victims female, a very young victim.

Larry, how old was the little girl victim? I think she was five. Larry Hatteberg, how old was his youngest victim?

HATTEBERG: I think she was five or six, s I recall. And that was in the Otero murder. That was the first murder where he killed a family of four.

GRACE: Oh, good lord. Now, Larry, there`s DNA in that case, right?

HATTEBERG: There was DNA in that case. There were DNA in several of the cases, because as I said earlier, he was a ritual killer. And while he didn`t sexually assault any of his victims, he would leave semen at the scene, sometimes semen on the body...

GRACE: Well, I don`t know what you mean by sexual assault, but when a dead body has semen all over it...

HATTEBERG: Yes. Well, to the best of our knowledge, he did not sexually assault his victims. Now, he did leave semen on them and around the area, according to the investigators. But to the best of our knowledge, he did not sexually assault his victims.

GRACE: OK, I`m just letting that sink in for a moment, that fine distinction you are making, the parsing of the words. But Larry, I know you`re reporting it just the way it came out from the court documents.

To Lauren Howard, psychotherapist, is it all fitting together for you? Are you getting a picture of this guy?

HOWARD: Absolutely. I mean, this is this existential abandonment issue. This is a person who...

GRACE: Whoa, whoa, whoa, existential abandonment?

HOWARD: He was somehow brutalized at a child. And that could be because he was under-disciplined, as opposed to over-disciplined. We have this, you know, tendency to think, oh, parents, you know, if we molest children...

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Why the power over his victims?

HOWARD: Because he felt disempowered, because he felt powerless. See me. Find me. It`s almost with a religious zeal, these murders. It`s almost this -- if there`s a god, where is he? Is this all there is? Please find me.

Which is why you have this consistent reaching out and sending documents and things to the newspaper, to the police. He`s begging to be seen, to be contained. This is a man who lacked a feeling of containment for his identity, which is why he`s binding. Binding is a perfect metaphor for that. Contain me. Bind me. Torture me. Brutalize me. Kill me. Put me out of my pain.

GRACE: I don`t know. I don`t know that he wanted to be caught so much, Jeff Davis, as to get attention, an attention-seeker, that feeling of power over innocent people, unsuspecting people. Many of these victims women, one a little girl, children, bound, tortured, and killed.

Jeff, you seem convinced that Dennis Rader is the BTK killer that killed your mom, Dolores. Why?

DAVIS: Well, I think now I am, but as I`ve said before, publicly, for a long time, I didn`t hold that opinion. But in this resurgence that he has been doing for the last year and calling the attention to himself -- first of all, I don`t think he wanted to get caught. If he wanted to get caught, he could pick up the phone and say...

GRACE: Me either.

DAVIS: ... "Hey, guess who I am. Here I am. Come get me." He was walking a fine line between this notoriety that he just thrives on and the reality of undoing himself, which I think is what happened. He did undo himself.

He knew it was a calculated risk, but he`s had the upper hand for 30 years. And he`s tried to show everybody that he was smarter than the police and the community. And it was worth it. His poor, pathetic, sick ego got a thrill out of that. And that`s only way to think of himself as a man.

And I agree with him on that. That`s the only way he can think of himself as a man, because he is not. And so he was opportunistic. He preyed on, obviously, people couldn`t defend themselves. And the whole profile fits now in retrospect.

But I guess specifically why I think or am convinced that he is the one that killed my mom was because he was an opportunist, and I`m sure he had plenty of contact to come in contact with my mom. They lived within a mile of each other. And as soon as I heard on the news they were sacking a house with a warrant that was over in that part of the county, red flags went up everywhere, because I thought, you know, that`s not coincidence.

Animals are territorial. And being the animal that he is, he was stalking out his territory. And so that was a red flag. My conjecture only, because understand, I know nothing official from any law enforcement.

I can only draw my own conclusions, the same as everybody else, based on what I see and hear. But my opinion is, something in that house connected him with my mom, because the next day, they said they had him, made him for my mom`s case. So inductive logic tells you they got something in that house.

GRACE: Yes, something out of the house. Before we go to break...

DAVIS: But that`s just my guess.

GRACE: Back to you, Jeff.

Elizabeth, could you show the picture of Jeff`s mother? What a smile. I mean, what a beautiful lady your mom, Dolores, was.

How has her murder affected your life?

DAVIS: Well, it`s completely redefined my life. And I`m sure I`m not saying anything that any other victim out there, the Oteros, or any of the others will tell you. When you go through something like this -- and I think you know yourself, Nancy -- that it winds up forcing you to have to redefine who you are and how you relate to the world around you.

But of course it left a hole that won`t ever be filled. That`s the reason I wrote the book was in memory of her and to try to give some others some solace to come from the same situation.

I think of her in terms of, she was a warm spot in life of everybody who ever knew her. And now everybody to a person who knew her feels kind of a cold draft in her wake. And so after 14 years, like anything else, it doesn`t have the enormity. And I don`t anguish and grieve over it like I did for the first five years, probably every day for the first five years, but I realize that her loss certainly diminished my life. And it diminished us all to a degree, because she was just that kind of a person.

GRACE: You know, I was trying to think about what to get my mom for Mother`s Day. I thought about you after the last time we talked on that -- must be such a hard, hard time for people that have lost their mother, much less like this, just left out outside like that....

DAVIS: Yes, we try...

GRACE: ... like discarding a trash on the side of the highway.

DAVIS: Yes, that`s exactly the words I used in the book, that`s exactly -- that`s his respect for women and mankind in general is to dump them like a bag of dirty laundry on the road.

GRACE: And I keep thinking about that little girl. I believe she was hung.

Ellie, she was hung, right, 5-years-old? And when they found the body, it being covered with semen that way, is just -- but we`ll see what happens at trial.

Quick break, everyone. Let`s go straight to "Trial Tracking": Today, jury selection begins for the sentencing phase against Lynndie England, remember her, the American officer who allegedly posed in photographs next to naked Iraqi prisoners. It was humiliating.

She allegedly held our country up to scorn. She has pled guilty to seven of the nine counts against her, including abuse of detainees and committing an indecent act. Under the deal, she could face as little as two years behind bars.

She says she was uncomfortable posing in the photos, but her then- boyfriend, Private Charles Graner, told her to do it. He was sentenced to 10 years behind bars for his part in the prison scandal.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEBBIE ROWE, MICHAEL JACKSON`S EX-WIFE: My kids don`t call me mom because I don`t want them to. They`re Michael`s children. It`s not that they`re not my children, but I had them because I wanted him to be a father. I believe that there are people who should be parents. And he`s one of them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Well, let`s just say that did not make a good impression on the Michael Jackson jury. Welcome back, everybody. Let`s go straight back out to the California courthouse.

Jane Velez-Mitchell with "Celebrity Justice" standing by. Jane, $200 million in debt, an alleged sociopath. What the hey is going on out there?

JANE VELEZ-MITCHELL, "CELEBRITY JUSTICE": It was a great day for prosecutors, Nancy. They scored on a whole bunch of points.

And investigator got up and said Debbie Rowe told him a year ago -- and that of course is Jackson`s ex -- that Michael Jackson was a sociopath who regarded his children as possessions. And also, we heard testimony that he is deeply in debt and a financial crisis.

But the most important thing, they got Rudy Provencio on the stand, the man that C.J., "Celebrity Justice," has been saying for more than a year now will be the key to the prosecution`s conspiracy case and connect Michael Jackson to this alleged conspiracy.

