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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Nebraska Ebola News Conference; NFL Teams Questioned during Unannounced Visits from DEA; Police Audio Obtained of Officer Darren Wilson

Aired November 17, 2014 - 12:00   ET

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

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hi, everybody. I'm Ashleigh Banfield. And welcome to LEGAL VIEW.

We've got some breaking news this hour. At any moment we are expecting to hear from Nebraska Medical Center about that second Ebola death that occurred here in the United States. It's a doctor from Maryland, Martin Salia. And he contracted the virus while treating patients in West Africa. And we have now learned that he died and that happened this morning.

The White House has issued a statement. It reads, "Dr. Salia's passing is another reminder of the human toll of this disease and of the continued imperative to tackle this epidemic on the front lines where Dr. Salia was engaged in his calling."

And the heartbreaking irony of it all, it was just months ago that Dr. Salia was telling us about his passion to help others.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. MARTIN SALIA: I knew it wasn't going to be easy. But why did I decide to choose this job? I firmly believe God wants me (ph) to do it. And I knew deep within myself there was just something inside of me, and the people of this (INAUDIBLE) needed help. I see it as God's own desired framework for me. I took this job not because I want to, but I firmly believe it was a calling and that God wanted me to.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: Well, it was that spirit, that calling that inspired his own son. Take a look at this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAADA SALIA, DR. MARTIN SALIA'S SON: He decided to work at Sierra Leone because he found out that was his true calling. He's really, really a hero to me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: So right now there are doctors and administrators giving a news conferment at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. I want to listen in. DR. JEFFREY P. GOLD, CHANCELLOR, UNMC: Dr. Salia has only been with us for a very short time following his arrival late Saturday afternoon. The dozens of staff members who cared for our patient are all taking this very hard. They put forth a truly heroic effort during the time that he was with our care.

In addition, the outpouring of grief and support for his family and for our staff, literally from across the nation and around the world, has been remarkable, including all of our former patients, people in Washington and state headquarters, et cetera.

We use the maximum amount of supportive care and every advanced technique available in an effort to save his life. We are very, very sorry that the outcome wasn't the one that we had all wished for.

I would like to extend our profound gratitude to the remarkable professional staff who gave their all in this heroic effort. Our focus on extraordinary care, as well as the global, educational and research elements is truly remarkable. It is the standard for quality and it is an inspiration for all.

The Ebola virus infection is obviously an extremely deadly disease. We are reminding today that even though this was the best possible place for a patient with this virus to be, that in the very advanced stages, even the most modern techniques that we have at our disposal are not enough to help these patients once they reach a critical threshold. The focus needs to remain with the global emphasis on prevention, as well as early diagnosis and treatment.

Before I turn it over to our panel, I'm reminded of the words of Theodore Roosevelt who said, "it is far better to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in a great twilight that knows not victory or defeat," end quote.

It is my pleasure now to turn this over to Dr. Phil Smith, who will then introduce the other panelists, Dr. Dan Johnson, Dr. Chris Kratochvil and Ms. Rosanna Morris.

Dr. Smith.

DR. PHIL SMITH, DIR., UNIV. OF NEBRASKA MED. CTR. BIOCONTAINMENT UNIT: Thank you, chancellor.

I'm Dr. Phil Smith, medical director of the biocontainment unit at UNMC.

As the chancellor told you, this morning, about 4:00 a.m., Dr. Martin Salia, a physician, a surgeon, in fact, from Sierra Leone, died. He was admitted to our biocontainment unit after a long trip from Africa late Saturday afternoon. He arrived in very critical condition. In spite of that, we had nurses and doctors working literally around the clock to try to reverse his condition but were unable to do so.

Even though he was only here 36 hours, we got to know his family very well. A wonderful family, especially his wife, and we have great respect and admiration for the way they conducted themselves and we extend to them our deepest sympathy.

I'd like to introduce Dr. Dan Johnson. Critical care medicine was outstanding in their support of Dr. Salia and I'd ask Dr. Johnson to give us a few points about some of the supportive measures they used.

DR. DANIEL JOHNSON, DIVISION CHIEF, CRITICAL CARE ANESTHESIOLOGY, UNMC: As Dr. Smith alluded to and as the reports in the media have shown, Dr. Salia was extremely critically ill when he arrived to our hospital. He had no kidney function. He was working extremely hard to breathe and he was unresponsive.

Within the first few hours of his arrival, we started running continuous dialysis. And within the first 12 hours, he had progressed to complete respiratory failure, requiring intubation and mechanical ventilation. Shortly thereafter, he developed severely low blood pressure and required multiple agents at very high doses to maintain even a marginal blood pressure. In this setting and in the setting of multiple treatments for -- specific for Ebola virus disease, and despite the amazing care of our nurses and respiratory therapists, he progressed to the point of cardiac arrest and we weren't able to get him through this.

