Return to Transcripts main page

American Morning

Bye-Bye Bandit; Why Roe V. Wade?

Aired November 15, 2005 - 09:33   ET

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

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, let's talk about the cell phone bandit, shall we? She allegedly is under arrest here. Her name is Candice Rose Martinez, and she's in custody after an alert FBI agent responding to a BOLO -- that's a be on the lookout for, BOLO, as they say -- for her vehicle spotted her at 3:35 a.m. Eastern Time, local time this morning, under arrest, questioning and the process begins of answering some of our questions.
Mary Anne Jennings who is with the Fairfax County Police Department and joined us yesterday about this time to talk about this.

Good have you back, Mary Anne, and I'm glad we have an arrest to talk about this morning.

First of all, can you hear me okay?

MARY ANNE JENNINGS, FAIRFAX CO., VA. POLICE DEPT.: Yes, I can.

M. O'BRIEN: OK, good.

JENNINGS: Yes, I can.

M. O'BRIEN: I wasn't sure. The arrest came on the part of an FBI agent being held by local authorities? Will these be federal charges? Will these be federal charges? How will this work out? Because robbing a bank, I think, is a federal offense, right?

JENNINGS: Right now she's being charged, or she's being held on state charges, which are Fairfax County charges and Loudoun County charges for the bank robberies. There are federal charges that are pending, but I don't know when they'll be filed.

M. O'BRIEN: OK. So as to what jurisdiction this will ultimately be in, way too early to say. I assume that investigators have had an opportunity to question her, correct?

JENNINGS: Yes. She's been in our police headquarters building now for several hours since she was taken into custody this morning, and she's been questioned by both the FBI , and our detectives and several other localities that are working on their own cases against her.

M. O'BRIEN: OK. And we know, of course, four cases that she is apparently linked to, all Wachovias. Can you share with us any answers to all of the questions we have like, who was she talking to? Was she really talking to anybody? Why the Wachovias? Any of that stuff? M. O'BRIEN: You want to know that stuff?

JENNINGS: Yes, I do.

M. O'BRIEN: Yes, I do.

JENNINGS: Actually, so do I, Miles, but I haven't heard from investigators yet, and I may not hear from investigators what the answers to all those questions are. They play things pretty close to the vest when they actually start getting information.

M. O'BRIEN: OK. What is the next process? I understand she will be transferred that the point. We might actually get a glimpse of her and might actually see her without a phone or attached to heard, to get a glimpse of that. What happens next?

JENNINGS: What happens next is that once we finish questioning her, she'll be walked over to our adult-detention center and turned over to the sheriff's department to be held in our jail on the charge of bank robbery from both Fairfax County and Loudoun. After that, it will be up to the federal authorities to file charges, and they may take over the case against her and move her into a federal holding facility. I don't know that yet. That's strictly up to them.

M. O'BRIEN: And once it gets into that level, it gets to be very serious business, I imagine, with all the sentencing guidelines and that sort of thing. Do you have any idea of what sort of possible sentence she could face if found guilty.

JENNINGS: No, I don't. Sorry I'm not up on the federal law and what they might be able to do with her.

M. O'BRIEN: All right.

JENNINGS: But do I know that she faces four bank robbery charges. So it could be substantial.

M. O'BRIEN: And you still don't know how much money she got away with, do you?

JENNINGS: If I knew, I couldn't tell you.

M. O'BRIEN: You'd have to kill me, right?

JENNINGS: No, no, wouldn't have to kill you, but as I mentioned yesterday, I think, we just don't talk about the details until the court case is in a courtroom. Sorry.

M. O'BRIEN: Mary Anne, final question, did she get a phone call? Did she get to make a phone call?

JENNINGS: I would assume that they're following the letter of the law. So my assumption is that, yes, she did.

M. O'BRIEN: Cell or otherwise, she did get her phone call.

All right, Mary Anne Jennings, keep us posted there in Fairfax County, Virginia.

All right, Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Well, a 20-year-old letter written by Samuel Alito is raising some new questions about how potentially the new Supreme Court nominee could vote on any issues, including Roe v. Wade coming before the court, or affirmative-action cases coming before the court.

Here's what the letter says in part, "I am and I've always been a conservative, and I'm particularly proud of my contributions in recent cases in which the government has argued in the Supreme Court that racial and ethnic quotas should not be allowed and that the Constitution does not protect a write to an abortion."

