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No Secret Session for House of Representatives; Hazardous Extra Duty; Shelter Tragedy; Romania's Orphanage System Crisis

Aired September 26, 2006 - 13:59   ET

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

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Fighting words from President Bush aimed of critics of his war in terror, they came in at a news conference with an ally on the front lines. And Afghan president Hamid Karzai, well, he's facing an alarming increase in deadly attacks by Taliban and al Qaeda insurgents back home.
Here's part of what Mr. Bush had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I of course read the key judgments on the NIE. I agree with their conclusion that because of our successes against the leadership of al Qaeda the enemy is becoming more diffuse and independent. I'm not surprised the enemy is exploiting the situation in Iraq and using it as a propaganda tool to try to recruit more people to their -- to their murderous ways.

Some people have, you know, guessed what's in the report and have concluded that going into Iraq was a mistake. I strongly disagree. I think it's naive. I think it's a mistake for people to believe that going on the offense against people that want to do harm to the American people makes us less safe.

We weren't in Iraq when they first attacked the World Trade Center in 1993. We weren't in Iraq when they bombed the Cole. We weren't in Iraq when they blew up our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

My judgment is, if we weren't in Iraq they'd find some other excuse because they have ambitions. They kill in order to achieve their objectives.

HAMID KARZAI, AFGHAN PRESIDENT: Terrorism was hurting us way before Iraq or September 11th. The president mentioned some examples of it.

These extremist forces were killing people in Afghanistan and around for years, closing schools, burning mosques, killing children, uprooting vineyards with vine trees, grapes hanging on them. Forcing populations to poverty and misery.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Well, tomorrow Mr. Bush has a three-way White House meeting with President Karzai and Pakistan's president, Pervez Musharraf. He'll be trying to get those neighbors to work together in the fight against the Taliban and al Qaeda. Now, later today, Pakistan President Musharraf will join Wolf Blitzer in "THE SITUATION ROOM," 4:00 p.m. Eastern, right here on CNN.

Now, this weekend CNN takes an unprecedented up-close look at Donald Rumsfeld. The defense secretary acknowledges some things haven't gone as expected in Iraq but challenges anybody who questions his planning.

An exclusive interview, candid comments. That's "Rumsfeld: Man of War," only on CNN Saturday and Sunday, 8:00 p.m. Eastern.

LEMON: It hasn't happened in more than 20 years and it won't happen now. The House of Representatives won't go into secret session over a previously secret intelligence report.

CNN's Andrea Koppel is on Capitol Hill with more on this developing story.

Hi, Andrea.

ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi there, Don.

Well, this is a highly, highly unusual move that was made by the House minority leader, Nancy Pelosi. In fact, I'm told by her staff she has never done this before.

She made a motion just a short time ago on the floor of the House to go into secret session in order for all House members to be fully briefed on that NIE, that highly secretive NIE. The motion, as you might expect it would in a Republican-dominated House, failed by a vote of 171 in favor to 217 against.

Nevertheless, Don, it is an illustration of just how highly charged and how highly politically charged this atmosphere on Capitol Hill is. We're just six weeks out from those midterm elections. This is the last week that Congress is in session.

Republicans in both the Senate and the House have been furiously working behind the scenes to try to push through their legislation highlighting the accomplishments that they want to put forward to the American people on national security. In particular, a vote could happen today on a border security bill over in the Senate.

Meanwhile, Democrats both in the House and the Senate, you want to talk about moving from one end of this building to the other, trying to put forward various press conferences to again showcase what they say are the failings of the Bush administration, in particular in Iraq, but also related to that NIE, saying it further supports their argument that the war in Iraq has made the United States less safe rather than more -- Don.

LEMON: All right. Andrea Koppel, live on Capitol Hill.

Thank you very much.

PHILLIPS: A former president, a current cabinet member trading shots over the war on terror. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice fires back at Bill Clinton after Clinton's remarks to FOX News that President Bush had eight months to get Osama bin Laden before 9/11 but didn't even try.

