Return to Transcripts main page
Dr. Drew
Is Killer Mom Insane?
Aired May 05, 2014 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. DREW PINSKY, HLN HOST (voice-over): Tonight, a mom accused of murder. Two kids dead because they talked back. Is she mentally ill? The behavior bureau is here to decide.
Plus, sexual predator in school.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Many of these victims not only verbally said no, no, no, as he was pulling off, physically forcing off their bras, their underwear.
PINSKY: More than a dozen girls assaulted. The suspect, a fellow 18- year-old student.
Let`s get started.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: Good evening, everyone.
We are live tonight from New York City. My co-host is, of course, Samantha Schacher.
Coming up, we have a white supremacist accused of abusing his stepdaughters because -- is he a pretty picture?
SAMANTHA SCHACHER, CO-HOST: Yes.
PINSKY: Abusing them because they are Latinas.
SCHACHER: And, Dr. Drew, what he did to them is atrocious.
PINSKY: We`re going to find out about that.
SCHACHER: Yes.
PINSKY: I want to know and I don`t.
SCHACHER: It`s bad. You don`t want to know.
PINSKY: All right. We`ll find out later on.
But, first up, we have a disturbing and graphic murder case, another horrible case. A middle-aged mom on trial for killing her two teenage children for having so-called sassy mouths. Have a look at this.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The prosecution says it`s premeditated murder. They were just too mouthy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She`s driving, Beau Schenecker to her right, she points out to his head, bam. She takes her gun, bam, shoots her son the second time.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But the defense says, wait a minute, she`s insane.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She goes upstairs where her daughter, Calyx, is working on the computer. She raises the gun up. Bam. Shoots her in the back of the head.
JULIE, "MOUTHY" MOM: Hey, you guys, are you leaving the kids?
POLICE: We want to find out what happened yesterday, what happened last night, what happened this morning from you, yourself.
JULIE: Yes. Are my kids coming in later?
POLICE: I`m sorry?
JULIE: Are my kids coming in later?
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PINSKY: So, Sam, you get this, she didn`t even know she killed her kids. That was the interrogation the next day. I`m going to have a hard time deciding whether this is evil or mental illness.
Let`s bring in the panel.
SCHACHER: I know where I stand.
PINSKY: All right. Let`s bring in the panel. I`ve got Mark Eiglarsh, attorney at speaktomark.com. Loni Coombs, former prosecutor, author of "You`re Perfect and Other Lies Parents Tell", Vanessa Barnett, social commentator, host of hiphollywood.com.
And, Sam, this is trending on twitter as the mouthy mom. What does that mean?
SCHACHER: OK. This is in regard to her journal entries. One of the entries, she described as both of her kids being sassy mouths and also she allegedly told police that she killed her children because they were talking back to her and that they were, quote/unquote, "mouthy".
PINSKY: Let`s get an update from court today. I`ve got Mandy McGlothlin. She was in court.
Mandy, what happened today?
MANDY MCGLOTHLIN, JOURNALIST (via telephone): Drew, the prosecutors laid out a case today and have shown that Julie Schenecker planned and played out the murders of her children. Julie went to a gun store and purchased a .38 caliber gun, put on a show in the gun store and lied about why she was buying the gun. She was able to fill out the forms to buy it and how to work it.
A couple of days later, she shot and killed her son, Beau, and her daughter, Calyx and afterwards covered up their bodies with sheets. She was able to reload the gun. And then she put post-its on the front door to let the carpool know she`d be in New York City until Tuesday and left one for her friends. And then she gets out her journal and writes every detail from all the events during the shooting.
PINSKY: Oh, Mandy, thank you for that. So that`s in the journals you`re talking about?
SCHACHER: Oh, my gosh, Dr. Drew. The journals, there`s e-mails back and forth.
PINSKY: The e-mails I saw. The e-mails actually confused me because you see the husband struggling with her mental illness and her not complying with treatment which is the part I have a problem with.
SCHACHER: Exactly.
PINSKY: Mark, my question to you, though, she didn`t comply with treatment. She was -- she was insane at the time of all this going down. My question, though, is -- is that enough for an insanity defense?
MARK EIGLARSH, ATTORNEY: Probably not. Let me just say this. When she told law enforcement that this was the worst thing she`d ever done, that sealed her fate. She`ll be in prison for the rest of her life. On that comment, alone, because it shows even if she had a mental illness, she knew legally right from wrong at the time that she --
PINSKY: She knew it was bad.
EIGLARSH: However -- she knew it was bad. It`s not even whether bad, just she knew it was wrong. So they have to first show mental illness which they will. She has a long history dating back to 2001 when she was diagnosed with both bipolar and other mental illnesses. They`ve got that. But the prison`s packed with people who have mental illness. The question is whether she knew right from wrong.
PINSKY: Yes.
EIGLARSH: I think the facts don`t support that theory.