GRACE: With us at the courthouse, Jane Velez-Mitchell with "Celebrity Justice." We`ll all be right back. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(NEWS BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL JACKSON, DEFENDANT: I wanted to have a place that I could create everything that I never had as a child. So, you see rides. You see animals. There`s a movie theater. I was always on tour traveling, you know? And I never got a chance to do those things. So, I compensated for the loss.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: That is from Jackson`s first public statement, his response to the -- this round of child molestation charges.

Welcome back.

Let`s go straight back out that Jane Velez-Mitchell. She is standing outside the courthouse.

Jane, take a listen to Debbie Rowe.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEBBIE ROWE, EX-WIFE OF JACKSON: He would never hurt a child. Never. It`s not in him. It`s -- no way. He would never do anything inappropriate with a child. It`s the furthest thing from his mind. When those allegations came, `93 I think it was, he was devastated. I mean, talk about going for the jugular.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: They have got the soft music playing. They have got the fireplace roaring in the background. I know I`m getting set up for something with that, Jane Velez-Mitchell.

You know what? We heard completely different testimony on the stand today, right?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Absolutely.

Last week, Debbie Rowe took the stand and said wonderful things, along the same lines that you just heard, about Michael Jackson. Today, an investigator said that in a conversation taped just a year ago today, precisely to the day, she said Michael Jackson was a sociopath and the only reason she said nice things about him is that they had come up with a plan at the time of their divorce to say nice things about each other in public and that she decided to stick with that plan, which explains why she may have acted the way she did on the stand.

GRACE: Hmm.

Take a listen to Macaulay Culkin.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MACAULAY CULKIN, ACTOR: The thing is, with Michael is that he`s not very good at explaining himself. And he never really has been, because he`s not a very social person. You`re talking about someone who has been sheltered and sheltering himself, also, for the last like 30 years. And so he`s not very good at communicating to people and not very good at conveying what he is actually trying to say to you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Joining us tonight is Tom O`Neil, senior editor with "In Touch Weekly."

Tom, how many of his celebrity friends, Jackson`s celebrity friends, do you really think are going to take the stand?

TOM O`NEIL, SENIOR EDITOR, "IN TOUCH WEEKLY": Boy, that`s a great question, Nancy. How many will the judge allow? This case is about child molestation and conspiracy. What does Elizabeth Taylor know about that? What does Stevie Wonder know about that?

There are only so many character witnesses they`re going to allow here. But I think celebrity is what this whole defense hangs on. We don`t convict celebrities of serious crimes. O.J., Robert Blake, I mean, look at these guys. They got off and let`s presume possibly that they were guilty. We do convict celebrities like Martha Stewart of perjury or Winona Ryder of shoplifting.

But to win this case, Michael`s going after the celebrity quotient.

GRACE: Hmm.

I want to go to Debra Opri. She is a defense attorney also Jackson`s parents` attorney as well.

That is a good question, Debra. What do all these celebrities that the defense claims are going to be their witnesses -- and the whole thing with Elizabeth Taylor, freaky. Did you hear Michael Jackson on Jesse Jackson`s radio show talking about how Elizabeth Taylor had to spoon-feed him because he just didn`t feel like eating?

OK. What do they know about child molestation?

DEBRA OPRI, ATTORNEY FOR MICHAEL JACKSON`S PARENTS: Well, where do I begin? First, prosecution has put on their witnesses. The defense has a right to put on their witnesses. Their best witnesses are people to say, I was at Neverland. I never saw anything. I never saw child molestation. Will the judge tolerate many of those witnesses?

GRACE: Uh-uh.

OPRI: I don`t think so.

What key witnesses will be up there? Macaulay Culkin, because he was directly referenced in the 1108 prior bad acts testimony, which the judge allowed in. Other child celebrities which may have been guests, why not? All in all, we have to look at the summation of the prosecution`s case. And does Mesereau really have to put on that many celebrity people? I don`t think, at this point, he does.

I think he just has to pick and choose the key celebrity witnesses who will best demonstrate Michael Jackson`s character, in terms of the child molestation allegations.

Well, Michelle Suskauer, I agree with Debra Opri on this point. To bring people in, basically unrelated to the case, to say, hey, I didn`t see him molest anybody when I was around him, that`s usually inadmissible. It`s like in a murder case when you bring on the guy`s cousin and he says, well, when we had our family reunion, he didn`t murder anybody.

What does that have to do with these charges?

SUSKAUER: Well, but it`s significant.

And, first of all, also, it`s really -- I agree. It`s going to be the quality of the witnesses, not the quantity. So, it`s not bringing in 50 of these celebrities. And it just so happens he surround himself with celebrities. These are the folks who were at Neverland. These are the folks who saw him interact with children. It`s important and it`s material. And it`s very good character evidence.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Wait a minute. What about all those other people that saw him interact with children, specifically with their swimming trunks outside the shower with him, the kid in the shower?

SUSKAUER: You know, the jury is going to have an interesting time gauging the credibility of those witnesses. And a lot of them have a lot of baggage, Nancy, that have been brought out before this jury.

And, again, this jury is going to gauge. And you know what? They may be swayed by celebrity. Sure they would. But they`re going to bring in Elizabeth Taylor, Macaulay Culkin. And that may make a difference.

GRACE: You know what? I`m glad you said that.

Tom O`Neil, do you believe really that Elizabeth Taylor is going to cross the country and testify in a child molestation case? Talking about celebs, who do you think is going to come in and testify for Jackson, except maybe Macaulay Culkin?

O`NEIL: Your buddy Larry King, because we believe he`s integral to this case, if he really did hear some key evidence that day when -- What was it? -- the prosecuting attorney said that -- What was it? -- that -- oh, this family is just out for money.

Jay Leno we suspect is going to be a major player in this case, also accusing the mother and this family of being grifters. And, of course, Chris Tucker may give a whole different take on that trip to Miami, claiming that he`s the one, not Jackson, who said, we`re going south.

GRACE: Interesting.

What about it, Jane Velez-Mitchell? Do you really see an all-star lineup for the defense? How will the defense kick off its case?

Hi, Liz.

And will this last witness end the state`s case?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, I think, yes. Rudy Provencio will be the star witness for the state. And tomorrow, he is expected to talk about more details of what he allegedly heard Michael Jackson saying vis-a-vis this alleged conspiracy.

We are told that he took meticulous journal notes, that he`s going to testify that Michael Jackson knew about the alleged conspiracy, knew about the plot to allegedly get this family off to Brazil, that he was very disturbed by what he heard, that he also heard conversations between Schaffel and then Jackson attorney Mark Geragos, and that he took notes on this and was actually asked to deposit some checks vis-a-vis this alleged conspiracy and refused to do it because he was scared to get involved, because he thought this was something that just wasn`t right and he was disturbed, very upset by what he heard.

GRACE: Lauren Howard, what do you make of this blanket of people around Michael Jackson? If these charges are true, basically, they enabled it. They let it happen. They will claim they saw this. But what did they do about this?

HOWARD: Well, you know, this speaks to Tom O`Neil`s point about this -- what I call this emperor`s new clothes mentality, where you have this person that we have pedestalized. And we do this with our celebrities, with our sports figures.

GRACE: Pedestalize.

HOWARD: Yes.

GRACE: Is that really a word?

HOWARD: We have raised him up on a pedestal.

GRACE: I`ll go with it. You`re the shrink.

HOWARD: We have made him royalty. We have made him larger than life. And we have invested all of our affection and adoration in him. And so now to let him fall off of that pedestal and to say, how could this be, who could someone that I know...

