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Snowden Speaks Out; President Obama's Poll Numbers Drop; FBI Digging for Hoffa's Body Again

Aired June 17, 2013 - 15:00   ET

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

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. Top of the hour, I'm Don Lemon live from New York.

We're going to begin with a fast moving situation at the airport in Newark, New Jersey. OK, there's the map. Let me tell you about what's happening. The FBI is on the scene after a Boeing 777 landed from Hongkong just a short time ago. OK, pictures from the scene now. An unruly passenger was removed. There he is right there, from United Flight 116, which landed without incident. You see him in the blue jacket. And you see some officers, some people, two men in uniform, taking him off.

The man was then taken to a local hospital for evaluation. Now, officials say he had become disruptive during the flight, claiming the passengers had been poisoned. The CDC has since cleared the plane to park at the gate. No charges, no charges have been filed at this point. We're going to bring you more information as soon as it becomes available.

But there's the video moments ago, officers taking that unruly passenger off the plane and putting him into an ambulance and taking him now to a hospital to be evaluated. More on that as we get it.

Now to the man who broke open one of the nation's most secretive agencies opening up even more now about himself. And this time Edward Snowden took your questions. Snowden did a live chat through the Web site of Britain's "Guardian" newspaper. And, as he's opening up, you have to wonder what authorities are doing to pin him down.

The U.S. plans to file charges against Snowden for leaking the classified documents the exposed snooping by the National Security Agency. It acknowledged it tracks phone calls and Internet communications en masse. Snowden said e-mail surveillance could be thwarted, telling one questioner this. "Encryption works. Properly implemented, strong crypto systems are one of the few things that you can rely on. Unfortunately, end point security is so terrifically weak."

And Snowden, very cryptically himself, gave hints if anything happens to him, the leaks will continue. Quoting Snowden now: "All I can say right now is the U.S. government is not going to be able to cover this up by jailing or murdering me. Truth is coming. And it cannot be stopped."

Nic Robertson is in Hong Kong with more on Snowden's live chat. Listen, does that -- that kind of sounds like a threat. Like, either you don't do anything to me or you can't murder me. That sounds really odd, Nic.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It sounds like a guy who's really putting up a defense.

And you never quite know when it's going to be the last time that we're actually going to hear from him. I mean, look, he's taken into his confidence a few journalists. He has to figure that a lot of intelligence agencies, not least of all from the United States, would like to get their hands on these computers. He came out with four computers. Would like to get its hands on those computers to find out precisely what he's got.

But a man like this, tech-savvy as he is, you have got to believe that he has dumped down some of that data and passed it off to other people. So, maybe that's inherent on what he's saying there. You know, this was a very fiery defense that he gave of himself here, about 20 questions answered in the space of close to two hours, around about midnight time here, and answering criticism from Dick Cheney, who'd accused him of being a traitor.

And I will read you what he says here, a very fiery comeback. He says, "This is the man," talking about Dick Cheney, "who gave us the warrantless wiretapping scheme as a kind of atrocity warm-up," he says, "on the way to deceitfully engineering a conflict that killed over 4,400 and maimed nearly 32,000 Americans, as well as leaving 100,000 Iraqis dead. Being called a traitor by Dick Cheney is the highest honor you can give an American."

So this was the sort of spirit of what he was -- of his mood, answering some questions in detail, technical questions, but firing back at this criticism about him, Don.

LEMON: Yes. And, of course, he said Dick Cheney did all this when he was U.S. vice president under George Bush. But what's the response to the live chat on "The Guardian" Web site. Was it overwhelming? It has to be. Everyone is paying attention to it.

ROBERTSON: You know, there is a lot of interest. It was only announced just a couple of hours before the chat took place; #askSnowden was the hashtag that it was given by "The Guardian" newspaper a couple of hours before. That got 17,000 tweets. And that's a big number. It was leading in the United States.

And the other hashtag associated with Snowden, #Snowden, in about the eight hours around that period, that had 43,000 tweets. That was trending very high. It is -- what he's saying is being watched, is being listened to by a lot of people, Don.

LEMON: He got into this by saying, you know, I don't want to be the center of attention. It's the information that I want Americans to know about and let them decide whether it's right.

I have got an interesting question for you just real quickly here from Twitter, because you mentioned the response on Twitter. It says, "Isn't it time the media stop giving Snowden the attention he so desperately craves?

Do you think he's craving attention, Nic?

ROBERTSON: Yes, partly. But he wants to keep the debate going. He needs to generate support for himself.

