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Glenn Beck

Civil Lawsuit Arises from School Assault of Handicapped Girl; Iraq War Veteran Discusses NYT Controversy

Aired June 30, 2006 - 19:00   ET

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

ANNOUNCER: Tonight`s episode of GLENN BECK is brought to you by Britney Spears. Britney Spears, she is one messed up (beep).
GLENN BECK, HOST: Well, it`s been -- I apologize, Britney. It`s been quite a week. Middle East on fire. The northeast is drowning and, of course, most shocking of all, Star Jones left "The View."

It has been quite a week, also, on the show. We had a lot of great guests, covered a lot of interesting topics. We started looking into a story that is extremely heinous and disturbing. After you hear about it I`m sure that you are going to share my outrage. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BECK: First I want to tell you a story about something I feel passionately about. My faith teaches me that the handicapped are the most valiant among us. My gut tells me, after I volunteered for Special Olympics, that when we get to the end, when we go see God face to face, we`re going to realize that we`re the retarded ones, not those who are fighting with mental disabilities.

Kalie McArthur. She is 20 years old. She has an I.Q. of about 50. She`s basically a 4-year-old. She was assaulted in September 2004 at Rampart High School in Colorado by a 15-year-old boy assigned as a peer trainer.

This kid had been suspended 20 times in the previous year, had a grade point average of 0.0. The school didn`t train him. The school didn`t screen him. And making this horrific situation even worse, the district has refused to mediate a civil lawsuit as one of its experts called the attack pleasurable for Kalie.

People are wearing arm bands. They`re always saying what would Jesus do? You know what? Jesus was a man of peace. But a millstone around the neck comes to mind. I think he would take thing into his own hands and demand some action.

I want you to know right up front, I am not a crusader. I am not out there fighting for you. I am never going to call for a boycott. I`m basically a rodeo clown just trying to entertain you every night. But this particular story and stories like this are very personal to me. And I promise you we will be following this closely. If you do harm to kids, look out, because we will be relentless in our pursuit of you.

Joining me now is the victim`s mother, Cindy Starr.

Hi, Cindy, how are you?

CINDY STARR, VICTIM`S MOTHER: I`m good. How are you doing?

BECK: Very good. Thanks for being on the program. I know we flew you into Seattle from Alaska so you could be with us. You`ve been on the radio show a couple of times. I just need you to sum up the stairwell scene so people get an idea of what kind of a situation we`re dealing with here.

STARR: OK. Well, Kalie -- for those -- none of you know her, but she is a special educations student. And she`s very loving, very trusting, very -- just loves everybody and wants everybody to love her. And in a way that she`s just very friendly.

So she was with her peer buddy and trusted him and, like I said, she`s very simple. And he took her into a stairwell at her high school and basically sexually assaulted her. He took her pants off, and he had his off. And he was doing all kinds of thing to her that are just horrible and inappropriate. And...

BECK: What was she saying in the stairwell when the coach found her?

STARR: The coach found them, and she was, because she`s so simple. She was saying, "Up and down, up and down." So I don`t know if he told her to do that or what, because she would not know how or what that was all about. So that`s horrifying.

BECK: So now you find out. The school calls you. You go in. You can`t imagine what horror lies in front of you. And it gets worse. Because you don`t -- you`re not the suing type.

STARR: No.

BECK: You are now suing. Why?

STARR: Well, basically the assault happened in September of 2004. And you know, we as parents felt maybe Kalie will just sort of forget about this, because she`s so mentally challenged and will kind of fall, you know, under the rug and be gone.

But what happened was over the course of basically a year and a half, she got more and more problems from it. Basically she started -- initially she would, like, rip her skin open or wet her pants. She had, like, a 20- pound weight loss. She just had a lot of behavioral changes.

And then as the course of the year went on -- so, by May of the following year, so May of 2005, she was reported to us by her school that she was afraid of the men at the school.

Now we`ve been -- we don`t know if she`s afraid of the men or she gets anxiety around the men, and then she then will go and try to attack men or seek them out and she will try to hurt them.

So we`ve had all kinds of problems with her in school. She`s not doing well. Her school that she`s in is a transition program. They basically told us in May of 2006 that because she`s regressed so much, she no longer can function in their program unless she had a one-on-one female in her program.

BECK: And you have tried to work with the school. Right? But they - - but then they come out with this report that your daughter found this pleasurable.

STARR: Well, basically what`s happened is once the assault happened, Kalie went from high school into a transition program, because she was supposed to be in transition anyway. She had turned 18 during the year before. But she had such a great year, and everybody loved her and she loved everybody, that they kept her in the high school. And once the assault happened, then we moved her into transition.

