Return to Transcripts main page
Nancy Grace
New Photos to Be Released in Casey Anthony Case
Aired April 28, 2009 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Breaking news in the desperate search for a 2- year-old Florida girl, Caylee. Six months of searching culminates when skeletal remains found in a heavily wooded area just 15 houses from the Anthony home confirmed to be Caylee, manner of death homicide. A utility meter reader stumbles on a tiny human skeleton, including a skull covered in light-colored hair, the killer duct taping and placing a heart-shaped sticker directly over the mouth, then triple bagging little Caylee like she`s trash.
Bombshell tonight. Have secret surveillance photos of tot mom`s car emerged? And do they pinpoint the time little Caylee`s body may have been removed from tot mom`s car trunk-turned-coffin? Tot mom circling and circling, according to police evidence, before dumping that car at a local Amscot, leaving it chock full of personal items, begging to be stolen. Was tot mom trying to set up a would-be car thief for Caylee`s murder?
After a disastrous PR junket by grandparents George and Cindy, including a botched appearance on Oprah, tot mom`s defense lawyer piles on by speaking on camera, now saying he can explain photos of tot mom`s partying non-stop in the days after Caylee goes missing. He go on to compare tot mom to an accused black widow convicted of poisoning her husband with arsenic, the case later reversed. Is he planning to copy that defense, to battle evidence of deadly chloroform discovered in tot mom`s car?
The lawyer showing all his cards up front and dodging tough questions, still offering no explanation about the nanny they claim kidnapped Caylee or why tot mom goes a whole month without reporting Caylee missing. The lawyer claims cutting-edge science is junk science after it proves a decomposing body was in tot mom`s trunk, even going on to compare the smell of Caylee`s body to a potato. He then says tot mom`s been, quote, "intimidated" and intimates because there`s no cause of death and no eyewitness, tot mom is innocent.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROY KRONK, METER READER: (INAUDIBLE) down by the school. I need you, like, now. I just found a human skull.
CASEY ANTHONY, CAYLEE`S MOTHER: The (DELETED) detectives (DELETED) They got all of their information from me. Yet at the same time, they`re twisting stuff. They`ve already said they`re going to pin this on me if they don`t find Caylee.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) purposely misled us. So that was a lie.
CASEY ANTHONY: That was a lie.
GEORGE ANTHONY, CASEY`S FATHER: So let`s just cut to the chase, and why don`t we just end this right now, today.
I`m not going to be able to handle this too much longer, Brad.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How come everybody is saying you`re lying?
CASEY ANTHONY: Because nobody`s (DELETED) listening to anything that I`m saying.
KRONK: I grabbed the bottom of the bag, and I pulled it. And I pulled it the second time, and then a human skull dropped out, with hair around it and duct tape across the mouth. And I went, Oh, God, and immediately came out and called my supervisor and (INAUDIBLE) Orange County utilities and notified them that I had found human remains and that I needed the police.
CASEY ANTHONY: My entire life has been taken from me! Everything has been taken from me!
GEORGE ANTHONY: I`m getting ready to end this. I`m getting ready to walk out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: And tonight, a 17-year-old high school beauty, a model student, soccer player vanishes into thin air spring break, Myrtle Beach. Her mother with us live. The critical first 72 hours passed. Still no sign of the missing high school junior. Tonight, where is Brittanee Drexel?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Brittanee Marie Drexel was in Myrtle Beach with a group of friends, went for a walk on the beach and never returned.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The kids that she was with are all older than her, and they have five different stories that they`re telling.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: According to police reports -- and friends that were hanging out with her told her that, you know, We switched from one hotel to the next hotel. Friends are telling police that that is the last time they had contact with her.
GRACE: She went back to this other hotel to see a friend she knew from home town Rochester. Did he say she appeared there? She showed up?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That`s the statement he gave to police, saying that was the last contact he had with her and then she walked away. And after that, he never saw her. She said, I put him on the phone with the sheriff, gave him a different story, but then gave Don Drexel a different story. And then it turns out later on Saturday, around 1:00 o`clock, in the morning, he checks out. So that`s something the mother is saying, you know, she feels a little fishy about.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it is very, very shady that somebody decides to make a 17-hour drive back to Rochester, New York, at 2:00 o`clock in the morning, leaving clothes, liquor and a deposit back at the hotel.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We love you and we want you to come home.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us. Have secret surveillance photos of tot mom`s car emerged? Do they pinpoint the time little Caylee`s body may have been removed from tot mom`s car trunk-turned-coffin?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CASEY ANTHONY: I`ll take this as far as I need to to prove my innocence, which I guess is my point in all this.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) what do you mean?
