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American Morning

Making the Case; Iran Hostages Claim; Airport Insecurity

Aired July 01, 2005 - 08:59   ET

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

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: No body, no murder. That may not be the case, actually. Aruban authorities say there could be a murder trial in the Natalee Holloway case. This as the search for the missing teen presses forward. Live to Aruba straight ahead.
A high-speed police chase on a Phoenix airport tarmac and some runways. It's not the first time. We're live on that story as well.

And Brooke Shields calling Tom Cruise ridiculous, and more, as the war between the stars heats up again on this AMERICAN MORNING.

ANNOUNCER: From the CNN Broadcast Center in New York, this is AMERICAN MORNING with Soledad O'Brien and Miles O'Brien.

M. O'BRIEN: Good morning to you. We're going to also tell you about an amazing coincidence. Two moms, not really friends...

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: No they know each other -- well, the first time around.

M. O'BRIEN: They meet in the labor and delivery room, basically.

S. O'BRIEN: A lot of bonding goes on there.

M. O'BRIEN: A very strange turn of events, you'd say.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes. There they are right there with their numerous children. The women were in the hospital after they delivered their babies the first time, then fast forward four years...

M. O'BRIEN: And they hadn't talked, right?

S. O'BRIEN: No, they decided, you know, hey, we're busy. It happened again.

M. O'BRIEN: There they are.

S. O'BRIEN: It's sort of like it's meant to be. They have to realize, they're meant to be best friends now.

M. O'BRIEN: I bet they're staying in touch now, yes.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes. We're going to have that story ahead. It's a very cute story.

M. O'BRIEN: All right.

We're always in touch with Carol Costello, who's here with the headlines.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm glad of that. Good morning. Good morning to all of you.

"Now in the News," we're following new developments out of Afghanistan this morning. A reconnaissance team has been missing since Tuesday right near the area where a U.S. military helicopter was shot down.

All 16 crewmembers onboard that helicopter were killed. It is said to be the worst single day death toll for U.S. forces since the Afghan war began almost four years ago.

A dramatic scene in Turkey. Take a look at this.

A man running in handcuffs is a suspected suicide bomber. He's trying to get away from the police. Police reportedly fired warning shots before eventually shooting and killing this man.

You can hear the gunshots there. This all happened outside of the justice ministry in Ankara. Even after the man was killed, authorities, of course, were still concerned about explosives. They sent in a specialist to diffuse a device he was wearing, and he is dead this morning.

It's being call the second largest wildfire in Arizona's history. The Cave Creek Complex fire near Phoenix has now grown to almost 200,000 acres. Firefighters say light winds and higher humidity are helping them contain the flames, but some residents are preparing for possible evacuations just in case.

And the most successful first day for a Tom Cruise movie ever. According to studio estimates, the sci-fi thriller "War of the Worlds" raked in more than $21 million on the open day in the United States, and it has earned more than $34 million since it open world wide on Wednesday.

So maybe there's an -- all the pundits were wrong.

S. O'BRIEN: There's a moral there.

M. O'BRIEN: There' a moral.

COSTELLO: Act crazy and your movie will do good.

S. O'BRIEN: Or any publicity is a good thing.

COSTELLO: Ooh, and you're going to talk about more publicity between Tom Cruise and Brooke Shields.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes. We've got that in "90 second Pop."

M. O'BRIEN: All part of the plan, I think, guys. I think so.

S. O'BRIEN: All part of the big plan. Interesting.

All right, Carol. Thanks.

M. O'BRIEN: All right. Thanks.

Aruba's chief prosecutor says the Natalee Holloway case could be prosecuted without a body. Investigators have no evidence that the missing teenager is dead. In fact, after a month of searching now, not a single trace has been found.

Chris Lawrence, live once again in Palm Beach, Aruba.

Chris, we've seen that tape this morning. This is exclusive tape of the two suspects being handcuffed together. A lot of questions this morning about police tactics in the wake of seeing that. Right?