And the transition people that are working are for the school district and the people that are working in the actual transition program have all reported she`s had so many changes and difficulties.

But the expert witness came out with a report in May of this year, saying that Kalie, who is mentally retarded and has an I.Q. of 50, who does not understand boundaries or anything like that, who would never understand any kind of sexual experience, found pleasure in the experience, which is horrifying to us.

BECK: Cindy, we want you to know that we`re going to follow this.

STARR: OK.

BECK: And we will make sure that action is taken, and we will also do our darndest to make sure that it doesn`t happen elsewhere, because there`s a lot of stuff going on that we`re going to get into in the next couple of days. This is -- your daughter, unfortunately, is not alone.

Cindy, thanks so much for being with us.

STARR: Thank you for having with me.

BECK: Now Wendy Murphy is here. She`s a former sex crimes prosecutor. She is a friend of the show and has been with us several times.

Wendy, the worst part of this story is the sentence of this 15-year- old: no training, no vetting, 20 school suspensions. He is somebody who now has spent his whole sentence of two weeks behind bars for raping this little girl. What -- what has happened to us? How does that even -- how does that even happen in America?

WENDY MURPHY, FORMER SEX CRIMES PROSECUTOR: Yes. Well, you know, it`s a question that, unfortunately, a lot of policy folks, legislators, law enforcement people around the country are afraid to answer.

You know, the ugly truth is, Glenn, especially when you`re talking about kids or disabled people, we don`t respect them nearly enough. It`s reflected in how we treat them, when bad things happen to them, and frankly, there is a solution, and it`s to make sure that states like Colorado and other states around the country that aren`t getting it right enact laws that make it clear there`s a mandatory punishment when you rape a child or a mandatory punishment when you rape someone who is effectively a child, which is true about this little girl.

BECK: Is there anything more offensive -- I mean, I`ve got to tell you, there are so many things to be concerned about in today`s world, but there is nothing that will put you at the gates of hell faster than raping a child or raping a handicapped person. Nothing that will put you there faster.

And I got news for you, you don`t have to be the rapist. You just have to be the person who does nothing about it. And that`s us.

MURPHY: That`s right. We should able to prosecute the school officials, as well, for putting her in the care and custody of someone who was clearly not capable and was potentially dangerous.

BECK: So what do we do? I mean, if here I am -- if I`m sitting at my house right now, I would be -- my eyes would be open, my mouth would be down on the floor. But I would be thinking to myself, so what do I do about it? What good is this information for me?

MURPHY: Yes. There are a lot of things that the folks can do that they may not know about. One is to, you know, educate yourself. What are the laws in your state? And are they tough enough to handle these kinds of cases? Because in Colorado the laws are not tough enough.

So what`s the government doing? You know, what are the folks doing in the legislature who claim to care about protecting kids in vulnerable populations? Put them to the test, and don`t reelect them if they don`t get it right.

Or social protest. I`m a big fan of getting -- especially parents who care about kids, getting them to the courthouse. When a judge gives out a crummy sentence, get to the courthouse, write a protest sign and make a stink. It actually works.

BECK: Well, what about a protest in front of the school? On this particular...

MURPHY: Protest in front of the school.

BECK: I mean, on this particular case, I as a parent, I -- God bless Cindy and her husband. How they took it when they opened up that letter that said their daughter found this to be a pleasurable experience. We`re talking a rape.

MURPHY: Look, there`s no question. Parents with kids in that school district should be very afraid. And this is not uncommon, Glenn. For a school to face scandal of this magnitude, what`s their best and first defense? Cover it up. Push it under the rug, try to blame the victim, even if she`s mentally retarded.

This kind of scandal should have the folks in that community up in arms. I don`t care if they don`t have children. Don`t they care about the integrity of their community? They should be at every school board meeting henceforth, demanding heads to roll and changes in policy. And there`s no excuse for the public not to be doing their job when it comes to these kinds of important issues.

BECK: Wendy, thank you very much.

And just so the school knows, we are following this story. We are not going to let this story go away. You better step to the plate and show America that it`s fixed. Show some respect.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: So what was "The New York times" ultimate argument for running yet another story about a top secret government operation? To stop al Qaeda?

Quote, "The administration`s extraordinary access to this vast repository of international financial data, however carefully targeted its use may be, is a matter of public interest," end quote.

If you want to go down the public interest route, "New York Times", why not run some hot pictures of Eva Longoria? Better yet, how about pictures of Eva Longoria with only two coconuts? It`s of public interest where she decides to put the coconuts. What does she do with the third place? I don`t know. Public interest, "New York Times".

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Kills me, man, just kills me. When President Bush and John Murtha agree on an issue something remarkable is happening. When President Bush, John Murtha and I agree on something, I`m telling you, it`s like check for the red heifer, because the messiah is coming. That`s the perfect storm.