Rice tells "The New York Post" -- and we quote -- "What we did in the eight months was at least as aggressive as what the Clinton administration did in the preceding years. We were not left a comprehensive strategy to fight al Qaeda."

She was then asked, "So, you're saying Bill Clinton is a liar?" Her response, "No, I'm just saying that, look, there was a lot of passion in that interview."

Clinton says he did leave a comprehensive anti-terror strategy for his successor.

LEMON: With the Afghan president at the White House, insurgents were on the attack. A suicide bomber blew himself up outside the compound of a provincial governor in southern Afghanistan, killing at least 17 people. Among the dead, Muslim pilgrims wanting documents to travel to Mecca.

Another attack just south of the Afghan capital. A NATO convoy hit a roadside bomb, killing an Italian soldier and an Afghan.

Almost five years into the Afghan war, a CNN poll by Opinion Research Corporation shows Americans are almost evenly split. Fifty percent say they favor the war, 48 percent don't. At the time of the U.S. invasion weeks after 9/11, nine Americans in 10 approve. Three years ago the approval camp held a two-thirds majority.

PHILLIPS: The plight of the Stryker Brigade, a U.S. Army unit based in Alaska that expected to be back in Alaska weeks ago after a year of extremely hazardous duty in Iraq. Instead, the Stryker Brigade is still in Iraq and some of its members won't be coming home at all.

CNN Pentagon Correspondent Barbara Starr reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice over): These soldiers should have been home by now, back with their families, but the Army's 172nd Stryker Brigade drew the ultimate short straw. Just as they were headed back to their base in Alaska last month from a year-long tour of duty, they were ordered to stay in Iraq. Now they are patrolling and sometimes dying in Baghdad's toughest neighborhoods.

Sergeant Joey Davis was killed when his Stryker vehicle struck an IED. Now Joey's brother Andy will meet his new sister-in-law for the first time at his brother's funeral.

ANDY DAVIS, BROTHER OF FALLEN SOLDIER: I got an e-mail that said, "Hey, I got married," right before he shipped out.

STARR: Andy knew his brother was in danger.

DAVIS: I guess the last time my mom spoke with him two weeks ago, the part of the city where he died, he was telling her he was going there and he described it as the ghetto, the worst -- one of the worst places to be.

STARR: Candace Jordan (ph) was hearing the same thing from her son, Corporal Alexander Jordan, after the unit was ordered to stay in Iraq.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that's where I really became alarmed.

STARR: Alexander's e-mails were grim.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He wrote me an e-mail about a week ago and he said, 'Mom" -- he said, "I hate to tell you this," but he says, "those people are trying to kill us."

STARR: She knew what had happened when there was that knock at the door.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I know exactly what to expect. I know who to expect. And that was my worst nightmare. I think it would be any mother's nightmare. I never ever expected to see them at my door.

STARR: And Staff Sergeant Eugene Alex, killed on patrol in Baghdad. Three soldiers scheduled to have been back home with their families, ordered to stay in Iraq, killed in the last three weeks.

Barbara Starr, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MOHAMMAD MAJEED AL-KHALEFA, CHIEF JUDGE (through translator): You are a defendant and I'm a judge. You have to respect the courts. We should not allow you to speak.

The court decided to remove defendant Saddam.

Shut up! No one is allowed to speak.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Well, as you heard there, the chief judge hears enough and orders a defiant Saddam Hussein out of court again. It's the third time in a week the deposed Iraqi leader has been ejected from his second trial. He and six others are accused of killing about 180,000 Iraqi Kurds with poison gas in the late 1980s.

After today's session, the trial was adjourned for two weeks.

PHILLIPS: Well, we haven't heard the last of Tony Blair, but this was the beleaguered prime minister's last official speech as head of the Labour Party. After nine years of power, Mr. Blair has agreed to step down next year, well before the next general elections.

