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New Eyewitness Accounts Emerge of Ferguson Shooting; Video of Police Shooting Revealed

Aired August 21, 2014 - 15:00   ET

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

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: And let's continue on and stay in Ferguson as we roll along, top of the hour. I'm Brooke Baldwin.

The National Guard has just been ordered out of Ferguson, Missouri. It seems cooler heads are prevailing in the city that has really become this flash point of protests and clashes with police. Overnight, though, I can tell you those protests were mostly peaceful, arrests, just six. That is minimal compared with the dozens arrested over previous nights.

One of the them charged with restoring calm is this man. This is Highway Patrol Captain Ron Johnson.

CNN's Don Lemon rode along with him, saw firsthand how he is interacting with the people of Ferguson, Missouri.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Not that many people out. It seems to be under control. What did you do right since two days ago?

CAPT. RON JOHNSON, MISSOURI STATE HIGHWAY PATROL: I think that first, the community did some things right. The clergy, and the elders and the activists came out, and didn't allow agitators and criminals to mass themselves within the group.

And they were actually pointing them out to us. They were helping us. They were moving away from them and not having the same activity. So really, the community did it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why we can't be like, young man, come here, let me talk to you for a second. OK. Maybe I might stop and listen to see what you got to say.

But if you're jumping out with me when I feel like animosity and stuff like that, well, I feel like, I'm going to make you do your job today then.

LEMON: So it's how somebody approaches you? If the officer approached you with respect, you would respond with respect.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They ain't approaching us right.

They are approaching us like we already committed a violent crime or something. They are approaching us like you caught me selling dope to somebody or something like that. You ain't. You just pulled me over, OK? I pulled you over because your pants were sagging. Can you pull them up? OK. I can pull them up, officer. No problem.

I will pull them up. Pull your pants up. Get off. Get -- man, look, now what?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: You saw Don there. He joins me now from Ferguson.

And can we just go back for a minute to that initial question you asked of Captain Johnson when you said, sir, what have you done right? Did you listen to his answer? He's not taking, at least it seems to me, not much of the credit.

LEMON: Yes.

He's -- and that's the kind of guy he is. He's saying it's a coordinated effort and he talked about the community leaders being out. He talked about his officers being out. And, listen, you know, he's -- when you -- you know, I like to call him the velvet glove, because he's clearly in charge when we go around.

And if he doesn't like something from his own officers, they were blocking the street with their cars. And he got out and he said, listen, I need to get out and I need to handle this. He's saying, we don't need all these cars there, we don't need this much presence here. You have the cars, you have the presence. Move out of the way. Don't block the traffic.

And people really respond to him, because he gets out, he talks to people. And he meets people where they are. And that's very important. That's real community policing, Brooke.

BALDWIN: You know, you're out there, you're talking to people. We are hearing different accounts too of the shooting of Michael Brown some 11, 12 days ago.

Anderson just talked to a man by the name of Michael Brady, his own account. But I have to imagine, and you have been, you know, a journalist for a number of years, knowing that there have to be other people who have witnessed this shooting and they are just simply not coming forward, because they're afraid.

LEMON: Yes. We spoke to a witness much like Anderson spoke to the -- he said, listen, I saw some of it, I heard the shots. I went over and as I got there, I saw sort of the aftermath and what was happening after. And there were people who were there already there with their cameras.

There were people who were already out there on the street. And I know some of those people, they have not been interviewed by police, because they are afraid of the police. They don't want to get involved. And also they don't want the media attention.

But, quite frankly, the number one thing they say to me is, they're afraid. They don't want any retaliation from the police, because of the interaction that they have had so far. They just don't want to get involved. And, I mean, that's a sad statement about kind of the relationship between police and the community.

It really shouldn't be that way, Brooke. They said that police -- now, this is according to them -- were taking people's phones and asking for their Facebook accounts and those sorts of things. That could just be part of the investigation to figure out what happened much, but to some people it is intimidating to have officers do that.

BALDWIN: Yes. Keep telling those stories, Don Lemon. Tell the stories. Find the truth of what happened in Ferguson. Thank you so much for all of your reporting.

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: Thank you.

BALDWIN: What exactly happened between Michael Brown and officer Darren Wilson? At this moment, it's still a mystery. And now another witness to the shooting has come forward here to CNN. Just talking about this a moment ago.

I want you to listen to what he describes as what he saw.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL BRADY, WITNESS: By the time I get outside, he's already turned around, facing the officer. He is -- he had his arms like under his stomach and he was like halfway down like he was going down. And the officer lets out three or four shots at him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: This new account differs from what we have heard from previous witnesses.