When we all think "The New York Times" shouldn`t have released the news that we`re trying to monitor the terrorists` financial doings, you got something on your hands here. Here`s what the president had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Congress was briefed, and what we did was fully authorized under the law. And the disclosure of this program is disgraceful. We`re at war with a bunch of people who want to hurt the United States of America, and for people to leak that program and for a newspaper to publish it does great harm to the United States of America. What we were doing was the right thing. Congress was aware of it, and we were within the law to do so.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: You know, what kills me is they never said we were doing the wrong thing. Why did they publish this? I mean, what was their point other than, "Hey, look, look what we can do"? They`re not making any charges of anything illegal. The real question is, who benefits from this leak other than, you know, Osama bin Laden?

The press has the right to print whatever is factual. However, don`t -- don`t some things need not to be printed? Somehow or another if somebody is saying, "Hey, look, we could blow up national monuments if you just did this," shouldn`t you not print that information? You have a responsibility not to publish it.

Rights are only meaningful when they`re balanced with responsibility. If we as a society can`t exercise morality and responsibility in everything we do, then our society is doomed. There is no hope for us. And that just ain`t the bandwagon I`m on.

ANNOUNCER: This is GLENN BECK.

BECK: Let`s move on to somebody who actually fought war on terror, Lieutenant Ilario Pantano. He`s a married father of two. He served in Iraq. You probably know his name. He shot and killed two Iraqi insurgents. But instead of being celebrated as a hero, Lieutenant Pantano was court-martialed and charged with murder. Remember him now?

Ever since he was acquitted on all charges, and he`s telling his book now -- his story in a new book, "War Lord: No Better Friend, Mo Worse Enemy." Lieutenant Pantano joins us now.

Hello, sir. How are you?

LT. ILARIO PANTANO, AUTHOR, "WAR LORD": Terrific. Thank you.

BECK: You`ve seen the enemy eye to eye. Let me bring it back to "the New York Times". Which enemy -- where does "the New York Times" fall on an enemy list?

PANTANO: Well, I`ll tell you. There was a very interesting article about a month ago "The New York Times" ran, and it was decrying the methods of Task Force Black, the Spec Ops guys that captured and killed al-Zarqawi. Of course, a month later they captured and killed Zarqawi, and you don`t see an article saying, "Hey, these guys were right."

So you know, there`s one thing to think about. Another is that everyone is always calling for the professional, the responsibility of the troops to be precise as they employ their weapons. We forget sometimes that words are weapons that have to be deployed professionally and responsibly. And that doesn`t always happen.

BECK: Words are incredible weapons, especially -- what you went through, I mean, I don`t know where you stand on Abu Ghraib. But I thought it was an abomination. I don`t want to see our soldiers behave in a way like they were. I mean, for the first point it was just unprofessional. I mean, there are things that we have to do that we have to do. Let`s at least be professional about it.

But that was a calling card. That was a rallying cry with Abu Ghraib. What you went through, pretty much the same thing. And they were wrong on you.

PANTANO: You know, Glenn, they were indeed. In fact, my book is about the five-day hearing and all of the Iraq story kind of happens as flashback. And one of the things I talk about is Abu Ghraib. I was in the first Fallujah fight, and we had been fighting for our lives for months before. And I think sometimes things get politicized to a degree, and we create incidents where there aren`t any.

And I`m not suggesting that Abu Ghraib and incidents like it that create or ferment, you know, some hatred are not -- are not bad for our men and women in combat. But I am suggesting that often we create the fervor that we`re so afraid of.

And they`ll tell you, the enemy was very intent on killing myself and my men before the Abu Ghraib story ever broke. So the suggestion that it`s this kind of conduct that triggers that is inaccurate.

BECK: You -- I can`t believe that your trial lasted five days because you were a calling card for quite awhile, saying look at our bad, out of control soldiers.

PANTANO: You know, it`s -- in fairness, Glenn, one of the things, and I`m actually really honored to be here today. And I say that because a year ago I was fighting for my life in a courtroom. Two years before that, I was fighting for my life in Iraq.

And here I am today as an advocate for the Marine Corps and for these men and women that in combat, saying to America at large, hey, wait a minute. My case was called a pretty ugly case, too, when it broke. And one of the reasons, of course, is the labels that were used like innocent and civilian.

These guys were al Qaeda. They were fleeing a weapons cache in a car with bomb compartments, and they attacked me. Yet somehow they still maintain this label of innocent civilian. And those labels, again, come back to the words are weapons.

