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Another Delay in Hussein Trial; Sentencing Phase Begins for Smith Murder Trial; Marble Falls from Supreme Court Facade

Aired November 28, 2005 - 10:30   ET

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

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: And welcome back for our second half hour. I'm Tony Harris, in for Daryn Kagan. Here's what's happening "Now in the News."
California authorities believe a sleepy driver caused a bus crash over the weekend north of Los Angeles. A pregnant woman and a man died when the Greyhound bus ran off the road and ran down an embankment. The accident yesterday morning left dozens of people injured. The driver is expected to face charges.

Mixed signals on the start of the holiday shopping season. The International Council of Shopping Centers reports Thanksgiving weekend sales seemed lower than last year. Analysts say Friday's early bird sales drew customers, but shoppers weren't as willing to take out their wallets later in the day. Some individual stores such as J.C. Penney and Wal-Mart are reporting better-than-expected sales.

"Time" magazine says another of its reporters has agreed to cooperate in the CIA leak case. Viveca Novak will testify about her discussions with Karl Rove's attorney Robert Luskin. Novak's appearance before the grand jury suggests prosecutors are still considering charges against Rove.

And there's another delay in the trial of Saddam Hussein and seven members of his regime. The chief judge adjourned the case until next Monday, giving two defendants time to choose a new attorney. The trial had resumed today after a 40-day recess.

And we want to get you back to Baghdad now. As you know, our Nic Robertson has been in the courtroom. He was there all morning long for the proceedings in the Saddam Hussein trial. And Nic is standing by now with someone who we understand, Nic, can give us a little bit of clarification about the role former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark is going to play in this trial.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Tony, that's correct. There were two new additions in the courtroom today, two new international advisers for Saddam Hussein. Ramsey Clark, the former U.S. attorney general, and the former justice minister from Qatar, Najeeb El Nauimi, who joins me now.

Mr. Nauimi, what were you doing in the courtroom today?

DR. NAJEEB EL NAUIMI, FMR. QATAR JUSTICE MINISTER: We tried to explain to the court that we need a lot of time because we are not being given any file, any, to say, any information at all about our client. We had asked to meet our client prior to this trial. It was denied. First, they said you will, then they denied us. They gave us only a very little chance to meet with him in the recess.

ROBERTSON: When you say -- sorry to interrupt you -- but when you say your client, who is your client in this?

NAUIMI: Saddam Hussein. Saddam is my client and he appointed me directly. The point is that we're trying to tell the court if you want to be individual, impartial, if you want to be independent, you have to listen to us. We are, you know, we are -- international standard of trial, procedure and we tried to tell them that we challenge you. We should not listen to the witnesses that have been called. We should challenge you on the jurisdiction side. We are challenging you on the legitimacy of this court.

This court was established by Bremer -- we call it number one. At that time being elected by or not appointed by the Supreme Council, which was appointed by -- Bremer appointed these judges. These judges not being elected, not through the normal system. This court is a private court, it is not really a public, normal court like any other courts. It does not represent really the normal international standards always being used anywhere in the world. It does not even come close to the former Yugoslav or Rwanda.

ROBERTSON: Now, Mr. Clark's also in the court. Is he also representing Mr. Saddam Hussein?

NAUIMI: Yes. He's representing directly Mr. Saddam Hussein and he will be dealing, like me, on the next session which is on the 5th of December. I don't know how quickly I can deal with so many things within five days.

ROBERTSON: That's what I want to ask you. You have said in the court today you challenge its legitimacy. Mr. Clark has indicated that he's here to support the defense lawyers because of their security. But how are you going to defend Saddam Hussein? What is your method?

NAUIMI: There are two methods, in fact. One method is really to try to find him a better court. If we can do it, international court, we accept it. If it has to be later on with the Arab League, with the U.N., with anyone, just to get the proper way of standard of the trial and the judicial system.

Second, we will be actually challenging the same court. And we are telling them you have no jurisdiction. You are based really on a certain number of laws and decisions. Geneva Convention number 5464 says occupiers have no right to set up a judicial system or to add to any criminal law whatsoever. So there are infringements of the international law. From my side...

