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American Morning

Search Continues for Missing Boy Scout; 'Surviving The Game'

Aired June 20, 2005 - 07:29   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is in Cairo this morning, calling on Egypt to lead and define a democratic future in the Middle East. Secretary Rice delivering a speech earlier at Cairo's American University. She also met with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Secretary Rice said she hopes Egypt will take a major step towards democracy, beginning with its own elections in September.
A fourth suspect in the disappearance of an Alabama teenager is expected to appear before a judge in Aruba today. The arrest of disc jockey Steve Croes was announced on Friday. Among the three other people being detained in the case is the son of a Dutch judge. The boy's father was questioned over the weekend. Eighteen-year-old Natalee Holloway disappeared on May 30. No one has yet been charged in the case.

And a reminder: Go online to see more of our top stories. Just visit CNN.com, clock on "to watch," and check out the most popular stories, everything from politics and sports to entertainment. And the best thing about it, it is free on CNN.com.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, that's new.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: There's a catch. There's got to be a catch, right?

COSTELLO: There's no catch, Miles. It's free.

M. O'BRIEN: Wow! Wait. There's more, right?

COSTELLO: There's video. It's cool.

S. O'BRIEN: Ginsu (ph) knife.

M. O'BRIEN: Exactly.

S. O'BRIEN: It's just video, but it's still pretty cool.

M. O'BRIEN: We're working on the Ginsu (ph) knife.

S. O'BRIEN: Thanks, Carol.

M. O'BRIEN: All right. On a more serious note here. The search for a missing Boy Scout picks up again in about an hour-and-a-half in the mountains of Utah at first dawn. Eleven-year-old Brennan Hawkins has been missing since Friday evening. Wasatch County sheriff, Dave Edmunds, is in Kamas, Utah. He joins us now. Sheriff Edmunds, just bring us up to date. What's the plan this morning for the search?

SHERIFF DAVE EDMUNDS, WASATCH COUNTY, UTAH: We're going to hit it hard again today. We're expecting a large number of volunteers and also search-and-rescue operators. We're going to be back with our swift water team, searching in the Bear River. We're going to search that very meticulously today. We also have horse units, mounted units, four wheelers and ground pounders as well. Once again, we're going to hit it with everything we have.

M. O'BRIEN: Any specific direction or theory at this point? And any sort of trail that anybody has picked up on?

EDMUNDS: You know, unfortunately, at this point, no. This is our fourth operational period, and we don't have anything new. But a positive note has been that the weather has been very cooperative with us. And in my opinion, that's very positive.

M. O'BRIEN: All right. Tell us a little bit about what we know about this young boy. His parents are quoted as saying he's pretty familiar with the outdoors. Obviously, he's a Boy Scout, so he has some experience with all of this. Is he well-equipped to be lost in the woods?

EDMUNDS: No, he's not well-equipped. You know, he may have some basic knowledge and some survival skills. And we hope, obviously, that he's calling upon those. But when he went missing, he was wearing a pair of shorts, and he was wearing a long-sleeved sweatshirt. So, he didn't have a lot of provisional items with him and certainly wasn't dressed that warmly. But nevertheless, since it hasn't been that cold, that may not be a major issue.

M. O'BRIEN: What were the temperatures like overnight, over the weekend?

EDMUNDS: You know, they've been down into the 40s. You know, for this high mountain area, that's really not too bad. You know, it's not unusual for this time of year for it to get well below freezing up here. So, as long as the weather maintains and holds for us, we're hopeful.

M. O'BRIEN: All right. Let's talk about last summer. Garrett Beard -- Bardsley, I should say, another Boy Scout, same location, very similar circumstances. There you see his picture. He was never found. Is that just a terrible and tragic coincidence, do you think, sheriff?

EDMUNDS: You know, it could very well be. I wouldn't be doing my job properly if I didn't consider all of the possibilities. And we're certainly looking into the fact that this may have been a kidnapping. However, we don't have any reason to believe that at this point. We don't think that that's the case, and certainly don't have any evidence of that. But nevertheless, we're going to continue to work that angle, and I have detectives that are currently working on that right now. M. O'BRIEN: But you're doing that more or less as a routine type matter. You don't have any reason beyond that fact to launch a criminal investigation, correct?