BECK: Let me bring -- let me bring into Haditha for a second. Because the way it`s been described -- and I`m not going to try it on TV. But the way it`s described in, you know, the "Times" and elsewhere is that these were innocent people and we just went in and executed them. And if that is indeed true, well, I think they should spend their time in an Iraqi prison and get the justice that they deserve.

However, what people don`t understand and what is never reported in American press is that a week before, in the market in Haditha, they were selling a videotape of insurgents gutting our soldiers, and people were buying it in the marketplace. This isn`t a good place.

PANTANO: Glenn, there`s a lot of things candidly that aren`t reported in the media that ought to be, and there`s a lot of details about this case that I`ve already been privy to that I suspect the public will be soon that are yet to be reported.

Now, the same way that I called for patience in not trying this case in the media, I don`t want to be a hypocrite and begin to go there. But what I will say is we have to give our men the benefit of the doubt. In a place like Haditha, one of the things that was even reported by "The New York Times" is that, as those men were under fire with that first IED strike, two units tried to respond to them in QRF, or quick response force, and they weren`t able to because they were, in turn, under fire.

So the suggestion that this was a placid day that Marines were on a spree I think is inappropriate. And there are so many things that get left out.

BECK: Ilario, thank you for your time and thank you so much for your service, sir.

PANTANO: Thank you, Glenn.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: Every day the Glenn Beck program is heard nationwide by over four billion Americans in over 5,000 U.S. cities. And one of those cities is Houston, Texas, and KPRC, where the morning guy, my best friend, Pat Gray.

Hello, Pat.

PAT GRAY, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: Hello, Glenn.

BECK: Andrea Yates, I mean, can you guys get this one right eventually? I`m just saying.

GRAY: Sure would like to. It`s -- dragging through that Andrea Yates cesspool again, and it`s tough to go through.

BECK: Yes. I got an -- I got an e-mail from you this morning, and I haven`t had a chance to talk to you about it and find out what you meant by this, but you said, "I don`t want her to die any more." What was it you said, exactly?

GRAY: I don`t remember exactly what I said in the e-mail, but I have softened on it. You know, in the beginning when the emotions were high and we all saw the images of the kids and the family...

BECK: Yes.

GRAY: ... and everybody felt pretty strongly about putting her to death and executing her the good old-fashioned Texas way.

BECK: Sure.

GRAY: But, you know, in the last five years I`ve softened. I mean, I`m not saying...

BECK: So you`ve forgotten the kids?

GRAY: No, no, no.

BECK: Because I could show you -- no, I could show you the pictures of the kids.

GRAY: No, that`s OK. No, that`s OK. I haven`t forgotten the kids. I`m not saying let`s release her, you know, let`s set her free, let`s let her find her soul mate on eHarmony.com.

BECK: Sure.

GRAY: Although I`d like to hear the commercials: "I`m Dr. Neil Clark Warren. If I could find Andrea Yates` soul mate, match her on 29 dimensions of compatibility, I can find a match for you."

BECK: Right. Would -- would the 30h dimension be dragging your kids into the tub?

GRAY: Yes, but we won`t get into that one right now.

BECK: All right. So why are you softening?

GRAY: I -- you know, she`s just clearly not in touch with her reality, you know? And every time she gets in touch with reality, she goes right back. Every time she realizes what she did, she seems to lapse back into nothingness.

BECK: So if that is your case, if that`s your case, wouldn`t you say that it would be more humane to kill her? You know, because that`s why -- I mean, when I said, when everybody else is screaming for the death penalty, I said let her live. Because if she`s lucid enough to realize what she`s done, it is the worst torture. I mean, it would drive you insane.

GRAY: She`s got to be trapped in her own living hell.

BECK: Yes.

GRAY: And it seems -- and you probably saw the footage of her -- not footage, but heard the stories about her breaking down in court and weeping as they showed the crime scenes. So you know she`s reliving this thing over and over again.

BECK: Real quick, let me just switch gears with you, because Texas killed half-man, half-angel yesterday.

GRAY: Well, we can`t kill him. He`s going to be -- I wanted to put your CNN correspondents on notice in the Middle East. He`s going to be -- day after tomorrow he`ll be showing up at some railroad track there. He is the railroad killer after all.

BECK: What is up with that? We only have one minute.

GRAY: OK. But it`s interesting to see, you know, the protesting outside of the Huntsville prison and dead -- people screaming that he`s too nuts or people are too stupid or it hurts too much. The guy`s a vicious killer. Come on.

BECK: And they -- they were playing the race card.

GRAY: They played the race -- they always do, as if this guy were white and killed 15 people in cold blood, we wouldn`t be putting him to death? It`s unbelievable. Unbelievable.

BECK: Thanks a lot, Pat, for the buzz from Houston. And you`re on what station again?

GRAY: KPRC.

BECK: AM...