GRACE: Uh-huh.

O`NEIL: The royal know, how could someone I know commit these heinous acts? I mean, that`s what we -- we set that up in our culture. And I think Tom`s point is well taken about celebrities not getting convicted for the big, bad, ugly crimes.

GRACE: Lisa Wayne, I have only got 20 seconds left, but I think that that is one of the strongest things Jackson has going for him, that people have loved him all these years and that they`re thinking, well, the Michael Jackson that I know through the TV, of course, couldn`t possibly have done this.

WAYNE: That might be true, but it cuts both ways, Nancy. And the problem is, is, when you have a celebrity, you also might be scrutinized and put under a lot more pressure than you would if you were a normal accused of these very same things.

So, I don`t buy that. I think that we take celebrities down. In the history of this country, we`ve taken a lot of African-American celebrities down. So, I don`t buy into that. If they have the evidence, they are going to get the conviction. If they don`t, they shouldn`t convict him. And his friends are standing by him because they believe in him. They believe that he`s innocent, period.

GRACE: Well, Jane Velez, we`ll find out how many of those celebrities that Mesereau named off at the get-go are really going to show up.

We`ll all be right back in just a moment.

Jane Velez-Mitchell standing by at the courthouse.

Please stay with us.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JACKSON: I have been forced to submit to a dehumanizing and humiliating examination by the Santa Barbara County Sheriff Department and the Los Angeles Police Department earlier this week. They served the search warrant on me which allowed them to view and photograph my body, including my penis, my buttocks, my lower torso, thighs and any other area that they wanted to.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "LARRY KING LIVE")

KING: What do you make of all that`s happening with Michael?

LATOYA JACKSON, SISTER OF MICHAEL JACKSON: I think it`s overly exaggerated. I think it`s too much emphasis on it. I think that they should let him live his life and do as he chooses. Michael is a brilliant person. He`s a wonderful person. And I think, most of all, he is a fabulous father. He is a wonderful, loving father.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Speaking of, let`s go to Jane Velez-Mitchell.

How`s that custody suit going that Debbie Rowe filed against him?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: It`s still going strong in L.A. court. And that`s one of the reasons that prosecutors expected her to be hostile to Michael Jackson when she took the stand last week. And that`s why they were so surprised that she was so glowing about her ex. She does want custody of her kids back.

We have learned on the Thursday, the second day of her testimony, a very odd document was filed in her custody battle, basically, the old 2001 document that terminated the parental rights. We don`t know the significance, but, certainly, the timing of it was very odd, that they would refile that old document which has since been overturned. And we wonder, was it to send her a message? Did it rattle or spook her, as some sources have suggested it may have?

GRACE: Jane, Provencio is going to be the state`s last witness. Do you expect him to put the nail in the coffin on the conspiracy or will he also speak to the actual alleged molestations of the children?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: I think he is going to focus almost exclusively on the conspiracy case.

You see, he testified today. He was hired by one of the alleged unindicted co-conspirators Mark Schaffel and Michael Jackson to work on a music project and that Schaffel liked to put Michael Jackson on speakerphone to kind of gloat about this important person on speakerphone that he had. And that is how he heard all these conversations.

He said he knew Michael Jackson`s voice, because it`s the most distinctive voice in the world. And he said, except when he got angry, and then he would use that other voice, which some other people have described as a lower octave voice. And he is going to say he heard Michael Jackson - - we believe he`s going to say this -- talk specifically about this alleged conspiracy.

And they haven`t connected Jackson to the conspiracy yet. That`s why he is such a crucial witness. If he gets up and says this, that could revive a conspiracy case that a lot of people have said has kind of basically died.

GRACE: And, very quickly, in our few remaining seconds on Jackson, who will the first defense witness be?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, we have heard and it`s been publicly reported that three of the young men from the past who have insisted they were not molested by Michael Jackson will take the stand, including actor Macaulay Culkin, one, two, three, including perhaps some of their mothers and sisters.

GRACE: OK.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: And that could be dynamite for the defense.

GRACE: Jane Velez, thank you so much.

Everybody, we have got to switch gears very quickly. I want to talk to you about a young man missing, 22-year-old Patrick Welsh, a college student.

Tonight, in San Francisco, victims rights advocate Marc Klaas.

First to York, Pennsylvania, and WPMT reporter Jennifer Sherlock.

Hi, Jennifer. Bring us up to date.

JENNIFER SHERLOCK, WPMT REPORTER: Hi, Nancy.

Well, we got a tip call on Friday from a York college student who noticed pictures of Patrick Welsh all over campus. That`s when we quickly notified Patrick Welsh`s parents, met them on campus. And they are devastated. They told us they heard from him on April 14, I believe, a day before leaving for New York City on a train station in Harrisburg. That`s how he got up to Manhattan.

And since then, they haven`t heard from him. It`s been about a month now. And there aren`t many answers. They don`t know who he visited at Columbia University in Manhattan. And they`re just trying to find answers. Police are actively searching for him. They`re hoping cell phone records will lead them to possibly his last known whereabouts in Manhattan.

Unfortunately, though, they say a homeless man is the last person who used Patrick Welsh`s cell phone.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: OK, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. What is he doing with this kid`s cell phone?

SHERLOCK: They don`t know. They don`t know how Patrick Welsh, if he lost the phone or how the homeless man got in contact with the cell phone. But...

GRACE: OK. Hold on. Hold on, Jennifer.

SHERLOCK: OK.

GRACE: Marc Klaas.

Let me guess, Marc. He says he found the phone. What do you think, Marc? Have we lost a lot of crucial time?

MARC KLAAS, KLAAS KIDS FOUNDATION: Well, you know, he said he found the phone. They know who this individual is. He is wanted for -- he is wanted for an assault warrant, I believe, in New Jersey. So, this is not a good guy.

There are certainly strategies that can be employed at this point to try to find out what happened. What they do know and they are reporting that he did get to New York City. He did make contact with somebody using his cell phone, but they won`t say who, on the 15th of April. And, after that, the trail goes cold until his cell phone picked up by this homeless individual.

GRACE: Take a listen to this, Marc.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ADAM BUMGARNER, ROOMMATE OF PATRICK: He just seemed happy to get away for the weekend, didn`t seem anything out of the ordinary. It is just not like him to go away and not tell anybody.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: A 22-year-old college student missing, last seen headed to New York.

Jennifer Sherlock is a reporter with WPMT-TV.

Jennifer, it seems as if the whole trail went dead April 15.

SHERLOCK: Yes, it does. They don`t know.

The last phone call Patrick Welsh made was on April 15. Police aren`t releasing who that person was. They`re not even saying if that person is a suspect. But the last phone call made with Patrick Welsh`s cell from a homeless man on April 18. And, from there, they don`t know. They`re just hoping his cell phone can lead them to where his last known whereabouts are. They say his cell phone does have a GPS tracking system in there.

So, they`re hoping they can talk to people and find out. No one knows who he was visiting at Columbia University. That`s the problem. His parents don`t know who these friends were. Police don`t know who these friends were.

GRACE: OK.

We`ll be right back with the latest on a 22-year-old missing young man, Patrick Welsh.

But first to tonight`s all-points bulletin. The FBI and law enforcement are on the lookout for this man, Genero Espinosa Dorantes. He is wanted by the FBI in connection with the burning, beating, torture and murder of his 4-year-old stepson in Nashville, Tennessee Feb 2003, 34 years old, 5`6``, from Mexico, 175 pounds, black hair, brown eyes, scar on his face, tattoo of a heart on his left arm, armed and dangerous, the FBI offering a reward of up to $100,000 for info leading to his arrest.