PINSKY: And, Loni, this is my question to you, same issue whether you agree with him or not I want to know. Here`s my deal. This is my message to everybody out there. If you have mental illness and you`re not complying with treatment, you are putting yourself and your family in harm`s way and then God help you once the ax falls when you`ve done something horrible related to your mental illness but you didn`t take the treatment when the time was right.
LONI COOMBS, FORMER PROSECUTOR: Exactly. And, you know, it is not an excuse. If you`re bipolar, if you have depression, that does not take away your ability to know what is right and what is wrong. And that is --
PINSKY: Listen, I disagree. I disagree, Loni, because it can. It can make you not know where you are. You can have no recollection what you did. You don`t know what`s going on.
COOMBS: Right.
PINSKY: You could be talking in tongues. That`s what being mentally ill does for you.
COOMBS: OK, let me clarify. But that`s not what was going on in this case. She didn`t say, I blacked out, didn`t say I was hearing voices. She didn`t say I was hallucinating. First thing she said to the police, that`s the worst thing I`ve ever done.
She writes out in detail exactly what she did. She planned ahead. She went and bought the gun, then she had to wait three days. She came back after the three days.
PINSKY: OK, I get it. I get it.
COOMBS: Then, you know, it`s also interesting, Dr. Drew, when she talked about the children being mouthy not only did she execute her children, but then she took a second shot on each of them into their mouth to send that message she did not like them talking back to her.
PINSKY: Oh, my God. That is awful. I mean, Vanessa, I can`t even -- Vanessa, you get the last word here. What do you say?
VANESSA BARNETT, HIPHOLLYWOOD.COM: As a mother it`s disgusting, atrocious. You can`t fathom this has occurred. But if I put myself in the place of the jurors -- I`m not an attorney like either one of them. If I put myself in place of the jurors I`m almost a little nervous they will get the insanity plea because it`s been well-documented decade, over a decade of mental issues. Then on top of that, you have these people sitting here that it`s almost like, why are we here? What`s going to happen in the end, and just put her away for life.
(CROSSTALK)
PINSKY: Well, that may be criminally insane. I want to give Sam the last word. You guys, the attorneys quiet for a second.
Sam, last word.
SCHACHER: Where is the responsibility, though? I know that she`s had mental illness for 20-some years but there`s also been bouts where she refused treatment, where she refused substance treatment, where she drove her kids to school high --
PINSKY: Drunk.
SCHACHER: Yes, there has to be responsibility here.
PINSKY: OK. So that`s the issue, everybody. Once again, you must take responsibility for your treatment. You`re not responsible for your illness. You`re responsible for your treatment.
Next up, investigators remove more than 500 pills from Schenecker`s home. Behavior bureau has some thoughts about this, and we will be back with them after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JULIE: I shake.
POLICE: You shake a little bit?
JULIE: Yes.
POLICE: Why do you shake?
JULIE: Ah, side effects from Abilify.
POLICE: That`s the medicine for?
JULIE: To stop the shaking. There is more, there`s, like, 10 --
POLICE: What did you take, let`s say, in the last eight hours?
JULIE: Benztropine.
POLICE: Benztropine. And what else?
JULIE: Lithium.
POLICE: Are you bipolar?
JULIE: Yes. I spent the last eight weeks in bed.
POLICE: Do you drink any alcohol or anything last night?
JULIE: Three or four glasses.
POLICE: Of what?
JULIE: Beer, then I switched to wine.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PINSKY: Reminder, we are live from New York city. New York bureau at CNN.
That`s some of the police interrogation with Julie Schenecker on trial for murdering her own children. We heard in that last block shooting them in the back of the head then in the mouth. I almost can`t deal with this woman.
Back with Sam. Back now with the behavior bureau. We`ve got Dr. Judy Ho, clinical psychologist, Erica America, Z100 Radio personality and psychotherapist. Leeann Tweeden, social commentator, host of "The Tomboys" podcast on Blog Talk Radio.
If you want to join the conversation, tweet us right now @DrDrewHLN, #behaviorbureau.
I want to clarify the interrogation you just heard. She said Benztropine, that`s called Cogentin base. These are medicines to stop tremor and side effects of other antipsychotic medication. So, which means to me that that tremors you`re seeing, the Parkinsonian appearance is side effect of the medicine. She documented as having tardive dyskinesia, which another chronic, what is that? You`re asking --
SCHACHER: English.
PINSKY: Tardive dyskinesia is a long-term complication of certain kinds of antipsychotic medication. And God knows, it could have been all the meds that set her off. Might not have been the mental illness.
Sam, my question for you, how did the police even find out about this killing?
SCHACHER: Oh my gosh, Dr. Drew, so the day before that the police went to her house and found the two children`s bodies, she e-mailed her siblings and parents this totally nonsensical e-mail. It was rather chilling.
She went on to go on and say that, you know, she`s fed up with the children, that they have attitudes. She also said that, quote, "I will end this soon." And that`s what alarmed her mom.
The mom then alerted the police to do a welfare check. The police showed up the very next day and --
PINSKY: And the mom --
SCHACHER: Oh, my gosh.