GRAY: AM 950.

BECK: Wow, that`s great, on your AM dial. See you tomorrow.

Thanks a lot, Pat. Bye-bye.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BECK: I don`t want to jump on the bandwagon that everybody else is jumping on, that the "New York Times" is not alone. It`s also the "Los Angeles Times" and "The Wall Street Journal."

But I`ve got to tell you, I don`t know who these people are. You know, red-staters always say media doesn`t get us; Hollywood doesn`t get us, and you know what? I don`t get -- I don`t get Hollywood. I don`t get "The New York Times."

These people, it`s like they`re a Woody Allen movie to me. You know, you`re like, OK, maybe I`m not smart enough to understand. What possible reason could the "New York Times" have for taking America apart and printing this kind of stuff?

Here`s what I would really like from "New York Times": I would like them to come up with a declaration of principles just so I know right where they stand, because I don`t know who they are.

Now, I`d never asked them to do something I wouldn`t do, so to be fair, here`s who I am: One, I believe the United States has made bad mistakes in the past, but you know what? We`re good people and we`re trying to do better. We try to make up for our mistakes.

Two, I believe that we should stop living in the past and start looking to the future. Hello, Bill Cosby, please come speak to my neighborhood.

Three, I believe that our system of government may stink on ice, man, but it`s the best one on the planet. Show me one that`s better and that doesn`t involve a Kennedy of some sort.

I also believe that war is hell, but you know what? I`d fight it rather than have my kids fight it a decade or two later.

I also believe that doughnut holes are much better than doughnuts. They`re more delicious. You can fit more in your mouth, and you feel like a fat pig if you eat three doughnuts, but you can have 10 doughnut holes. I don`t know how many equal a donut, so I`m pretty cool with that.

Michael Gross, he`s a constitutional lawyer and former ACLU attorney.

Michael, we`re going to try to make -- try to make nice here and not make the blood vessels pop out of our head when we talk to each other. All right?

MICHAEL GROSS, CONSTITUTIONAL LAWYER: I`ll try, but it`s difficult for me, especially with that opening.

BECK: Well...

GROSS: You want to know who I am? Give me liberty, or give me death.

BECK: See this, Michael? Starting to pop a blood vessel right here.

GROSS: That`s not a blood vessel. It`s circulation.

BECK: Here`s the deal. Why, there is such a thing as liberty -- you`re right on the money on that. I feel the same way, sir. I`m part of the press. I appreciate freedom of the press. But don`t they have a responsibility? This is not something that was illegal. They`re not even claiming that it was unethical. Why would they print it?

GROSS: Because it`s the truth, and it`s something that the people have a right to know. Now, that`s the only criteria that`s required.

BECK: Michael -- Michael, why do you scream? This is a show you don`t have to scream on. I don`t hate you. Do you hate me?

GROSS: Certainly not.

BECK: OK. Then let`s not scream at each other.

They have a right to know, you say, because it`s the truth. My mother taught me when I was, oh, about this tall that sometimes the truth doesn`t need to be said.

GROSS: Glenn, the administration doesn`t need a P.R. agent in "New York Times" or "The L.A. Times" or certainly the "Wall Street Journal", where it`s doing pretty well. And if the "Journal" printed this as well as the "Times" and the L.A. papers, you know that this surveillance program is not being watched by oversight. He won`t. Nobody in the administration...

BECK: You had John Murtha come out and say, "Please don`t expose this." John Murtha said don`t expose this.

GROSS: It doesn`t make any difference who said don`t expose it. Let me give you the words real clear: no law Congress shall make...

(CROSSTALK)

BECK: Yes. Say it with a smile. There you go.

GROSS: OK. I`ll try. Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of the press. No law -- what part of that can`t you understand? It can`t be restricted. You live in a country that doesn`t have a free press, and the government does whatever it wants to do.

BECK: Nobody is talking about that, Michael. Wait a minute.

(CROSSTALK)

GROSS: You pick and choose what you like to hear.

BECK: No, I`m not saying that.

GROSS: Criticism is not disloyalty.

BECK: I am not saying that. They weren`t criticizing it, sir. They were just telling about a secret plan.

GROSS: OK.

BECK: Is there no time for secrets? I`m not saying ban them. I`m not saying take their press credentials away. What I`m saying is, don`t they have any concept of being a responsible citizen? You only have freedom, sir, when you exercise responsibility with that freedom.

GROSS: The "Times" really knows, because the "Times" brought this case to the United States Supreme Court in 1971 with the publication of the Pentagon Papers over the objection of the Nixon administration.

