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Actress Accused of Sending Ricin-Laced Letters; NSA Leaker Revealed; Forced into Marriage at Age 14; Supreme Court Rulings Could Come Any Minute

Aired June 10, 2013 - 09:30   ET

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


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Still unfolding this morning, a bizarre case of a pregnant D-list actress who stands accused of sending ricin- laced letters to President Obama and the New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Investigators say Shannon Richardson actually tried framing her estranged husband for the crime, she failed a polygraph test and now the evidence is pointing right to her. Christine Romans is in New York with the latest. It's so strange.

(CROSSTALK)

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: It really is. Now, Richardson told authorities, this woman told authorities her husband made her mail the letters. Early on in the investigation when she was trying to pin the whole thing on him, law enforcement officials, Carol, said they had serious credibility issues with her. For now, Carol, she is in custody.

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ROMANS: The 35-year-old mother of five is waking up in a Texarcana jail this morning awaiting her arraignment. Shannon Richardson is accused of knowingly mailing letters containing the dangerous substance ricin and may face additional charges, as well.

Investigators allege the letters were sent in an elaborate attempt to frame her husband, Nathaniel Richardson, a U.S. Army veteran who she allegedly wanted to divorce. Richardson is pregnant with her sixth child, the first with her husband. Letters for President Obama, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the head of a gun control organization co-founded by Bloomberg in Washington, D.C., all tested positive for ricin. But the Obama and Bloomberg letters were intercepted before reaching their intended victims. During a radio appearance last week, Mayor Bloomberg seemed unconcerned by the threat.

MAYOR MICHAEL BLOOMBERG, NEW YORK CITY: I have more danger from lightning than from anything else. And I'll go about my business and we're certainly going to keep working on getting guns off the streets out of the hands of criminals and people with mental problems.

ROMANS: Richardson is an actress who has gone by the names Shannon Guest and Shannon Rogers. Small roles on TV shows including "The Walking Dead" and "Vampire Diaries," which evidently was news to producers for both the shows who took to Twitter, seemingly unable to remember her.

"Some actress from "The Walking Dead" sent ricin letter to the Prez? Never heard of her."

"Anyone know what role she played?" Tweeted Glen Mazzara, the executive producer for the AMC zombie show.

A producer from "The Vampire Diaries" responded, "If she played an equivalent part to the one she supposedly played on "The Vampire Diaries" she was third background from the right or something."

Richardson herself contacted police saying she suspected her husband had sent the letters after she found information about ricin on his computer.

Authorities say they found castor beans, a key ingredient in ricin, in the trunk of Nathaniel's car as well as traces of the poisonous powder around his belongings in the house. CNN obtained a copy of the letters Richardson allegedly sent which said, in part, "you will have to kill me and my family before you get my guns. The right to bear arm as is my constitutional God-given right. What's in this letter is nothing compared to what I have planned for you."

Investigators say they believe Richardson planted the evidence and that Nathaniel couldn't have been the one searching online about ricin because he would have been at work when the searches were done.

JOHN DELK, NATHANIEL RICHARDSON'S ATTORNEY: We cleared the hurdle that he was the only person involved and now we need to prove that he wasn't involved.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: Authorities now say they were skeptical, Carol, of her story and credibility from the beginning. Nathaniel Richardson has filed for divorce citing discord or conflict of personalities. Shannon Richardson's attorney did not respond to CNN's request for a comment on this case and this client. Carol?

COSTELLO: It goes on. Christine Romans reporting live for us from New York.

At 33 minutes past the hour, stories we're watching in NEWSROOM. The opening bell ringing a new week on trading on Wall Street. Doing the honors today, an executive with the New York-based Blackstone Mortgage Trust. Let's head to the New York stock exchange and Alison Kosik. Good morning.

ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. We're watching stocks add to Friday's big gains. It looks like momentum from Friday's jobs report carried through the weekend. No downbeat news to throw that momentum off track just yet. The economic calendar is quiet and no big earnings reports out today.

But there is one individual stock we're keeping our eye on today, McDonald's. Shares at Micky D's jumped 2.6 percent in May and this is significant because it's a big turn around after sales fell in the first four months of this year. McDonald's says breakfast sales gave a big boost. They recently added breakfast items to their "After Midnight" menu. Seems to be working for them. Watching shares at McDonals's up about 1.5 percent, helping to give the Dow a little bit of a lift. Dow up 21 points in the first few minutes of the trading day. Carol?

COSTELLO: We'll check back. Alison Kosik reporting live for us.

In Hawaii, a man is under arrest after getting his truck stuck in the pacific ocean. Look at it there. Police say the man was driving along the beach when a wave pulled the truck into the water. He is charged with operating a vehicle under the influence and reckless driving. Three tow companies were needed to pull the fully-submerged truck from the water.