If you have any information, please, call the FBI, 901-747-4300.

Local news next for some of you, but we`ll all be right back.

And, remember, live coverage of the Jackson trial tomorrow 3:00 to 5:00 Eastern on Court TV.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GRACE: Welcome back.

As you know, we here at NANCY GRACE want very much to help solved unsolved homicides, help find missing people. Tonight, take a look at Jessica Cox. She went missing from Macon, Georgia, my hometown, when she was just 7 years old. Now she`s 18. If you have any information on this girl, Jessica Cox, please call the Washington County Sheriff`s Office, 276- 676-6252. Please, help us.

Speaking of missing people, tonight, we are talking about a 22-year- old college student, Patrick Welsh, no history of going missing -- look at that smile -- on his way to visit friends in New York City, never seen again.

Here in the studio with me, psychotherapist Lauren Howard.

What is your take?

HOWARD: Well, it`s a tough one, because we don`t really have a lot of information.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Yes. We learned that with Jennifer Wilbanks.

HOWARD: I have to say this, Nancy. It`s been two weeks.

This kid was a writer, a prolific writer. His professor at school said he was a very good writer. Are people reading his writing? Are people looking for clues within the content of his exposition to find out? Nobody knows who the friends were he was going to visit at Columbia? It just seems like too much time has gone by and that the digging hasn`t occurred, because nobody just is a loner who, you know, disappears off the face of the Earth.

Either came upon foul play or he tried to disappear, which all of these are possibilities.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Marc Klaas, I`ve got one minute left. The first hours of the search, so crucial. What is your take?

KLAAS: Well, they most certainly are in a missing child case. This is very different. We know because of Jennifer Wilbanks what stress can sometimes do to a person.

It took a week to report this individual missing. But what they can certainly do that is very practical is create a flier. They can utilize the missing adult Web sites. They can go on and do a Google search of homeless shelters in New York City. And then they can deliver that flier to those shelters and ask for it to be posted. You can put his picture on. You can put the picture of the homeless guy that had his cell phone on. And that may just bring a break in the case.

GRACE: Well put, Marc Klaas.

Tonight, we are trying to find Patrick Welsh.

I want to thank all of my guests tonight, but, as always, my biggest thank you is to you for being with us tonight, inviting all of us into your home.

Coming up, headlines from all around the world.

I`m Nancy Grace, signing off again for tonight. And I hope I see you right here tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern. And, until then, good night, friend.

END


Aired May 3, 2005 - 20:00:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Tonight, "Bind, Torture, Kill": The BTK serial killer, Dennis Rader, pleads not guilty to 10 murders that we know of.
And tonight, we need your help. A missing college student, 22-year- old Patrick Welsh, last seen April 15 at a train station headed for New York City. Patrick, where are you?

And we go live to California and the Michael Jackson child sex trial. Testimony that Jackson`s ex-wife labeled Jackson a sociopath.

Good evening, everybody. I`m Nancy Grace. Thank you for being with us tonight.

Sociopath, that is how Michael Jackson`s ex-wife described Jackson, says a detective under oath. So why did Debbie Rowe change her story?

Plus, college student Patrick Welsh is missing tonight. Patrick, last seen at a train station in Pennsylvania two weeks ago, headed to New York City.

But first, BTK, "Bind, Torture, Kill," it`s a not guilty plea. BTK serial killer suspect Dennis Rader entered by the judge. The former dog catcher set for trial on multiple murders.

With us tonight from Memphis, Tennessee, Jeff Davis. You remember Jeff. His mother believed to have been a BTK murder victim in 1991. Also, in Denver, defense attorney Lisa Wayne; in West Palm Beach, Florida, defense attorney Michelle Suskauer; in New York, psychotherapist Lauren Howard.

But first, let`s go to Wichita, Kansas. KAKE-TV reporter Larry Hatteberg is with us.

Hi, friend. Bring us up-to-date.

LARRY HATTEBERG, KAKE-TV REPORTER: Well, I`ll tell you what happened in court today. Dennis Rader stood mute and the judge entered the plea of not guilty today.

And there`s one other thing that happened in court that was very interesting, Nancy. For the first time in any of Dennis Rader`s court appearances, as he walked into the courtroom, as the video you showed just a few seconds ago would indicate, as he walked into the courtroom, for the first time, he looked at the gallery and acknowledged the people in it. He`s never done that in court before. You saw that little nod right there.

And I was sitting on the front row there in court and caught his eye, and for just a moment, that`s a very -- it`s a very momentous feeling when that happens. Kind of little scary feeling. But that`s the first time that he`s ever acknowledged the people who were looking at him.

GRACE: Larry Hatteberg, I think you`re holding back. People that were in the courtroom said he looked at you specifically and nodded.

HATTEBERG: Some people have said that. I will tell you that we did make eye contact. Whether or not he was looking at me, I think we would have to ask Dennis Rader that particular question. But we did make eye contact.

And then I think his eyes slid past me, perhaps to see who else was in the gallery there, perhaps looking at some of the relatives of some of the victims who were sitting over to my left. But whether or not he made eye contact with me, I think that`s a question we still have to ask Dennis Rader.

GRACE: Larry Hatteberg, for our viewers that are not familiar with BTK, "Bind, Torture, Kill," why have police decided on Rader? Why do they believe Rader is the serial killer?

HATTEBERG: Well, through a series of things that happened. They caught pictures of his truck at a Home Depot, this following a package being left there that contained parts from another murder. They also traced in his last communication -- they traced a floppy disk to the church where he was president of his church.

Plus, they had a DNA sample from his daughter. And that matched in the familia segment. And so all these things put together, they were apparently able to use those to trace and go directly to Dennis Rader. Big story in...

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Larry, if you could describe for us the method of the BTK`s killings. We know of 10 killings that span several decades. Describe.

HATTEBERG: Well, bind, torture, kill. That`s what he liked to be known as, and that`s exactly what he did. What he liked and what he enjoyed most of all, this man we call BTK, was the power that he held over the victim. As he was killing the victim, he had incredible power over them. And he certainly enjoyed using that power.

And that gave him some sort of sexual satisfaction, to the best of our knowledge, as when he killed. He was a ritual killer. He would go through a little ritual before he actually made the killing.

And one of the people who he admired was a guy by the name of Harvey Glatman who was a serial killer who was executed in the 1950s. Harvey Glatman used to take pictures before...

GRACE: Oh, God.

HATTEBERG: ... before, during and after.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: You know what, Larry? I almost wish I hadn`t asked you. But I know I had to.

To Lauren Howard, psychotherapist, does that fit hand-in-glove with the way Rader acted in court today? Walking in and looking out to see what press was there, who was there, what family members of his alleged victims were there watching him?

LAUREN HOWARD, PSYCHOTHERAPIST: Well, you have this dichotomy between someone who is enacting this power play, which can only happen from someone who feels completely disempowered. So it`s not surprising to me that he wants to make eye contact. He wants you to see him.

In fact, the behavior of a serial killer of this nature is someone who wants to be seen, which is why he`s been sending these packages and notices to the newspaper. He wants to be seen. He screaming out, "See me. Contain me. Find me. Stop me."

GRACE: I want to go to a very special guest joining us tonight. Jeff Davis is joining us from Memphis, Tennessee. His mom, Dolores is believed to have been one of the victims of the BTK killer.

Welcome, Jeff. Jeff, you know that he did not speak in court today. But he obviously was thrilled there were media there, that there were family members of the alleged victims there all looking at him. What do you have to say to that?