I think what Dr. Smith and Dr. Gold have said is right on the money. We really, really gave it everything we could. All modern medical therapies were provided. And we wished there could have been a different outcome. But I'm also proud of the team for what they were able to try.

I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Kratochvil now.

DR. CHRIS KRATOCHVIL, ASSOC. VICE CHANCELLOR FOR CLINICAL RESEARCH, UNMC: One of the roles of an academic health center is evaluation and implementation of research interventions. As you know, there are no approved treatments for Ebola. So one of the things that we did early on in the Ebola outbreak was to evaluate what research interventions may be available. And there were two research interventions that we were able to implement in the case of Dr. Salia. One was ZMapp and that's an intervention that we were able to obtain. And that was initiated Saturday evening. The other is convalescent plasma (ph). And as you know, convalescent plasma is often used - it's taken from individuals who have survived Ebola. And we think it may have a role in potentially treating individuals with Ebola. And those are the two interventions that were implemented on Saturday shortly after his arrival.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Rosanna.

ROSANNA MORRIS, CHIEF NURSING OFFICER, UNMC: Good morning. My name is Roseanne Morris. I'm chief nursing officer and chief operating officer here at Nebraska Medicine.

On behalf of the entire team, I want to share that it was an absolute honor to care for Dr. Salia. The team is unwavered in their commitment to provide the highest level of care and intervention for these patients.

I had the pleasure and the honor of interacting with Mrs. Salia over the past 24 hours. She is an incredibly strong, stoic, brave individual who really, I think, taught us a lot about someone going through these circumstances and was so appreciative, I think, of their time here.

I want to thank our local heroes who took care of a global hero these past few days. They did a remarkable job and their work was second to none.

Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So we'll now open it to your questions.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE) from NBC News. You mentioned that he had a plasma transfusion. Who donated that plasma?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, so there was a -

BANFIELD: The audio is a little tricky to hear the reporter's questions, but obviously there are a lot of questions to be answered about why this doctor died when others have survived. And as many of those doctors that you just heard said, he arrived in extremely critical condition.

I want to bring in senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen, who's live in Atlanta. And I'm also joined here live on set by CNN medical analyst Dr. Alexander van Tulleken, who's a senior fellow at the Institute for International Humanitarian Affairs.

First to you, Elizabeth. It is so significant, it can't be understated, that that problem of him arriving at extremely critical condition is really at the root perhaps of his death. But why did it get so bad? He's a surgeon. If anyone should know he's in bad shape, you would think it would be the surgeon. How did it get to that point?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: You know what, Ashleigh, we just don't know exactly what happened. It may be that he was unaware that he was operating on an Ebola patient. That's a possibility. We don't know exactly where he was working. So if he was operating on someone and didn't know that the person had Ebola, he wouldn't necessarily put it together.

Now, there have been some reports by other media outlets that he originally tested negative for Ebola. Now, that can happen because this test isn't perfect and early on it can give false negatives. But, yes, Ashleigh, this does speak to the importance of early, early identification of Ebola and early treatment. I remember when I was into Liberia a few months ago, a doctor said to me, Elizabeth, the difference between getting a patient on day five of their illness and say day eight of their illness is huge. Ebola move very quickly.

Now, as we've seen, most patients in the U.S. have been saved, but that's because, again, they got early treatment. BANFIELD: I want to bring in Dr. Xand here on this and to the notion

that one of those doctors who just spoke said that it was 36 hours. That's all that this doctor had at the University of Nebraska before he died. They had 36 hours to work on him and nothing, including that entire kitchen sink, worked. How fast can this disease grab you from the moment you get the fever?

DR. ALEXANDER VAN TULLEKEN, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Yes, I mean we're talking about progression over a few days. It's not an illness that kills over a few weeks, but the people who die frequently from developing symptoms to death can be a matter of days. And I think Elizabeth described really well that we don't -- we don't know exactly the difference between the people who survive and don't, but it may well be he was a surgeon, he was exposed to Ebola, probably though a patient, who would have had a high level of virus. So he would have been exposed to quite a high-dose of virus initially. We see this with families as well. The families that care intensely for people at home are exposed to high levels of virus. They're much more likely to die than people who are exposed to lower levels.

BANFIELD: He's a surgeon in West Africa.

VAN TULLEKEN: Yes.

BANFIELD: He already knows he is playing with fire just in the work that he does every day.

VAN TULLEKEN: Yes.