ROBERTSON: I'm sorry. I'm going to interrupt and ask you one question about Mr. Ramsey, as well. You're challenging legitimacy, we understand that. But when it comes to defending him, if you don't -- if you're not able to challenge the legitimacy and already the government here, their advisers are indicating they're not happy with you being in the court -- what is Mr. Ramsey going to do? How can he -- what's his legal knowledge in the Iraqi law system? What is his ability to aid the defense here?

NAUIMI: Well, Mr. Ramsey is actually presenting, like me, on that issue. Plus, we want to make sure that lawyers and defense have the full right. You know, the court is based on three things: judges, prosecutors, lawyers. Lawyers are now being assassinated here. Lawyers being kept away, lawyers being threatened, them and their families. Have not being really allowed, even, to stand. You know, we've see the prosecutor, for example, today passing a private guard to enter the location.

And we are being very much screened, checked and you know, through a lot of things, security, like we are going do something. So there is no balance in what we -- what they're supposed to do. We only calling. Mr. Ramsey can deal the matter of merits of the Iraqi rule is not a problem. We - you have seen the demonstration of one video. I would really ask anyone in this world if he had find out that Mr. Saddam is really guilty in that video.

ROBERTSON: Mr. Nauimi, thank you very much, indeed.

NAUIMI: Thank you.

ROBERTSON: So Mr. Clark in the court to aid in the defense. But the primary objective here, it seems to be to challenge the legitimacy of this court in Iraq -- Tony.

HARRIS: OK. Thank you. Appreciate it, Nic, thank you. Nic Robertson in Baghdad for us.

And quickly now, let's get you to Washington. A White House Christmas tradition that dates back to 1889 is underway right now. There you see the first lady, Laura Bush. And she is meeting there -- I know this family's name -- the Deals. Yes, the Deals who provided the tree. We'll get to that in just a moment.

Live images now where 18.5 foot Frazier fir tree, fresh from North Carolina, is being delivered to First Lady Laura Bush. It was cut down from the Smokey Holler Tree Farm, owned by the Deals, on Friday and shipped in a refrigerated truck with two companion trees. Are we going see the tree? Why not? Why not? And perhaps -- yes, yes, just to the left there. This is -- it's some file pictures, pictures from Friday of when the tree was actually cut down.

There it is. The tree being brought in, horse-drawn carriage. And this is for the Oval Office. We're going to listen in a little bit to First Lady Laura Bush. She commented just a moment ago there that the horses are looking a little fatigued.

LAURA BUSH, FIRST LADY OF THE UNITED STATES: This is a very fun tradition, delivery of the Christmas tree to the White House. This is the 40th year the National Christmas Tree Growers Association has given the White House the magnificent tree that's in the Blue Room, the biggest tree there. It started 1966, President Johnson accepted the first tree from the National Christmas Growers.

And today we're accepting from the Deal family, from Laurel Springs, North Carolina, Smokey Hollow Tree Farm.

Thank you very, very much for being a part of our Christmas this year at the White House.

We're getting ready to -- the decorators are in there right now. Santa's elves are in decorating the White House. And all of you will get to see it, the day after tomorrow, I think.

And so I welcome your questions then when you come look at all the decorations.

All things bright and beautiful is the theme this year. I think it will be really nice and beautiful with this fabulous tree.

So thank you all very much. Happy holidays.

I know this is the real start of the season, the Monday after Thanksgiving and so I want to wish everybody happy holidays. And we'll see you later this week with the White House decorations.

Thank you very much for the Deal family.

Thank you so much.

HARRIS: The tree will go to the Blue Room of the White House. You may want to know what kind of a tree it is. Did you hear just a moment ago from the first lady? It is a Douglas fir, 24-year-old Douglas fir, and once again, the Deal donated the tree. The Deals own a massive property there in North Carolina, the Smokey Holler Tree Farm, Laurel Springs, North Carolina.