CHRIS LAWRENCE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Exactly. Well, possibly, that was because police and prosecutors know they are only guaranteed three more days to interrogate these suspects. They were some of the last people to see Natalee Holloway on the night she disappeared, but come Monday, a judge could rule there's not enough evidence to keep them in custody.

Take a look here. This exclusive CNN video from last night.

We watched investigators take two of the suspects out of the police station. Joran Van Der Sloot and Deepak Kalpoe were handcuffed together. And just reading their facial expressions and body language, they appear to be fairly calm, although we're told that they did -- they were interrogated for several hours.

And earlier on AMERICAN MORNING, the Aruban government spokesman said police are using different techniques to try to make sense of their stories.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RUBEN TRAPENBERG, ARUBA GOVERNMENT SPOKESMAN: The investigators have their techniques that they use to check the stories, see if they fit. If not, if two guys are put together, it's to find out more of what they have to tell each other.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LAWRENCE: And while Natalee Holloway's family keeps one eye on what's happening inside, they are getting a lot of support from the outside.

Yesterday, the people of Aruba held a vigil for Natalee and her family right outside the hotel where Holloway had been staying. Even some tourists gave up a bit of their vacation to show their support for the family. And Natalee Holloway's father said he was at rock bottom earlier this week, but that vigil, last night and yesterday, it really rejuvenated him. He feels now he's got a lot more energy to keep this going -- Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: Chris Lawrence, in Aruba. Thank you very much -- Soledad. S. O'BRIEN: The White House is investigating the newly-elected president of Iran. Several former hostages say that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was involved in the 1979 U.S. embassy takeover.

The photo on the left, if we can show that, that's the 1979 student photo of Ahmadinejad. On the right is the photo from the embassy siege.

Our military analyst, General David Grange, was an Army Ranger involved in Operation Eagle Claw, the aborted mission to save the hostages. He joins us this morning.

It's nice to see you, General. Thanks for talking with us.

BRIG. GEN. DAVID GRANGE (RET.), U.S. ARMY: Good morning.

S. O'BRIEN: The plan was eventually scuttled. But what exactly was the plan? And what happened?

GRANGE: Well, the plan was obviously to rescue the hostages out of the American embassy in Tehran. It was scrubbed during the infiltration phase in Desert I. The role I was involved in was to extract that force, rescue force and the hostages out of Iran, if that was successful, at a remote airfield to be seized by the Rangers.

S. O'BRIEN: So Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have you heard this name before?

GRANGE: I don't recall the name before. But, you know, when you -- the interviews of those that were hostages think that that may have been the same individual, and the conditions they lived in and how you attune yourself to your captors, it resonates with you, movements, looks, and everything else. So there's some credence to the hostages if they think that's the guy.

S. O'BRIEN: The administration vows to investigate. But you have to wonder a couple of things.

For one thing, the hostage-takers' faces, if you look at videotape, was not covered some 26 years ago. Also, now you have the new president-elect of Iran a big focus for the administration. Is it at all possible that the administration is not aware of the background of this person?

GRANGE: Oh, I think the administration has a lot of information, and it's been following this character closely. It's the job of the intelligence services of this nation to do so. Not only the president-elect, but also all of the hard-line leaders of Iran.

S. O'BRIEN: So for those hostages who say they do not recognize the hostage-taker as the new president-elect, could they just not make the connection? Or do you think that there's a good chance that it's not the same guy?

GRANGE: Oh, there's a chance that it's not. But those that think it is may have had close contact with that hostage-taker. You'll remember, the people were segregated. They weren't all in one spot. They were in different locations throughout the embassy compound. So it just depended on who had contact with who. And so, yes, there's going to be hostages that don't have a clue who this guy is.

S. O'BRIEN: What is your -- regardless if he's the hostage-taker or not, what's your biggest concerns? Or do you have big concerns about Ahmadinejad taking over Iran?

