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American Morning

Investigations Continue into Alleged Civilian Killings in Iraq; More Americans Becoming Living Organ Donors

Aired June 02, 2006 - 09:30   ET

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

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. Welcome back, everybody. Last half hour of AMERICAN MORNING. I'm Soledad O'Brien.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Miles O'Brien. Thanks for being with us.

(NEWSBREAK)

(WEATHER REPORT)

S. O'BRIEN: U.S. forces in Iraq are now undergoing core values training, ethics in the battlefield. Essentially, the training comes amid three separate incidents and investigations.

Let's go right to Tony Perry. He writes about the incidents and the investigations, too, in the "L.A. Times" this morning. He's in San Diego. Nice to see you, Tony. Thanks for talking with us.

We've been talking all morning about these incidents in Haditha, where 24 civilians were killed. Ishaqi, where 11 civilians appear to have been killed. Hamandiyah, where one civilian -- they're expecting, actually, murder charges to be filed soon against marines there.

Let's start with Haditha. Because that's the one I think that's best known. What's the very latest on that, Tony?

TONY PERRY, "LOS ANGELES TIMES": Two investigations are underway, one to see if there was a cover-up, whether enlisted officers or commissioned officers covered up the truth and kept it from coming out. And then a second investigation to see if there should be criminal charges. And on both of those, it appears to be leaning towards criminal charges, ranging from murder to dereliction of duty against maybe half a dozen marines.

S. O'BRIEN: Hamandiyah, which is one that you write about this morning. One civilian killed. It happened back in April. Give us some details on that one.

PERRY: That appears to be a case where a squad of marines and a Navy medic corpsman went out to interview a suspected terrorist and it got way out of hand and they ended up killing a man who was unarmed and then possibly planting evidence cartridge shells and maybe a shovel near him to make it look as if he had been an insurgent caught in the dead of night planting an IED. It all unraveled very quickly. The marines and the corpsmen were pulled back into Pendleton, slapped in the brig and now we're looking at criminal charges, probably murder against some; conspiracy, kidnapping against others. Maybe today. More likely early next week.

S. O'BRIEN: Let's talk about Ishaqi. The videotape that has come to us from the BBC -- and actually what we've been showing you is not as graphic as what the BBC says they have, because it's pretty horrific, they say. Eleven people killed. What did the military say in that one happened originally? What was their first story, is what I mean?

PERRY: Well, the first stories in a lot of these cases are that it was insurgent-inspired or maybe gunfire back and forth, and then they've to back to off that in a couple of cases here. I think what we're seeing now is a new sensitivity on the military's part. They've always been sensitive to civilian casualties, but I think since Haditha, since they were embarrassed that it took "Time" magazine to sort of pierce the veil of lies that started in Haditha, I think they're moving much more quickly now on all allegations of civilian atrocities.

S. O'BRIEN: A lot of the trail, frankly, leads back to marines at Camp Pendleton, where I know you spent some time. Tell me a little bit about the marines there.

PERRY: Well, the Pendleton marines are in the third and fourth deployments in Iraq. They're responsible for the Al Anbar Province, the violent Sunni triangle. As the commanding general said at one point, marines like the toughest job. When they're told to move a piano, they move the piano, not just the bench. And the marines have drawn the really tough job. Now the question has been in pursuing that job and trying to root out the insurgency, whether in other -- couple of incidents, they've gone way too far.

S. O'BRIEN: Of course, the big -- in a way, the bigger question is who's ultimately responsible. And not just, you know, who immediately is responsible for the cover-up, which is part of the investigation, as you point out. But who ultimately is going to take the blame for this?

PERRY: Well, that -- certainly in the Haditha case, that's what their looking at. How far up did any cover-up go? Did it stop at a sergeant or lieutenant or did higher officers know what really happened? And there wasn't an improvised explosive device that killed those two dozen Iraqis, including women and children and old people. Who knew that and who covered it up? Was it just at low level, did it go all of the way up?

And the Marine Corps asked that this investigation be done by an army general so that there would be no sense that it was an in-house job. And they've pledged to make it all public soon, and I think we may be seeing that out of Baghdad in the next couple of weeks.