In North Carolina, police are trying to figure out what killed an 11- year-old boy and left his mom unconscious in a hotel room. The very same room police found an elderly couple dead in April. Police don't believe the cases are connected and say there is no danger to the general public.

He has no high school diploma but claims he could spy on anyone, even the President of the United States. Outraged lawmakers say the NSA leaker is a liar.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He doesn't have a clue how this thing works.

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COSTELLO: The White House scrambles to action, though, as Americans try to figure out who they should believe.

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COSTELLO: Edward Snowden has been described as mild-mannered and soft spoken but his actions rocked the U.S. government and maybe your trust in the government, as well. Snowden said his computer work for the intelligence community exposed a huge government secret. When you pick up the phone or log onto the internet the government is watching and listening.

Somewhere here in Hong Kong, Snowden is in hiding from his own country. He said he came forward knowing the risks because he said Americans are losing their freedoms without even knowing it. Here's part of his interview with the British newspaper, "The Guardian."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EDWARD SNOWDEN, NSA LEAKER: When you're in positions of privileged access like a systems administrator for the sort of intelligence community agencies, you're exposed to a lot more information on a broader scale than the average employee, and because of that you see things that may be disturbing, but over the course of a normal person's career, you'd only see one or two of these instances.

When you see everything, you see them on a more frequent basis and you recognize that some of these things are actually abuses. When you talk to people about them in a place like this where this is the normal state of business, people tend not to take them very seriously and move on from them. But over time, that awareness of wrongdoing sort of builds up and you feel compelled to talk about it, and the more you talk about it, the more you're ignored, the more you're told it's not a problem. Until eventually you realize these things need to be determined by the public not by somebody who is simply hired by the government.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: But a government investigation is now under way. Charges may be filed, although we don't know what those charges may be at the moment. And the White House is dealing with this, too. That's where CNN's Brianna Keilar is this morning. How is the White House handling this? Any comment?

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: So far, Carol, the White House is not commented on the identity of Edward Snowden being revealed. Right now, the administration is considering options for prosecuting and extraditing Snowden. Also, depending exactly where he ends up, what country he ends up in, if he stays in Hong Kong or not, but this is something that comes on the heels of three other controversies forcing President Obama off message in these key early months of his second term.

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KEILAR: As Edward Snowden stunned the world with his admission, the administration intensified calls to hunt down the leaker of an NSA surveillance program. Sunday night the Justice Department formally announced they were launching an investigation into the unauthorized disclosure of classified information. President Obama returning from California after a two-day mini-summit the Chinese president had no comment. But he recently made clear he's upset by the spate of high- profile leaks.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't welcome leaks because there's a reason why these programs are classified.

KEILAR: Making the Sunday talk show rounds, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee said the leaks don't give a full picture of the NSA program.

REP. MIKE ROGERS, (R) HOUSE INTELLIGENGE COMMITTEE: I know your reporter that you interviewed, Greenwald, says that he's got it all and now is an expert on the program. He doesn't have a clue on this thing works. Neither did the person who released just enough information to literally be dangerous.

KEILAR: Something the former NSA chief agreed with.

GEN, MICHAEL HAYDEN, FORMER NSA/CIA DIRECTOR: There are no records of abuse under President Bush, under President Obama.

KEILAR: But how the NSA gathers its information and what it does with the data remains a point of contention.

SEN. MARK UDALL, (D) COLORADO: I'm not convinced that the collection of this vast trove of data has led to the disruption of plots.

KEILAR: And on Capitol Hill, the fight is just beginning.

SEN. RAND PAUL, (R) KENTUCKY: Don't troll through a billion phone records every day. That is unconstitutional, it invades our privacy and I'm going to be seeing if I could challenge this at the Supreme Court level.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KEILAR: But the administration is comfortable that what it has done in these programs is legal. That they're governed by abilities given to the administration by Congress itself and certainly administration officials, Carol, point to the fact that while, yes, there may be bipartisan opposition to some of the details uncovered in these stories over the last week, they feel that they have some really strong bipartisan support from key Democrats and Republicans.

COSTELLO: Talk much more about this in the next hour of NEWSROOM. Brianna Keilar reporting live from the NEWSROOM -- or from the White House this morning. Sorry.

Coming up next in NEWSROOM, it's the Supreme Court's busiest month of the year and waiting it see how justices will rule on key major issues from voting rights to same-sex marriage.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is Melka. She lives in Northern Ethiopia and her story is far too common. At the age of 14, she was forced into an arranged marriage.

MAAZA MENGISTE, WRITER: In Ethiopia, one in five girls gets married before the age of 15. The reason is really financial hardships. The family feels like they need to send a girl off to another man's home so that he can take care of her.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But when girls like Melka refuse to marry, they suffer.

MELKA, FORCED INTO MARRIAGE (through translator): Without my consent, my parents forced me to get married. I said I do not want to go and when I refused to go, my parents beat me.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: On her wedding night, Melka ended up in the hospital. Authorities got involved and she was sent back to her family. Her mother says she regrets forcing Melka to marry, believing they both would have been better off if Melka had continued her education.