PINSKY: The grandma knew this was a possibility in her gut. That`s interesting.
Judy, tell me what you think this all was. What was wrong with this woman? Can we speculate?
JUDY HO, PSYCHOLOGIST: Well, Dr. Drew, as you just mentioned, she had tardive dyskinesia. That means that she was on really high dose or really long-term antipsychotics and she was mixing alcohol with it. So, there`s a lot of --
PINSKY: And painkillers.
HO: That`s right.
PINSKY: And painkillers. By the way, I was reading e-mails from the husband who was saying sort of appealing to her doctors going, listen, I`m not the doctor, I don`t know, but alcohol, painkillers, all these meds, is that a good thing?
Not a good thing. Not a good thing.
Go ahead, Judy, finish up.
HO: Right. Absolutely. And when you hear her speak in the interview, oh my goodness, she`s not lucid, she is not alert, she is not oriented. Who knows how long she`s been experiencing the psychosis she`s been experiencing.
Sounds like it`s a long time because she`s been journaling this whole time of how she was going to take her children`s lives. And when you look at mothers who kill their children, sometimes the delusion are saving the children, thinking it`s better for them or getting rid of them because they think that, you know, it`s actually because the children have brought them a lot of strain and they`re trying to get rid of them.
There are different reasons for that. But this is a long-term psychosis that`s been going on for maybe years now.
PINSKY: Erica, how about the relationship between the husband and this woman? I saw a whole series of e-mails where the husband -- some of the things he endured. If you didn`t have a clinical eye you`d go, oh my God, that poor man.
But then my sense goes, why did he endure all this? I guess he came from sort of alcoholism and background of abuse and whatnot. And, man, what he endured here is unbelievable.
And in a weird way, OK, I`m going to ask a tough question. Did he in any way enable this? I don`t want to blame him. Did he enable it in any way? Because who enabled this is how did it happen?
ERICA AMERICA, Z100: It`s a tough situation, because on one hand, you say he stuck with this woman through her hard times. On the other hand he was away and knew his wife was as sick as she was and left her alone with the children. Yes, he said they can`t drive with her, had certain specifications. Still, she was live with them.
And what I wanted to say is I actually have to take the opposing opinion as it seems like a lot of you are. I think she really was insane at the time of the crime. I think this was a severe mental health psychosis that had been going on for years and years and years.
And my question is, where are the doctors or therapists of psychiatrists?
HO: Right.
(CROSSTALK)
HO: All of these medications at the same time.
AMERICA: They said at a certain point she was in bed 20 hours a day. So, if she`s in bed 20 hours a day, it`s getting worse and worse.
PINSKY: She should be in a residential facility at that point. She shouldn`t be out in the world.
But, Leeann, I`m glad that Erica said that because I know you`ll drop some sort of bomb on all our theories and tell us you don`t care.
LEEANN TWEEDEN, SOCIAL COMMENTATOR: No, I`m very sympathetic to that. It seems like she had a long history of issue and problems. Her husband even said, he told the detectives I think she had those problems before they were married and they just got worse as they went along.
PINSKY: Yes. That`s right.
TWEEDEN: I think the dad who was in the military and had to deploy to the Middle East, there was no choice. When the military says you`re going to deploy, he had to leave his children. They don`t care. OK? This is his service to his country. He had to leave them.
So, he at least said I don`t want you to drive with them in the car because I know you`re impaired. Tried to get her into therapy, he sent her to treatment for 21 days. He would take her and physically do things and try to help her. At some point, there`s only so much you can do and it`s so tragic for these children.
PINSKY: Let`s make note, even Leeann sympathetic to how disastrous this situation is. I mean, that`s how horrible it is.
I`ll give you, Sam, last word.
SCHACHER: You know what? I just want to stay on record. As I read those email, her husband went above and beyond. Communicating with her doctor.
PINSKY: He sure tried.
SCHACHER: Tried his damnedest to make sure that she got the help she needs. She was the one that refused treatment, refused medication, and she is the one who should have to pay for what she did.
(CROSSTALK)
HO: It is so severe. It was giving her all these side effects.
PINSKY: Judy, I know. We got to leave it. Got it leave it right there. Thank you, panel.
Next up, a white supremacist accused of abusing Latina stepdaughters merely because they were Latina. Look, what a lovely man. Our behavior bureau breaks it down after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thirty-three-year-old Justin Lad is accused of hitting young family members with a hammer and a 2x4, pulling their tongues with pliers, touching them inappropriately and exposing himself. Neighbors say police were called dozens of times over the years but never saw anyone arrested.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Maybe it`s not bad because if it was bad, you know, things would be happening and the kids wouldn`t all be there.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The victims suggested the abuse was racially motivated. How it allegedly went on so long without being notice is still a mystery.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: A mystery indeed. We are live tonight from New York City with Sam and our behavior bureau, Judy, Erica, and Leeann.
And we are talking about a man who`s accused of brutally torturing his stepdaughters for years, pinched their tongues with pliers, like some weird cartoon, while their mother watched all this.