CASEY ANTHONY: Serving the indictment today and the warrant for my arrest, everything else.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`m trying to think, did she really do it only to better herself, or does she even just white lies just to do it? I`m really trying to think now because sometimes it seems like she has just to lie.
JESSE GRUND, CASEY`S FORMER FIANCE: Do I believe it`s possible that someone -- that Caylee did have a nanny and Casey lied to her enough about her family and that she thinks that she`s protecting them right now? Does she think she`s protecting Caylee? I don`t see why not. We can all tell that from the last couple years, Casey is a very effective liar. I think I`d use the word diabolical to describe the way she lies.
CINDY ANTHONY, CASEY`S MOTHER: Go (INAUDIBLE) Mr. Morgan. She didn`t fight with me, sir. No. No. Let it go. Let him look like an ass on the thing.
GEORGE ANTHONY: I`ve already answered him. This is not the lady. When I get up out of here, I want to walk over to her and shake her hand and tell her I`m sorry.
CINDY ANTHONY: I`m done.
GEORGE ANTHONY: You better get this over in five minutes. I`m giving you five minutes more of my time. Otherwise (INAUDIBLE) I`m walking out of here.
CINDY ANTHONY: I`m tired getting beat up. He asked me a question and he won`t let me finish it.
GEORGE ANTHONY: I`m over this. I`m over you. I`m over all this other stuff.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Straight out the Mark William, anchor and reporter standing by there in Orlando. Mark Williams, the photos -- discovery has already gone out to the defense. We are anticipating getting it, released to the media within hours. And in that discovery, are Amscot photos. What do you make of it?
MARK WILLIAMS, ANCHOR/REPORTER: Well, those new photos have emerged in the Casey Anthony affair. We have not seen the photos yet. We hope to get those a little bit later on. They were handed over to the defense. And they`re photos of the Amscot store where Casey`s car was found. Now, Nancy, could this show a new timeline of the case? Could it tighten up the timeline? And could it help pinpoint Casey`s location when little Caylee finally went missing?
GRACE: Let`s unleash the lawyers. We are taking your calls live. Have secret surveillance photos emerged on tot mom`s car? Does it pinpoint the time little Caylee may have been disposed, discarded like trash out of that car trunk? That`s what police are hoping.
Straight out to Holly Hughes, former felony prosecutor out of Atlanta, Raymond Giudice, defense attorney, and renowned lawyer out of the Philadelphia jurisdiction Joe Lawless, also author of "Prosecutorial Misconduct." Welcome, attorneys. Give me your best shot. Holly Hughes, the police evidence suggests that, due to cell phone pinging, she circled, went around and around all over the place before she finally dumps that car at an Amscot. In the car, it`s chock full of personal items, begging, Steal me, take me, I`m a car, I`m dumped here, I`m abandoned at the Amscot. Is she trying to pin the murder on a would-be car thief?
HOLLY HUGHES, FORMER PROSECUTOR: Absolutely, Nancy. She`s trying to pin it on anybody but herself. We see her do that constantly. She tried to pin on it Jesse Grund. She tried to pin it on Zanny the nanny. She tries to pin it on people who don`t even exist. That`s what she was hoping. That`s why -- she might as well put a sign in the window that says, Steal me, because that`s what she was doing, leaving it there with everything. She wanted somebody to take it. That way she could claim, I don`t know anything about the decomposition, anything about the smell. Somebody else did this crime. It`s her modus operandi. We see her do it every day.
GRACE: In the meantime, Raymond Giudice, Joe Lawless, the defense attorney takes to the airwaves after a disastrous PR junket by the grandparents, including a highly botched appearance on "The Oprah Winfrey Show." Ray Giudice, I recall I was under strict orders for the decade that I prosecuted felonies, Don`t speak to the press. I had a standard line. If they caught me coming in or out of the courthouse, I would say, I believe a jury will render a verdict to speak the truth, and I believe in our evidence. End of story until the trial was over. What is he thinking?
RAY GIUDICE, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Listen, it`s just one more step in bad big case management. If you`re going to say anything, it should be the script that you gave, or as I think he made a big mistake yesterday, for him to try to shoot from the hip to rebut the scientific evidence when he has a known national expert, Miss Baden, on his criminal defense team that would be in a much better position to start responding.
GRACE: Look at what we`re showing right now, Lawless and Giudice. He`s apologizing in this interview on camera, stating, I`m sorry I haven`t emoted like I care about the case. Now, I think he was confronted about why he hasn`t been emotional whatsoever regarding the case. Now, his response seems very, very removed, Joe Lawless.