JEFF DAVIS, MOTHER KILLED BY BTK: Well, first of all, I`m not surprised that he didn`t say anything. I think it`s fitting. The one thing we know about that cockroach is that the one time he`s not telling lies when his mouth`s shut. So that really didn`t surprise me.

I didn`t know that about trying to make some kind of quasi-eye contact with the audience. I would certainly like to have been there, because I have sure been thinking about making eye contact with him.

GRACE: You know, Jeff, the death of your mom affected your life in so many ways. Do you plan to go to the trial?

DAVIS: Oh, yes. I can`t go through the whole laborious, drawn-out process because I`m trying to manage a life and a career here, but I`ll be back there at least for her portion of the trial. And I`ll definitely be back to hear -- for him to hear my victim`s impact statement. I suspect it will be pretty powerful.

GRACE: To Lisa Wayne, defense attorney, joining us. Lisa, the reality is, under the law, when a defendant refuses to enter a plea in court, the judge will automatically enter a not guilty plea for them.

This is not a death penalty case. The state cannot seek the death penalty in that jurisdiction for the crime that occurred at the time that it did. So what`s the point? What is the point? This is a mind game, Lisa.

He`s just dragging it all out. He`s playing a big game with the victims` families because he doesn`t want to get shipped to the penitentiary. He wants to stay there in the county jail so his friends and his relatives can visit him until he gets a guilty verdict.

LISA WAYNE, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Nancy, you have got to remember something, and this is the most important thing that we have in the Constitution and in our system, OK? That`s the presumption of innocence. So no matter how grizzly and ugly the facts are, how many alleged victims you may have out there, he is presumed to be innocent.

And until and unless the state can prove him guilty, he has a right to a trial. So even as ugly and as horrendous as it may seem to us, this is a man who may be innocent. He may not have done all the things that he is alleged to do. And that`s why we have a trial, because we want those safeguards in place.

And I know we don`t like it all the time. But that`s the best system in the world.

GRACE: Well, I`m certainly not fighting with the founding fathers of the Constitution.

But Larry Hatteberg, let me ask you this. What is the evidence against him? I understand that there is DNA. He had possession of one of the victim`s driver`s license that he then sent to police about a decade later after it was taken.

You know what that means, Larry? This guy held on to this dead victim`s driver`s license for all these years. And then, just torture the rest of us, or the victim`s family, sent the driver`s license to the cops.

HATTEBERG: Well, Nancy, I want to tell you, they have rooms full of evidence, not drawers, not boxes, but rooms full of evidence. Because, as you know, this case has been going on now for some 30 years in Wichita, Kansas. That`s been three decades. That`s an incredibly long time for any case to go on.

So the prosecuting attorneys here, the district attorney, Nola Foulston, they have some powerful evidence at their disposal. The person who doesn`t have that evidence yet, of course, is the defendant, the attorney who`s been appointed as his public defender. It`s an uphill battle for him.

GRACE: Well, they will have the evidence under the discovery rule, so they`ll have all of the state`s evidence.

Very quickly, Michelle Suskauer, we are headed to break, but, you know, this guy, Dennis Rader, had basically gotten away with murder, according to the police. Why make himself known now? Why use the church disk, for Pete`s sake, that fits in the church computer? Why send the driver`s license via the mail? They got DNA off the stamp on the mail. Why now?

MICHELLE SUSKAUER, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: You know, Nancy, again -- and I agree with Lisa -- that you know, we cannot convict him before his arraignment. He has just been arraigned here. He is presumed innocent.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Yes. That`s not what I asked you. I asked you...

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: ... known now, all these years later. He had beaten the rap.

SUSKAUER: You know, Nancy, I can`t get into his mind and say what he wants to do. But the killer, the real killer, whether it`s him or somebody else, always wanted publicity here. So if it was him, this is something that he was always seeking. He was always seeking publicity and was angry when he didn`t get it.

GRACE: OK, we are taking a quick break. As you know by now, "Bind, Torture, Kill," a serial killer that terrorized a community for three decades has now been brought to justice, according to police. Today, a not guilty plea in a court of law. Stay with us.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your honor, we have received a copy of the information. We will waive a formal reading. At this time, the defendant would stand mute as to the plea and ask the court to enter the appropriate plea and set the matter for trial.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Very well. On the defendant standing mute, the court will enter a plea of not guilty. I will set this matter for jury trial on June 27th, 9 o`clock in the morning. Thank you very much.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHIEF NORMAN WILLIAMS, WICHITA POLICE DEPARTMENT: Dennis L. Rader has been arrested in connection with 10 homicides that span 31 years in the city of Wichita, in Sedgwick County. Dennis Rader`s currently in the Sedgwick County Detention Facility being held on a $10 million bond, $1 million per victim.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: A not guilty plea in a court of law today. The BTK suspect, "Bind, Torture, Kill," Dennis Rader, a former dogcatcher, has a not guilty plea.

To psychotherapist Lauren Howard. Dogcatcher, wants power over his victims, his victims female, a very young victim.

Larry, how old was the little girl victim? I think she was five. Larry Hatteberg, how old was his youngest victim?

HATTEBERG: I think she was five or six, s I recall. And that was in the Otero murder. That was the first murder where he killed a family of four.

GRACE: Oh, good lord. Now, Larry, there`s DNA in that case, right?

HATTEBERG: There was DNA in that case. There were DNA in several of the cases, because as I said earlier, he was a ritual killer. And while he didn`t sexually assault any of his victims, he would leave semen at the scene, sometimes semen on the body...

GRACE: Well, I don`t know what you mean by sexual assault, but when a dead body has semen all over it...

HATTEBERG: Yes. Well, to the best of our knowledge, he did not sexually assault his victims. Now, he did leave semen on them and around the area, according to the investigators. But to the best of our knowledge, he did not sexually assault his victims.

GRACE: OK, I`m just letting that sink in for a moment, that fine distinction you are making, the parsing of the words. But Larry, I know you`re reporting it just the way it came out from the court documents.

To Lauren Howard, psychotherapist, is it all fitting together for you? Are you getting a picture of this guy?

HOWARD: Absolutely. I mean, this is this existential abandonment issue. This is a person who...

GRACE: Whoa, whoa, whoa, existential abandonment?

HOWARD: He was somehow brutalized at a child. And that could be because he was under-disciplined, as opposed to over-disciplined. We have this, you know, tendency to think, oh, parents, you know, if we molest children...

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Why the power over his victims?

HOWARD: Because he felt disempowered, because he felt powerless. See me. Find me. It`s almost with a religious zeal, these murders. It`s almost this -- if there`s a god, where is he? Is this all there is? Please find me.

Which is why you have this consistent reaching out and sending documents and things to the newspaper, to the police. He`s begging to be seen, to be contained. This is a man who lacked a feeling of containment for his identity, which is why he`s binding. Binding is a perfect metaphor for that. Contain me. Bind me. Torture me. Brutalize me. Kill me. Put me out of my pain.

GRACE: I don`t know. I don`t know that he wanted to be caught so much, Jeff Davis, as to get attention, an attention-seeker, that feeling of power over innocent people, unsuspecting people. Many of these victims women, one a little girl, children, bound, tortured, and killed.

Jeff, you seem convinced that Dennis Rader is the BTK killer that killed your mom, Dolores. Why?

DAVIS: Well, I think now I am, but as I`ve said before, publicly, for a long time, I didn`t hold that opinion. But in this resurgence that he has been doing for the last year and calling the attention to himself -- first of all, I don`t think he wanted to get caught. If he wanted to get caught, he could pick up the phone and say...

