Return to Transcripts main page

Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Latest on Veterans Affairs Scandal; Highlighting Changing Attitudes about Marijuana; Kidnapping Ordeal Examined

Aired November 10, 2014 - 12:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: It's now been a year since CNN blew the lid of the scandalous neglect of the nation's veterans by the very department that is supposed to protect them.

Endless waits for even routine medical care, veterans who died before they ever thought sought doctors and records that were doctored to protect the administrator's bonuses. All of that led to a shake up at the very top of the Veterans Affairs Department, the Secretary himself.

And now, Veteran's Day Eve 2014, the new man who took charge that he is planning a big shake up of his own. Here's what he told in 60 Minutes last night.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

ROBERT MCDONALD, VETERANS AFFAIRS SECRETARTY: The report we've passed up to the Senate Committee and House Committee has about 35 names on it. I've got another report that has over a thousand.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If a thousand people need to go, give me a sense of what are some of the things that they did?

MCDONALD: Well, We're simplistically talking about people who violated our values.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And those values are what?

MCDONALD: It's Integrity, its advocacy, its respect, its excellence. These are the things that we try to do for our veterans.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

BANFIELD: And if it weren't for the work of one particular guy who is on the screen beside me with an incredible investigative team, we might not have known about any of this. This is our Senior Investigative Correspondent, Drew Griffin, he's owned the story with the CNN team from the beginning. He joins me now with the latest.

Here's the question I have for your, Drew. If we have now discovered that there has been horrible laziness and the fieriest activity going on with some of these employees, why can't you just take a side? Why can't you just carve out the bad, get rid of the poison in the cancer and start afresh? Is it really that tough to get rid off the bad people?

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN SENIOR INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Secretary Bob McDonald, remember this guy is used to be head of Procter & Gamble. He knows how to fire people. Now he is the head of a government agency and he's having trouble doing that. These 35 people on his list, a thousand more in his back pocket apparently.

According to members of Congress, they should all just be fired and they're questioning why it is taking so long. You know he talked about the values. These are the people, the administrators, who established these terrible wait times, who covered it up, and lied about it. These are the people that really need to go in the VA, the administration that needs to go. And Congress is saying "Look, why don't you just get rid of them." Actually here -- I asked them the same question two weeks ago when he was here at Atlanta, this is what the Secretary had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MCDONALD: As the new Secretary of VA, why would I want to take a long period of time to get this done? It's not in my interest. It's not in the Veterans interest and it's not in the interest to the members of Congress.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRIFFIN: According to the Secretary to fire somebody, you have to notify them that they're going to be fired. They have appeal process. They can go through some kind of administrative hearing and all the while, while you're waiting to fire them, they are being paid by tax payers, Ashleigh, and it's going on for months and months and months for some of these people who really in my view don't have any defense.

BANFIELD: It's amazing. It's amazing. It's actually after all of the evidence that's come to light. There's copious amount of evidence as well.

So, look, if you're talking about cutting the bad, who will represent, you know, that vacuum? What kind of hiring can they do and how can they find the number of people they're going to need?

GRIFFIN: They had a lot of managers and administrators who are lying about wait lists. The reason they were lying about he wait lists because they didn't have enough doctors and nurses to supply the actual service. So they need, the VA needs to hire over the next, you know, decade or so, 28,000 or so doctors and nurses. And Bob McDonald have been touring the country, actually, Ashleigh, going to medical schools trying to capture these kids and saying, "Come to the VA. Work for us. We'll forgive some of your student loans even if you work for us." They need...

BANFIELD: Wow.

GRIFFIN: ... actual people who will deliver the service. McDonald, business guy, he wants to treat every veteran as a customer of the VA and he's trying to bring that model to the Veterans Administration. BANFIELD: Turns out he probably offered them some really big job security. It's unbelievable.

GRIFFIN: Yeah.

BANFIELD: You are so great. Thank you for joining us, incredible work. Especially tomorrow to the Veterans Day. Thanks Drew.

GRIFFIN: Thanks Ashleigh. And thanks to all our veterans for crying out loud. They really ...

BANFIELD: Exactly.

GRIFFIN: ...deserve that, right.

BANFIELD: You nailed it. Thank you. You're absolutely right. Well, hopefully they're going to get it now.

All right. So by the way, as Drew finishes up his report on this program, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs, you saw him, Robert McDonald, he's going to be live on CCN next hour with our colleague, Wolf Blitzer. So make sure you stay tune for that.

So, you know, it's been approved for medicinal purposes. It's been approved for recreational purposes and it keeps showing up on the ballot box. I'm talking about weed, but what is the future of pot? In the next block, you're about to find out how angel investors are getting involved, that's right, putting their money where the pipe is.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: Get a little confusing out there these days, whatnot with some states saying it's OK to smoke fat for fun and some state saying, it's OK to smoke pot of you're sick, and some states saying, no. But, in New York City, something's getting little freaky.