The girls are now 14 and 16. They told the social workers the following. They were forced to exercise excessively. They were hit with hammers if they stopped. Their tongues pinched with pliers. Hit with belts, straps, forced to expose themselves. Dance for the step dad.
Then, he threatened if they told anyone, this is the typical abuser manipulation, they would be raped and killed by a motorcycle gang. He had a special sort of fantasy in reserve for them. It`s nice. He`s a lovely man.
Stepfather, Justin Lad, there he is, he`s in custody. Stepdaughters are in a foster care. He has three biological sons also removed from the home.
Sam, a question about this guy looking at him is why the 02? You said, this is nasal cannula with oxygen --
SCHACHER: Let me tell you this. I`m glad you asked. He claims he`s ill. He needs a wheelchair and this oxygen.
PINSKY: Maybe he is, though.
SCHACHER: Well, guess what? No, people have caught him folding up the wheelchair, walking along, and then taking out the oxygen and smoking. He`s not that ill, Dr. Drew.
PINSKY: What is the illness he`s supposed to have?
SCHACHER: I don`t know, people believe --
TWEEDEN: Obesity?
SCHACHER: -- he`s doing this for a sympathy ploy.
PINSKY: Leeann, you think it`s obesity?
TWEEDEN: This guy is a punk. Can you show my face? This guy is the lowest of the low, OK? I`m sorry. I just want everybody to know I believe in capital punishment when it comes to people like him.
Doing that to an 8-year-old and like a 12-year-old girl because they were born to somebody else and it was maybe of an ethnicity that you did not like, but I mean, pinching their tongues with pliers, pinching their pinky toes and beating them. I read one thing where he would make them strip and sit on top of them with their bums exposed and touch their nipples and he would ask them to touch them and touch his nipple.
PINSKY: Oh my God!
TWEEDEN: And twist them.
I`m thinking, these girls are scarred for life. This guy should go away or better yet, castrate him or put him to death. Be done with him.
PINSKY: These abuse experiences change the brain. They change it forever. They need a lot of treatment to bring it back. It`s hard to do so.
Judy, do you think the mom was under coercion and control as well as why she, the mom, didn`t step up on behalf of these girls?
HO: Well, Leeann, I want to say, too, I prefer seeing your face over Justin Lad`s face, also.
But back to the mom. Why does she stay in this relationship, sit through this abuse? Well, I think the man has some manipulation about him. There`s some redeeming qualities. And this is why abused people stay in these relationships because they`re constantly waiting for that moment that they`re going to turn and be the good husband again.
So, there must be something --
PINSKY: It`s a cycle. It`s a cycle, where they reunite then the tension builds. They walk on egg shells. There`s another crisis.
SCHACHER: He had white power tattooed on his stomach.
TWEEDEN: Give me a break.
HO: I think it`s less motivated by race. I think it`s more motivated by the fact these are his stepdaughters. I don`t think there`s been any reports that the children he fathered had any problems, did there?
PINSKY: As Wendy Walsh often points out to us, a child not biologically related to the male is in potential for harm`s way.
I want to talk to somebody on the phone who knows more about this. It`s Christina Fintonis. She`s a friend of the family. She witnessed some of this abuse when she allowed the family to stay at her home.
So, thank you for joining us.
What did you see?
CHRISTINA FINTONIS, FAMILY FRIEND (via telephone): When they stayed with me, it was a week, the whole family. I had the eldest daughter with me for a week before the whole family. I witnessed him screaming and yelling at them. Calling them the "C" word. The "N" word.
PINSKY: Wow. Oh, my God.
FINTONIS: He was constantly having the younger son follow them around to spy on them to see if they were going on the Internet or not. And he had grabbed the 14-year-old by her face and was shaking her head and screaming in her face and squeezed her mouth so hard together that it made her mouth bleed.
PINSKY: Oh, gosh.
Did you report this, Christina?
SCHACHER: Right.
PINSKY: Did you report to the cops?
FINTONIS: After I seen a few things and the verbal abuse, I had talked to the oldest daughter and said, listen, I can tell there`s something more going on, what`s going on? And she opened up to me.
PINSKY: More?
FINTONIS: And she told me all the horrific stories you`re hearing she told me all of that has been going on --
PINSKY: Did you report it? Christina, did you report it?
FINTONIS: Yes, I did. I`m the only one that came forward and actually finally reported this and made sure that they were taken out of their care and put into foster care. They wouldn`t let me keep them because I`m not family, but I made sure they did not go under his roof like these --
PINSKY: OK, Christina, thank you, Christina, you`re the hero.
We cannot independently confirm Christina`s claims about Justin Lad but local police confirmed his arrest and 21 charges. The alleged abuse his stepdaughter suffered is detailed in court records.
One last question, Christina, to you -- what is the medical problem that requires the oxygen?
FINTONIS: He has COPD and he puts on an act. I`ll tell you that right now. He was fine.
PINSKY: It`s an act. There you go. Thank you for that, Christina. That`s what we suspected.