JOSEPH LAWLESS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: This is a death penalty case at this point. Yes, somebody`s going on TV and giving interviews where their client`s life is at stake boggles my mind. If you`re going to talk to the press, you do it in a way that`s short, that`s precise, and that serves a purpose you need to represent your client. You don`t go down in the middle of the night, open your refrigerator door, a light goes on and you give a 15-minute interview. This is insanity. It`s playing with someone`s life.
GRACE: Also, he says he does not believe in the death penalty, that it doesn`t work. To Dudley Sharp, founder of Justice Matters. Does the death penalty work, Mr. Sharp.
DUDLEY SHARP, FOUNDER, JUSTICE MATTERS (via telephone): Well, of course, it works like any other sentence does in the respect that once the person is executed, they`re dead, and that`s the intent of the death penalty. I`m presuming what he`s talking about is whether or not it deters or not. And for those of us who find that negative consequences deter people, we know that the death penalty deters, and we have 16 recent studies to back that up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: During that year before the disappearance, did she ever describe Zanny to you?
GEORGE ANTHONY: I never heard a description of Zanny until all this stuff happened in July of 2008.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have you ever seen a picture of Zanny?
CINDY ANTHONY: No, I haven`t.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
GEORGE ANTHONY: I`ve looked at her many times.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
GEORGE ANTHONY: And I feel sorry for her being here.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So let me ask you a very specific question...
GEORGE ANTHONY: And I mean that from the bottom of my heart. I feel sorry that you have to go through this.
CINDY ANTHONY: It would have just all blown away for her if she wouldn`t have gone and had her little Channel 6 and then Mr. Morgan parading her all around, so...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, I appreciate you want to say all that, ma`am, but you know...
CINDY ANTHONY: Well, I`m telling you the truth. I am...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`m not asking you those questions. I`m really not. So let`s just make it...
CINDY ANTHONY: I know you`re not. That`s OK.
CASEY ANTHONY: Oh, 5-7-ish. She`s just, like, maybe an inch or two shorter than Dad, so 5-6, 5-7, very thin, maybe a little bit more meat than me, about 140-ish.
CINDY ANTHONY: She`s not 25 years old. She`s not 5-foot-7. She`s not 140 pounds. She doesn`t have black hair. She doesn`t have perfect teeth. She`s not a 10. I`m sorry, ma`am. You`re cute, but you`re not a 10.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: She`s referring to the imaginary nanny, according to police, that performed an imaginary kidnapping of little Caylee. She`s describing a would-be kidnapper.
Tonight, have secret surveillance photos of an Amscot check cashing parking lot emerged, and do they pinpoint the time tot mom abandoned her car? Air samples from that car trunk definitely prove a human decomposing body had been there.
Out to Leonard Padilla, bounty hunter. He will be under oath in this case. Leonard, what do you make of it? What do you believe we can learn? If there`s Amscot surveillance video and these are the photos, what will we learn from it finally?
LEONARD PADILLA, BOUNTY HUNTER: Well, if the cameras are properly positioned, based on where the car was parked or moving in and around, I believe that there could be some evidence that would be forthcoming. However, you know, I`m not quite sure about that because it would have been something that law enforcement would have released long ago, if they had something positive with those cameras.
GRACE: But what would they show? To Detective Lieutenant Steven Rogers out of Nutley, New Jersey. What could we learn from these photos? Obviously, we`re going to learn the time and the date. It`s going to be stamped with that. We`ll know precisely when the car was left. We already know where she had been driving around, looking for a place to dump the car, according to police, because of her cell phone pings. But what will we learn? If it`s surveillance video, will we see her checking the car? What will we see? What can we potentially learn?
DET. LT. STEVEN ROGERS, NUTLEY, NJ, POLICE DEPARTMENT: Oh, Nancy, you`re thinking along the lines of a good detective. Yes, you might find her going in and out of that car, moving around that car. This is the smoking gun I believe that the police were waiting for. They have it, and we`re going to see more of it, I`m sure.
GRACE: To Ellie Jostad, our chief editorial producer. Ellie, the evidence has not been released. It`s been given to the defense but not to the public. Why?
ELLIE JOSTAD, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: Right. Right. Well, in this case, we`ve seen the state has all along -- they`ve turned things over to the defense. Maybe a week or two later, they`ve released it to the public. And just -- we just found out that the defense has gotten those Amscot photos, as well as some interviews from Leonard Padilla, his associates Rob Dick and Tracy McLaughlin (ph), as well as about 500 pages of other evidence that aren`t described in the paperwork.