Well, joining us this morning is senior analyst Jeff Greenfield to talk about all of this. We know, obviously, it's sort of like throwing another log on the fire. Why does the debate always boil down to abortion at the end of day?

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SR. ANALYST: This really didn't start until the nomination of Judge Robert Bork in 1987. He's written extensively and very strongly that there was no general right to privacy in the Constitution. He not only thought Roe vs. Wade was wrong, also took issue with the Griswald case. That's a 1965 Supreme Court decision that struck down Connecticut's law banning birth control, even for married couples, and Bork's notion that there was no right of privacy in the Constitution seems so out of the mainstream, to use the cliche, but he was rejected by a 58-42 vote.

Now ever since then, even conservative nominees have said they don't want to revisit Griswald. That's the birth-control case, so that's sort of off the table.

So that leaves really abortion as the one that stirs up a battle. Now look, it doesn't always mean controversy. Justices Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg were both confirmed with virtually no opposition. Even though it was pretty clear how they'd vote. But when there is any kind of fight, abortion always seems to go front and center. Most nominees resolute and say, well, I can't talk about how I'd vote in a case, because abortion might come before the court.

So this Alito letter seems to say, oh, we have a real hint of how he might vote, and that's why this is going to be stirred up again.

S. O'BRIEN: At the end of, is it really about state's right versus federal rights, not necessarily about abortion or not abortion?

GREENFIELD: Well, what's interesting is that abortion as an issue doesn't come up before the Supreme Court that often. There's a case on the way up that's going challenge the new late-term abortion ban that the Congress passed and President Bush signed, but in my view at least, and in the view of people who I would say know more than I do, the really significant areas, where the court is likely to stay involved in controversy. It has to do with limits on federal power. How much the states control things like assisted suicide or medical marijuana or gun control laws.

Arlen Specter, who chairs the Judiciary Committee, is very, very unhappy with how often this Supreme Court strikes down federal law and says you've overreached. But you almost never hear about that, because abortion is so dominant the theme in public argument about this.

S. O'BRIEN: And is that because at the end of day, politically, you know, it's what motivates people? It's what gets everybody on either side screaming on, frankly, cable talk shows about how they feel. It's emotional.

GREENFIELD: I really think it is political. I mean, in the Alito letter, for instance, he suggests -- the 20-year-old letter you talk about -- he suggests he disagrees with the Supreme Court decisions on apportionment. That implies....

S. O'BRIEN: What's apportionment?

GREENFIELD: Well, one man, one vote. They can't draw congressional districts or legislative districts on balance in terms of population. The warrant court said, sorry, one person, one vote is how you have to do it. Now if Alito really means he disagrees with that, you'd thank that would stir up some controversy or at least some raise eyebrows.

But the reason is, both political parties have gotten progressively more adamant about their positions on abortion. The Republican platform has an endorsement of the human life amendment, which would outlaw abortion everywhere. It wouldn't leave it up to the states. The Democrats, their interest groups are impatient with any restrictions on abortion, even Democrats who vote for parental notification.

So I think the cause of this politicization, no matter what people say, there is a litmus test on both sides. But that's -- you have to say this, so there is no litmus test, right?

S. O'BRIEN: Right. I mean, it's the first thing you hear about any candidate. We do not have a litmus test, it's not about abortion. But really, it is.

GREENFIELD: Except Al Gore and John Kerry both said we'd never name a Supreme Court justice who thought would overturn Roe. And on the right, one of the reasons they didn't like Harriet Miers was they couldn't be sure she'd overturn Roe.

And one last point. These interest groups really don't care how you get to this decision. That is, what your judicial philosophy is. They say they do. There are plenty of liberals who think Roe versus Wade, as a constitutional matter, was badly decided, that it was badly reasoned. And there are plenty of conservatives who don't like Roe but say we shouldn't revisit it, it's too much of a precedent.

But as far as the interest groups and most of the people voting on Judge Alito, all they want to know is push the button, yea or nay. One last point, the -- some of the anti-Alito groups have said, we want to look at the broader record. Affirmative action, ethics. It's going to be abortion that stirs the base, raises the money, gets the blood flowing.

S. O'BRIEN: There's a litmus test, and it's abortion.

GREENFIELD: You know, that's one of those things that's like -- it's right. There is no litmus test, but I'm not going to vote for anybody who does this or that. By me, this is a litmus test.