Now Melka is working to prevent this from happening to other girls. She spends her free time at the local primary school teaching them about the dangers of early marriage and how they can make a better life for themselves by staying in school. Women like Melka want girls in Ethiopia to know they have a choice and they are not alone.

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CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Melka was able to go back to school and complete her high school education. To learn more about how to help prevent early marriages and support girl's education go to CNN.com/girlrising. And by the way CNN film "GIRL RISING" premieres this Sunday, June 16th at 9:00 Eastern.

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COSTELLO: Same-sex marriage, affirmative action, voting rights, human genes patents -- the U.S. Supreme Court expected to rule on this issues by the end of the month. In fact the ruling on one of those issues could come down within the next 30 minutes, we just don't know.

George Washington University's Jonathan Turley is here. He's a constitutional attorney and Supreme Court observer -- welcome.

JONATHAN TURLEY, LAW PROFESSOR, GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY: Thank you Carol.

COSTELLO: So we have been anticipating all month long but so far no big rulings have come down in the early days of June. Why the wait?

TURLEY: Well I can reflect a number of things. First of all the court does tend to hold it's more important decisions for the end but also the justices might not be in agreement. You know we've seen major decisions handed down that seem to be the product of last-minute negotiations. A good example of that: the healthcare ruling by Chief Justice Roberts. Many of us thought that seemed almost like a last- minute opinion it didn't hold together as well as the other opinions.

So you can have this type of trading of votes that goes back and forth as justices decide whether they want to be in concurrence or dissent or which side they want to join.

COSTELLO: Well I'm amazed that it's all kept so secret because I've heard not a peep, a leak, nothing coming from the Supreme Court.

TURLEY: No you don't -- they don't have a lot of leaks from the Supreme Court. It helps to have only nine people that are really in the know. They also have some judiciary clerks. It is a very small group if a leak occurs it's not that hard to figure out who it is.

COSTELLO: Ok so I'm going to ask a prediction. Which -- like everybody is saying same-sex marriage. That won't come until the very last day of the session which is June 24th so what might come first?

TURLEY: Well, first of all, the key to remember about same-sex marriage, Carol, is that if they take one of those off-ramps, if they say for example that the decision was -- what's called improvidently granted, this is called digging a case or dig a case and by that, they -- they basically say we made a mistake we shouldn't have accepted the case, that was openly discussed in oral argument.

Or they could get rid of the case on what's called standing or technical ground. If they go with one of those routes then we could see an opinion come out earlier. There's little reason to hold on to it.

I'm looking most carefully at the patent and voting rights cases which seem to me are ripe for release.

Now the patent case as you mentioned earlier is really sweeping. And the question is what can be claimed as property and here they are claiming this gene sequence that is being used to test for breast cancer as private property. And that has really forced a question that has been long debated. What are the limits? Because the patent law says that you can basically claim anything under the sun that is made by man.

But of course, those genes are not exactly the product of this company. But they are saying they spent a lot of money to find out specifically the sequence you need to see if you have a likelihood of breast cancer.

COSTELLO: Yes and of course, the -- this case became even more famous in light of Angelina Jolie who went to that very company.

TURLEY: That's right.

COSTELLO: The only company that can determine if you possess this gene.

TURLEY: That's right yes.

COSTELLO: That's right. We are going to talk much more about this in the days to come. Jonathan Turley, thank you. And you will be back if, of course, the Supreme Court has a decision in the next 20 minutes or so.

TURLEY: Thanks Carol.

COSTELLO: Jonathan Turley thank you. We're back in a minute.

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COSTELLO: Fifty-six minutes past the hour, time to check our "Top Stories".

That's the Massachusetts turnpike flooded with cars and traffic after reopening a few hours ago. Police had to close the highway Sunday after a widespread power outage hit Boston. More than 12,000 people were affected. All roads are open again. And most customers have power. Extreme storms expected across much of the East Coast today and that includes the risk of tornadoes. Hail and high winds possible from Lexington to Nashville.

Erin Brockovich-Ellis, you know that environmental activist who inspired the Julia Roberts movie, was arrested for allegedly drinking and boating outside Las Vegas, seriously. Officials say they found her struggling to dock her boat. And after an investigation they say she quote, "significantly over the legal drinking limit".

Coming up tomorrow morning -- my interview with the legendary Nick Fleetwood and Lindsey Buckingham of Fleetwood Mac -- they're on tour and they've also got a new self-titled EP out. That's Tuesday morning right here in the NEWSROOM. I can't wait.

We're back in a minute.

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COSTELLO: Happening now in the NEWSROOM.

Nothing to hide -- Edward Snowden, the NSA leaker, said he did it for you.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EDWARD SNOWDEN, NSA WHISTLEBLOWER: Even if you're not doing anything wrong --