EDMUNDS: Right. You know, it's not unusual in a missing person case to go ahead and run dual investigations like this. It's very common to do so. But, again, we don't have any reason to believe that it is criminal at this point. We believe right now that we have a missing child up here in the woods. And if you come up here and you see the area that we're looking for and you spend any time in the Uinta Mountains, it's really not that hard to believe that a young boy could go missing up here. It's much like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

M. O'BRIEN: And I understand the father of Garrett Bardsley, the boy lost last summer, is actually helping in the search. What's that been like?

EDMUNDS: That's correct. You know, Kevin Bardsley has just been outstanding. He's been through this before. He's been very helpful to the Hawkins family. He's been very helpful to us, quite frankly. You know, he spearheaded a lot of the volunteer effort. And we're very appreciative of his efforts up here.

M. O'BRIEN: All right, Dave Edmunds is the Wasatch County sheriff. We wish you well in the search today, sheriff.

EDMUNDS: OK, thank you very much.

M. O'BRIEN: All right -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: If you have kids, you probably spent a lot of the weekend shuttling them from one sports activity to another. Well, today we begin a new series. It's called "Surviving the Game." It's got tips for parents and kids to try to keep sports fun. Remember, it's supposed to be fun.

AMERICAN MORNING's Kelly Wallace joins us this morning.

Good morning. Nice to see you.

KELLY WALLACE, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Soledad.

And we begin with something I bet you've come across: overzealous coaches and parents. Just a couple, just a few here and there. Well, many of us have heard about them or come across them ourselves.

Well, one father, after learning something he found quite disturbing about his son's Little League coach, saw an opportunity to try and get a message out.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RICHARD DRESSER, LITTLE LEAGUE COACH: Nice. Way to hold on, Michael. Nice inning. Nice inning.

WALLACE (voice over): Richard Dresser remembers the day when his son, Sam, who was 10 at the time, learned his coach had a new strategy for the playoffs, and it involved cheating.

(on camera): I mean, when you heard this, you must have thought, what?

DRESSER: Yes, I went crazy. But being a writer, I also sort of stepped back and realized, hey, I can use this.

WALLACE (voice over): With his son's former coach in mind, Richard wrote a play called "Rounding Third," which is in theaters across the country. We asked the actors to perform for us.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As soon as you get on base, you look at me. If my hat is turned around like this, when you get to the next base, you slide. And when you slide, pretend to injure your leg. And why do I want you to do this? So we can take you out of the game and put in a faster runner, and maybe get a run we wouldn't have scored otherwise.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That isn't strategy. That's called cheating.

WALLACE: Mike is a coach who thinks fun should be the goal; Don, the win-at-all-cost type.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's my team.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's my team, too, and I don't want them to cheat. If we can't find a way to win fair and square, then I for one would rather lose.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You can't stand up in front of people in their formative years and say you would prefer to lose.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I would prefer to lose than cheat.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, would you quit wasting our time quoting from the handbook of curling?

WALLACE: Richard says he was surprised to learn he was a little like Mike and Don.

(on camera): What do you learn about yourself as you start coaching?

DRESSER: Well, I learned really unpleasant things, like I really want to win. You know, like I want the kids to have fun, but it's more fun to win than to lose.

WALLACE: So, you're a win-at-all-cost dad?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, no, no.

WALLACE (voice over): There are plenty of recent examples of overzealous coaches and parents: a Texas man charged with critically shooting his son's high school football coach, and parents and other fans banned from a Massachusetts arena after a brawl following a high school hockey game.

DRESSER: A lot of it comes out of the personal frustrations that parents feel in their own lives. They want to see their kids win. And it's very easy to go over the line.

WALLACE: And even the best intentions sometimes can get carried away.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have a confession to make, Don.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, what's that?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I really want to win.

WALLACE: And so the lesson of the play?

DRESSER: How do we raise our kids to function in this ruthlessly competitive society that's getting more ruthless with every passing day?

WALLACE: On this day, those words really hit home. Richard's son's team lost in the playoffs.

DRESSER: I talked to him a little bit, and I said, you know, what can you say when you play that well? The other part of it is you get up tomorrow morning, and, you know, you've got to put it behind you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE: Great advice there. So what else can you do to try to avoid an overzealous coach or parent or becoming one yourself? Well, first, do your homework. Find out the philosophy of your child's coach. Get to know the coach and other parents on the team. And take cues from your child, Soledad. Find out what they really want to do, not what you think they want to do.