S. O'BRIEN: That's a litmus test. By me, too, and I'm not a political analyst.

GREENFIELD: There you go.

S. O'BRIEN: Jeff Greenfield, as always, nice to have you.

GREENFIELD: Good to see you.

S. O'BRIEN: Thanks -- Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: If it walks like a duck, right?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: Coming up this morning, scary news for parents. The number of children who are getting high off of household products is on the rise. Results can be deadly. Dr. Drew Pinsky's going to join us to tell us what every parent needs to know. That's just ahead on AMERICAN MORNING. We're back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

M. O'BRIEN: All right, this is an interesting story. It's a story that, you know, I remember from growing up. There was a big issue about sniffing glue. That was the thing that people talked about. But there apparently is an uptick in people doing what is called huffing. Huffing. Which means, essentially, kids generally taking whiffs of things you'd find around the household, from paint thinner to whiteout to whipped cream to this body deodorant called Axe. And it's causing some concern in some corners.

Joining us now to talk a little bit about it is Dr. Drew Pinsky. He is author of the book "Cracked: Putting Broken Lives Back Together Again." Always good to have him drop by. Dr. Drew, good to have you with us.

DR. DREW PINSKY, AUTHOR, "CRACKED": My pleasure.

M. O'BRIEN: Let's talk about this. What is going on? Is it just that there are new things that kids are sampling these days? Or is there generally more sampling of all kinds of things?

PINSKY: Well, I guess, really, it's both things. This Axe spray is sort of a headline that people are using. This product, it's kind of a cool product out there. Suddenly they've decided to put it in a rag and inhale it. That was the new story.

Also the things we're concerned about is although we're off our 1995 highs, there's been an uptick in the use of inhalants and huffing, so to speak, in eighth graders over the last two years. We're now at the point where almost one in ten eighth graders have done this. And of all years, 12 and 13-year-olds. Isn't this remarkable?

S. O'BRIEN: Why do you think it's the case? I mean, why the uptick? What explains it, do you think?

PINSKY: These hard things hard to come -- to really explain in an accurate way. But I can tell you, you know, working with a lot of young people, that the primary reason -- it's not your average kid that's huffing. You've got to think about it. They got to go to a gas station, fill a rag with gas, put it in a plastic in a bag and put it over your mouth and huff it. That's a desperate attempt to regulate oneself, to get high.

Most kids that are desperately seeking a way to sort of get high, so to speak, is to regulate their feeling states. They typically come from dysfunctional family systems, often abuse situations and are high-risk youth in general.

M. O'BRIEN: All right, well, let's look at some of the commonly- abused inhalants for just a moment, kind of go through the list. This Axe Body Spray, which I wasn't too familiar about, but apparently seems to be a fad. Whipped cream -- doesn't whipped cream have nitrous oxide in it? Laughing gas?

PINSKY: Right, that's a little bit different thing. That's a so-called Whip It. It's a nitrous oxide. And that is somewhat different than really, what we're here to talk about this morning, which is inhaled solvents. And solvents are the things that are most -- these are hydrocarbons and they can cause sudden death. Think of it in terms of -- not only does it dissolve your nail polish, it dissolves the frontal lobes of the brain.

M. O'BRIEN: Ouch.

S. O'BRIEN: It's crazy when you think about kids -- and really, it is mostly kids, I know -- doing this. Let's take a look at the brain scan. Because this stuff is scary. This is a normal brain scan first. Do we have that shot?

M. O'BRIEN: This is the point where we do the this is the brain and this is your brain on...

PINSKY: Right.

M. O'BRIEN: ... huffed items.

S. O'BRIEN: But in seriousness, you know, all seriousness, when you see the pictures of the before, right here, the healthy brain scan, and then you go the brain scan after huffing. I mean, what are we seeing right now? PINSKY: You can see the shrinkage. You're seeing generalized shrinkage. There is actually more reparation of this. It repairs -- the brain the does repair itself a little bit, at least more than we used to think.

But I'll tell you what, when these kids are doing even moderate amounts of this, even for a week or two, you'll start to see behavioral changes. They'll start to no longer attend to their hygiene. They'll smell funny. They'll have red eyes. You can really tell these kids that are doing this, because they have profound global cognitive changes.