Blair told the party faithful it's important for Britain to remain a close ally of the U.S. but admitted it can be hard. Blair's die-hard support for the war in Iraq is largely to blame for his plummeting popularity.

LEMON: Coming up in the NEWSROOM, a very disturbing story. A safe haven becomes a crime scene.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RUSTY DORNIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Does everybody in this town know where that shelter is really?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, I wouldn't say so. The longer that a location is in existence, then, of course, the more well known it becomes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: A victim of abuse is now dead and the hunt is on for her husband. And that is just the beginning of this story, ahead in the NEWSROOM.

PHILLIPS: A fate worse than death? You may well ask that question when you see how Romanian children are forced to live.

That story still ahead from the NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Well, another clue in the hunt for a suspected killer, a man police say gunned down his battered wife in a place she thought was a safe haven.

Rusty Dornin here with the very latest.

Maybe kind of brief our viewers on the story if they're just tuning in. And also, the newest news, they think they found his car.

RUSTY DORNIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They think they found his car in -- well, they did find his car in Knoxville, Tennessee, but they're not sure if it's a diversion planned by John Woodring, who is accused of killing his wife, stalking her to a women's domestic violence shelter, and actually killing her inside there.

So, apparently, they did discover the car because one of the employees at the Greyhound bus station in Knoxville, Tennessee, thought it was weird the car was parked not quite square in the lot and had been there for five days. And so it was actually one of the cops in Knoxville who had been moonlighting at the Greyhound bus station who called police.

And they found the car. But again, they're not sure -- he's very smart, and they're just not sure whether this is planned to be a diversion or he actually got on a bus. PHILLIPS: And he's got a history. You've been investigating his background. What more do we know about him?

DORNIN: He has a history of domestic violence. Also, very interesting, he wrote a book. He had been in a federal penitentiary for actually trespassing on a domestic shelter on a Cherokee reservation. So he violated federal law doing that.

He wrote a book and communicated with Son of Sam, Eric Rudolph. He brags about that sort of thing. He was going to school to ironically be a counselor, but he was failed apparently in one class because one of the professors asked him about abuse with women and he said to her, "Well, you have to see whether the woman is provoking it."

PHILLIPS: Wow. You wonder, too, if the wife had any idea of his background or any of these communications that he had in the past.

DORNIN: She was infatuated with him. It was a very intense relationship, the family tells me.

Also, the next-door neighbor whose car he did steal, allegedly stole, and also stole a gun from there, told me that he kept a very close eye on her, wouldn't even allow her to go into the garden. Would take her down by her hand -- hold her hand down to the garden, watch her while she gardened, and then take her back. The only thing she ever did on her own was going back and forth to work. She was a nurse at the local hospital and apparently very well loved there.

PHILLIPS: All right. I don't know if we have any pictures that we can bring up, but just to let viewers know, I mean, he's on the loose. What can...

DORNIN: Considered...

PHILLIPS: Yes, considered armed and dangerous. Correct?

DORNIN: Considered armed and dangerous.

PHILLIPS: Here we go. We did get a mug shot. Great.

If anyone does see this man -- now, I'm seeing U.S. Marine Corps. Was he a Marine?

DORNIN: Yes, he was. But they say don't expect this guy to be any Eric Rudolph, that despite the fact that he was a Marine, they don't really think that he was hiding -- of course here you can tell he wasn't hiding, of course -- in the woods sounding Sylva, North Carolina, which is very rural, in the Great Smoky Mountains, that sort of thing.

They don't discount it, but they say it's unlikely. He sort of lacks the survival skills to do something like that. He is more likely of an urban dweller, that he would hide out somewhere in the city or something like that.

PHILLIPS: Try to mix in with crowds.

Now, Knoxville police, is that who people should contact? Or is it a -- whatever police department?

DORNIN: Whatever police department they can.

PHILLIPS: OK.