TWEEDEN: Christina, thank you. You probably saved thousand two girls` lives. Honest to God.
PINSKY: Yes. I think that`s true. And so hats off to Christina.
Next up, sexual assault out of control on a high school campus. Prime suspect is there. An 18-year-old student. Get into that after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)
SHERIFF PAUL BABEU, PINAL COUNTY SHERIFF: This is a serious and serial sex offender and rapist.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is Tyler Cost.
BABEU: Highly manipulative, very charismatic and charming.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He is accused of pinning down and.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sexually assaulting at least 18 high school students.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: His youngest alleged victim, 13 years old.
BABEU: Many of these victims not only verbally said no, no, no, as he was pulling off, physically forcing off their bras, their underwear and penetrating them. He was threatening to kill people, to make their life a living hell. We have a girl that tried to commit suicide.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: His accusers say his mom might have been able to stop it. One alleged victim told investigators his mom walked in while coast was raping her and said he should be more discreet in the future.
BABEU: I just said that these women had their bras and underwear torn off and ran physically from him and are these 18 women ganging up on this one guy? That`s a stupid question.
(END VIDEO TAPE)
DR. DREW PINSKY, DR. DREW ON CALL HOST: We are live from New York City. I`m back with Sam, Mark, Loni, and Vanessa. Tyler Cost, 18-year-old high school student accused of raping and assaulting 18 girls, most of them his classmates. Police say Cost threatened to manipulate his victims to keeping quiet, but apparently, Cost says those girls, in fact, he`s not the -- he`s the victim. They`re bullying him. Vanessa, what do you make of that?
VANESSA BARNETT: I cannot believe that he has the audacity to play the victim card. Now, even more disgusted at his parents, especially his mother, who walked in, saw it happening, and she is defending him. She is also saying that he`s been bullied, he`s been the victim in this whole ordeal. Eighteen girls have had their lives ruined at the hand of this young boy and he wants to play victim? It`s disgusting.
SAMANTHA SCHACHER: Yeah.
PINSKY: Joining us on the phone, I`ve got Sheriff Paul Babeu. I hope I`m pronouncing that last name correctly. He is the sheriff in that town. Sheriff, 18 victims, are there more?
BABEU: There`s no doubt. Everything we know in law enforcement, the overwhelming majority of victims of sexual assault or rape, 80-plus percent actually remain silent, never reporting this crime to law enforcement. So, there`s no doubt we`re gonna have other victims come forward.
PINSKY: And sheriff, does that mom have any culpability? I don`t know what the age of consent is here -- there in your state, but here she walks in on an -- he`s an 18-year-old, they`re high school students, maybe underaged, and makes no assumptions about with these girls asking for help. What`s her role in all this?
BABEU: We`re looking into that. Our first priority clearly was to get Tyler Cost re-arrested. Of course, you may have heard one of our local judges had released him on only a $10,000 bond. You only had to put up $1,000 cash while we had all these victims that were in fear for their life. So.
PINSKY: Wow.
BABEU: We immediately developed the probable cause for ten full cases that we submitted a total of 29 felony counts against him. So, now he`s in my jail. He`s not gonna be released until he goes to trial. And he faces literally hundreds of years in prison.
SCHACHER: Thank God. Sheriff, do you guys -- are you guys aware if there were any other behavioral problems before this? Was he one to get in trouble with the school? Has he been suspended from school before growing up?
PINSKY: Good question.
BABEU: That`s what -- and I talked to the principal recently and a lot of people who`ve known him playing baseball and being involved in other things, some people said they were weirded out looking back. Other what would have been potential victims as he aggressively pursued them. He was described as you`ve already shown as a very charming, very bright young man. And he looks like a boy, yet he`s doing these very violent acts. Not just sexual assaults but physical then the threats on top of it. Not just threatening to kill individuals, but to expose them, calling them all kinds of horrible sexual names saying that he`s going to ruin their reputations.
PINSKY: Wow.
BABEU: Two girls already literally left the state of Arizona to flee him because they were in such fear of his threats.
(CROSSTALK)
PINSKY: Mark, your question for sheriff?
BABEU: Yes?
MARK EIGLARSH: Sheriff, it sounds like you`ve got a compelling case against him. I`m just curious, though, if there was DNA evidence at all to link him to any of these crimes.
BABEU: Well, here`s what we have, five cases just from February to present. It`s not -- not one of these cases was reported immediately following. And that`s not uncommon for a trauma victim such as this. Yet we -- after he was released, we rearrested him on physical characteristics to get all that, both DNA, pubic hairs, all the things that we would normally collect to build our case. And what we`re doing now.
(CROSSTALK)
EIGLARSH: He`s gonna be arguing consent anyway, right? I mean, he`s just going to argue that they asked for it, you know?
BABEU: Well.
EIGLARSH: Right?
BABEU: Try that before a jury when you have 18 females, most of whom never met each other before, all saying very similar stories.
EIGLARSH: It`s not going to work, yeah.