GRANGE: Well, you know, I think the issue is that Iran's always been a concern. It could be -- many say it's more dangerous, was more dangerous than Iraq.

When you combine the hard-line leadership of Iran, you combine the development of nukes, nuclear weaponry, if that's the case, if, in fact, that's what they're doing to do -- and I believe it is -- and their support for terrorism, especially the militant arm of Hezbollah, and then you throw a guy like this into now being one of the leaders, a key leader, it's a dangerous combination.

S. O'BRIEN: General Grange, nice to see you. Thanks for talking with us this morning.

GRANGE: Thank you.

M. O'BRIEN: California has been taking a beating from torrential storms during the past year. The wettest rainfall year for Los Angeles for more than a century. But with all that wet weather and all that damage it caused, the rainfall year that ended Thursday fell about an inch short of the all-time record set for the L.A. area in 1884. This year's storms took a heavy toll, causing dozens of deaths and hundreds of millions of dollars in damage.

(WEATHER REPORT)

M. O'BRIEN: Still to come, a dramatic police chase caught on tape. A truck makes its way to the runway of the Phoenix Airport. Never got airborne, but he was whizzing past the planes and police. Up next, we'll talk with an airport official to talk about what's being done to prevent this type of security breach from happening again. By the way, this is the second time that happened here.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes, exactly.

M. O'BRIEN: What's up with that?

S. O'BRIEN: Also ahead this morning, how much you willing to pay? Will increasing prices at the pump put the brakes on holiday weekend travel? We'll take a look at that.

M. O'BRIEN: And nine concerts, nine cities, one great weekend of music. More than a hundred of the world's top musicians uniting money to raise money for the hungry in Africa. We'll have a live report from one of the venues, Philadelphia, ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

M. O'BRIEN: Security being questioned this morning at Phoenix, Arizona, Sky Harbor International Airport. A wild chase which was captured, of course, by the TV news helicopters. The man crashed his truck -- stolen truck through barriers, onto the tarmac, got on to a runway right beside a 737 or two.

Deborah is the spokeswoman for Sky Harbor Airport. She is live from Phoenix this morning on what is obviously a busy morning for her.

Good to have you with us.

DEBORAH OSTREICHER, SKY HARBOR AIRPORT: Hi, Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: All right, Deborah. First of all how did this all initially unfold? Give us the basics of the event.

OSTREICHER: Well, as you have on a lot of your video, somebody in a large Titan Nissan truck was able to plow through the fence and get on to the taxiway of Sky Harbor Airport. We're really lucky that he did not make it on to a runway.

He was on a taxiway going past some planes that we had come to a stop because we had known that he was out there and going to be near them. So they did all come to a stop.

M. O'BRIEN: And for a little while, air traffic controllers shut down arrivals and departures?

OSTREICHER: That's right. They shut down arrivals and departures.

There was one plane that was already on the final approach. So they did allow him to come in because he was not in an area near where this was going to be a dangerous problem. There was another aircraft on his way in, and they asked that one to circle around the airport so that he wouldn't be in danger or put anyone on the runway in any danger.

M. O'BRIEN: Naturally this morning there's a lot of questions about the security of the perimeter of this airport. You know, cyclone, chain-link fence kind of thing.

You had a similar incident back in 2003, although I think this car didn't get through. It was a lighter car. But in any case, it there much thought this morning about trying to improve the security of, you know, sort of the ramparts of the airport?

OSTREICHER: Of course. As you can imagine, we were in meetings all day yesterday, and we'll continue to work on it all day today to figure out just exactly what we need to do in this particular area.

Now, as your expert said last night with Wolf Blitzer, Richard Falkenrath, nothing is 100 percent. But in this particular area where this guy broke through, we're required to have a six-foot high chain- link fence. And at Sky Harbor, we went above and beyond and put an eight-foot high fence. And obviously, that wasn't enough.