S. O'BRIEN: All right, Tony Perry, the piece that explains and walks through all these incidents is in today's "L.A. Times." Thanks, Tony. Appreciate it.

PERRY: My pleasure.

M. O'BRIEN: As of this morning, more than 92,000 people in the U.S. are waiting for a donated organ. It's a desperate wait for many of them. That's according to the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network. On average, 110 people die every day while waiting for a donated organ. But a growing number of Americans responding to the need by becoming living donors.

CNN medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen with a closer look and a preview of her "CNN PRESENTS," "Body Parts." She joins us from the CNN Center with that.

Good morning, Elizabeth.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Miles. Well, usually when we think of donations, organ donations, we think of cadavers. You sign the card that goes on your license and you donate after you have died. However, what many people know is that now half of all organs come from people who are living, not dead.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... where we all take a moment now to extend our hand towards our sister Kathleen.

COHEN (voice-over): In the depths of winter, a woman prays. In the midst of summer, her prayers are finally answered.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Lord, we ask you to be with her every day of her life, but most especially this Tuesday.

COHEN: Tuesday is the day Kathleen Sampson (ph) has been praying for.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Amen.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You might feel a warm sensation going up your arm.

COHEN: After months of testing she's giving her kidney to someone who would die without it, someone she's never met.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Basically, here's my kidney, do what -- whatever's best. Give it to the best person. And this is just something that i want to do, and I'm hoping that it will have great results.

COHEN: She's not alone. There are 78,000 living donors, and nearly 400 of them are like Kathleen, giving to complete and total strangers.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They realize that, hey, I've got two kidneys and really my body will function perfectly well with one kidney. COHEN: Dr. Robert Montgomery (ph) will be performing her surgery at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. Kathleen's son Conner (ph) died several years ago when he was five. Conner died at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Kathleen is now here to give life where she lost it.

Thousands of people would love to get Kathleen's kidney. Some are so desperate they beg on Web sites. This huge demand has some people worried. In the rush to help those who need organs, will doctors be too quick to take them from generous people like Kathleen?

Our investigation found that surgeons have approved donors who some believe are highly questionable, children as young as ten, drug addicts, even people who were mentally ill.

ART CAPLAN, CTR. FOR BIOETHICS, U. OF PENN: I've seen anorexics give organs. I've seen people who are clearly depressed give organs. I've seen people come who have been accepted at programs who are morbidly obese. I've seen people come to programs who have had a long history of drug and alcohol abuse.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COHEN: On our special this weekend, you'll find out who Kathleen gives her kidney to and how they both do after their surgeries -- Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: So it's not always -- I think the way we portray these stories is how wonderful it is that people are giving, and how it always ends up a happy ending. Doesn't always end up that way, does it?

COHEN: That's right, it doesn't. And we hear a lot of those happy stories. What we don't always hear is that sometimes things don't go well. For example, sometimes donors like Kathleen -- not her, but sometimes other donors -- will get infections. Or sometimes things just won't go well. Or sometimes, years down the road, they'll get some kind of an illness that was associated with them giving a kidney.

And in our special we talked to people, two women, in fact, who lost their husbands. Their husbands donated a part of their livers to their brothers, and they actually ended up dying because of that donation.

M. O'BRIEN: Now, I assume, and this is important because there are a lot of people in need of organs, that that is very rare, and that's the kind of thing that if you were at all interested in doing this, you would know the odds.

COHEN: Exactly. It is indeed very rare. For kidneys it is extremely unusual for someone to suffer immediately after donating a kidney. If you give part of your live to another adult, it is actually much more dangerous than if you're giving a kidney. However, the issues that a lot of bioethicists have and a lot of general advocates have is they say that sometimes these deaths and illnesses that the donors get were actually preventable if only they had screened these donors better, that some of these donors should never have done it in the first place.

M. O'BRIEN: Yes, so much pressure there for people who are just desperate. All right, Elizabeth Cohen, sounds like a fascinating hour, and we'd like for you to tune in, watch her report. It's called "BODY PARTS," airs on Sunday night, 8:00 Eastern, 5:00 Pacific on CNN. And if you miss it you can watch it at 11:00 Eastern, which would make it's 8:00 specific. So really it's 8:00 pretty much everywhere.