BABEU: This guy would literally chase them down. His M.O. is the same. So, clearly they`re.
PINSKY: Sheriff, we`re gonna have to leave it there.
BABEU: You bet.
PINSKY: Panel, thank you. We have to get out. Thank you, sir, and thank you for being so diligent with the protection of your community.
Next up, hear one of the victims in this case on the Behavior Bureau. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It just got to the point where I didn`t want it be at school anymore, I didn`t want to be around him. I was afraid.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My daughter was verbally assaulted, physically assaulted by him. It was bad. It was really bad. I cried with her every day she didn`t go to school.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You`ve had contact with his parents. What`s their attitude?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That it`s everybody else, not him.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
PINSKY: Yeah, really bad. It`s a sad story. We are live from New York City. I`m here with Samantha. And we`re talking about a high school student accused of sexually assaulting 18 girls, possibly more, threatening to kill them if they spoke to anybody about it. Bring in our Behavior Bureau. Let`s come in everybody, Erica, he is -- there`s our Behavior Bureau, which is Erica, Judy, and Leeann again. Erica, he is 18 years old, charming at first, would invite people to his house, and then rape.
SCHACHER: Right.
PINSKY: What do you think.
(CROSSTALK)
SCHACHER: Not just the house.
ERICA AMERICA: OK. Well, can I speak? Is it at me? OK.
PINSKY: Please. Go. Yeah.
AMERICA: So, this is a dangerous, dangerous case. And even though it took 18 girls, I am so happy that he is behind bars right now. And I hope the full law.
(CROSSTALK)
PINSKY: What do you think it is? Is he a psycho sociopath?
AMERICA: Anti-social personality.
PINSKY: Anti-social, yeah.
AMERICA: Because of A, he has.
(CROSSTALK)
PINSKY: Erica, hold on. Erica, I got to interrupt. Hang on, Erica. Shouldn`t there be a long history of that kind of behavior? We just heard the sheriff say that people said he played football, played baseball, and he was pretty charming.
AMERICA: He`s very charming and he`s manipulative. So, he`s charming and manipulative.
PINSKY: You think it`s that.
AMERICA: Meaning that that he can kind of get around it. This is the type of person that will evolve into a serial killer. Serial. Did you hear me? Serial killer. He needs to be taken off the streets. If this is where his impulses are at 18, it`s gonna get worse and worse and worse. This is a dangerous kid.
PINSKY: All right. Well, let`s see if Judy agrees. Couple of cases, Judy, the girls would try to push him off, he punched them according to their reports, allegedly. Do you agree with Erica?
JUDY HO, PH.D.: I agree that he`s an anti-social personality disorder, Dr. Drew, absolutely. And you know, in terms of why didn`t this come out earlier? Yes, there`s that manipulation. He`s obviously bright. He`s been able to cover it up. Plus, sometimes these individuals don`t actually show these symptoms until about their mid-teens. So, maybe this is really just when it`s starting to develop for him. But he knows how to pick his victims, too. I have a feeling that he picks people who need love, need nurturing. He goes straight for the jugular, goes for what they need, gives to it to them momentarily and then gets them into these compromising positions.
PINSKY: Don`t you think at a high school, Sam, in high school wouldn`t the reputation when get around? Other girls would stay away from him.
(CROSSTALK)
SCHACHER: But Dr. Drew, he did, he psychologically coerced them. He bullied them to the point where two people moved out of state, where one girl tried to take her own life. I mean, this guy is a monster. What I will categorize him as, a monster.
(CROSSTALK)
PINSKY: Well, I know Leeann is already short on words when it comes to guys like this. Go ahead, Leeann.
LEEANN TWEEDEN: Can we castrate him? Because that seems like he has just given up that card. You what, 18 girls, we don`t know if there`s more. There could have been more, but we`re talking about, I know we have doctors and you`re a doctor. But it`s like, can the kid just be evil? I know, I mean, anti-depressant.
(CROSSTALK)
PINSKY: But Leeann -- Leeann, your using -- a rose by any other name, you know what I`m saying? People with those sorts of disorders can be evil. Criminals can be evil and not have those disorders, but.
(CROSSTALK)
TWEEDEN: Let`s say he was smart. Yeah, but I mean, let`s -- he needs to take responsibility. I mean, he was physically abusing these girls -- psychologically abusing these girls. Driving them out to the forest and then saying I`m not gonna give you a ride back way miles out in the forest until you have sex with me. And then his mother came in and let him get away with it. Where is the dad? The dad should show the kid, how to have -- you know, love women and to respect them.
PINSKY: Where is the dad? That`s always -- how often do we get to that point on these stories? We`re yelling at the mom, holding the mom accountable. We think, where`s the dad? What happened here? Where are the dads? Thank you, panel.