Currently now, you're not going to be arrested if you're caught with a slight amount of weed. A law enforcement official tells CNN that under a brand new plan anyone caught with a low level of marijuana in New York City will not be arrested. They will get a ticket kind of like a moving violation and they will have to appear in court to pay a fine. But, they're not calling it criminal necessarily.

And that's not all. Businesses are gathering at a Las Vegas convention to learn how to profit off off weed, which seems to be a quite a movement.

Miguel Marquez is there and he's joining us with more on this. So, what exactly are they're going to be doing at this fancy trade show, Miguel?

MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, this is sort of a -- think of it as a shark tank for the weed industry. This is an investment group called the ArcView Group that has done as far as -- a few years now. And there were hundreds of companies, companies like extraction companies. They extract the THC from the cannabis in order to make edibles and vaporize-like devices.

Edibles companies are here. One company is at ease which is like a company where you've been ordering at (inaudible), you could order marijuana off of an iPhone app as well. Another one is a company that wants to do a breaded breakfast, a casual bed and breakfast in Washington states where you can smoke, eat, and drink marijuana products to your heart's content apparently.

Look, this is now legal in Colorado and Washington State. Voters have just approved it in Alaska and Oregon and Washington D.C. By 2016, a whole other raft of propositions on the ballot in Arizona, California, Massachusetts, Maine, and Nevada. By 2019, state legislators not even propositions anymore, state legislators will pass recreational pot use in Rhode Island or expected to Vermont, New Hampshire, Delaware, Hawaii, and Maryland. All those will be debated.

So, by 2019, we could have a whole hack of a lot of states with recreation of marijuana on the books and the country clearly especially news at New York today moving in that direction. Companies here trying to take advantage of it as quickly as possible, Ashleigh?

BANFIELD: So, that's great. Those companies wanted to take advantage of it. But there's still that pesky federal issue. It's still very, very illegal right across the country even with this state actions. So, aren't this people behind you getting this really risky business?

MARQUEZ: This is the big problem for them. And this is why it hasn't attracted the sort of giants of money that they expected it will. If you have things like banking and financial services for the marijuana industry, if it's legalized on a federal level. Here's what the marijuana policy project says about banking laws.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MASON TVERT, COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR, MARIJUANA POLICY PROJECT: The first types of things we expect to pass when it comes to federal legislation would be things like ensuring that legal marijuana businesses have access to banking services.

You know, whether you support making marijuana legal or not. If it's legal in a state most people would agree that these businesses should have banking services. It's a matter of public safety. It's a matter of fairness...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MARQUEZ: And that's what they want. Next, they want that that banking piece it's to be approved federally. So, that these individuals -- the businesses can actually open bank accounts and trade like any other business.

That's probably a toll border at -- today.

BANFIELD: Yeah.

MARQUEZ: But maybe not for very long, Ashleigh? BANFIELD: Yeah. Well, and that is tricky when you can't bank and be in business at the same time. So, Miguel, thank you. Keep us posted on what transpires out there.

MARQUEZ: Yeah.

BANFIELD: All right. Thank you.

A man who was arrested after allegedly abducting a woman off the street in Philadelphia and you saw the video it was absolutely horrifying. As he's arrested, we're now hearing about another case, a case beforehand involving the very young girl, a 16-year-old girl. And now, that girl's mother is telling us exactly what her daughter went through. And it is nothing short of terrifying. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: So, I want to show you how we were introduced to a man name Delvin Barnes here on a video. Accused of snatching a young woman name Carlesha Freeland-Gaither from a Philadelphia street just over a week ago. Utterly, terrorizing here and it is incredible that that young woman was found alive three days later.

And then, that man Barnes found arrested, cuffed and put behind bars. But not in Philadelphia, in Virginia where police suspect him in at least one other case and maybe even more. Here's Jean Casarez.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It may not have been the hometown welcome he expected. Defendant Delvin Barnes captured and brought back to Virginia. Barnes is facing charges of attempting to murder and kidnapped a local 16-year-old girl five weeks ago and setting her own fire. For the first time, her mother speaks out.

KEISHA GAITHER: I just want to kill him. I just want to kill him when he went to go look for a lighter there. He tell her that he was going to kill her. She was going back after all that beating, rape, choking, all of that. She got away the burns of her skin. My daughter didn't look like herself. It was devastating to watch.

CASAREZ: According to a federal criminal complaint out of Pennsylvania Barnes has already confessed to kidnapping Carlesha Freeland-Gaither in Philadelphia last Sunday night. She was found alive and rescued almost 72-hours later.

Up until a week ago, Barnes had led what seemed to be a normal life working at this grocery store in Richmond. According to court documents, Barnes has spent most of his life in Charles City, Virginia and is divorced with one 12-year-old daughter. He spent one year in college and did some time in the army.

Barnes graduated from Charles City High School in 1994. Ironically, Barnes and Captain Jason Crawley who brought him back to Virginia from Marylyn Thursday night went to high school together. Crawley spoke to Barnes after he was arrested in Marylyn. CAPTAIN JASON CRAWLEY, CHARLES CITY COUNTY VIRGINIA SHERIFF'S OFFICE: He kind of had a grin on his face he--I know it's been some years and I put on some pounds but he recognized me. And I think he--his body language told me he knew why we we're there.