We're back with more in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: What people fight over. It's amazing, isn't it? In "AM Pop" this morning, the breakup with Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn hits the big screen today. The buzz has less to do with the breakup and more to do with the off-screen hookup.

CNN entertainment correspondent Sibila Vargas with that.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SIBILA VARGAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Taylor and Burton did it in "Cleopatra," Cruise and Kidman in "Days of Thunder," and Jolie and Pitt in "Mr. and Mrs. Smith." They fell in love. Coincidentally the latest Hollywood power pair to reportedly go from scripted romance to the real thing is Pitt's ex-wife Jennifer Aniston and her co-star, Vince Vaughn.

JENNIFER ANISTON, ACTRESS: I have three lemons.

VINCE VAUGHN, ACTOR: What my baby want, my baby gets. You know that.

MIKE FLEEMAN, "PEOPLE" MAGAZINE: Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn clearly are very much in love. It's very much a relationship.

VARGAS: According to "People" magazine's Mike Fleeman, the relationship was born on set.

FLEEMAN: Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston really had not met before the making of "The Breakup." And Vince Vaughn said when he was thinking about the story, he was thinking about Jennifer Aniston, even though he didn't know her.

VAUGHN: It just was one of those things that luckily it just -- we had great chemistry.

VARGAS: Chemistry while filming "The Breakup." Shot ironically on the heels of Aniston's very public, real-life breakup Brad Pitt.

ANISTON: It doesn't tickle to have a breakup. It doesn't. I wouldn't trade any of it, but I think they're all -- nothing that doesn't kill you, it will always make you stronger.

Aniston and Vaughn have yet confirm to their romance publicly, even arriving to the film's premiere separately. FLEEMAN: Jennifer Aniston has tried to put the lid on the relationship, this one, and her marriage with Brad Pitt.

VARGAS: Efforts often undermined by seemingly incessant tabloid coverage.

VAUGHN: Truthfully, for me, I find it all a bit ridiculous. Not that it makes me angry, I just think it's kind of silly. You know, it's almost like high school gossip.

ANISTON: That's what the sad thing is, is that everybody's really happy, and everybody is really doing really well. So why they're still trying to create this soap opera-type, you know, stuff, but I guess they've just got to sell their magazine, you know?

VARGAS: Whether it's magazines or movie tickets being sold, soon the breakup will be part of the Hollywood history. Fans will have to wait and see if the same fate is in store for its stars.

Sibila Vargas, CNN, Hollywood.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

M. O'BRIEN: How does she get her hair that way? That kind of messed up thing? How do they do that? I'll have to find out later. "The Breakup" is getting mixed reviews. One critic calls it the "Pitts." And that's spelled with two 't's, get it, you know, a play on ex-hubby Brad Pitt. Onward.

"CNN LIVE TODAY" coming up next. Your hair looks like it's a little more put together than that kind of matted thing she's got going on.

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: I was just remarking that of everything in that piece before, you took away Jennifer Aniston's messy hair look. Such a guy thing.

M. O'BRIEN: It's a guy thing.

KAGAN: Guys and hair. It's a whole other topic for a different piece.

Anyhow, coming up on "LIVE TODAY" we are going meet one cool guy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is wrong with you?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm starting to ask myself the same question.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: Antarctic Mike training for a South Pole marathon inside a freezer.

And what in the world? A blank sheet of paper, now draw a detailed map of the world. It's the final exam for one geography class. Could you do it?

And this:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Every dog deserves a chance.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: Oh yes, paralyzed after an accident, homeless after Katrina, red the pit bull is ready to roll, literally, right into a brand new life. You know I can't resist the special animal stories. Those stories, we have Mr. Moviefone, and also the morning's -- speaking of special animals, we have Mr. Moviefone -- breaking news, and we get started at the top of the hour for "LIVE TODAY."

M. O'BRIEN: Oh, yes, the owner of the three-legged cat once again putting her editorial imprint, her paw print on the show.

KAGAN: Yes, I am not unbiased when it comes to those stories. Those stories go on my show. All right, wouldn't miss it for the world.

Thank you, Daryn.