But, as he put it, he said, look, the mainstream media, they're not debating the principal issues here about how this surveillance system works and that there aren't checks and balances, as he sees, that he thinks should be in place. He said now the mainstream media has gone on to talking about what my girlfriend looks like.

So, yes, he does want people to talk about it. But he wants them on this core issue. After all, look, this is a guy who doesn't want to go to jail for the rest of his life. And he knows the only way he can do that is stump up enough support wherever he is.

And if you read -- just to explain a little here, if you read what some of the Chinese state media are saying right now is they're saying that Beijing shouldn't let Hong Kong allow him to be extradited to the United States. All right.

LEMON: Yes, all right, Nic Robertson, thank you.

Let's move on now because in the meantime, President Obama is across the pond, Northern Ireland, G8 Summit. That's what is happening. And at last word, he had entered a crucial meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on the war in Syria.

Russia is arming the Assad government and Obama has now described -- decided, excuse me, to arm the rebels trying to overthrow that government. We're awaiting word on that meeting.

But here at home, the president's standing has just taken a nosedive. I want you to take a look at this. President Obama's job approval rating didn't merely slip below 50 percent. It went all the way down to 45 percent in a CNN poll, a CNN-sponsored poll. That's an eight- point plunge in just one month.

With us now live from Washington, our chief political analyst, CNN's Gloria Borger.

So it is a sizable drop.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes.

LEMON: It is. So what's the reason behind this?

BORGER: Well, there are there are a couple things that come to mind.

First of all, this is a president who's been dealing with an awful lot of controversy lately. Let's start with IRS, National Security Agency surveillance you were just talking about, Edward Snowden over there, the question of drones, leak investigation. These are things that raise the eyebrows of a lot of people, make them question trust in government and question the president himself.

The second thing is, as you look internally into these polls, Don, what you see, the president's greatest drop is among the people who liked him the most, and that is younger voters. You will see he dropped 17 points in one month among the under-30 set, 17 points. That's an awful lot.

LEMON: Yes.

(CROSSTALK)

BORGER: That's an awful lot for him. And these are the people who really were behind him 100 percent.

LEMON: Gloria, we did that little unscientific poll this weekend with people on Facebook and Twitter with one of our human behavior experts.

BORGER: Right.

LEMON: And the people on Facebook who are older sided with the Snowden -- with -- on the side of the government, saying Snowden should not have given away these secrets. The younger people on Twitter were saying, hey, this guy is a hero because we don't like to be spied on. And I think that's probably why younger people feel that they can't trust a government which spies on them.

BORGER: Right. Right, yes.

LEMON: So, that may make sense there, yes.

BORGER: And older people also have a sense that they have already given up their privacy.

LEMON: Right.

BORGER: Because the kind of privacy they have now is nothing like what they remember back in the day, right? And younger people think, you know what? We still do have a bit of privacy. And we don't want to be to be surveilled upon.

And you just put up this poll here, honest and trustworthy. This is another big problem for the president, Don, because he's down nine points from May. And even if people didn't like the president, they kind of always gave him the benefit of the doubt, because they thought that he was generally a good guy who meant well and was trustworthy. Now you see how that poll -- that number is dropping precipitously. And I think they're starting to link the president and their lack of trust in him to the government, which they also don't trust. And so that's another problem for the administration.

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: Great analysis, as always. Gloria Borger, thank you very much.

BORGER: Thank you, Don. Good to see you. LEMON: You as well.

The Supreme Court today striking down the Arizona law requiring voters to provide proof of citizenship. The state argued that it helps prevent voter fraud. But the justices agreed with critics who called it unconstitutional and a lot of unnecessary paperwork.

The FBI digging today for the body of Jimmy Hoffa. That's right, Jimmy Hoffa again, Jimmy Hoffa, union boss, convict, organized crime figure. Hoffa vanished on a hot summer night in Detroit 1975 and hasn't been seen since. An hour or so ago, a lawyer with ties to the case said this time it's for real.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID CHASNICK, ATTORNEY: The Hoffa body is in that field, no doubt about it. There used to be a barn in the field, buried under the barn under a cement slab. And that's where our understanding is that the body should be.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: So he says. But keep in mind, that tip is -- of a dubious nature from tipsters of shaky repute have triggered evacuation -- excuse me -- excavations for Hoffa's missing body as far away from New Jersey.

Today's operation is back in suburban Detroit, Oakland Township more specifically, some 20 miles from the diner where Hoffa was last seen alive.

OK. So, joining me now from Washington, Tom Fuentes, former assistant director from the FBI.

We have to stop meeting this way, Tom. It's every day we're having a conversation. He once ran the bureau's organized crime unit and he is now a CNN law enforcement analyst.