Next up. New details in the cardboard box mom case. More bodies possibly yet to be found. Be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: Seven dead babies found in cardboard boxes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Over the course of ten years, police say Megan Huntsman gave birth to then killed at least six babies.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police said, the babies found were born between 1996 and 2006. At least seven pregnancies neighbors say were kept hidden.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How to you get pregnant seven times and no one notices? Police say they questioned Huntsman after her ex-husband found a dead baby in a box in the garage.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When she was pregnant and killing the babies, he was in the home.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The fact that she did this and then went and hid the babies in boxes shows she knew what she was doing.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE 3: There`s something off in this woman`s brain. Obviously.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: I`m live from New York City with Sam, Judy, Erica, and Vanessa, and according to newly unsealed police search warrants, Megan Huntsman did not know -- you`re gonna ask yourself why this is -- how it could possibly be -- did not know how many dead babies were in her home. She gave investigators a quote, ballpark figure of eight or nine. Seven bodies have been discovered so far. Vanessa, doesn`t know how many times she gave birth. What do we do to with this woman?
BARNETT: First of all, she`s lying. I do not believe that she does not know how many times she gave birth and killed her children. She`s flat-out lying. And furthermore, there`s been more information that comes out saying that she had to dispose of huge mattresses because there`s so much blood after giving birth. You can`t tell me that that kind of physical pain -- you go through that kind of physical pain, and the moving of an entire mattress and box-spring, you can`t tell me how many children you`ve killed? You`re a liar. And I believe that the people involved in her life are liars, too. You can`t be pregnant seven, eight, nine times and your strange husband who was in and out and helped create somebody`s babies -- I`m sure and your daughters that were living with you, no one knows? I`m so sick of this story, and people aren`t telling the truth. They need to dig deeper.
PINSKY: First of all, Vanessa, well said. Right-on. You nailed it. I wonder if Erica or Judy, agree. Erica, what do you say?
AMERICA: Well, I wasn`t looking at it that way, Vanessa, but that is, you know, understandable. It could be that. I was looking at it as more, you know, for her to be able to do something like that, I`m still waiting to hear from her mouth what the -- I know she said she killed the babies, but why. I just wanna know why, so, I can kind of help put it in a frame of, you know, what kind of mental illness this could be. But I would think that someone who would do this seven to nine times would be mentally ill and it`s just so out of it that they can`t remember. That`s what I have to say.
SCHACHER: Can I share -- I`ll share my theory. I think that she`s a serial killer. Listen, she assimilated really well into society. People described her as a nice, caring woman. And I think she bred these babies to murder her victims, Dr. Drew. Well, listen, she kept them in boxes like trophies. That`s what serial killers do.
PINSKY: Oh, Sam, that`s gross. Didn`t we know that these weren`t the husbands, right? That she might have been carrying on.
SCHACHER: That`s another theory.
BARNETT: We don`t know. We don`t know.
PINSKY: I understand. I understand. Judy, what say you?
HO: Well, I wanna actually talk about something that Sam just mentioned and the new forensic evidence which is that there`s been this weird smell that people have been picking up from these boxes, right?
PINSKY: Yes.
HO: So, is it a form of preservation like was there formaldehyde involved? And she`s keeping them like museum pieces just like Sam alluded to.
SCHACHER: Exactly.
HO: And then the other thing I was thinking about which is kind of morbid, is that they`ve been doing studies on pigs and how they decompose as a similar to humans and you can see when the time of death is. So, of all the babies had a similar smell, does it mean they were all killed around the same time? There`s just so much more that we don`t know and I wonder about that timeline.
PINSKY: You ladies gross me out. I`m completely grossed out by this story.
AMERICA: We`re grossed out.
PINSKY: I am grossed out. You`re taking it to such places that my mind just has trouble going. This whole thing is.
AMERICA: It`s a horrifying story.
PINSKY: It`s a horrifying story.
BARNETT: It`s unbelievable.
PINSKY: And, Vanessa, I think you`re absolutely right. We just don`t know exactly what`s going on here. We need more information. And we`re gonna have to leave it right there. Next, our most tweeted story of the day. James Franco. You guys stay with me. I want this panel with me because I wanna Behavior Bureau in here to figure this one out. James Franco naked Instagram selfie. Is he OK? We`ll talk about it after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(JAMES FRANCO HUMMING)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PINSKY: Live from the New York Bureau at Columbus Circle here at CNN Tonight, Sam, Judy, Erica, Vanessa join me. And that video was from Instagram. This is the most tweeted story of the day and the story I`ve been most asked about all day. Wherever I go, people wanna know, James Franco, is he OK?
SCHACHER: I asked you this last night, Dr. Drew. I did.
PINSKY: You asked me yesterday. You`re ahead of the crowd here. But he is non-stop shirtless Instagraming, posting bizarre photos. He recently added fuel to the fire when he posted, I gonna show you a semi-nude selfie to Instagram which then came down about an hour later. Yeah, and in fact, Erica, you were telling me Instagram reached all into your Instagram and took it away, is that right?
AMERICA: Yes. When I saw that I knew that that was an ultra-special intimate Franco selfie. So, I screenshotted it, I tagged you, Dr. Drew. Cause I was like we`re gonna talk about this.