And the procedure is very simple and very fair, and the "Times" abided by it here. They told the government: Here`s what we know. Here`s what we intend to print, do you have a problem with it? The government said, "Don`t print it." And the "Times" said what the United States Supreme Court told them to say, show us that it will cause an immediate -- immediate damage to the security of this nation. They couldn`t do that.

BECK: All right.

GROSS: If they could do that, and even if the "Times" didn`t agree, they`d go to court and they get a prior restraint. The fact that they didn`t seek the prior restraint means they don`t believe it themselves. It`s simply trying to deflect focus.

(CROSSTALK)

BECK: I`ve got 30 seconds, so I`m going to give you rapid fire questions, OK? And then maybe a little Bayer aspirin for the heart. Here we go. You just tell me, yes or no, should you print these things? Yes or no, troop positions?

GROSS: No.

BECK: Non-illegal ethical spy techniques?

GROSS: Print it.

BECK: I don`t understand it. Location of the Cheney bunker?

GROSS: That`s troop positions (INAUDIBLE) definitely in the Army.

BECK: The 11 secret herbs and spices from the colonel? I`m just saying...

GROSS: Thank you for giving me a smile.

BECK: Michael, we`re out of time. Thank you very much.

GROSS: Nice to see you, Glenn.

BECK: You bet, bye-bye.

ANNOUNCER: This is GLENN BECK.

BECK: All right. Let your blood pressure come down just a bit. Not too much. Unfortunately, this story is -- we got a happy story in a few minutes. This is not it, though, unfortunately.

Yesterday I brought up a story that is deeply personable -- personal to me; it`s also deeply disturbing. Kalie McArthur, she`s 20 years old now. She has an I.Q. of about 50. She`s about a 4-year-old mentally.

She was assaulted sexually in September 2004 by a 15-year-old boy that was assigned as her peer trainer. The attacker had been suspended 20 times the year before, had a 0.0 grade point average and never been screened or trained. The punishment: two weeks in prison.

We`re going to be following this story very closely, as I told you yesterday. And next week we`re going to bring you some more of this horrible story. Unfortunately, this may not have been the first time this happened to Kalie by different boys.

But tonight I want to talk about how this may be happening in your school, with possibly your kids.

Joining us now is Pete and Pam Wright. They`re attorney and psychotherapist. They are advocates for those with special needs. How prevalent is this, guys?

PETE WRIGHT, ATTORNEY FOR SPECIAL NEEDS KIDS: It`s very prevalent. I was on the phone yesterday for an hour with a parent who was yanking their child out of the public school because of the physical and mental abuse the child had suffered and was placing a child in a private school.

And, Pam, tell Glenn about all the e-mails that we get on this issue.

PAM WRIGHT, PSYCHOTHERAPIST: We probably get 100 or more e-mails a week from parents and from teachers.

BECK: It`s not -- it`s not just kids that are predators, I mean, like in this particular case it was a 15-year-old kid. It`s also some of the caregivers that we`re seeing now with non-special need kids.

PAM WRIGHT: Exactly. And aides, untrained people working with kids with disabilities, no supervision of children in special-ed programs, and abuse by staff, where kids are being put in boxes, being put in time-outs - - they`re called time-out rooms, little windowless boxes that are five by five. Kids who are put in restraints.

BECK: Pam and Pete, let me ask -- I don`t know which one of you is better to ask or answer this question -- my daughter has special needs, and she has a miracle of a mother. It was a full-time job to be an advocate for my child, and she took it on, and she was relentless, but there are a lot of people that don`t have that time or they don`t have that wherewithal to be able to do it. They don`t even know where to begin.

What does the average person do? How can people make sure this isn`t happening to their kid?

PAM WRIGHT: I think it`s very important for apparently to realize that the buck stops with you, and so you need to spend time at school, as much as you can. You need to get to know the teachers and staff. You need to make friends. You need to offer to help, bring cookies, whatever, and develop good relationships.

So if your child is targeted or does have a problem, you are far more likely to find out about it quickly from the educators who are going to be very concerned about it and wanting to know, wanting to know.

BECK: Pete, are the laws tough enough?

PETE WRIGHT: No, not in terms of the consequences for public school educators who have knowledge that a child is being abused and look the other way, or even for those that commit the abuse.

BECK: In this particular case, in Colorado Springs, it -- it kills me that the school`s not being held responsible. I mean, it`s an outrage. I don`t know if you`re following this case...

PAM WRIGHT: Yes, yes.

BECK: ... but one of the school experts said that Kalie enjoyed the rape or the sexual abuse. That`s incredible. That`s criminal.

PAM WRIGHT: That`s outrageous, you`re right.

PETE WRIGHT: And sad to say, so many individuals working with these children believe this kind of stuff. They believe, well, you know this young lady did enjoy the sexual experience, and that makes it OK. And how individuals can be thinking like that is just beyond our ability to comprehend it.