So we need to figure out today exactly what has to be put there to prevent this from happening in the future.

M. O'BRIEN: Well, you know, on the front door of the airport these days, when you drive up to get on a plane, you see those concrete jersey barriers, and you can barely stop your car to get out. Then you get frisked, you take off your shoes, all that kind of stuff.

Is there enough attention being paid to the back side of the airport, this sort of thing? Should there be more concrete barriers on the perimeter. Or is that just impractical?

OSTREICHER: No, that's an excellent question, Miles, because, you know, we went through and evaluated the airport, we continue to evaluate every day. We are constantly looking at those things.

And you're right, throughout most of the airport we have these concrete barriers or blockade fences or blocked walls. I mean, there are so many different things that we have throughout the airport on the roadways and near where somebody could get in.

This particular area was sort of in a remote area by the fire station. In our initial assessments, we didn't determine that that was a high-risk area. So we just went above and beyond with a two- foot higher fence. Now we know that wasn't enough, so we'll be working on that today.

M. O'BRIEN: Are you concerned at all this morning that this offers an example to perhaps a terrorist bent on suicide, if you get that close to an airplane with a vehicle?

OSTREICHER: Well, yes and no. I think the important thing to keep in mind here is that this was simply a car chase, a guy who didn't intend to come to the airport, from what police tell us. He was just trying to escape police.

And the biggest thing you don't want to do when you want to escape police is go to the airport. It's one of the highest, most secure areas in the country. And you have so many eyes and ears on you, your every single move.

The control tower was watching him, the police were watching him, the cameras, everything. So if want to lose police, the airport's the worst place to go.

M. O'BRIEN: But if you're bent on something -- some sort of strange terrorist suicidal act, you could do it.

OSTREICHER: Well, I guess, hypotheticals, there are a lot of hypotheticals. And we're working every day with the TSA, the federal government, to figure out what precautions need to be taken in every area.

We have layers of security, though. So if you break through the fence, there are a lot of other things right behind that that are going to stop you as well.

So no one thing will do it. So just the fence, no. But the police were right there, the control tower, and all of our security measures, which stopped this guy as soon as he got on to the airfield.

M. O'BRIEN: Deborah Ostreicher, spokesperson for the Sky Harbor Airport in Phoenix. Thanks for your time this morning.

OSTREICHER: Thanks, Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: All right.

S. O'BRIEN: Well, it is the mother of all coincidences. Up next, the story of two moms who met four years ago in a hospital maternity ward. They figured they'd never see each other again and parted ways. But then, four years later, there they were in the same hospital room again. We have their story up next.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: Kerri Culkin and Michelle LaPlaca first met in a hospital room after giving birth to their daughters back in 2001. They quickly became friends but they failed to stay in touch.

Well now, four years later, fate has put them back together again. Both were giving birth to their second children at the same hospital, and they ended up in the same hospital room together again.

Kerri Culkin and Michelle LaPlaca join us this morning.

Nice to see you. We should mention, ladies, you got your kids with you as well, the newborn babies, the 9 and 10-day-olds, Kiara (ph) and Jake. And then your big girls, Kiley (ph) and Samantha.

So welcome to all of you. Thanks for talking with us.

A couple of Long Island girls. Me, too, I might add.

Take us back to July 2001. Kerri, why don't you start. How did you meet Michelle?

KERRI CULKIN, NEW MOM: Well, she came into the room after she delivered her first child, like 11:00 at night. And she was having a couple of problems. So I was trying to help her out. And we ended up talking for the rest of the evening, and just kept talking throughout the rest of our stay.

S. O'BRIEN: So then, Michelle, I was kind of surprised. Why wouldn't you -- it sounds like you hit it off. Why not remain friends?

MICHELLE LAPLACA, NEW MOM: Well, it was funny. I guess at the time we were both overwhelmed with new babies. And, you know, you always meet people and say that you're going to stay in touch. And you never do.