DORNIN: This is actually handled, of course, out of North Carolina, the state bureau of investigation there. But contact any police department, of course, they will get through to the North Carolina authorities.

PHILLIPS: All right. We'll stay on the story.

Rusty Dornin, thanks so much.

LEMON: More now on the desperate plight of abandoned children in Romania. To meet the standards for membership in the European Union, Romania shut down its abysmal orphanages, but the horror still exists. It's just as a different name now.

Chris Rogers with Britain's ITV News uncovers the details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRIS ROGERS, REPORTER, ITV NEWS (voice over): Dumped in a Romanian hospital, she is one of thousands abandoned each year. The lucky ones are saved, fostered. Many are condemned to virtual imprisonment, driven mad in appalling conditions, confined to miserable institutions until they die.

We are armed with fake aid worker I.D., but there are too few nurses on these eerily quiet wards to notice us. They are understaffed, underresourced yet teeming with Romania's abandoned. Some are starving, left somehow to feed themselves.

They are simply unwanted, but others are dumped because of birth defects. Ioness (ph) has been here seven years and treated for cerebral palsy.

As a condition of Romania's forthcoming EU membership orphanages were closed and replaced with a local fostering program. But Children's Charities claim the system is overwhelmed. And according to one nurse, many hospitals have instead become orphanages with horrific consequences.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): I think the hospital is like a zoo. They live like animals all day in their cots, and that makes the children become physically and mentally damaged. To stop this institutionalization we need more help so we can offer love to the abandoned children and stop them becoming disabled.

ROGERS: An aid worker showed us children crippled from lying on their backs for months on end.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She can't sit up.

ROGERS: These loveless wards also create mental scars. The rocking motion a common side-effect. I was witnessing the creation of mentally ill and physically disabled children destined for the country's most horrific homes.

This is an statute for disabled children typical of several we saw, but here a nurse let us film. She's tired of hiding her country's failure. Some had been born mentally ill, but many had arrived in need of little more than love and attention.

(on camera): We are surrounded by victims of institutionalization here and this is the treatment they receive. You're looking right at it.

They sit on the benches all day or just lie here on the rug. Some of them with their hands tied behind their backs to protect themselves, but also the other children.

(voice over): The nurse is clearly overwhelmed. She keeps the room clean but she has little else to offer these children. She didn't want us to film the children tied up, but they clearly didn't know what to do with their freedom.

Romania insists its notorious institutes have been dealt with. Some like this one have been shut down. But where were the children here sent to?

The younger orphans are now in newly built centers. Aid workers call them show homes, where fund-raisers and celebrities are given tours. We got a job in one, and our secret filming revealed disturbing practices. The children are still tied up to stop self- abuse and damage to the property.

Our bogus charity work got us inside this adult institute, the final resting place for Romania's unwanted. Two 18-year-olds are confined to a bed together. After a life in orphanages, we're told they've lost the will to live.

Romania promised attack on its child welfare problems. So why does this abandoned baby still face a life of neglect and cruelty?

Chris Rogers, ITV News, Romania.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LEMON: Coming up, ITV reporter Chris Rogers joins us in the NEWSROOM. He'll talk to Kyra Phillips on -- more on Romania's unwanted children, can anything be done to help.

In the meantime, there are ways that you can help. Check out www.romanianchild.org. It is an umbrella organization connected to dozens of charities that provide assistance.

PHILLIPS: Straight ahead, a mother's trust results in a daughter's pain. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was a lot of guilt. I handed her to him, I signed permission slips for her to go with him. I felt she was safe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: This attacker war a military uniform and had easy access to his victim. We'll hear the story.

LEMON: Plus, their fishing boat had found her. Their last flare was about to fizzle out. So why would you call these guys the lucky seven?

Hang on. We've got the story next in the NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Take a look at that. Alone and adrift, seven men packed into a life raft for two days after their fishing boat sank off the Delaware coast. Just when they thought all was lost, their last flare was fizzling out when a Coast Guard chopper spotted the smoke. The crew pulled all seven to safety.