For one, Michael Brown's friend, Dorian Johnson, who was there, he says after being chased, Brown turned around with his hands up, told the officer he wasn't armed. Then we heard from a woman by the name of Tiffany Mitchell. She says officer Wilson was shooting just as soon as he got out of his car while chasing Michael Brown.

We have heard from Piaget Crenshaw, who took that video, the aftermath from her balcony apartment. She says Michael Brown was running away while the officer continued firing at him. And then -- and let's be clear -- this wasn't an eyewitness account. This was at least a secondhand account from this alleged friend of officer Wilson, calls herself Josie.

She called into this radio station, said Brown shoved Wilson back in the car, and grabbed the gun. She says officer Wilson was acting in self-defense as he shoved Brown away and shot at him. Sources familiar with the investigation confirm that account does exist.

So joining me now, Mark O'Mara, CNN legal analyst and criminal defense attorney.

Mark, we have touched on this before. But since we have run through specific examples of these different accounts, and no one knows the real version of events, and we actually may never know. Of these accounts, which seems most credible to you?

MARK O'MARA, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: It's so difficult, because if you look at them all individually, they all have a commonality, which is that there was a difference -- or a distance between the officer and Mike Brown. So that's going to be significant, according to how far away he was when the shooting occurred.

They do have Mike Brown turning around. That is significant, because either it's to surrender or it's to attack. That's a big point. This most recent witness, if he had a videotape showing what he just said he saw, that would be devastating to the officer, because if, in fact, Mike Brown was almost crunched over, maybe in reaction to the first shot or second shot, and was going down and he continued to shoot, then that's not appropriate.

An officer is allowed to shoot to protect himself, but has to believe that he's in fear of great bodily injury. And though it's difficult to decide when that happened, and when it dissipates, 10, 15, 20 feet away falling down probably does not give rise to fear.

BALDWIN: Aren't you also though, as an attorney, if and when this goes to trial, looking at each eyewitness or looking at each witness and determining the attachment, the relationship with the victim, in this case Michael Brown, and that final account from Michael Brady, it appears he is, you know, unattached to the situation, which I would think would increase the credibility of his version of events.

O'MARA: Well, it would. It's according to how far we're going to dig into credibility issues and attachment issues, because if I was a criminal defense attorney in this case, one thing I'm going to be looking at is, look, there is suspicion in the streets, blacks against cops and cops against blacks.

And if that suspicion impacts on how a person perceives an event, that the cop is always at fault or the black kid is always at fault, then that is going to infect the way they testify. So we as defense attorneys look at all those credibility issues, including what the subtle biases may be and also how they fit into the forensic evidence.

BALDWIN: OK. What about this grand jury? I understand the prosecutor has extended an invitation to this police officer, Darren Wilson, to testify. No one has heard from him. So would it behoove him to do so, to accept the invitation or not?

O'MARA: You know, again, I said this to you a couple days ago. It goes against my grain to say this as a criminal defense attorney. But an opportunity to present a defense to a grand jury in a case like this may be a good decision, because, after all, only the officer can say what exactly happened, what that officer was reacting to.

So I would probably wait until I get more of the forensic evidence, look at it, see if it comports with my client's decision, and then may actually take the outrageous chance of having him testify before a grand jury.

BALDWIN: Mark, just quickly, will that initial autopsy, will the information be made public?

O'MARA: Oh, yes. That's part of the ongoing discovery.

Remember that we all want it right away, but the prosecutor should take control of his case and move forward. If he wants to go to the grand jury, so be it. That information doesn't need to become private -- or public until it's asked for. But we will see the autopsy at some point. The grand jury will see it probably before we will.

BALDWIN: OK.

OK. Mark O'Mara, thank you so much on the legal aspects of this whole thing.

Next, we have new questions about police force, as this chilling new video has surfaced showing the death of an African-American man just a couple miles from Ferguson. Does the video contradict the police account we heard from several days ago? We will discuss that.

And at any moment, the secretary of defense will address the beheading of an American and what the Obama administration will do in response, all of this as we learn ISIS militants demanded $130 million before his murder.

This is CNN's special live coverage.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: You're watching CNN. I'm Brooke Baldwin.

Let's talk about this new cell phone video that has emerged. In this video, which you will see in a minute, it shows two police officers shooting a young black man in Saint Louis. Kajieme Powell was killed Tuesday just a couple miles from Ferguson.

Police say Powell walked out of this convenience store. He had energy drinks and doughnuts that they say he didn't pay for. Police say once outside, he came at them with a knife and less than 20 seconds after they arrived on the scene, they opened fire and they killed him.

So we have that cell phone video of the shooting. It is very graphic. So we have chosen to freeze the footage right before Powell is shot. But the audio continues. So you can still hear nine shots being fired.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The police are going to pull up. You all from the police? They're ganging up. They have got a gun out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shoot me. Shoot me. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh (EXPLETIVE DELETED) Oh (EXPLETIVE DELETED) Oh

(EXPLETIVE DELETED) Oh (EXPLETIVE DELETED)

They got their guns out.