So, this is a lighter story to talk to you about. But the tipster behind this latest search is a guy named Tony Zirelli. He's a former mobster. He did time in prison. He got out. And now he tells the FBI he knows where Hoffa's buried. We had a guest last hour who told us quite a lot about Tony Zirelli. So, let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAN MOLDEA, AUTHOR, "THE HOFFA WARS": He was broke. He had no place to go. And so he went to a reporter at NBC and he said, I want to show you where Jimmy Hoffa's body is. So, he took the reporter to this field in Oakland township. So, of course, everyone started looking at the property records. And the property is in the name of Jack Tocco.

So, the question is, does Tony Zirelli really know something or is he just trying to get even with Jack Tocco for making him persona non grata in the underworld. LEMON: OK.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: OK, Tom, did you get all that?

(LAUGHTER)

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: Why should we believe Tony Zirelli is any different than any of these other mafia figures who've known where Hoffa was supposedly buried for all these years?

TOM FUENTES, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, Don, he's a former mafia boss. He has to be telling the truth, right?

But, on the other hand, the FBI has over the years -- and, as you mentioned, I ran the program and came up working organized crime in the Chicago office during my career. So there have been sightings or claims of knowing where that body is ever since he disappeared in 1975.

But the difference is that so many of the people in the past wouldn't have a clue and really just didn't really know or weren't in a position to know. Now, last year, there was a dig for a body -- for his body. And the person said, oh, I saw Jimmy Hoffa being buried by two guys. Later, it comes out, well, I saw a guy who was burying a bag that it was right around the time Hoffa disappeared. So, you have had all these sightings in the past that were not very good.

But Zirelli was the boss of the Detroit mob from '70 to '75. And Hoffa disappears in '75 while he's in prison. And Zirelli gets out of prison a shortly after. So, it's not just a low-ranking guy. It's not just some other gangster. But it's a boss of a La Cosa Nostra family in America at the time.

And the mafia in America was very, very powerful during the '70s. So, he's in a position that he could know. Now, whether he does know or whether he's telling the truth or whether, as alleged, he's writing a book right now and maybe he's just trying to get better book sales and attention and put himself out there in the media, that could be.

But, on the other hand, he is a person that the FBI has looked at and said, well, if somebody's going to know and if there is somebody that might have the information, he would be one. And it's worth following up on.

LEMON: Well, we will know soon enough, because the proof is in the digging. So...

FUENTES: That's true. That's for sure.

LEMON: We will know. Thank you, Tom Fuentes. Appreciate it.

FUENTES: You're welcome, Don. LEMON: All right.

Coming up, a realty TV show taping a police raid when an officer shoots and kills a 7-year-old girl. Did the cameras contribute to her death? That's next.

Plus, a new twist involving the deaths in room 225, three people found dead inside the same hotel room weeks apart. We found out it was because of carbon monoxide. But now we're learning the medical examiner knew about the problem with room 225.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: It was a bloody Father's Day weekend in Chicago, despite the fact that murder and shooting rates have dropped. There were 26 shootings over the weekend in the city, leaving seven people dead. Earlier, a Chicago pastor spoke about why the violence is erupting and how it's part of the ongoing street culture in Chicago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COREY BROOKS, PASTOR, NEW BEGINNINGS CHURCH OF CHICAGO: Well, there are a myriad of issues surrounding all this violence. You have educational issues. You have got social, spiritual issues. But at the end of the day, you have a lot of angry young men, a lot of hostile young men, so much so that there's a lot of retaliation, a lot of going back and forth.

A lot of people don't understand the trauma and the drama that's going on in our community.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Pastor Brooks credits police for their work, but says more collaboration needs to come from the community, neighborhoods and families.

A police spokesman says the overall crime rate in Chicago is down by 14 percent, the lowest since 1963.

To Detroit now. A jury is deciding the fate of a police officer who killed a little girl during a raid on her home. During the raid, officer Joseph Weekley's gun went off, shooting 7-year-old Aiyana Jones. She was sleeping on her couch. Weekley is charged with involuntary manslaughter and has testified that he didn't intentionally kill the girl.

Well, the raid was being filmed for A&E's documentary-style TV show "The First 48." And a clip was shown in court.

Here's CNN's Sara Ganim with more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SARA GANIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The video played in court was low-resolution. Listen carefully. Just seconds after the flash bang grenade goes off, a shot is heard; 7-year-old Aiyana Jones, asleep on a couch, was hit in the head with a bullet from Officer Joseph Weekley's MP5 submachine gun. Now he's on trial for that shooting.