S. O'BRIEN: I have to say, I think I've seen more overzealous parents than I've actually seen the overzealous coaches. So, what did he do after he learned that his son's coach was going to cheat? I mean, did he just take his son out of the team?

WALLACE: No. He was outraged. He got together and talked to the other parents. They had a representative from the parents approach the coach. They thought they had the problem solved. So, they're watching the game. They see a player...

S. O'BRIEN: He turns the hat around.

WALLACE: They see the player slide into second base. They think the kid is really hurt. So, they think, oh, OK. Well, later he's driving home with his son, and he says, "Sam, wow, how is so and so?" And he's like, "Dad, that was the play." They put in another runner, and that runner scored. So they won. So, the parents felt like, wait a second here, we thought we took care of the problem.

S. O'BRIEN: They were had.

WALLACE: They were had, and the team won.

S. O'BRIEN: Wow!

WALLACE: So, it was a very confusing lesson, Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes, right. Where was the lesson for his kid? Oh, man, that's a tricky story.

WALLACE: It is.

S. O'BRIEN: Kelly, a great story. Thanks a lot.

WALLACE: Sure.

S. O'BRIEN: What do you got tomorrow?

WALLACE: Tomorrow we talk about burnout, how kids can start burning out. Three out of 4 kids, according to researchers, start burning out of organized sports by the age of 12.

S. O'BRIEN: Oh, wow!

WALLACE: We talk about why and how to prevent that from happening.

S. O'BRIEN: All right, Kelly, we're looking forward to that. Thanks.

WALLACE: Sure.

S. O'BRIEN: For more on our series, "Surviving The Game," be sure to check out our Web site. It's at cnn.com. You're going to find importance information on how to make sure that your kids are getting the best experience out of sports -- Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: All right. It was an NBA nail-biter at the end of game five in the finals on Sunday. The play was in overtime when San Antonio forward Robert Horry found himself wide open to drop in a surprise tray right there. There you go. With less than six seconds to go, that gave the Spurs a winning one-point lead, 96-95, over the Pistons. The Spurs now hold a 3-2 lead in the best of seven series. Winning in Auburn Hills isn't easy.

And in golf, a long-awaited prize for a New Zealander, Michael Campbell emerging as the surprise winner Sunday at the U.S. Open in Pinehurst. Campbell takes home a trophy and a $1.7 million check. Tiger Woods, runner-up, 2 over par after shooting a 1 under par 69 in round four.

It's weather time.

(WEATHER REPORT) S. O'BRIEN: Well, 40 million credit cards may have been compromised because of a security breach. One card company says it's not as bad as you think. Andy is going to explain as he minds your business ahead.

M. O'BRIEN: I'm not sure I'm buying that. All right. What was the juror in the Michael Jackson trial doing at the party for the singer? All in our "90-Second Pop" segment ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

M. O'BRIEN: A fleet of Ferraris pulled into St. Peters Square Sunday, hoping for the blessing of Pope Benedict, and they got it. The 45 Italian sports cars belong to members of the Easy Rider Association. That's a different kind of easy rider over there, I guess. A Catholic priest in the square said the pope isn't making any kind of distinctions. He can give a blessing to anybody or anything. I guess the Maserati owners are heathens or something. I don't know. You know, actually, maybe when they get pulled over by the cop for speeding, they can say holy bleep, officer.

ANDY SERWER, "FORTUNE" MAGAZINE: Yes.

M. O'BRIEN: And it really will be holy bleep.

SERWER: I guess so. Can the pope bless the stock market, by the way, do you think?

M. O'BRIEN: I'm sure if they could get the stock market into St. Peter's Square, they would probably do it.

SERWER: That's what I'm interested in.

M. O'BRIEN: Let's talk about this -- Andy Serwer is here, by the way. And this I.D. theft thing. It keeps coming. We've been victims ourselves here.

SERWER: Right.

M. O'BRIEN: And it just keeps -- and this is big numbers now. What are we all going to do about this?

SERWER: Well, that's a great question. Let me just tell you what's going on here.

First of all, this is a massive hack attack that was first reported over the weekend, 40 million individuals with credit cards, Visas and Mastercards. This was at a third-party processor of credit card transactions. Mastercard is saying that really only 68,000 people are at high risk. And we'll have more about this later in the program.