They're all reported in good health, Kyra. That's good news, don't you think?

PHILLIPS: It doesn't surprise me. Some of those same guys were the ones that were rescuing people from Katrina in New Orleans.

LEMON: Yes.

PHILLIPS: They're the best, those search and rescue.

LEMON: Glad they're OK.

PHILLIPS: All right. Health care premiums are a major burden on companies and their employees, as Cheryl Casone tells us live from the New York Stock Exchange.

(BUSINESS REPORT)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Well, it's been more than 15 years since Romania's horrible orphanage system shocked the world. You might think it's cleaned up its dismal act since then but you'd be wrong. Chris Rogers is with Britain's ITV news. He defied Romania's ban on journalists to get the heart-breaking truth. He joins us now live from Newcastle, England with more.

And Chris, we've seen both the pieces now in our 1:00 and 2:00 hour. Already I'm getting a lot of response from people on how to help and why this exists. First of all, why don't you explain to our viewers why journalists are banned from even telling the story. CHRIS ROGERS, ITV CORRESPONDENT: Well, Romania introduced a law which bans the filming and photography of children, period, whether it's photography by a journalist, an aid worker or a tourist or any kind of visitor to the country.

You can only but read into that. They've obviously got something to hide. It made life very difficult for charities wanting to raise money and raise awareness of the issues that they were trying to deal with. How can you print a pamphlet without the pictures of the children and institutions you're trying to help?

But obviously it went beyond that. It was to stop journalists from exposing some of the horrors that I managed to expose a few weeks ago when I was filming there. Romania has been under a lot of pressure to solve its problems and to be fair to the Romanian authorities, they have made some progress, but clearly not enough.

PHILLIPS: Tell me about the women that are having these children. Are they not seeing what is happening here? And so it's a lack of education or are they doing it for the money? Is it just still a part of the culture? I mean, you see what's happening and you sort of feel a flashback from the times of Ceausescu and the way that he treated women.

ROGERS: Yes, in the time of Ceausescu's rule, Romanian families were encouraged to have as many children as possible. Abortion and contraception was banned. They wanted to create a workforce for Romania. Old habits die hard.

And the problem for the Romanian gypsies is that they are treated as outcasts. They have been left behind by Romania's progression as it heads into the European Union and has received a lot of international aid. They live in very poor, appalling conditions and they don't receive any kind of education, they don't receive sexual education.

Many parents have up to 15 children. Some mothers will have children with four or five men and they are left in a position where they have 15 mouths to feed and no money in which to feed them. If a foreigner like you and I walks into a gypsy village today right now, you'll be offered a number of children and we're talking of the price of a new car, maybe four or $5,000. And they're not well educated so they don't really understand what might happen to that child if it got into the wrong hands and I don't think Mr. and Mrs. Jones in Connecticut could go to Romania and successfully get a child out of Romania, but a sex trafficker or a pedophile could.

PHILLIPS: So who needs to be held accountable. Is it the president of Romania? Is it the EU? Who needs to feel the pressure to start to make a cultural change?

ROGERS: Well 17 years ago when Ceausescu was assassinated and the cameras were allowed to go into Romania for the first time and reveal and film some of the horrors that were going on there, the Romanian authorities and the new Democratic Romania invited journalists in, they invited cameras in, they invited politicians into the country to expose the problems that they had inherited from Ceausescu.

What has changed from then and now is that under pressure to perform and to heed conditions set by the European Union in one hand Romania has solved some of its problems, in the other hand it's sweeping them underneath the carpet, sweeping them underneath the rug to try to hide them from the outside world, to try and prove that they are coping.