GRACE: Me either.

DAVIS: ... "Hey, guess who I am. Here I am. Come get me." He was walking a fine line between this notoriety that he just thrives on and the reality of undoing himself, which I think is what happened. He did undo himself.

He knew it was a calculated risk, but he`s had the upper hand for 30 years. And he`s tried to show everybody that he was smarter than the police and the community. And it was worth it. His poor, pathetic, sick ego got a thrill out of that. And that`s only way to think of himself as a man.

And I agree with him on that. That`s the only way he can think of himself as a man, because he is not. And so he was opportunistic. He preyed on, obviously, people couldn`t defend themselves. And the whole profile fits now in retrospect.

But I guess specifically why I think or am convinced that he is the one that killed my mom was because he was an opportunist, and I`m sure he had plenty of contact to come in contact with my mom. They lived within a mile of each other. And as soon as I heard on the news they were sacking a house with a warrant that was over in that part of the county, red flags went up everywhere, because I thought, you know, that`s not coincidence.

Animals are territorial. And being the animal that he is, he was stalking out his territory. And so that was a red flag. My conjecture only, because understand, I know nothing official from any law enforcement.

I can only draw my own conclusions, the same as everybody else, based on what I see and hear. But my opinion is, something in that house connected him with my mom, because the next day, they said they had him, made him for my mom`s case. So inductive logic tells you they got something in that house.

GRACE: Yes, something out of the house. Before we go to break...

DAVIS: But that`s just my guess.

GRACE: Back to you, Jeff.

Elizabeth, could you show the picture of Jeff`s mother? What a smile. I mean, what a beautiful lady your mom, Dolores, was.

How has her murder affected your life?

DAVIS: Well, it`s completely redefined my life. And I`m sure I`m not saying anything that any other victim out there, the Oteros, or any of the others will tell you. When you go through something like this -- and I think you know yourself, Nancy -- that it winds up forcing you to have to redefine who you are and how you relate to the world around you.

But of course it left a hole that won`t ever be filled. That`s the reason I wrote the book was in memory of her and to try to give some others some solace to come from the same situation.

I think of her in terms of, she was a warm spot in life of everybody who ever knew her. And now everybody to a person who knew her feels kind of a cold draft in her wake. And so after 14 years, like anything else, it doesn`t have the enormity. And I don`t anguish and grieve over it like I did for the first five years, probably every day for the first five years, but I realize that her loss certainly diminished my life. And it diminished us all to a degree, because she was just that kind of a person.

GRACE: You know, I was trying to think about what to get my mom for Mother`s Day. I thought about you after the last time we talked on that -- must be such a hard, hard time for people that have lost their mother, much less like this, just left out outside like that....

DAVIS: Yes, we try...

GRACE: ... like discarding a trash on the side of the highway.

DAVIS: Yes, that`s exactly the words I used in the book, that`s exactly -- that`s his respect for women and mankind in general is to dump them like a bag of dirty laundry on the road.

GRACE: And I keep thinking about that little girl. I believe she was hung.

Ellie, she was hung, right, 5-years-old? And when they found the body, it being covered with semen that way, is just -- but we`ll see what happens at trial.

Quick break, everyone. Let`s go straight to "Trial Tracking": Today, jury selection begins for the sentencing phase against Lynndie England, remember her, the American officer who allegedly posed in photographs next to naked Iraqi prisoners. It was humiliating.

She allegedly held our country up to scorn. She has pled guilty to seven of the nine counts against her, including abuse of detainees and committing an indecent act. Under the deal, she could face as little as two years behind bars.

She says she was uncomfortable posing in the photos, but her then- boyfriend, Private Charles Graner, told her to do it. He was sentenced to 10 years behind bars for his part in the prison scandal.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEBBIE ROWE, MICHAEL JACKSON`S EX-WIFE: My kids don`t call me mom because I don`t want them to. They`re Michael`s children. It`s not that they`re not my children, but I had them because I wanted him to be a father. I believe that there are people who should be parents. And he`s one of them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Well, let`s just say that did not make a good impression on the Michael Jackson jury. Welcome back, everybody. Let`s go straight back out to the California courthouse.

Jane Velez-Mitchell with "Celebrity Justice" standing by. Jane, $200 million in debt, an alleged sociopath. What the hey is going on out there?

JANE VELEZ-MITCHELL, "CELEBRITY JUSTICE": It was a great day for prosecutors, Nancy. They scored on a whole bunch of points.

And investigator got up and said Debbie Rowe told him a year ago -- and that of course is Jackson`s ex -- that Michael Jackson was a sociopath who regarded his children as possessions. And also, we heard testimony that he is deeply in debt and a financial crisis.

But the most important thing, they got Rudy Provencio on the stand, the man that C.J., "Celebrity Justice," has been saying for more than a year now will be the key to the prosecution`s conspiracy case and connect Michael Jackson to this alleged conspiracy.

GRACE: With us at the courthouse, Jane Velez-Mitchell with "Celebrity Justice." We`ll all be right back. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(NEWS BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL JACKSON, DEFENDANT: I wanted to have a place that I could create everything that I never had as a child. So, you see rides. You see animals. There`s a movie theater. I was always on tour traveling, you know? And I never got a chance to do those things. So, I compensated for the loss.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: That is from Jackson`s first public statement, his response to the -- this round of child molestation charges.

Welcome back.

Let`s go straight back out that Jane Velez-Mitchell. She is standing outside the courthouse.

Jane, take a listen to Debbie Rowe.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEBBIE ROWE, EX-WIFE OF JACKSON: He would never hurt a child. Never. It`s not in him. It`s -- no way. He would never do anything inappropriate with a child. It`s the furthest thing from his mind. When those allegations came, `93 I think it was, he was devastated. I mean, talk about going for the jugular.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: They have got the soft music playing. They have got the fireplace roaring in the background. I know I`m getting set up for something with that, Jane Velez-Mitchell.

You know what? We heard completely different testimony on the stand today, right?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Absolutely.

Last week, Debbie Rowe took the stand and said wonderful things, along the same lines that you just heard, about Michael Jackson. Today, an investigator said that in a conversation taped just a year ago today, precisely to the day, she said Michael Jackson was a sociopath and the only reason she said nice things about him is that they had come up with a plan at the time of their divorce to say nice things about each other in public and that she decided to stick with that plan, which explains why she may have acted the way she did on the stand.

GRACE: Hmm.

Take a listen to Macaulay Culkin.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MACAULAY CULKIN, ACTOR: The thing is, with Michael is that he`s not very good at explaining himself. And he never really has been, because he`s not a very social person. You`re talking about someone who has been sheltered and sheltering himself, also, for the last like 30 years. And so he`s not very good at communicating to people and not very good at conveying what he is actually trying to say to you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Joining us tonight is Tom O`Neil, senior editor with "In Touch Weekly."

Tom, how many of his celebrity friends, Jackson`s celebrity friends, do you really think are going to take the stand?

TOM O`NEIL, SENIOR EDITOR, "IN TOUCH WEEKLY": Boy, that`s a great question, Nancy. How many will the judge allow? This case is about child molestation and conspiracy. What does Elizabeth Taylor know about that? What does Stevie Wonder know about that?

There are only so many character witnesses they`re going to allow here. But I think celebrity is what this whole defense hangs on. We don`t convict celebrities of serious crimes. O.J., Robert Blake, I mean, look at these guys. They got off and let`s presume possibly that they were guilty. We do convict celebrities like Martha Stewart of perjury or Winona Ryder of shoplifting.