I want to switch over and talk about the markets a little bit, though, Miles, because the price of oil is skyrocketing. In fact, in trading this morning hitting a record high, exceeding $59 a barrel. But, as you can see here, it's up about five bucks over the past week, which is just a whole lot.

The interesting thing going on here, Miles, though, is the stock market seems to have shrugged this off last week. The Dow up 110 points over the past five previous trading sessions. You can see here a lot of green up on the screen. And the market not too concerned about higher oil prices. In fact, what they're talking about on Wall Street is a rally in the fall and the fact that the fed may not have to raise interest rates.

Futures are lower this morning, though, because at some point these higher oil prices are going to catch up with the economy.

M. O'BRIEN: But the traders are not so worried about the oil prices, for whatever reason. It's baked in, as they say.

SERWER: Apparently, that's it, although, you know, at some point, when you start to see 60, 61 on the board...

M. O'BRIEN: Yes.

SERWER: ... I think people are going to sit up and take notice.

And one other note I should point out here: To learn more about these stories, you can go to money.com to get some more stuff on that hacking story, as well as oil prices.

M. O'BRIEN: All right, thank you, Andy.

SERWER: You're welcome.

M. O'BRIEN: We'll see you a little later -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Still to come this morning on "90-Second Pop," the red carpet gets a little rough for Tom Cruise in London. We'll tell you what led to this confrontation. That's coming up next on AMERICAN MORNING. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: I'm glad we're going to spend more time talking about Tom Cruise this morning. Welcome back, everybody. It's time for another episode of "90-Second Pop," with our stars this morning. Christopher John Farley from "TIME" magazine. Jessica Shaw from "Entertainment Weekly." Andy Borowitz from borowitz.com.

Good morning.

ANDY BOROWITZ, BOROWITZREPORT.COM: Good morning.

JESSICA SHAW, "ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY": Good morning.

S. O'BRIEN: I actually have to say, I have a whole new opinion of Tom Cruise after this incident. For people who don't know what I'm talking about, I'll set it up for you. He's in London for the premiere of his new movie called "War of the Worlds." And he starts doing an interview, a stand-up interview. The guy who is holding the mike, it's not really a mike. It's a squirt gun.

Let's take a look at what's happened.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOM CRUISE, ACTOR: I'm here giving you an interview and answering your questions, and you do something really nasty. You're a jerk. You're a jerk. Well, you know what? You're a jerk.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

S. O'BRIEN: I've got to say, he showed incredible self- restraint, considering the guy had just squirted him in the face with water. And you see the towel, and he's wiping his face off. Apparently, it was a British TV show, and it's supposed to be a joke. And I think they even said something like, well, we hope he took the joke in the tone it was intended.

BOROWITZ: Yes, sort of like "Punked."

S. O'BRIEN: Yes, hysterical.

BOROWITZ: I guess that was the idea. Yes, it was the prank that backfired. The only thing I can say about Tom, though, is that, you know, he's marrying Katie Holmes. A lot of times Katie and her friends are going to be over with super soakers and water pistols. And I just hope he gets used to this sort of thing. That's the only thing.

SHAW: I have to say I like him a lot more after this. He's been such an absolute freak lately that for him to act normally, and even, like you said, show some restraint and just kind of act, you know, with dignity and class and say, you know what? That was really rude. I would have expected him to clobber the guy or strangle him or something.

S. O'BRIEN: I was kind of waiting for him to take a swing at the guy, and it didn't happen.

CHRISTOPHER JOHN FARLEY, "TIME" MAGAZINE: Well, the key thing is, when you're squirted like that, you don't know what's in that gun.

S. O'BRIEN: It's got to be scary.

FARLEY: I mean, so there's a moment where you're like, well, what was I squirted with, you know? So...

BOROWITZ: I think he should take a leaf from Russell Crowe. Always carry a phone with you so you can then throw the phone when that happens.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes, exactly. Assault. Of course, on the other hand, then you're spending time in jail. It takes away from the whole nuptials.

BOROWITZ: Well... SHAW: And you've got a wedding.

S. O'BRIEN: You've got the wedding going on.

FARLEY: If any of these cameras squirt me, I'm going to lose it.

S. O'BRIEN: You heard that, guys.

BOROWITZ: Don't make me come over there.

S. O'BRIEN: Chris is not kidding. Friday night, the Jackson family...

SHAW: Yes.