And the theme this year, all things bright and beautiful. So all of the artisans and all of the crafts people now get busy trying to make that theme come to life. There it is, 24-year-old tree there on the horse-drawn carriage to be taken into the White House shortly.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: And this hour in Sarasota, Florida, the sentencing phrase is under way for convicted child killer Joseph Smith. He could face execution for last year's kidnapping, rape and murder of 11-year- old Carlie Brucia. Smith's attorneys are expected to argue for life in prison without parole. Smith was convicted after jurors saw this video from a security camera of her kidnapping.

Joining us to lend some expertise on this case and another major legal development last week is Kendall Coffey, a former U.S. attorney.

Kendall, good talk to you.

KENDALL COFFEY, FMR. U.S. ATTY.: Hey, good morning, Tony. HARRIS: The defense in this case, take us back for a moment to the trial, never could overcome that video, could they?

COFFEY: Well, they had the video, and they had a brother of Joseph Smith, who said he had heard Joseph Smith confess to the crime to him, some forensic evidence, too, overwhelming case of guilt, no surprise at all in the verdict.

HARRIS: And, Kendall, walk us through the sentencing phase. In effect, it feels like a second trial. Will there be witnesses? Will we learn something about possibly some mitigating factors on Smith's behalf?

COFFEY: Well, it's going to be a very different proceeding. In fact, the defense began with a different lawyer to try to set the tone right away, and say this is a whole different set of considerations.

Tony, in Florida, unlike most states, the jury's role is only to make a recommendation by a majority, life or death, and it's the judge himself who will actually determine the sentence. The jury's supposed to consider aggravating circumstances, the factors that favor the death penalty, mitigating circumstances, the factors that favor life in the sentence, and there is very broad range as to what could be considered. Most significantly, from the prosecution's standpoint, victim-impact testimony. The parents are going to testify maybe as soon as today. And I tell you, as horrible as the crime was, nothing is going to be more powerful than hearing from the parents of Carlie Brucia.

HARRIS: Is there an opportunity for Smith to take the stand and testify during this phase?

COFFEY: Absolutely. One of the things to consider is when they want to still contest guilt or innocence now that the jury has made their decision, or put Joseph Smith on the stand to express remorse.

It's going to be very tough to spare him from the death penalty. He has no statutory mitigating circumstances in his favor at all, although there's a lot of latitude. They can talk about him being a good father, maybe a good brother. They're certainly going to try to develop the issue that he was intoxicated under drugs based on a drug problem, which may be something that the jury can consider.

But bottom line, it's going to be very hard to overcome the overwhelming evidence of guilt, and the magnitude of the crime and the passion of the parents, and he may have to take the stand in a desperate attempt to save his life.

HARRIS: Kendall, let me ask you a couple of questions about the Jose Padilla case. Look, you're a former district attorney, U.S. attorney. We've got new charges, charges that we didn't expect. And Padilla is not charged with plotting a radioactive dirty bomb attack on buildings in the United States. What happened to those charges?

COFFEY: Well, those charges got dropped, we think because the administration thought that they would have to compromise confidential sources that they wanted to protect for national-security reasons in order to get to those charges. They have other charges that they can bring without, in effect, disclosing too much of their various intelligence sources and information with respect to Al Qaeda.

So he's no longer the dirty bomber, in effect. He's not even an enemy combatant. He's now an indicted defendant who will face the same criminal process that applies to any other criminal defendant in this country.

HARRIS: And not only the information, but the means under which we were able to get that information, is that correct?

COFFEY: Well, that's right. And so the government has carved out certain charges, maybe not even the most serious, because they were left with a choice of either trying to keep them in detention indefinitely, without bringing criminal charges, which the U.S. Supreme Court made it pretty clear they weren't too happy with, letting him go, which was completely unacceptable, or indicting him, which means he will be down at some point in the southern district of Florida for court appearances and lawyers, the whole nine yards.

HARRIS: Hey, Kendall, I need to sneak in another quick one, because I haven't been able to ask this of anyone yet. If you can't make the case that you really want to make against Padilla because of the way you have gone about getting the information might compromise, might not stand up to court scrutiny, what sense does it make?