So to an extent, the European Union can be blamed for that. But also the Romanian authorities, as well. They need to be more honest. They need to approach their problems without the propaganda that we've seen in reaction to my piece, as they've been denying these images are being filmed in Romania. They're denying they've been filmed recently in Romania. That's not getting them anywhere. If they were more honest like they were 17 years ago, the European Union could do more. I think everyone is to blame. I think the EU and I think the Romanian authorities, as well.

PHILLIPS: And to put this in perspective of how big of a problem this is, you were saying to me it's like the AIDS problem in Africa. It's like what we're seeing in Sudan and the human right abuses. Is it truly that big of a problem? How many children are we talking about?

ROGERS: Well, it's hard to know because a lot of the children that you've seen in my films don't officially exist. They don't have birth certificates, there's no paperwork. They don't know who their parents are. They are children just lost in a system that is a complete and utter mess, to be frank.

The Romanian authorities did introduce a fostering program where babies that have been abandoned by their parents and end up in an institution can be adopted by a Romanian family. On paper, it's a great system but in reality, it's not actually working. There are around 14,000 foster parents available for around 100,000 abandoned children. So clearly the figures just aren't adding up.

So they've got a long way to go to make the fostering program work. It's very hard to pinpoint an actual figure on the amount of children that are abandoned or the amount of children that are in institutions, but you're talking of well up to 100,000 children in 90 institutions across Romania.

PHILLIPS: Chris, anyone that anywhere around the world that would see your report and want to go and just sweep up one of these babies and take them home, why can't that -- why is adoption not a possibility and who can make the decision to make that happen?

ROGERS: It won't happen. It's very unlikely it will happen. Romania has a huge sense of national pride and quite rightly, they want to prove to the outside world they can look after their own children and they should be given that chance.

And to be brought in line with European Union law, international adoption was banned in 2004 and that fostering program I was telling you about earlier was introduced to keep the children within their own country. International adoption is banned in Europe for many reasons. The main reasons is to protect children from pedophiles and sex traffickers and from families that aren't fit to adopt a child.

And there's also research to suggest that children are better off being kept in their own country. But then on the other hand as you've seen from our reports, these children can end up in horrific conditions in horrific institutions. And there are calls, particularly in America, there's a lot of lobbying in America but also among MEPs as well in the European Union to bring back international adoption to countries like Romania so a Romanian abandoned child has every chance of a decent life.

In the first hand, yes stay in the country, stay with a Romanian family. If that's not possible then hopefully be fostered off to a good family abroad in countries like America and across Europe. But that's very unlikely to happen. There is something like 1,100 babies that were due to be adopted in the middle of an adoption process with a lot of American families and British families and Canadian families that were just about to go. The ban was introduced and those children have now not been sent to those families.

The European Union did advise the Romanian authorities to allow those 1,100 babies to be sent to those families that were going to adopt them. And just today, Theodore Berntsy (ph), the head of adoption in Romania said, nope, it's not going to happen. They're staying in the country. Many of those 1,100 children are in horrific institutions with hands tied behind their backs, tied to their beds, fed a horrific diet and given no therapy for their mental and physical disabilities which have been created in many cases because they've been institutionalized and unloved.

PHILLIPS: Well, Chris, you have done an absolutely incredible job of exposing this story and taking a lot of risks to tell the story. We will promise you to stay on top of it, follow up with you and continue to get feedback from the EU, also Romania on this story. We want to thank you so much for giving us so much time and doing an incredible job.

ROGERS: Well, I'd just like to add that a lot of the charity workers and aid workers that helped me make that film, mainly behind the scenes of research have now been expelled by the Romanian authorities. So there are a lot of children who are not getting the help that they need from these aid workers now.

PHILLIPS: We'll continue to put pressure on the right people. Thanks, Chris.

ROGERS: Thank you.

PHILLIPS: In the meantime, there are ways that you can to help. Check out www.Romanianchild.org. It's an umbrella organization connected to dozens of charities that provide assistance.

LEMON: Just want to go there and scoop all those children up and bring them back to America.

PHILLIPS: I know. It moves you, definitely.