GRACE: And also, Ellie, tonight apparently airing on "Law & Order: Special Victims` Unit" is a scenario identical to this case. Explain. You`re seeing the video from NBC.com of the episode.
JOSTAD: Right. Right. They like to do these "ripped from the headlines" type episodes, and this one has a woman who was -- a little girl who goes missing. She`s reported missing by her grandmother. The grandmother...
GRACE: Hold on, Ellie. Let`s take a look.
JOSTAD: Sorry.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She used my car when she was away. Now Sarah`s gone, and the car smells like a dead body.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Now, that apparently is the mock-up grandmother Cindy. Go ahead, Ellie. What were you saying?
JOSTAD: Right. Right. And this grandmother comes in, tells police that her daughter and some girlfriends went down to Atlantic City for the weekend. The daughter comes back but no little girl. And the grandmother says the car smells like a dead body. Then cops go find the daughter. She says...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: Oh, here it is. Here it is, El!
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... special victims unit. How can I help you?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I haven`t seen my granddaughter four days. She`s only 11 months old.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does she live with you?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My daughter went to Atlantic City with some girlfriends for the weekend. She`s been home for over a day, and I haven`t seen my grandbaby since.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So you think your daughter had something to do with the disappearance.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She used my car when she was away. Now Sarah`s gone, and the car smells like a dead body.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: That`s the video from NBC.com of the "Law & Order SVU" episode that`s airing. Ellie, bottom line is this is going to be on NBC, a huge, huge audience pool. My question tonight is, has the defense in any way tried to stop it? Were they concerned that it could taint the jury pool?
JOSTAD: Not as far as we know. But the producers of the show did say, Don`t draw too many parallels. Their case takes a little different turn than the Anthony story.
GRACE: To Joe Lawless out of the Philadelphia jurisdiction. How, if at all, will this affect jury pool? Apparently, they teased the episode by saying maybe the grandparents shouldn`t watch it, so I don`t think it`s going to have a positive ending.
LAWLESS: Well, it`s a double-edged sword. I mean, you could try to stop it. You`re not going to be able to. The 1st Amendment`s going to prevent it. But it`s going to cause problems because this stuff gets imprinted on the public`s mind, and the TV series molds into reality. And when you try to pick a jury...
GRACE: It`s going to cause problems?
LAWLESS: ... that`s going to have formed an opinion...
GRACE: It`s going to cause problems. You know what? Boo-hoo! The problem is little Caylee was murdered and her mother is the chief suspect. That`s the problem, Lawless not NBC "Law & Order."
LAWLESS: The problem is she has to get a fair trial, and this is going to interfere with that.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE ANTHONY: Is this 15 minutes of fame so important to you?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sir, I don`t have to explain anything, but I will.
GEORGE ANTHONY: Yes, sir, you have to explain a lot to me.
CASEY ANTHONY: I don`t want to hear any of this media (DELETED) People want their face on the news, want to have their two seconds of fame. I never once wanted to be on TV or to have anything, period.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You went on TV and you said that this is the person...
CINDY ANTHONY: No, I did not.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ma`am...
CINDY ANTHONY: I did not say that this is the person.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have played this.
CINDY ANTHONY: No, because I did not know...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes or no, the way you like it. Yes or no, the way you like it!
CINDY ANTHONY: No, because I didn`t know her name was C. Zenaida Gonzalez or I would have cleared her name!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let`s don`t play games.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: A very different demeanor than what we saw on the CBS "Early Show."
Out to Natisha Lance, our producer who`s been on the story from the very beginning. Natisha, also Jose Baez, the defense attorney, really shows all of his cards and says he`s going to compare, apparently, tot mom`s case to an accused black widow who was charged with poisoning her husband with arsenic. Her case was later reversed.
NATISHA LANCE, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: That`s right, Nancy. This is Cynthia Sommer, and she was charged with killing her husband at the time. Her case was recently reversed, and she wants to have it completely dismissed with no prejudice. And what happened is that they came back later, they found some more forensic evidence, and they were able to clear her on that forensic evidence without showing any arsenic that was found in her husband`s body.
GRACE: OK. Back to the lawyers. But first to the calls. Brenda in Florida. Hi, Brenda.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. How are you?
GRACE: I`m good, dear. What`s your question.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I love your show, love (INAUDIBLE) I have a comment and question.