But to win this case, Michael`s going after the celebrity quotient.

GRACE: Hmm.

I want to go to Debra Opri. She is a defense attorney also Jackson`s parents` attorney as well.

That is a good question, Debra. What do all these celebrities that the defense claims are going to be their witnesses -- and the whole thing with Elizabeth Taylor, freaky. Did you hear Michael Jackson on Jesse Jackson`s radio show talking about how Elizabeth Taylor had to spoon-feed him because he just didn`t feel like eating?

OK. What do they know about child molestation?

DEBRA OPRI, ATTORNEY FOR MICHAEL JACKSON`S PARENTS: Well, where do I begin? First, prosecution has put on their witnesses. The defense has a right to put on their witnesses. Their best witnesses are people to say, I was at Neverland. I never saw anything. I never saw child molestation. Will the judge tolerate many of those witnesses?

GRACE: Uh-uh.

OPRI: I don`t think so.

What key witnesses will be up there? Macaulay Culkin, because he was directly referenced in the 1108 prior bad acts testimony, which the judge allowed in. Other child celebrities which may have been guests, why not? All in all, we have to look at the summation of the prosecution`s case. And does Mesereau really have to put on that many celebrity people? I don`t think, at this point, he does.

I think he just has to pick and choose the key celebrity witnesses who will best demonstrate Michael Jackson`s character, in terms of the child molestation allegations.

Well, Michelle Suskauer, I agree with Debra Opri on this point. To bring people in, basically unrelated to the case, to say, hey, I didn`t see him molest anybody when I was around him, that`s usually inadmissible. It`s like in a murder case when you bring on the guy`s cousin and he says, well, when we had our family reunion, he didn`t murder anybody.

What does that have to do with these charges?

SUSKAUER: Well, but it`s significant.

And, first of all, also, it`s really -- I agree. It`s going to be the quality of the witnesses, not the quantity. So, it`s not bringing in 50 of these celebrities. And it just so happens he surround himself with celebrities. These are the folks who were at Neverland. These are the folks who saw him interact with children. It`s important and it`s material. And it`s very good character evidence.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Wait a minute. What about all those other people that saw him interact with children, specifically with their swimming trunks outside the shower with him, the kid in the shower?

SUSKAUER: You know, the jury is going to have an interesting time gauging the credibility of those witnesses. And a lot of them have a lot of baggage, Nancy, that have been brought out before this jury.

And, again, this jury is going to gauge. And you know what? They may be swayed by celebrity. Sure they would. But they`re going to bring in Elizabeth Taylor, Macaulay Culkin. And that may make a difference.

GRACE: You know what? I`m glad you said that.

Tom O`Neil, do you believe really that Elizabeth Taylor is going to cross the country and testify in a child molestation case? Talking about celebs, who do you think is going to come in and testify for Jackson, except maybe Macaulay Culkin?

O`NEIL: Your buddy Larry King, because we believe he`s integral to this case, if he really did hear some key evidence that day when -- What was it? -- the prosecuting attorney said that -- What was it? -- that -- oh, this family is just out for money.

Jay Leno we suspect is going to be a major player in this case, also accusing the mother and this family of being grifters. And, of course, Chris Tucker may give a whole different take on that trip to Miami, claiming that he`s the one, not Jackson, who said, we`re going south.

GRACE: Interesting.

What about it, Jane Velez-Mitchell? Do you really see an all-star lineup for the defense? How will the defense kick off its case?

Hi, Liz.

And will this last witness end the state`s case?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, I think, yes. Rudy Provencio will be the star witness for the state. And tomorrow, he is expected to talk about more details of what he allegedly heard Michael Jackson saying vis-a-vis this alleged conspiracy.

We are told that he took meticulous journal notes, that he`s going to testify that Michael Jackson knew about the alleged conspiracy, knew about the plot to allegedly get this family off to Brazil, that he was very disturbed by what he heard, that he also heard conversations between Schaffel and then Jackson attorney Mark Geragos, and that he took notes on this and was actually asked to deposit some checks vis-a-vis this alleged conspiracy and refused to do it because he was scared to get involved, because he thought this was something that just wasn`t right and he was disturbed, very upset by what he heard.

GRACE: Lauren Howard, what do you make of this blanket of people around Michael Jackson? If these charges are true, basically, they enabled it. They let it happen. They will claim they saw this. But what did they do about this?

HOWARD: Well, you know, this speaks to Tom O`Neil`s point about this -- what I call this emperor`s new clothes mentality, where you have this person that we have pedestalized. And we do this with our celebrities, with our sports figures.

GRACE: Pedestalize.

HOWARD: Yes.

GRACE: Is that really a word?

HOWARD: We have raised him up on a pedestal.

GRACE: I`ll go with it. You`re the shrink.

HOWARD: We have made him royalty. We have made him larger than life. And we have invested all of our affection and adoration in him. And so now to let him fall off of that pedestal and to say, how could this be, who could someone that I know...

GRACE: Uh-huh.

O`NEIL: The royal know, how could someone I know commit these heinous acts? I mean, that`s what we -- we set that up in our culture. And I think Tom`s point is well taken about celebrities not getting convicted for the big, bad, ugly crimes.

GRACE: Lisa Wayne, I have only got 20 seconds left, but I think that that is one of the strongest things Jackson has going for him, that people have loved him all these years and that they`re thinking, well, the Michael Jackson that I know through the TV, of course, couldn`t possibly have done this.

WAYNE: That might be true, but it cuts both ways, Nancy. And the problem is, is, when you have a celebrity, you also might be scrutinized and put under a lot more pressure than you would if you were a normal accused of these very same things.

So, I don`t buy that. I think that we take celebrities down. In the history of this country, we`ve taken a lot of African-American celebrities down. So, I don`t buy into that. If they have the evidence, they are going to get the conviction. If they don`t, they shouldn`t convict him. And his friends are standing by him because they believe in him. They believe that he`s innocent, period.

GRACE: Well, Jane Velez, we`ll find out how many of those celebrities that Mesereau named off at the get-go are really going to show up.

We`ll all be right back in just a moment.

Jane Velez-Mitchell standing by at the courthouse.

Please stay with us.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JACKSON: I have been forced to submit to a dehumanizing and humiliating examination by the Santa Barbara County Sheriff Department and the Los Angeles Police Department earlier this week. They served the search warrant on me which allowed them to view and photograph my body, including my penis, my buttocks, my lower torso, thighs and any other area that they wanted to.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "LARRY KING LIVE")

KING: What do you make of all that`s happening with Michael?

LATOYA JACKSON, SISTER OF MICHAEL JACKSON: I think it`s overly exaggerated. I think it`s too much emphasis on it. I think that they should let him live his life and do as he chooses. Michael is a brilliant person. He`s a wonderful person. And I think, most of all, he is a fabulous father. He is a wonderful, loving father.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Speaking of, let`s go to Jane Velez-Mitchell.

How`s that custody suit going that Debbie Rowe filed against him?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: It`s still going strong in L.A. court. And that`s one of the reasons that prosecutors expected her to be hostile to Michael Jackson when she took the stand last week. And that`s why they were so surprised that she was so glowing about her ex. She does want custody of her kids back.

We have learned on the Thursday, the second day of her testimony, a very odd document was filed in her custody battle, basically, the old 2001 document that terminated the parental rights. We don`t know the significance, but, certainly, the timing of it was very odd, that they would refile that old document which has since been overturned. And we wonder, was it to send her a message? Did it rattle or spook her, as some sources have suggested it may have?