LEMON: We'll move on now. A mother's trust results in a daughter's pain.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There's a lot of guilt. I handed her to him. I signed permission slips for her to go with him. I thought she was safe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: This attacker wore a military uniform and had easy access to his victim. The story ahead in the NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: They're armed with prestige, authority and power. They wear uniforms and work day and night to win the hearts and minds of impressionable teenagers. Military recruiters, by and large, work strictly by the book, but sometimes hearts and minds are not what they're after.

Here's CNN's Randi Kaye with a joint investigation by the Associated Press and "A.C. 360."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Shedrick Hamilton was a Marine sergeant, a popular and respected recruiter.

JILL GIUNTA, VICTIM: He had that uniform on, and everybody trusted him.

KAYE: Yet, he had a terrible secret.

TRISH GIUNTA, JILL'S MOTHER: I had no idea. I didn't ever think anything happened. I vouched for this man when my husband questioned why, why was calling all the time? It's Hamilton. Everybody -- the kids loved him.

KAYE: Especially Trish Giunta's daughter, Jill, until...

J. GIUNTA: He threw me in the back of the car. And, you know, again, like, I kept saying, no, like, you know, I mean, I didn't want to do it.

KAYE: Sergeant Shedrick Hamilton first raped Jill Giunta on Valentine's Day nearly three years ago. She was just 16 years old. Sergeant Hamilton was 34, married, with two children.

T. GIUNTA: I woke her to go with him.

KAYE (on camera): As a mother, do you feel -- am I seeing guilt? Is that what that is? T. GIUNTA: There's a lot of guilt. I handed her to him. I signed permission slips for her to go with him. I thought she was safe.

KAYE (voice-over): The sergeant drove Jill to Marine Corps physical training, a program to involve kids in the Marines in hopes they will join. Nearly every week, he picked up Jill at her home in his government car and drove her to this New York recruiting center, until, one day, he made a sharp turn down this deserted road, not even a mile from Jill's home.

J. GIUNTA: He just started doing what he wanted to do. And, you know, I would just like sit there and just, like, you know, look off. And tears would just come down my face and stuff like that. And he just would finish up what he wanted to do.

KAYE (on camera): Help me understand why, after the first incident, or even the second incident, why didn't you run home and say, Mom, help me. This guy is attacking me?

J. GIUNTA: He kept making sure that I knew, that he would repeatedly tell me that nobody would find out about this, nobody would believe me.

KAYE (voice-over): As disturbing as it is, Jill's story is not unique. An investigation by the "Associated Press" found last year at least 35 Army recruiters, 18 Marine Corps recruiters, 18 Navy recruiters and 12 Air Force recruiters were disciplined for sexual misconduct or other inappropriate behavior with potential enlistees.

MARTHA MENDOZA, ASSOCIATED PRESS: In 2005, 80 recruiters were disciplined for sexual misconduct, with more than 100 victims.

KAYE: AP Reporter Martha Mendoza found across all services one out of 200 recruiters, those who deal directly with young people, was disciplined for sexual misconduct. The abuse ranged from inappropriate touching to rape.

In Pennsylvania, an Army recruiter pleaded guilty to having sex with a 14-year-old girl. In Wisconsin, a Marine Corps recruiter was recently charged with sexual assault and false imprisonment of a potential female enlistee. He has pleaded not guilty. In Indiana, a National Guard recruiter was indicted for allegedly assaulting eight different potential recruits outside schools, in cars, and in recruiting stations. He's out on bail, pending trial.

(on camera): Why are there so many cases of sexual misconduct among recruiters? Remember, the No Child Left Behind Act was passed in 2001, in part to help grow the military's ranks.

No Child Left Behind guarantees schools federal funding, as long as they grant recruiters access to students on campus. Unlike the rest of us, who have to show ID, recruiters can walk right in, no questions asked.