Coming up on our program, your chance to live like Martha, Martha, Martha, if you're willing to pony up a cool $9 million. that is. We'll explain that one, next on AMERICAN MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BUSINESS HEADLINES)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

M. O'BRIEN: CBS reporter Kimberly Dozier on the mend, off the ventilator and talking to her families and doctors. She'll come back Sunday on a U.S. military flight from Landstuhl, Germany. She remains in critical, but stable, condition this morning and she will be headed to a hospital here stateside. Dozier wounded four days ago by a roadside bomb in Baghdad, as you recall. Now, the army has released the name of the soldier who died along with Kimberly's cameraman and sound man.

And Carol Costello is here with a really gripping story of how this has affected his family.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Oh, just so sad, Miles. So sad. And there's so many stories just like it. As you know, that car bomb killed cameraman Paul Douglas, soundman James Brolan, and seriously injured reporter Kimberly Dozier. Now, as she recovers at a U.S. military hospital in Germany, we're learning more about the army captain who died in the same insurgent attack.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) JENNIFER FUNKHOUSER, HUSBAND KILLED IN IRAQ: It's not something that I ever thought would happen, but it did. It did. And it's the worst thing imaginable.

COSTELLO (voice-over): The worst thing imaginable. It's happened so many times. This time, it's the family of Army Captain James Funkhouser Jr. mourning the loss.

JAMES FUNKHOUSER SR., SON KILLED IN IRAQ: Even knowing that he died doing what he loved to do, what he wanted to do, it doesn't take away the pain.

COSTELLO: On Monday, the 35-year-old Army captain was securing a location in Baghdad just across the river from the Green Zone. With them, a CBS news crew. Then it happened. A car bomb exploded. The blast killed Funkhouser, his Iraqi interpreter and two members of the CBS news crew.

Back home in Kilene (ph), Texas, Funkhouser's wife, Jennifer, got the news, in the kind of scene played out more than 2,000 times over the past three years.

JENNIFER FUNKHOUSER: I had two army officers come to my front door, and I thought it was a Memorial Day. They were handing out pamphlets, passing out information about soldiers. I opened the door, and I took one look at the major who was there, and you could tell his eyes were red, and he was trembling. It was hard for him to even speak. I knew -- I said, I just talked to him yesterday.

COSTELLO: Funkhouser had been in Iraq since December. His wife and family called him Alex. He was the father of two young girls, and the couple had just celebrated their sixth anniversary.

JENNIFER FUNKHOUSER: He always thought about me. He would write me all the time. This is Valentine's Day. And we just had our wedding anniversary a little over a week ago and he sent me flowers. And I haven't been able to throw them away yet. A T-shirt I was going to send to him for Father's Day. Big Texas man. Little Texas humor.

COSTELLO: Funkhouser was third generation military. His father and grandfather before him, James Sr., spent 31 years in the service.

JAMES FUNKHOUSER: When you lose a child it's always painful. And when you lose your only child, it is especially painful.

JENNIFER FUNKHOUSER: I just want his name out there. You know? he was -- he was wonderful. He was a great soldier, a great guy, a great father, a great husband.

COSTELLO: But the attention given to tragedy involving the CBS news crew and her husband is somehow bittersweet. Because so many others die in relative anonymity.

JENNIFER FUNKHOUSER: All of these soldier that is are injured, my husband had a lot of soldiers that were injured with him. They all have names. They all have stories. They're people. They're not just a soldier. They have a life. They have a family, a family that mourns them, a family that hurts. Everyone needs to know.

COSTELLO: Jennifer says her husband was proud of what he was doing in Iraq, and now she will carry on.

JENNIFER FUNKHOUSER: I'm a strong army wife. My husband trained me to be one. I knew that I was marrying a soldier for life, and death. This is part of it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: She is a strong army wife, isn't she?

James Funkhouser, Jr., will be buried in San Antonio, Texas, with full military honors. His father said Alex didn't like tears, so they plan to celebrate his son's life with stories and songs.

M. O'BRIEN: What a remarkable woman.

COSTELLO: I just can't even imagine. I can't.

M. O'BRIEN: An amazing reservoir of strength there. Thank you very much.

COSTELLO: Sure.

M. O'BRIEN: Back with more in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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