S. O'BRIEN: ... holds their big shindig, because Michael has been acquitted. How surprised were you that juror number 10, her name is Pauline.

SHAW: Kerkos (ph).

S. O'BRIEN: Kerkos (ph).

SHAW: She shows up.

S. O'BRIEN: It's for fans, right?

SHAW: Yes. There were about 500 people that showed up, and it was at a casino sort of close to Neverland. Michael didn't show up, mind you. But juror number 10 did. I don't know how we're supposed to have faith in the jury system, honestly, when she shows up to this. Not only does she show up, but she says, when I heard the song "Beat It," I almost started crying.

BOROWITZ: Well, I don't know.

SHAW: I mean, come on.

BOROWITZ: You know, in the past, I've always avoided jury duty. But if I had known there was a big party at the end, I think I'd have a whole different view of it.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes, only certain cases. Sorry to disappoint you. Here's a little of what juror number 10, for those of you who don't remember who we're talking about, had to say in sort of the media round robins they did after the verdict. Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What mother in her right mind would allow that to happen? You know, just freely volunteer your child, you know, to sleep with someone. And not just so much Michael Jackson, but any person for that matter.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

S. O'BRIEN: Sort of an interesting point she's making.

BOROWITZ: I'm leaving the country now. I don't know. That's very scary to me that she sort is giving that, and then she's showing up at the party.

SHAW: Yes, yes.

BOROWITZ: That's strange.

S. O'BRIEN: I wonder if this portends maybe an investigation. Or is it just water under a bridge at this point?

SHAW: I think a lot of people sort of expressed that sentiment, though. I don't know that she should have said it at a press conference. And she even said that someone asked her at the party if she thought that, you know, perhaps the mother lost this case, and she said, I would love to answer that, but I probably shouldn't. I mean, she is definitely walking a line and perhaps crossing it.

BOROWITZ: Yes, a loose cannon.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes, it's kind of interesting. All right, let's talk about "Batman Begins." This is a kind of a good news/bad news story. We'll start with the good news, $47 million, number one.

SHAW: And a great movie.

S. O'BRIEN: A great movie.

FARLEY: The thing that was unusual it wasn't all that great, because it didn't go so far beyond the other "Batman" movies that had opened up. So, I think they wanted to have more industry experts, expected to open more. And the fact that overall box office is down from this time last year shows that there's still a problem at the box office. But Hollywood shouldn't be surprised, because, I mean, the fact is they wonder why people don't like the new ideas at the box office, and they're remaking sequels to old series that were TV series before from comic books that came out in the '50s. So, of course you aren't surprised.

S. O'BRIEN: Now that you mention that it is a little bit redundant. But at the same time, it's like the 17th straight weekend...

FARLEY: Right.

S. O'BRIEN: ... that it's been down.

BOROWITZ: Of course, this weekend, though, a lot of people were at that Jackson party, and I think that probably had something to do with it.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes. Well, this weekend, but what about the other 16 weekends?

SHAW: (INAUDIBLE) tickets. S. O'BRIEN: You know, I guess, because when you think about it, DVDs, video on demand. I mean, people just have many other options.

BOROWITZ: And games. Games are huge. I mean, a lot of people are spending their time doing that.

SHAW: Yes. And also it has a lot to do with the viewing experience. People are not that into going to the movies. You can have a huge screen at home. You don't have to wait in line. You don't have to sit behind annoying kids screaming or throwing popcorn.

S. O'BRIEN: That's not fun for you? When I bring my kids to the theater, that's not fun for you? Huh.

FARLEY: But you have to give people a choice, a real choice of something that's brand new. I mean, now that the other big movie opening up is "War of the Worlds," based on a movie from the '50s from a book that came out in the 1900s, you know, the 1800s. I mean, come on.

BOROWITZ: Do you know what I want to see? Batman ends. I will go to that.

S. O'BRIEN: And when does "Bewitched" open, which is based on the TV show of the same name?

BOROWITZ: That looks like fun, though. That looks like fun.

S. O'BRIEN: All right. Well, we'll see. You guys, as always, I thank you very much -- Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: All right. It's better to watch at home. The floors aren't sticky, right?

S. O'BRIEN: See? Another plus.

M. O'BRIEN: There you go, another plus.

Coming up, another huge security breach involving personal financial data, 40 million credit cards. Forty million are affected. Is it time you consider perhaps I.D. theft insurance? We'll look at that ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

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