GRACE: Yes, ma`am.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was a short period of time before Caylee`s remains were found when attorney Baez had stated that Caylee`s death may have been an accident. And I can`t remember exactly when it was, but I`m thinking if it was around the time when the private investigator, Casey, went out into the woods -- if it was around that time, wouldn`t it prove his statement to be true that attorney Baez had told...
GRACE: Good question, Brenda in Florida. Ellie, it was a death penalty expert who wrote the memo stating in black and white that it may have been a death due to accidental overdose.
JOSTAD: Yes. That`s exactly right. It was Terence Leneman (ph). He wrote a letter to the state`s attorney arguing that Casey Anthony should not face the death penalty in this case.
GRACE: Was it around the time the PI went to the location, Ellie?
JOSTAD: You know, I`m going to have to have find out, find out the exact date that letter was written.
GRACE: OK.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you think your sister is being truthful?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To the best of her ability right now, I do. In fact I wouldn`t still be here if I didn`t think that she was trying to cooperate with me.
JESSE GRUND INTERVIEW, CASEY ANTHONY`S EX-FIANCE: We can all tell that from the last couple years, Casey is a very effective liar. I think I would use the word diabolical.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We`re tired of the lies. No more lies. What happened to Caylee?
CASEY ANTHONY: I don`t know.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She also says that Casey Anthony would do anything to spite her mother.
CINDY ANTHONY INTERVIEW, CASEY ANTHONY`S MOTHER: I don`t care where Casey is at. I still don`t care where Casey is at. All I want is Caylee back. Do you understand that?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Stop it. This is (INAUDIBLE) This is one of the main reasons that I chose dad.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When I asked her why won`t you allow us to see Caylee? And she said maybe I`m a spiteful [ bleep ].
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The sheriff`s office told me certain things. At the time when they told me, I believed them. As time goes on, I`m not sure what I believe. Same thing with Casey.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY GRACE, CNN ANCHOR, NANCY GRACE: Out to the lines, Myra in Virginia. Hi dear.
CALLER: Thanks for taking my call.
GRACE: Yes ma`am. Thank you for calling. What`s your question?
CALLER: I know it`s been a couple of months since Casey was charged with murder. What are the (INAUDIBLE) in Florida and when can we realistically expect this to go to trial?
GRACE: The speedy trial rules are a constitutional guarantee, so you have a state right to a speedy trial and a Federal right to a speedy trial under the Constitution, the U.S. Constitution. Typically the case must be tried. Once you file a demand for a speedy trial, either that grand jury term which typically runs three to four months, or the next grand jury term. So once you file a speedy trial demand, you`ve got about six to eight months before the state has to put up or shut up. In this case, isn`t it true, Ellie Jostad, did the defense waive their right to a speedy trial?
ELLIE JOSTAD, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER COVERING STORY: Yes, yes they did and it is set right now for October 12th.
GRACE: Out to the lawyers Holly Hughes, Raymond JJJ SSS , I don`t know about you, Holly, but when I was prosecuting, the moment I got a speedy trial demand, that case would be the number one trial on the next trial calendar.
HOLLY HUGHES, FMR. PROSECUTOR: That`s exactly right.
GRACE: You don`t mess brawn speedy trial demands. Once you get one, you try it because if you don`t try it within the term, it is an automatic acquittal.
HUGHES: That`s exactly right. They walk free Nancy and the first thing you do is ramp it up. You get all your witnesses ready. You start prepping. You collect your forensic evidence. You go through all the physical evidence. You see what needs to be tested. If additional testing needs to be done, it goes out to the lab. It is the number one priority. You live it, sleep it, eat it, breathe it. Seven days a week until that thing goes to a jury and you get your conviction, absolutely.
GRACE: To Dr. Michael Bell (ph) out of Palm Beach County. He`s the chief medical examiner there. He`s joining us from Miami. Dr. Bell, the defense is calling the lab results from Oakridge Laboratories junk science. How does the air in her trunk prove there was a dead body there, a dead human body?
DR. MICHAEL BELL, PALM BEACH CO. MEDICAL EXAMINER: I believe that they`re going to use some new techniques and that they`ll measure the different compounds and chemicals in the air and then kind of like an odor fingerprint, look at the composition, the different amounts and try to be able to discriminate between human and other types of decaying remains.
GRACE: Exactly. Over 20 components found in that car trunk air indicate human, not animal, decomposition. To Ray Giudice, Joe Lawless. Raymond Giudice, it is not just the air sampling that was tested at Oakridge Laboratories. A cadaver dog, a human cadaver dog hit on the trunk and the grandmother says and the grandfather says, smells like a dead body.