J. GIUNTA: I would be sitting in class and then my teacher is like, tapping me on my shoulder saying that -- to go outside the classroom, that somebody needs to speak to me and it was him.

KAYE (voice-over): No Child Left Behind also mandates recruiters be provided with students' home phone numbers and addresses.

J. GIUNTA: I definitely feel like he was stalking me. There were times when he would call the house, and he would tell me to look out my bedroom window. And he would be sitting in the government van right on the corner of the street.

SHEDRICK HAMILTON, FORMER RECRUITER, CONVICTED OF RAPE: I'm sorry.

KAYE: Shedrick Hamilton pleaded guilty. He was convicted of rape and endangering the welfare of a child and sentenced to prison. At sentencing the judge called Hamilton a child molester and a disgrace to his country and his uniform.

Sergeant Hamilton spoke with the "Associated Press" from jail.

HAMILTON: I ended up putting myself into a position to where I sought out comfort in a young lady that I shouldn't have done. I allowed myself to -- to get caught up into the wrong situation at the wrong time and I have no one to blame but myself.

KAYE: The Department of Defense declined our request for an on- camera interview, but issued this statement to CNN. "All military recruiters are briefed in regard to the conduct and ethics required of them and receive training. The Department of Defense has zero tolerance for misconduct by military recruiters."

The Pentagon says it is now monitoring its recruiter and will evaluate whether it needs to change its policy. But that comes only in response to the A.P. report and a Congressional Accountability Office study which found the DOD does not track all allegations of recruiter wrongdoing.

In January, having served two years for rape, Shedrick Hamilton is expected to be released.

T. GIUNTA: This is my child. He hurt my child. So, I'm going to watch him.

KAYE: Jill Giunta, now 19, has decided not to join the military, but to go to college and become a police officer instead. And she's made a promise to herself, when she puts on that police uniform, never to abuse her authority.

Randi Kaye, CNN, Monroe, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LEMON: You can catch more of Randi Kaye's reports on "ANDERSON COOPER 360." "A.C. 360" airs weeknights at 10:00 Eastern. You'll see it only on CNN.

PHILLIPS: President Bush meets an ally on his war on terror and claims his administration's latest intel report is being misinterpreted.

We're live from the White House.

LEMON: Plus, fired up and ticked off, but is he right? Former president Bill Clinton defends his record in the hunt on Osama bin Laden. We'll check the facts ahead in the NEWSROOM.

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PHILLIPS: Well, it started on Labor Day and firefighters worry it'll burn until Thanksgiving. You're looking at live pictures now of our affiliate KVC out Los Angeles. This is the stubborn wildfire in Los Padres National Forest. It's jumping fire lines, and so far scorching more than 143,000 acres in southern California. Less than half of that fire is contained, but calmer winds should help crews gain ground. Costing millions, millions of dollars to fight that fire.

LEMON: Ominous smoke coming from those fires there.

Well, crisp fall days. That's the word from the CNN "Weather Center". Let's enjoy, right?

JACQUI JERAS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Absolutely. It's so fabulous. All -- days like today, guys, I really got to work at my job. You would think it would be easy, but have to find something really interesting to talk about. We accomplished that for you today.

LEMON: Good. We're glad.

(WEATHER REPORT)

PHILLIPS: All right.

LEMON: Jacqui, I was going to put you on the spot. I'm going to talk to you about that nickname thing a little bit later on.

JERAS: I'm working on it.

PHILLIPS: She doesn't like J.J., right? We already know that.

LEMON: She doesn't like J.J.

JERAS: I'm trying to come up with one for him.

LEMON: All right. Thank you very much.

He said, she said. He's a former president. She's a current cabinet member. He says he left the strategy to fight al Qaeda. She says he did not. Details straight ahead.

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PHILLIPS: Tell you what, every single show he does, he just brings everybody to their feet. There's no place like home. New Orleans rocks as it welcomes the Saints back to the Superdome. The celebration straight ahead from the NEWSROOM.

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