So we were just honest with each other. We figured we'd have a lot on our plate, and we just kind of got discharged and went our separate ways.

S. O'BRIEN: All right. So then fast-forward for me, Kerri, if you will, four years. You're in the hospital having your second child -- right in front of us there -- and all of a sudden this woman's wheeled in. When did you figure out it was, in fact, Michelle?

CULKIN: Once we started talking throughout the night, we decided that there was too many things that we knew -- that I knew about her. And her voice sounded so familiar. And the things that happened she was bringing up the last time that I asked her when her daughter's birthday was, because she told me she had a 4-year-old. And as soon as I heard her birthday was the same day as mine, I knew that we had met before.

S. O'BRIEN: So, Michelle, Kerri says, hey, it's me, Kerri. I'm your roommate from the last time. What was your reaction?

LAPLACA: Well, it didn't quite happen like that. We just -- like she said, she said, "When was your daughter born?" And I -- you know, I said, "July 28th." And when I said July 28th and I saw her facial expression, we both just kind of froze.

And we just knew. You know? It was more of us just staring at each other for five minutes in an evening.

S. O'BRIEN: Utterly shocked. Now, you both had your babies both times at Good Samaritan Hospital in West Islip in Long Island. But you got -- the second time around you didn't have the same due date. One was early. One was late by a decent amount.

I'm told there's a one in 18,000 chance that this could happen. So I'm curious now, have you decided, there's clearly a higher power saying, okay, ladies, stay in touch? What do you think?

CULKIN: Yes.

LAPLACA: Yes. We will be staying in touch this time. Definitely.

S. O'BRIEN: Well, congratulations to you. Don't you love having the 4-year-old pulling on your hair while you're holding the baby at the same time?

CULKIN: Oh, yes. Isn't it great?

LAPLACA: Too much sugar this morning.

S. O'BRIEN: Congratulations. And you look great for nine days and 10 days postpartum.

CULKIN: Thank you.

LAPLACA: Thank you.

S. O'BRIEN: Wow. You go, ladies. Thanks for talking with us. It's a great story. Hope you do stay friends for a long time.

CULKIN: Thank you.

LAPLACA: Thank you.

S. O'BRIEN: You want to stay with us. We have much more ahead this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

O'BRIEN (voice-over): Ahead on "90 Second Pop," war of the words. Brooke Shields strikes back at Tom Cruise for his comments about mothers and postpartum depression.

And it's official. Ben and Jen, version 2.0, are married and they're expecting a baby. We've got the lowdown on their top secret surprise wedding ahead on AMERICAN MORNING.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: Good morning. Welcome back, everybody.

Let's talk about this morning on AMERICAN MORNING, where "90 Second Pop" is ahead.

M. O'BRIEN: You know, it's time to put the Cruise control on. Don't you think? I've had enough.

S. O'BRIEN: You've had enough?

M. O'BRIEN: I've had enough of Tom Cruise. I really am so over it.

S. O'BRIEN: I think it's an interesting development.

M. O'BRIEN: OK.

S. O'BRIEN: As you know, Brooke Shields, who suffered, as she writes in her book, from postpartum depression, took a little offense, I think that's fair to say, with Tom Cruise's interview with Matt Lauer, which was in and of itself a little bit strange. But anyway...

M. O'BRIEN: A little bit. You think a little bit?

S. O'BRIEN: Very strange.

M. O'BRIEN: Off the charts strange.

S. O'BRIEN: Anyway, he felt that -- Tom Cruise felt that Brooke Shields should have tried vitamins and other sort of methods, not gone to the drugs. She says, hey, the drugs helped me regain my life. M. O'BRIEN: And now let's talk about the market, shall we? From postpartum to the bell.

S. O'BRIEN: That's a smooth segue there, the bell ringing on Wall Street this morning.

M. O'BRIEN: That's as good as I can get for you.

(STOCK MARKET REPORT)

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