COFFEY: Well, it's coming up with a lot of terrorism cases. There are so many of the really strong charges they want to bring that they don't feel they can, because they would have to literally bring in the leader of Al Qaeda from some secret detention somewhere into a U.S. court to testify. Not doable.

I think with Padilla they have charges that they can bring. He's a U.S. citizen, Tony. It makes it much tougher to justify indefinite detention when it's a U.S. citizen, from our constitutional standpoint. So this is the Hobson's Choice they had. They probably made the right call. We'll see some day what a jury does with these charges.

HARRIS: OK, Kendall, good to see you. Thanks for your time.

COFFEY: OK, thanks, Tony.

HARRIS: Just in: We want to show you the first pictures from the U.S. Supreme Court building. As we've been reporting in this hour, piece of the facade, the marble facade on the front of the U.S. Supreme Court building, collapsed -- we just lost the picture; we'll get it back for you in just a moment -- have collapsed on the steps leading up into to the building. No reports of injuries at this time.

But once again, some damage to the outside, the external wall, the facade, the marble facade of the U.S. Supreme Court building. We will get those pictures back for you in just a moment.

More CNN LIVE TODAY right after this. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(STOCK MARKET UPDATE)

HARRIS: And, once again, the story just into CNN, a story we've been following for most of the hour. We've got the live picture back up again of the exterior of the Supreme Court building in Washington, D.C., where parts of the marble facade have actually collapsed.

And let's -- Christian (ph), let's roll in those pictures. There's a still picture I want to show you now. And what we see in the still is -- there it is. You can see some of the pieces of the facade that actually came crashing down onto the steps of the outside of the building, leading inside the building. And you see a guy there -- I'm guessing one of the security people there. It was actually moving a piece of a barrier, a real barrier there, just to keep folks away from the area.

Bill Mears is with us now. He is our Supreme Court producer. And Bill, what more can you tell us about this situation?

BILL MEARS, CNN PRODUCER: Well, it happened about 9:30 this morning. It was a huge piece of marble, Vermont marble. They're telling us it's about one foot by one foot by one foot. It's from the top of the penement (ph) here, a gentle molding is the description of it. It actually fell down without warning. People waiting in line, visitors to the Supreme Court, said they heard this huge cracking sound. And the next thing you know, they saw this big huge chunk of marble hit the front steps here and start tumbling down.

There are two big pieces here, probably about 40 pounds each. It's split in two and lots of other little pieces scattered throughout the steps. Engineers are still on the scene. They're assessing the damage here. Nobody was hurt but people were probably about 15, 20 feet away from it, waiting in line to go up the steps of the Supreme Court into the courtroom at the time.

There was no panic. Nobody was running away, nobody was scared or frightened or screaming or anything. They were more curious about what happened than anything.

HARRIS: And 40 pounds? Is that what you were saying, Bill?

MEARS: At least 40 pounds. Two big chunks, probably at least 40 pounds. They're kind of split evenly and there's lots of little others chunks scattered all of the way down the steps here.

HARRIS: OK, so is there -- what are they doing? Are they just sort of rerouting the traffic around into another entrance and sort of cordoning that area off a bit?

MEARS: Yes. Nobody really ran away or left. There was probably about two dozen people waiting in line here, and they are taking them to a side entrance here as a precaution. But you see the engineers are walking up the steps there, without the hard hats. They had hard hats on earlier, but they're not there now. Just kind of... HARRIS: Well, but, Bill, we've had a couple of chunks fall. I mean, others could fall, correct? We don't know how secure that area is.

MEARS: We don't know. But the area that -- where people are right now, there's no chance of anything falling on them right now. You had to go -- you'd have to pretty much go right to the top of the steps there on the steps itself to be a chance if were any more pieces falling down. And they aren't having anybody go up there.

HARRIS: I think we'd feel a lot better if those guys had on a hard hat or something. All right. Bill Mears, our Supreme Court producer. Thanks for that update, Bill.

We'll take a break and come back with more of CNN LIVE TODAY right after this.

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