(GUNSHOTS)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, my God.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Let me bring in Jake Tapper, host of "THE LEAD," joining me from Ferguson.

And, Jake, I know you went to the scene of that shooting. What did you find?

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: Well, it's interesting.

I think the knee-jerk response of most people who are not familiar with police work at all is, oh, my God, that's horrifying. He doesn't look like he could have really done anything to those officers. Isn't there another way they could have dealt with it?

What I learned by going there and also talking separately to many police officers is the following. First of all, the distances as viewed in that video are very difficult to discern. We recreated the scene or we tried to recreate the scene. We pulled the car up, the police car up to where we thought it was. And an eyewitness said no, no, no, it was far different than that. It was back about five or six feet.

Well, that five or six feet is significant. Second, there is a general rule that police are instructed when it comes to self-defense, and this individual, of course, did have a knife. No one disputes that. And that is just because someone is not within arm's length does not mean that they don't pose a threat.

And, in fact, it's a rule of thumb for some officers that if somebody is 21 feet away and your gun is in your holster, they can get to you with a knife before you can draw and stop them. So it is -- I'm not trying to justify the shooting. Obviously, that's a matter for an independent review board.

BALDWIN: Right.

TAPPER: But it is a lot more complicated than I think it looks, necessarily, on that video, which is, again, from about a quarter of a block away.

BALDWIN: Everything you're saying corroborates. I had all kinds of questions for a veteran police officer, former cop last hour, and he corroborates everything you just said.

So what about business owners in the area? What are they saying about all of this? TAPPER: Well, first of all, they knew him, and they knew this young

man, Powell, Mr. Powell. And, you know, there's a lot of regret that the days of community policing are over, where people don't know, hey, this is a young guy from the neighborhood that is troubled, and the police would automatically know that because they spend so much time in the neighborhood.

A lot of regret that there weren't people there to take care of him, and take him home and tell him, you know put the knife away, go home. Another thing that I heard from business owners is they're worried about repercussions, because, obviously, some of the business owners there called 911 because he was stealing things, allegedly, and, of course, had a knife and was behaving erratically.

They called 911. They didn't call 911 to have him killed. They called 911 to have the situation taken care. And they are fearful of repercussions from criminals, from looters, from angry people in the community who might take out their anger at what happened to this young man, to this 23-year-old with a knife, on them, and not on -- not on police or not in a more satisfying, healthy, constructive way, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Something I called into question on the show yesterday, and clearly just based upon what police are saying he said, just not entirely stable mentally, and wondering if anyone had even addressed that with him.

Jake Tapper, we will look for you at the top of the hour on "THE LEAD" live from Ferguson once again. Thank you so much.

And coming up next, something else that really struck me about all of this. If you have been listening and watching our coverage, you have attorneys, you have civil rights leaders there. They're using words like execution and murder, when we don't have all the facts in this case. Nancy Grace has some thoughts. She will join me next.

Plus, quick reminder. We're watching and waiting to hear from the secretary of defense discussing the gruesome beheading of that American this week and the failed mission to save him, this as the former CIA deputy director says he's afraid ISIS-trained Westerners could attack in the U.S.

Stay with me. You're watching CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: So at this point, we know that Attorney General Eric Holder has traveled to Ferguson. He can say that FBI agents have made -- quote, unquote -- "significant progress" into the investigation into Michael Brown's death.

But he also says it will take time to do it completely. Holder promises that his civil rights investigation will be fair. And that is definitely comforting news for some people in Ferguson, including, actually, Michael Brown's parents, to whom Anderson Cooper spoke a little while ago, because there is a separate investigation being conducted by the county that a lot of people in this Ferguson community just don't trust.

So to HLN's Nancy Grace, we go.

And a couple questions for you, Nancy. First, we know that this grand jury has begun to convene. But why is it that, apparently -- you know, this officer, we may not find out if he's fully charged until mid-October. Why?

NANCY GRACE, HOST, "NANCY GRACE": Well, I was concerned about that as well, because the autopsies are done, OK?

All the evidence has been gathered unless they want to talk to more witnesses. But all the evidence should be in, including toxicology. It's already come out there was marijuana in Michael's system. I don't know that that's either here nor there. But that proves to you that the toxicology results are already in.

Or I can tell you this much. They could be in if they wanted them to be in. You know, you can put a rush on toxicology and get them in a week. So, long story short, I have been looking at it. You know, I'm not suggesting that this is what's going on. But this grand jury is done toward the end of September.

And I'm just wondering if they're timing this indictment to come out at the time this grand jury is going to be released, so they're out of it. The district attorney is running for reelection. By the time this no bill or true bill comes out, it will be past the time for anybody to qualify to run against him.