BECK: Pam and Pete Wright, thank you so much for joining us from Richmond, Virginia.

And to you, do not miss next week as we tell you the rest of the story from Colorado Springs.

Back in a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: I`m on the Internet looking for the weather forecast for this weekend, yesterday. You know what was over Saturday? A question mark. A question mark? What kind of crappy weather system is that?

But you can tell me that it`s -- we`re going into -- we`re going to burn to death? Oh, shoot. Now I`ve wrecked the end of the Al Gore movie for you. I`m sorry. I didn`t mean to. It just came out. Should have said, "Spoiler alert. In case you`re going to see the Al Gore movie, we all burn to death in the end."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Hope I didn`t wreck that for you. If there is a TV show that is out there pushing the edge week after week this summer, it is -- other than this one -- it has got to be "Rescue Me," in which Denis Leary plays a New York City firefighter who`s a recovering alcoholic with a pretty complicated life.

Let`s see. So far, Leary`s character, Tommy Gavin, has lost his son to a drunk driver, encouraged his uncle to kill the guy who ran him over, and in last week`s episode rattled a lot of people`s pages, including the "New York Post," who was talking about it today, Tommy seemed to rape his estranged wife.

Oh, and did I mention that Tommy and his godson are also having an affair with the same hot high school teacher?

On tonight`s episode, there is also another disturbing twist there.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi.

I think she raped Damian...

DENIS LEARY, ACTOR: Did Damian say that he was raped by her?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He doesn`t have to. I know how he feels about it. He spends all that time in detention.

LEARY: That`s a hell of a leap of faith to go from him being in detention with a teacher he likes to him getting raped by her. I mean, come on. I`ll talk to him. I`m sure...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Dorene Sellick (ph) says that she gave them all Chlamydia.

LEARY: Gave who all?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Dijiac Russo (ph), Rodney`s cousin. She said that Rodney and the two other boys, they all have Chlamydia.

LEARY: Did Damian say anything about it?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why would he say something? You`re the one who just said that he wouldn`t be involved, so why would he...

LEARY: You`re answering your own question. I`ll talk to him. I`m sure he doesn`t even know what Chlamydia is. All right? Thanks for dropping by.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BECK: All right. Joining me now from location in New York is the man himself, Denis Leary.

Hello, Denis. How are you, sir?

LEARY: All right, Glenn. How are you?

BECK: Good. The first question is, is that make-up on the side of your face there or...

(CROSSTALK)

LEARY: Yes, we`re in the middle of shooting -- we`re in the middle of shooting a scene where my character, Tommy Gavin, gets into a fight with his brother, who`s living with his ex-wife. So...

BECK: OK. You -- I assume you`ve seen the "New York Post" today. And it talks about...

LEARY: Yes, I think people are -- actually, the "Post" was fairly supportive in calling it disingenuous to call that scene a "rape." And anybody that -- I think there`s a lot knee-jerk reaction. If you take a look at that scene and you watch the dichotomy and you know the history of the relationship, it was anything but a rape. It starts rough, obviously. And...

BECK: I thought it was through the course of -- I`m sorry. I thought it was very interesting that the "Post" said in it that the guys are just as abused as the women are in this show.

LEARY: Well, it`s sort of the torture of -- and the grief of what they`ve been through and what they go through on a regular basis. That`s kind of the core of the show. It`s where the humor comes from, as a defense mechanism for them. And at the same time the things that they go through in the course of doing their job can be fairly gruesome, you know.

But in terms of the relationship with his wife, that is a very tortured, passionate, fiery relationship. And it`s very interesting to listen to some of the critics call it a rape and other people see it for how it was written and how it was played, which is an escalation of the -- of the...

BECK: Did you write -- did you write this episode?

LEARY: This -- actually, Peter and I wrote this episode together, yes.

BECK: Because you -- I mean, you`re the creator. You`re the writer. You`re the director. I mean, you`re a spotlight hog. You do it all on this show.

Do you believe that there is such a thing as marital rape? And if so, what`s the difference? Because I didn`t see the scene. What is the difference?

LEARY: Well, the difference is -- there`s not a word spoken in the scene after a certain point. The two characters, Tommy Gavin and his ex- wife, reuniting in a way the spark their relationship has had from the beginning, which is really what carry -- that`s one of the reasons this relationship was so interesting, because it`s -- they`re like magnets. They can`t get away from each other.

Andrea Roth, the woman who plays my wife on the show, I thought it was some of the best work she`s every done on the show. It was really an incredible scene, and which is why I think Peter and I were upset about people writing it off as a one-note thing, because it`s not. It`s a very, very complicated and very, very delicately balanced scene. And by the end of it, I think some people got it and some people didn`t it, you know.