RAYMOND GIUDICE: Yeah, but you`re not going to be able to use her alleged smell test to support the scientific evidence. That scientific evidence is either going to have to stand or fall on its own quality. The United States Supreme Court in the Dalbert (ph) decision has set very high standards now for scientific experts and evidence to come into trial. That doesn`t mean it is junk. It just means it can be cross examined and attack.
GRACE: That could say that about anything. Didn`t you see Cochran and OJ Simpson and the DNA? Of course it can be attacked. Tell me something I don`t know, Giudice and when you say Ray Giudice that the grandmother`s statement, it smells like a dead body in the damn car, that will come into evidence.
GIUDICE: I didn`t say it wouldn`t be. No, no, what I said was it`s not going to make the scientific evidence any better. That scientific evidence either stands or falls on its own. What I`m telling you is, just like this California case, just like the OJ case, there is no such thing as a slam-dunk for the prosecution on scientific evidence. At the end of the day, the judge and the jury determine that it is good.
GRACE: Thank you for the lecture. But I was asking you about the air sampling and the fact that a cadaver dog hit on it and the family smelled it as well and told police. Joe Lawless, I don`t care where the grandmother and grandfather`s statement come into evidence. It could be in the 911 call and their interviews with police, doesn`t matter. It bolsters what the cadaver dog found and it bolsters the air sampling.
JOSEPH LAWLESS, DEFENSE ATTY: I think the air sample is the one area where there`s going to be a challenge and it can be a strong one, because that really hasn`t been verified as a valid area of science as of yet. It will be challenged. I`m guessing it`s going to be admitted but if the grandparents` statement gets in, it`s going to bolster the scientific evidence. I think they`ve got to fight the scientific evidence out and I`m not sure that`s been as widely accepted in the scientific community as is going to be require to be legally admissible.
GRACE: I had a feeling you would say that. The same thing was said about fingerprint evidence many years ago. Out to Robin in Michigan. Hi Robin.
CALLER: Hi Nancy. Thank you for taking my call. I love you. Don`t ever change.
GRACE: Thank you for calling in. And you can tell that to the defense bar. I think they have a different opinion. What`s your question, dear?
CALLER: My question is, this case infuriates me. I just want to know, with so much compelling evidence against her, what are they doing? What makes them think they even have a chance, one chance to come out innocent? I don`t understand.
GRACE: You know what? The reality is, let`s go back to the lawyers very quickly. Baez (ph) just can`t lay down on interstate 75 and say, run over me. I`m road kill. You`ve got to at least try. Bottom line though, by a botched PR junket and opening up to the press, I hardly think that`s the way to combat this case. What about it Giudice?
GIUDICE: Look you meet with your client. Your client says absolutely positively not guilty. Those are your marching orders as a lawyer, your constitutional oath and you go do your job. Whether Baez has done his job well or not will be up to the jury one day.
GRACE: Everybody, I want to tell you about a missing high school junior out of Myrtle Beach there on her spring break. Take listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAWN DREXEL, BRITTANEE`S MOTHER: Something is very, very wrong.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Myrtle Beach police are desperate to find missing 17-year old Brittanee Marie Drexel last seen with friends Saturday night around 8:00 p.m.
DREXEL: Hoping that we find her and she stays safe.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police say Brittanee was walking on the beach towards her hotel after visiting a friend at another hotel a half mile away.
DREXEL: It is not like my daughter to not call. Brittanee wasn`t answering anybody and she had gotten one last text from her boyfriend and she never responded back. And this was from her leaving the hotel where she was at and then going to the other hotel where her friends were at. And she just never showed up. Someone who could have tooken (sic) her. She could be laying dead somewhere. It is horrible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: With us tonight is a very special guest. Brittanee Drexel`s mother is with us, Dawn Drexel. Miss Drexel, thank you for being with us. What are police telling you?
DREXEL: You`re welcome. I had just returned from the police department not too long ago. They have some leads that they are going on. But they need to follow through with them.
GRACE: Now I know that you told your daughter, no, you cannot go to Myrtle Beach. So she went to Myrtle Beach. That`s not the worst thing in the world. Many a 17-year-old has gone off on spring break without telling their parents. But she stayed in contact with you. She stayed in touch with you for many, many days. Until when?
DREXEL: Until Saturday -- Saturday afternoon was the last time I spoke with Brittanee.
GRACE: Now, Miss Drexel, everyone with us, the mother of 17-year- old Brittanee Drexel. She goes away to Myrtle Beach on spring break and she has not been seen since. Miss Drexel, what is your understanding of the last time Brittanee was seen alive?