PINSKY: I saw it.
AMERICA: I put it on my page.
PINSKY: Yes, you do.
AMERICA: And then, they deleted it. That means Instagram -- so, I`m curious did Franco decide to delete it or did Instagram delete it? So, that we`re not a 100 percent sure. But I`ll tell you this he`s getting so much publicity out of this, Dr. Drew. This is really digging him a lot -- but is he going too far? That`s my question.
(CROSSTALK)
BARNETT: Yes.
AMERICA: Listen.
PINSKY: Hold on, everybody, hold on. Hold. Hold, everybody. Because I want some more information. So, I went to my buddy, Dax Holt, from TMZ. He`s on the phone. Dax, is something going wrong? Is he OK? Or is this just great publicity?
DAX HOLT, TMZ PRODUCER: I don`t think anything is going wrong. This guy is a master of publicity. He knows what he`s doing. I mean, this is a semi-nude photo on the heels (ph) of his little inappropriate Instagram (inaudible) 17-year-old. And then, you got to keep in mind, this guy`s got 14 projects going right now. So, the best thing for him is to stay in the news, stay relevant, have people talking about him. And the best way to do it is by, you know, getting people stirred up over these selfie.
SCHACHER: No.
BARNETT: No way. Go back. Wait. Let me -- let me talk, please.
PINSKY: Hold on. One time. Vanessa, hold on. Vanessa, hold on. Hold on, Sam. Then Vanessa.
SCHACHER: OK. Listen, hold on really quickly because I love me some James Franco. I used to. Used to follow him on Instagram until his selfies would take up my entire Instagram feed. And I`m sorry, I don`t care if you`re James Franco or some average Joe or if you`re sexy or not, that makes you look narcissistic and full of yourself and it`s not attractive and it`s not helping.
PINSKY: Stop sending those selfies to Sam, Dax. It`s all to say. It`s nothing all right?
(CROSSTALK)
HOLT: I don`t know if you guys read it or not. But he did this whole like write-up in The New York Times back in December about the evolution of the selfie and how it really, like, promotes people`s careers and how fans love just seeing what their celebrities are up to. And so, the selfie has become a way to self-promote yourself and it works really well for people and enhances their career.
BARNETT: Not this excessive.
PINSKY: That is exactly why he`s doing this.
AMERICA: He`s saving money on the publicity.
PINSKY: And, Vanessa, though, maybe he`s testing the limits of all this. Maybe he`s gone too far.
BARNETT: No. It`s coldly going to backfire. Any time you put your pubes on display, nothing good can come of, it first of all. And second of all, Instagram.
HO: Amen.
BARNET: They shut down Rihanna`s account when she posted her tats off there last week. James Franco is going to be gone and he won`t be able to promote anything.
PINSKY: Judy, any agreement there?
HO: Well, I agree with Sam. I used to love James Franco, too. But this is a little too much James Franco.
PINSKY: So, Dax, Dax, can you send a message into him that maybe he backs off a little bit? You know, if I were a movie, you know, distributor, a company, I`d be like, hey, dude, just cut it down a little bit. You know, particularly you were on -- you were the Wizard of Oz and stuff. Come on now.
HOLT: The fact that we`re all sitting here right now talking about this. Means that selfie is working. He`s getting publicity, staying relevant. It`s doing its purpose.
HO: He`s a mastermind.
SCHACHER: Can I ask Judy a question? Judy.,
HO: Yes, Sam?
SCHACHER: Judy, can I ask you a question? Is this a symptom of something bigger?
PINSKY: Could be.
SCHACHER: Because come on. This seems pretty narcissistic to me.
HO: It is really narcissistic. And he`s got some a lot of -- he`s had a lot of erratic behavior since the Oscars hosting. So, I`m a little bit worried that there`s something else that we`re not seeing.
PINSKY: Hold on, Judy. Stop.
HO: And he`s been hiding it.
PINSKY: I got to read a tweet. Darius is right next to you. Put that back up there again, you guys. I can`t read it. He was awesome.
(CROSSTALK)
PINSKY: People say he`s a creepy old man now, I say keep the half nude selfies coming. This is from Lissa Aronoff.
AMERICA: That selfie looks like a dirt bag motel picture.
BARNETT: Yeah.
PINSKY: Erica?
AMERICA: Yes, I just wanted to say, I agree with, Dax. Yes it does give him incredible publicity for now. But what happens is if you become more popular and known for those kinds of antics. Nobody wants to see you in a movie anymore. Think Lindsay Lohan. After we knew so much about her, nobody wanted to see her as someone else. So, we have to be careful.
PINSKY: All right. I say it`s too much. Just pull back a little bit m friend.
HO: Too much James Franco
PINSKY: Pull back a little bit. So, you don`t end up in the Behavior Bureau if people wondering if you`re OK or not. Dax, thank you. Forensic Files is next. Tonight, justice for a murdered mom 20 years after she was found dead. Can new technology help catch her killer? Forensic Files. Thank you panel. Forensic Files, starts right now.
END