BANFIELD: But Crawley and Barnes took separate paths after graduating. Crawley going on to elite local law enforcement. But Barnes began to lead a life of crime. The big question now is with two pending cases of kidnapping, could Barnes be responsible for the disappearance of other young women around Virginia.

CRAWLEY: And yes, we've taken that into consideration and we're going to continue the investigation with Delvin Barnes just because Delvin Barnes is in custody it doesn't mean we're going to stop our investigation of any other females that have experienced this with him.

BANFIELD: Many other young women have gone missing in Virginia and Barnes allegedly said a very curious thing to his young Virginia accuser.

CRAWLEY: He allegedly show the victim of some pictures of some prior women that he claimed that he allegedly had done the same thing to. And it's all of kind of intimidating her saying that, you know, if you tell I've got--I'm going to take your picture, I've got your picture along with these and, you know, I'll find you.

BANFIELD: Law enforcement hasn't found those photographs. To the mother of Barnes' accuser in Virginia she only has a few words.

GAITHER: You didn't succeed and I hop that your -- fry in hell..

BANFIELD: But a good friend of Barnes says this just can't be.

RONALD DAVIS, FRIEND: I don't believe it. He's always looking to help somebody. Always looking to bend over backwards, he will give the shirt off his back if he could.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: And Jean Casarez is with me now, one of the things I could not understand is why police in Virginia wouldn't make a public appeal, dangerous man on the lose if you are a single female look out, beware we're trying to find this guy. He is deadly.

CASAREZ: And I was told it was a strategy decision by law enforcement because a 16-year-old got away as we know alive with burns. But, Barnes didn't know that allegedly. And so, they felt if they made a public appeal that this girl got away and he's on the lose that he would go underground and they wouldn't be able to find him because they believe in his mind he thought she died. Because she ran off naked, burns all over her body was bleaching on fire. And so, they believe he though she was died.

And let me tell you this, they put a priority on getting the DNA of who kidnapped the 16-year-old, they were in competition with Jesse Matthew and Hannah Graham because it was the same forensic lab. They're both trying to get DNA profiles. They got their DNA profile of Barnes October 28th, they immediately got a warrant from his home, they went to the supermarket where he lives, they were ready to arrest because he had called in and say I'm going to come pick my paycheck. He never came to pick up his paycheck and that's one they said he fled.

BANFIELD: But do you think he was wise somehow that they were on to him?

CASAREZ: That's a good question. You'd want your paycheck, right?

BANFIELD: And they think maybe, he knew that they were coming for him.

CASAREZ: They didn't tell me but common sense tells me you say I'm going to come pick up my paycheck, a law enforcement and you don't show up.

BANFIELD: Unbelievable. Well, just really quickly you mentioned that this notion that it was Jesse Matthew in the same jurisdiction where they trying to do so much time to other missing person cases. Now they've got this guy to deal with as well.

CASAREZ: Unbelievable. Same jurisdiction.

BANFIELD: Unbelievable.

CASAREZ: So they're taking on GPS on the car and they're trying to see because he got the car in May, trying to see where he went with the car to see if anybody turned up missing.

BANFIELD: Keep us posted on what they find. Obviously that's a good source and you're working a lot of great information.

CASAREZ: Thank you.

BANFIELD: Jean Casarez, live for us thank you.

Another huge data breach that could have compromised your personal data, this time it's something many of U.S. postal, the U.S. Postal Service with the details on that on whether you actually might be a victim, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: He worked for the U.S. Postal service buckle up, has about three quarters of a million of you current performer workers you've been targeted by identity theft. U.S. Postal Service is acknowledging the breach today saying that hackers steal the personal data including social security numbers. And folks if you use the mail currently nearly million customers that sucks, we were also affected by this breach.

The investigation is being led by the FBI, the FBI issuing this statement. The FBI is working the U.S. Postal Service to determine the nature and scope of this incident, impacted individuals should take steps to monitor and safeguard their personally identifiable information. And report any suspected instances of identity theft to the FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center at www.ic3.gov.

Internationally renowned Mr. Miles Monroe and his wife Ruth were among nine passengers who were killed on Sunday when their plane crashed in the Bahamas. They were attempting to land in free port for a global leadership conference which was organized by Dr. Monroe's ministry. And so police say the jet hit a crane at the Grand Bahamas Shipyard and apparently exploded on impact.

Millions of Americans will come to an early winter blast today. Take a look at Minneapolis, ah lovely Minneapolis where about a foot of snow is expected to fall by tonight. Snowy conditions are going to affect most of the northern and central United States before a huge Arctic system moves through, yes it has a name it's called the bomb cyclone. Can you dig it?

Some 200 million Americans are going to be hit by plunging temperatures before this week is over. Yes folks, it's what it means when winter is on the move.

Thank you for watching everyone. It's nice to have you with us. Please stay tuned now my colleague Wolf starts right now.