You know, if you just look at the big picture of what's going on here -- now, there's some issues, will the cop testify? You cannot force him to testify.

BALDWIN: Right. Should he testify?

GRACE: Well, in this case, if I were his defense attorney, I think I might let him go in front of the grand jury, because I think he's probably going to be very, very persuasive.

He doesn't have to because he's a target. And you have a Fifth Amendment right. You cannot bring on a target or a defendant knowing that they're going to take the Fifth Amendment. You can't just bring them on to take the Fifth in front of a grand jury or a jury.

But if you are a defendant or a target, you come in and you can plead your case to a grand jury. I think that might not be a bad idea for him. On the other side of the spectrum, the prosecutor, the elected DA has been attacked because he's a crime victim. His father was a cop gunned down in the line of duty. And he wanted to be a cop, but he lost his leg to cancer.

And he said being county prosecutor was second-best to being a cop. A lot of people are angry about that. And I personally resent that on the state side. I'm a crime victim. Does that mean all my prosecutions...

BALDWIN: You have been personally affected by crime. I have wondered your perspective.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Yes. Are all my prosecutions, thousands of cases I handled no good because I'm a crime victim?

So I resent what they're saying about the DA. My main concern is this grand jury then and I don't think it should take until October to get a true bill or a no bill.

BALDWIN: OK. Something else, though, that struck me just sort of watching all of the coverage, I keep hearing the words execution and murder. And these are words being used by Michael Brown's attorneys, by civil rights leaders who have taken the trip to Ferguson.

We don't even know the official account from this officer. He hasn't been arrested. He hasn't been charged. Do you think those words are fair?

GRACE: Well, you know what, when you look at a fact scenario, everyone looks at that scenario differently.

And according to Michael Brown's family, this was a murder. I have seen some of the autopsy photos and some of the evidence. And I will say that I believe the police officer has an uphill battle here. You know, I kept saying, if you can just show me the autopsy results, I can tell you what happened. I don't need an eyewitness.

But, surprisingly, after hearing some of the autopsy results, it's even more murky right now. It is going to depend on eyewitness testimony.

BALDWIN: OK. Actually, Nancy, we're getting some breaking news and I would love for you to stand by on this.

But, first, let's go to Don Lemon with news on the condition of this officer, officer Darren Wilson.

Don, what are you learning?

LEMON: OK. We're learning some information regarding officer Darren Wilson's supposed injuries that we have been discussing and talking about here.

One of those injuries that has not been reported by CNN, but it's making its way around other media organizations and also on the Internet -- here's the thing. So according to a source close to the investigation, the officer, Darren Wilson, did go to the hospital after the altercation and the shooting death of Michael Brown.

He did have X-rays done. He had a swollen face. But the X-rays for a broken or a torn eye socket came back negative. That source says it is not true at all. He did not have a torn eye socket. And so he is saying that unequivocally -- he unequivocally denies that, saying it did not happen. But he did have a swollen face. He did go for X-rays. And that is

the very latest on that. But he said obviously there was some sort of scuffle, Brooke, because, you know, it was swollen. But that eye socket tear, whatever, it's called a tear or rupture or fracture to the orbital lobe -- Brooke.

BALDWIN: OK. OK, so a source saying he did not have this broken or fractured eye socket.

LEMON: Did not. Did not.

BALDWIN: Nancy Grace, let me just bring you back in. This is again another example of rumors flying in this whole story.

What's your reaction now to hearing, yes, he had the swollen face, but his eye socket was not fractured?

GRACE: One thing I would like to ask, Don, if you don't mind, did you say it was a ruptured eye socket?

BALDWIN: Don, can you hear Nancy?

LEMON: It was -- yes, I can hear Nancy.

They were saying that it was a ruptured or a fractured eye socket or a broken eye socket, correct, according to my producer. And they're saying that's not true. The only thing, the only injury -- and, Nancy, he had X-rays. So whatever it was, a broken -- or a fracture, whatever it is, it's not true.

They're saying that the only thing he had was a swollen face. That's the only injury that is reportable right now, Nancy.

GRACE: That's consistent with what Daryl Parks told me at the very, very beginning, when we talked by phone and when he reiterated to me last night that there was a scuffle between Michael and the police officer, and the officer might have gotten punched in the face. He might have fallen.

But he told me from the get-go that there was a scuffle with the officer, so I'm not surprised at all. And I really don't know if we're going to know for sure what any of this is, or the truth of it, until it comes out in court.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: OK. OK. Don, thank you. Nancy, thank you both, as well. So again, just reiterating, no broken eye socket from this officer, according to this source. Thanks to both of you. We'll stay on this breaking news out of Ferguson.