DREXEL: My understanding was, what had happened was she had went over to see a friend of hers at another hotel. And she had gotten a phone call from some girls that she had been staying with. And I guess she was wearing a pair of one of the girl`s shorts.
GRACE: Hold on just a second Miss Drexel. Everybody, we`re taking your calls and your tips tonight. That tip line is 843-918-1342. With us is Brittanee`s mom. A quick break as we go to break and we`ll be back with Brittanee`s mother.
Happy birthday to an 18-year-old, a New York friend of the show, model student, basketball superstar, volunteer at the holiday shop at his Catholic church, Nicky Torres. Happy birthday little Nicky, all grown up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DREXEL: She`s my first born. It`s tearing me up inside. I`m very, very upset.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: She left Wednesday night apparently and kept contact with her mom up until Saturday.
DREXEL: I talked to her on Saturday and she said she was coming home. She said I`ll just see you tomorrow. And then she will me she loved me. And I told her I loved her.
GRACE: Saturday night she gets a call from her friend, John Hahn (ph) out of North Carolina. The mother gets a call from him saying Brittanee is missing.
DREXEL: She wouldn`t have left her clothes at the hotel where they were all staying at. So I know something is seriously wrong. I just don`t have enough information.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Several different people throughout the two-day period that I was down there investigating, reported that he has been changing his story. I don`t know him personally. I think it is very, very shady that somebody decides to make a 17-hour drive back to Rochester, New York, at 2:00 in the morning, leaving clothes liquor, and a deposit back at the hotel.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Straight out to Aisha Khan with WBTW. Aisha, what can you tell me about the last person she reportedly saw? The friend of hers, the male friend of hers from Rochester? Did he in fact change his story?
AISHA KHAN, REPORTER, WBTW: That`s what we`re hearing. That`s what he told -- he gave the mom a different story but then he gives the sheriff a different story and then checks out around 1:00, 2:00 in the morning and he is still in Rochester and that`s all we know. The only information we have as far as he`s concerned. We`re not sure if he`s cooperating with authorities at this point. And there is no word from our Myrtle Beach police here as well, that they have any contact with him. What I can tell you, that Jodi Barr (ph), my colleague got some new information regarding Brittanee. They`re saying, there`s witnesses at oceanfront bar and grill where Brittanee was last seen, the wait staff there say that she came in with a couple of friends on Saturday and Sunday afternoon and was dining there on Saturday. She came with three girls and four guys, had lunch and then came back on Sunday with three other girls and had lunch again. And after that, they say they never saw her.
GRACE: That is an unconfirmed sighting. But Aisha Khan, how many wait staff identified her?
KHAN: Well, like I said, as Jodi Barr, our reporter that helped me get this new information. They were a couple of wait staff that he talked to today and they are telling him that they did see Brittanee, that they saw a girl with blond hair, blue eyes. They`re describing Brittanee just like that, that she came in on Saturday afternoon with a couple of guys and a couple of girls. They had lunch. She came back again on Sunday afternoon around 3:00 and did the same. This time she came around with four girls. And after that, they say she left the restaurant and headed up north on Ocean Boulevard and they never saw her after that.
GRACE: Joining us now is Dr. Joseph Deltitto, professor of psychiatry, joining us out of New York. Dr. Deltitto, we`ve gotten so many calls and e-mails about when will they learn, especially after the Natalee Holloway case. But the reality is, these are teenagers. Of course they don`t suspect a monster around every corner. They don`t think like adults think.
DR. JOSEPH DELTITTO, PROFESSOR OF PSYCHIATRY: They`re very naive. I`m the father of an 18-year-old girl myself. I`ve gone through this, thankfully, a very good girl. But kids are very naive and they really think that evil comes packaged in such a way that you can identify it. And who knows who they get involved with, where they go, et cetera just normally. Now whether this girl for some other reason may have had poor judgment and high impulsivity, we know that she had a history of depression. I don`t know if she had manic depression. I don`t know if she was hypo manic. It sounds like alcohol might have been involve probably which can dis-inhibit someone. Who knows? But yes there are a lot of 18, 17-year-old girls that just don`t understand. And unfortunately, these events occur.
GRACE: At this juncture, there is no indication whatsoever that drugs or alcohol were involved in any way in this disappearance. I want to go back to the mother of 17-year-old Brittanee Drexel. Dawn Drexel, your daughter has never gone this many days without being in touch with you, has she?
DREXEL: No, she has not.