GRACE: Jane, Provencio is going to be the state`s last witness. Do you expect him to put the nail in the coffin on the conspiracy or will he also speak to the actual alleged molestations of the children?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: I think he is going to focus almost exclusively on the conspiracy case.

You see, he testified today. He was hired by one of the alleged unindicted co-conspirators Mark Schaffel and Michael Jackson to work on a music project and that Schaffel liked to put Michael Jackson on speakerphone to kind of gloat about this important person on speakerphone that he had. And that is how he heard all these conversations.

He said he knew Michael Jackson`s voice, because it`s the most distinctive voice in the world. And he said, except when he got angry, and then he would use that other voice, which some other people have described as a lower octave voice. And he is going to say he heard Michael Jackson - - we believe he`s going to say this -- talk specifically about this alleged conspiracy.

And they haven`t connected Jackson to the conspiracy yet. That`s why he is such a crucial witness. If he gets up and says this, that could revive a conspiracy case that a lot of people have said has kind of basically died.

GRACE: And, very quickly, in our few remaining seconds on Jackson, who will the first defense witness be?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, we have heard and it`s been publicly reported that three of the young men from the past who have insisted they were not molested by Michael Jackson will take the stand, including actor Macaulay Culkin, one, two, three, including perhaps some of their mothers and sisters.

GRACE: OK.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: And that could be dynamite for the defense.

GRACE: Jane Velez, thank you so much.

Everybody, we have got to switch gears very quickly. I want to talk to you about a young man missing, 22-year-old Patrick Welsh, a college student.

Tonight, in San Francisco, victims rights advocate Marc Klaas.

First to York, Pennsylvania, and WPMT reporter Jennifer Sherlock.

Hi, Jennifer. Bring us up to date.

JENNIFER SHERLOCK, WPMT REPORTER: Hi, Nancy.

Well, we got a tip call on Friday from a York college student who noticed pictures of Patrick Welsh all over campus. That`s when we quickly notified Patrick Welsh`s parents, met them on campus. And they are devastated. They told us they heard from him on April 14, I believe, a day before leaving for New York City on a train station in Harrisburg. That`s how he got up to Manhattan.

And since then, they haven`t heard from him. It`s been about a month now. And there aren`t many answers. They don`t know who he visited at Columbia University in Manhattan. And they`re just trying to find answers. Police are actively searching for him. They`re hoping cell phone records will lead them to possibly his last known whereabouts in Manhattan.

Unfortunately, though, they say a homeless man is the last person who used Patrick Welsh`s cell phone.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: OK, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. What is he doing with this kid`s cell phone?

SHERLOCK: They don`t know. They don`t know how Patrick Welsh, if he lost the phone or how the homeless man got in contact with the cell phone. But...

GRACE: OK. Hold on. Hold on, Jennifer.

SHERLOCK: OK.

GRACE: Marc Klaas.

Let me guess, Marc. He says he found the phone. What do you think, Marc? Have we lost a lot of crucial time?

MARC KLAAS, KLAAS KIDS FOUNDATION: Well, you know, he said he found the phone. They know who this individual is. He is wanted for -- he is wanted for an assault warrant, I believe, in New Jersey. So, this is not a good guy.

There are certainly strategies that can be employed at this point to try to find out what happened. What they do know and they are reporting that he did get to New York City. He did make contact with somebody using his cell phone, but they won`t say who, on the 15th of April. And, after that, the trail goes cold until his cell phone picked up by this homeless individual.

GRACE: Take a listen to this, Marc.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ADAM BUMGARNER, ROOMMATE OF PATRICK: He just seemed happy to get away for the weekend, didn`t seem anything out of the ordinary. It is just not like him to go away and not tell anybody.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: A 22-year-old college student missing, last seen headed to New York.

Jennifer Sherlock is a reporter with WPMT-TV.

Jennifer, it seems as if the whole trail went dead April 15.

SHERLOCK: Yes, it does. They don`t know.

The last phone call Patrick Welsh made was on April 15. Police aren`t releasing who that person was. They`re not even saying if that person is a suspect. But the last phone call made with Patrick Welsh`s cell from a homeless man on April 18. And, from there, they don`t know. They`re just hoping his cell phone can lead them to where his last known whereabouts are. They say his cell phone does have a GPS tracking system in there.

So, they`re hoping they can talk to people and find out. No one knows who he was visiting at Columbia University. That`s the problem. His parents don`t know who these friends were. Police don`t know who these friends were.

GRACE: OK.

We`ll be right back with the latest on a 22-year-old missing young man, Patrick Welsh.

But first to tonight`s all-points bulletin. The FBI and law enforcement are on the lookout for this man, Genero Espinosa Dorantes. He is wanted by the FBI in connection with the burning, beating, torture and murder of his 4-year-old stepson in Nashville, Tennessee Feb 2003, 34 years old, 5`6``, from Mexico, 175 pounds, black hair, brown eyes, scar on his face, tattoo of a heart on his left arm, armed and dangerous, the FBI offering a reward of up to $100,000 for info leading to his arrest.

If you have any information, please, call the FBI, 901-747-4300.

Local news next for some of you, but we`ll all be right back.

And, remember, live coverage of the Jackson trial tomorrow 3:00 to 5:00 Eastern on Court TV.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GRACE: Welcome back.

As you know, we here at NANCY GRACE want very much to help solved unsolved homicides, help find missing people. Tonight, take a look at Jessica Cox. She went missing from Macon, Georgia, my hometown, when she was just 7 years old. Now she`s 18. If you have any information on this girl, Jessica Cox, please call the Washington County Sheriff`s Office, 276- 676-6252. Please, help us.

Speaking of missing people, tonight, we are talking about a 22-year- old college student, Patrick Welsh, no history of going missing -- look at that smile -- on his way to visit friends in New York City, never seen again.

Here in the studio with me, psychotherapist Lauren Howard.

What is your take?

HOWARD: Well, it`s a tough one, because we don`t really have a lot of information.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Yes. We learned that with Jennifer Wilbanks.

HOWARD: I have to say this, Nancy. It`s been two weeks.

This kid was a writer, a prolific writer. His professor at school said he was a very good writer. Are people reading his writing? Are people looking for clues within the content of his exposition to find out? Nobody knows who the friends were he was going to visit at Columbia? It just seems like too much time has gone by and that the digging hasn`t occurred, because nobody just is a loner who, you know, disappears off the face of the Earth.

Either came upon foul play or he tried to disappear, which all of these are possibilities.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Marc Klaas, I`ve got one minute left. The first hours of the search, so crucial. What is your take?

KLAAS: Well, they most certainly are in a missing child case. This is very different. We know because of Jennifer Wilbanks what stress can sometimes do to a person.

It took a week to report this individual missing. But what they can certainly do that is very practical is create a flier. They can utilize the missing adult Web sites. They can go on and do a Google search of homeless shelters in New York City. And then they can deliver that flier to those shelters and ask for it to be posted. You can put his picture on. You can put the picture of the homeless guy that had his cell phone on. And that may just bring a break in the case.

GRACE: Well put, Marc Klaas.

Tonight, we are trying to find Patrick Welsh.

I want to thank all of my guests tonight, but, as always, my biggest thank you is to you for being with us tonight, inviting all of us into your home.

Coming up, headlines from all around the world.

I`m Nancy Grace, signing off again for tonight. And I hope I see you right here tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern. And, until then, good night, friend.

END