But that`s fine. Because that`s the difference between the audience that should be watching the show and the audience that should be watching something else.

BECK: Right. This is a really -- it`s sounding like a really dark show in many ways. I mean, you are facing some real serious things. Alcoholism. You know what it is? It seems almost like the anti-hero that Tony Soprano is. You love Tony Soprano. But you don`t know why, because he`s really kind of a bad guy. Why do you think we`re -- why are we attracted to anti-heroes and what you`re doing?

LEARY: Well, I think it`s -- "The Sopranos" happens to be my favorite show on television. But I think it`s -- where the movies used to go -- in the movies that used to be made for $25 or $30 million, which were really interesting dramas, that has sort of gone away from the movie business, which has led a lot very talented actors and writers and directors into the hour-long dramas on cable television.

And I know that`s where my interest fall anyways as a viewer, and I think that`s where these stories are. I think it`s -- you know, we used to go to the movies and be able to see this. Now at the movies either $175 million budget of it`s a $3 million budget.

BECK: Right.

LEARY: So in between that is a lot of -- I mean, this is the heyday of the televised one-hour drama. I mean, our show, which I can`t speak for, because I`m biased, but I mean, "The Sopranos," "House," you know, "Grey`s Anatomy," you know, "Huff" on Showtime, which is a fabulous show, it`s really, really just some terrific work being done, and most of it falls on the dark side. You wouldn`t have seen a show -- you wouldn`t have seen a show like "House" on network television even five years ago.

BECK: Denis, I`ve only got about 10 seconds. Just quickly, I know you`re a parent and a good parent. Would you let your kids watch this show?

LEARY: My son watches it. He`s of age. But, no, I`ve always been very, very careful about what my kids can watch and what they can`t watch, because most of my movies are made for adult audiences. So, yes, I`ve always been -- I always still find it bizarre when a 7-year-old kid comes up to me and goes, "`The Ref` is my favorite movie." And you`re like, "What are your parents doing?"

BECK: I know. Denis, thanks a lot.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: I`m asking you to join me in a fight, a fight tonight against the penny.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: That`s right, America, I took a hard stand on our first show against the penny, saying it needs to be eliminated. However, when you make a strong stand on an issue that is so near and dear to so many people`s hearts, you know you`re going to make some pretty big enemies.

Political rivalries are not really new. There, of course, was Dewey versus Truman, Al Gore versus George W. Bush, and the newest political rivalry, myself and outspoken proponent of the penny, Kevin Federline. You know, the guy who Britney Spears pulled out of a trailer park.

Mr. K-Fed was in Manhattan suspiciously enough for Virgin Mobile while I was on the road to push for their text-message-for-a-penny plan. Of course, Virgin Mobile will most definitely reject your payment if you just send an envelope full of pennies to pay for it. Go ahead. Try it.

But why K-Fed? Why was he the pitchman for Virgin Mobile and pennies? You know, we`ll cut out the obvious jokes, like a penny was all they had to spend on a spokesperson, and that`s all K-Fed had in the bank account when he met Britney.

Instead, let`s focus on the heartfelt presentation for my worthy adversary. Listen to this, this guy...

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEVIN FEDERLINE, VIRGIN MOBILE SPOKESMAN: Hey, New York. I`m here with Virgin Mobile. We`re bringing power back to the penny.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: There`s like 12 people going, "Power to the penny what?" Dead silence.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FEDERLINE: Man. I feel good about the penny.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Oh, yes, no, don`t we all? Loser.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FEDERLINE: I love it. You know, I`m glad they`re giving back to these charities.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: First of all, the penny. Who loves the penny? And it`s good that you`re supporting charities? Yes, I guess so, because you`re going to be needing one real soon, K-Fed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FEDERLINE: You know, it`s real wonderful to help the kids, the reorganization.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Wait, wait, the what, the reorganization? Are you trying to say organization?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FEDERLINE: I`m going to do the first penny tax right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: I can`t wait. I love this part. Here he goes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FEDERLINE: Let`s do a big `96. We love you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: What, what? Let`s do a big `96? What does that even mean?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FEDERLINE: Virgin Mobile loves you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BECK: Virgin Mobile loves me? Virgin Mobile doesn`t -- they don`t even know me.

K-Fed, let me ask you a question: Did John Lennon schlep rotary phones? I don`t think so. K-Fed, this is just day one in my fight versus you and the penny. More to come as it happens.

By the way, you can hear me filling in on KFI Radio in Los Angeles, tomorrow, 3:00 to 6:00 Pacific in the afternoon, or hear it online at KFI640.com.

Until next time, do it big in `96. Virgin Mobile loves you, baby!

END