GRACE: What can you tell me about the last time you heard from her? What did she say? What did she text?
DREXEL: The last time I heard from her, I was actually, she is a very avid soccer player. She`s played soccer for about 10 years. And I was buying her soccer cleats. And I had called her and I had spoke with her about what kind of cleats she wanted, what her size was because I was getting them in the men`s department. So I had spoke with her. Her younger sister was with me and we had, you know, texted her a picture message. She said she liked them. And when I spoke with Brittanee, I asked her what she was doing and she says, oh, mom, I`m at the beach. And it was an 80- degree day in Rochester. So of course, you know, I thought that maybe she was at the beach in Rochester with one of her girlfriends that she said that she was staying overnight. And then I said, what do you plan on doing later? She said I`m going to hang out with my friend. We`re going to watch a movie. And I told her, I said, well, please give me a call later and she said, OK, mom. And then I told her, I said I love you Brittanee. And she said I love you, mom. And then we hung up the phone.
GRACE: With me is the mother of 17-year old high school junior Brittanee Drexel. She`s missing off spring break, Myrtle Beach. Out to Victoria Freile, staff writer with the "Democrat and Chronicle" there in Rochester. Victoria, thank you for being with us. What can you tell us?
VICTORIA FREILE, STAFF WRITER, DEMOCRAT AND CHRONICLE: Well, it`s been an interesting case as it follows. It appears that some of her friends, the friends that she traveled down with, traveled back to New York on Sunday, some on Monday and police were pretty sure that they had all left the area, but here in Rochester in the (INAUDIBLE) county sheriff`s office is insisting by talking to some of them to see what they have to say.
GRACE: What can you tell me about the young man who apparently was the last to see her? He hightailed it around 2:00 a.m. from Myrtle Beach, back home to Rochester. Is he cooperating?
FREILE: When I talked to him on the phone today, he actually declined a comment and told me to speak to his attorney and hung up. However, he didn`t specify who his attorney was and we haven`t really been able to confirm that he indeed has an attorney.
GRACE: Back to Brittanee`s mom, Dawn Drexel. Is it your understanding he has not changed his story? Is he cooperating with police Miss Drexel?
DREXEL: As far as I know, these boys have cooperated. I believe that they have tooken statements from them. That`s about all I know.
GRACE: Everyone, tonight taking your calls. Brittanee`s mom. Dawn Drexel. This high school junior, a model student, soccer player, missing off spring break, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. These first 72 hours critical and they have passed.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DREXEL: It has been horrible because I don`t know where she is. I don`t know if she is alive. She left all her clothing, her hair stuff, everything. It is just not like Brittanee.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Where is 17-year-old high school junior Brittanee Drexel? Take a look, absolutely beautiful, model student, soccer player, avid athlete. Out to the lines, Christine, Connecticut, hi, dear.
CALLER: Hi, Nancy.
GRACE: What`s your question?
CALLER: I used to live in that area when I was 17. And although there are a lot of crazies but there, there`s also a lot of street kids who come down for break and don`t leave. And I`m just wondering, does her mom think there is any chance she might have run away? If so, have the police talked to the known street kids that are there?
GRACE: I know that they have talked to the people she was there with. Dawn Drexel, she has never run away, has she?
DREXEL: No never.
GRACE: OK. Danielle, Missouri. Hi, Danielle.
CALLER: Hi.
GRACE: What`s your question, love?
CALLER: I want to know if she is on any medication for her depression? Is it out of the ordinary for her to run away?
GRACE: I can tell you right now she has never been away from home, run away before. Was she on any kind of medication Miss Drexel? I don`t know that I would have anything to do with it anyway.
DREXEL: No. I mean, it doesn`t have anything to do with it. She was but -- the -- right now I am going -- she`s just got a lot on her plate. She -- we are going through a divorce, me and her father are going through a divorce.
GRACE: Right. She was a young girl --
DREXEL: This has been very hard for her.
GRACE: She was a young girl that had been through a lot emotionally with a divorce. She was holding up very, very well, excelling in school and on the soccer field. Everyone, tip line 843 918-1382.
Let`s stop and remember Army Sergeant John Savage, 26, Rutherford (ph), Texas, killed in Iraq on his second tour, fulfilled his dream on joining the military, loved outdoors, the river, four-wheeling, remembered as charismatic and fun. Leaves behind mom and best friend Jaclyn (ph), one sister, John Savage, American hero. Thanks to our guests and especially for being with us. Please, keep a look out for Brittanee Drexel. See you tomorrow night. 8:00 sharp Eastern. Good night.
END