OFFICER JOSEPH WEEKLEY, DEFENDANT: You feel devastated, horrible, just the sorrow just to be involved. Even to this day, you can't explain it. It's horrible.

GANIM: Cameras from the A&E show "The First 48" were allowed to be there after an order from the chief of police.

RON SCOTT, DETROIT COALITION AGAINST POLICE BRUTALITY: The policy at that particular time was to use television essentially to highlight fighting crime in Detroit.

GANIM: Ron Scott, spokesman for the Detroit Coalition Against Police Brutality, says former Police Chief Warren Evans would later resign, in part because he was too involved with reality TV.

SCOTT: The series that he had wanted to initiate called "The Chief," and it has him walking down the street with a high-powered rifle saying he's going to clean up the streets.

GANIM: Chief Evans didn't respond to interview requests by CNN. But officer at Weekley's trial said they didn't want cameras there. They were looking for a murder suspect. It just added pressure to the situation.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They were nice enough people. But it was very intrusive, I felt, when you're investigating murder scenes.

GANIM: Weekley and his attorneys blame the shooting on the young girl's grandmother, saying she hit the officer's gun when the flash bang grenade went off.

WEEKLEY: A lady jumped up and grabbed my gun and I shot a kid.

GANIM: Ron Scott says that flash bang grenade would probably not have been used if the cameras weren't rolling.

SCOTT: I think that that was done for the camera. I really do. As much as they say that they didn't want to do it that way, I think that the idea was theatrics.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LEMON: Sara Ganim joins me now.

So, Sara, what does Joseph Weekley face if he's convicted?

GANIM: Well, Don, the jury is literally still out. They started deliberating. But they have not come back with a verdict. Prosecutors say this was negligence. So, he's charged with involuntary manslaughter. If convicted, he could face up to 15 years. But no one here is saying it was anything other than negligence, really, Don. LEMON: Sara Ganim, thank you very much.

Coming up next, three mysterious deaths in a North Carolina hotel room, well, they have all been linked to one thing, carbon monoxide poisoning. Now the Boone, North Carolina, medical examiner has resigned. We're going to tell you why, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: In Boone, North Carolina, three people have died in the same Best Western Hotel room in just months. Now the local medical examiner has resigned after it was determined the first two deaths were caused by carbon monoxide poisoning.

Could the third death, that of an 11-year-old boy, have been prevented?

Alina Machado has been looking into the strange circumstances in this -- these tragic deaths.

Alina, what have you found?

ALINA MACHADO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Don, Dr. Brent Hall turned in his resignation on Friday afternoon. He was the medical examiner for Watauga County, North Carolina.

And his resignation came less than a week after an 11-year-old boy died of carbon monoxide poisoning while staying at a Best Western Hotel in Boone, North Carolina. The boy, Jeffrey Williams, and his mother were found unresponsive at the hotel on June 8. They were in room 225.

That's the same room where Daryl and Shirley Jenkins were staying when they died April 16. Initially, according to documents CNN has obtained, Dr. Hall suspected a possible overdose as the cause of death for the Jenkins. But it wasn't until after the boy's death that police in Boone say they received the toxicology report for Shirley Jenkins, showing carbon monoxide was to blame for her death.

Now, according to a spokesperson for North Carolina's Department of Health and Human Services, the toxicology report for Shirley Jenkins was e-mailed to Dr. Hall on June 1. That was a Saturday. And it was exactly a week before Jeffrey's death. We don't know when Dr. Hall saw the report or why he did not send it to Boone police sooner. CNN has been unable to reach Dr. Hall for this story -- Don.

LEMON: All right. Thank you, Alina Machado. We appreciate it.

Up next, news on everyone and everything, including Google's new high- flying plan for Wi-Fi, Samsung making a move that could change how you get your music, and NASA announcing its new crop of astronauts. And it looks a lot different than the ones that came before. All that and more up next in the power block.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Bottom of the hour. I'm Don Lemon.

Technology, sports, business, health, science and showbiz news, we're hitting it all for you right now.

First up, high-tech goes old school high above the Earth. Google is launching 30 gigantic balloons, a test designed to bring Internet service to the far corners of the Earth. The 40-foot balloons will fly at 60,000 feet, about twice as high as an airliner. The plan is to create an airborne Web network controlled from a mission control on the ground.

Maybe it really is the root of all evil. Just looking at money, just the sight of piles of cash can trigger people to lie, steal or behave in other unethical ways. That's what researchers in four studies at Harvard and the University of Utah found. They showed images like these to several hundred people. And test subjects were more likely to do unethical things like steal office supplies or hire an employee who would share insider information about a former employer than those who didn't see the pictures.

Shame on you, people.