S. O'BRIEN: So an observant parent should be able to figure it out, is what you're saying?

M. O'BRIEN: But of course, as he said, these are households where the parents generally aren't observant.

S. O'BRIEN: Or an observant teacher?

PINSKY: Well, that's true, but you've got to be careful. I mean, any kid could be at risk. One of the most dangerous things I ever hear a parents say is, not my kid; my kid is a good kid. Well, the fact is any kid can get involved in these things. There's high levels of denial. These are things around the house. What could be so bad about this? John did it up the street, he seems OK, he said it was great, and you know, it's just lying around the house. How bad could it be after all? So they don't perceive the harm.

Although the perception of it being harmful has been up recently, and usually when we see the perceived harm go up, we'll see the use go down.

M. O'BRIEN: All right, let's just finish out the list here, a couple of other things that you might not think about. For example, computer cleaner, paint thinner and white-out, nail-polish remover, lighter fluid, and as you mentioned, gasoline.

So, parents, there's a list of things you may or may have not thought about for those of us who grew up in a generation where they talked about glue, for example, as being an issue. You should be looking out for it.

PINSKY: Absolutely. It's a scary time to be a parent, I'll tell you that.

M. O'BRIEN: Dr. Drew Pinsky, who is an addiction expert, author of the book "Cracked." Always a pleasure having you drop by.

S. O'BRIEN: Thanks, Dr. Drew. We appreciate it.

PINSKY: Thank you so much. My pleasure. Good to see you.

S. O'BRIEN: A short break, and then we're going to talk to Andy. He's "Minding Your Business."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: Oh, Martha, Martha, Martha.

M. O'BRIEN: Three times, always three times.

ANDY SERWER, "FORTUNE" MAGAZINE: She's not in jail at least.

S. O'BRIEN: You know what, you always look for the silver like, don't you? There you go.

SERWER: I did. I found it for her.

S. O'BRIEN: But on the other hand, not such good news. Do you want to do the markets first or Martha first?

SERWER: I want to do the markets first. I want to chat a little bit about what's going on on Wall Street this morning. Let's go down and check the Big Board. The Dow Jones Industrials down about nine points, giving back some gains from the past couple of weeks. Wholesale prices up -- that's inflation -- in October. That's not a good thing. Amazon is up about six percent to $45. The stock's being added to the S&P 500 Index. That means money managers have to go out and buy the stock.

Let's talk about Martha Stewart, because her stock has been falling literally and figuratively. First of all, the show, as we told you yesterday, "Martha Stewart the Apprentice" has been canceled after one edition. They don't call these seasons anymore, they're additions, because they're short than the entire season. Donald's "Apprentice" has been on the fifth edition now. But you know, the ratings war isn't as good as anticipated. They weren't so terrible, seven million viewers, but not what was wanted. And of course, now the spin-cycle begins. Executive producers saying they only intended to do one series, one edition.

S. O'BRIEN: Do people do more than one? Does anybody ever...

SERWER: No, I mean, who would want to do that?

S. O'BRIEN: Who would want to have a successful series that you recreate every single year. That would be terrible.

M. O'BRIEN: Boring.

S. O'BRIEN: Boring.

M. O'BRIEN: Awful.

SERWER: What I think is interesting, the Donald Trump show, the ratings have been slipping a little bit. And what does he blame it on, of course?

S. O'BRIEN: Martha, Martha, Martha.

SERWER: Of course. He said Martha's detracted from his show.

S. O'BRIEN: That girl cannot get a break.

(CROSSTALK)

SERWER: Look at this chart here. You can see how the stock went up initially on anticipation of the series, and then when it came out and didn't do so well, it kind slipped from the 30s down to below $20. And actually her daytime show isn't doing so well either. So...

S. O'BRIEN: Any other news for Martha you want to share.

M. O'BRIEN: Perhaps a limited edition there, huh?

SERWER: She was on the cover of "Fortune" magazine.

S. O'BRIEN: Oh, that's good news. There you go, see.

SERWER: That's good news for her.

S. O'BRIEN: Always the glass half full.

SERWER: I'm trying for Martha.

S. O'BRIEN: Thank you, Andy.

M. O'BRIEN: And that's a fine publication, that "Fortune," very fine.

SERWER: Thank you, Miles.

S. O'BRIEN: A short break. We're back in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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