BANFIELD: So, ultimately, a surgeon, you would think -- and I put this to Elizabeth as well, a surgeon who gets a fever in the line of work, you would think would say, get me on a flight to Nebraska today.

VAN TULLEKEN: Well, what's so interesting is, first of all, I mean, first of all, it's difficult to do that. And he went and had -- according to at least some sources, two negative tests before he did it. And a health care worker is like anyone else, can be in denial. The other issue is that we still don't know exactly who's paid for this flight, but the initial stories were, his wife would reimburse the State Department for it, potentially $100,000 or $200,000 for this flight. So it's a huge --

BANFIELD: And that she was pushing hard to get him out?

VAN TULLEKEN: Yes. Yes. So it's very difficult. He needed to be evaluated. The flight needed to be arranged. Then the crew needed to assess him. And it's very hard to communicate with people who are in Ebola treatment centers because they don't have their cell phones on charge next to them. The Ebola treatment centers, especially in Sierra Leone, are massively overburdened. It's hard to get a - you know, in an American hospital, we'd have a nurse on the phone say, can you carry the phone over to the patient's bed? Something like this. None of those things there. So communication problems are huge.

BANFIELD: So, Elizabeth, can you just give me the -- the notion that - I mean I've read through the list of what Dr. Salia got, and it was everything from ZMapp, dialysis, a ventilator, a plasma transfusion from a survivor. But effectively every single tool in the kit was thrown at this case and the ZMapp stood out. Are we still at the point where we can administer ZMapp in an emergency circumstance? Because other people have said, there's none left.

COHEN: Ashleigh, I've got to tell you, when I read on Nebraska's Twitter feed that they game him ZMapp, my jaw dropped. I was shocked because the company that makes ZMapp keeps saying they don't have any. As a matter of fact, on their website they still say they don't have any. So I don't - I don't understand how he - they managed to give him ZMapp. Other patients recently have not been given that drug.

But the bottom line is that, as one of these doctors said, there's a certain threshold that you pass where nothing is going to help. You can give him all the ZMapp in the world, you can give him transfusions and intubate him and give him kidney dialysis, it's just not going to help once he passes that threshold. And he arrived there in kidney failure.

BANFIELD: Yes. Yes.

COHEN: So this really says something, as Dr. Xand was just saying, about how fast this moves. Again, I was really struck when I was in Liberia. Doctors saying the difference between a patient of day five and day eight, just those three days can make a huge difference.

BANFIELD: It's life -- it's life and death, effectively. Well, our condolences to Dr. Salia's family and then I think our profound thanks to him as well for the work that he was doing so selflessly to help others in a very dangerous situation.

Elizabeth, thank you. Dr. Xand, thank you as well.

COHEN: Thank you.

BANFIELD: Appreciate it, both of you.

Some very big story that's developing right now. NFL teams with a bit of a surprise that was waiting for them after their games. Investigators from the DEA, the Drug Enforcement Administration, wanted to ask a few questions, take a peak around and it had nothing to do with steroids. Instead, this was all about prescription drugs and some pretty serious allegations about their use. The details, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: So they were brief and they were discrete. And to paraphrase a spokesperson, no one went away in handcuffs. But some unannounced visits by federal drug agents to NFL teams announced game - unannounced game day visits at that, have put the league on notice regarding the willy-nilly use of prescription pain medication as alleged by some. CNN's justice correspondent Evan Perez joins me from Washington with more.

I'm sure that's not the stuff that showed up on camera, as everybody was enjoying their football consumption this weekend, but what happened?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Right.

BANFIELD: What all of a sudden caused DEA agents to show up at stadiums?

PEREZ: Well, Ashleigh, you know, you had three teams, the 49ers, the Buccaneers, and the Seahawks all got these visits from the DEA after their road games yesterday. And the agents really just wanted to talk to the trainers and some of the personnel, the doctors, who work with these players to find out how they're handling prescription medications. They wanted to make sure - this is all part of an investigation - they wanted to make sure that these trainers aren't handing out pain pills to players, which would be illegal, and they also, you know, wanted to follow up on some allegations that have been made about whether or not, you know, trainers were handing out, for example, some of these very addictive pain pills that, you know, have now caused problems for many of the retired players that have now - you know, some of the big names in the game who have now retired.

BANFIELD: Who was basically the target of the investigation at this point? Was it just the doctors and the trainers or were they actually pointing out players and saying, before you take your pads off, I have a few questions for you?

PEREZ: No, this was - this was -- these were conversations with staff. These were the trainers, the doctors, people who work behind the scenes. And we're told that they were doing some interviews and this is all part of an administrative investigation of handling of prescription drugs. You know these -- this all comes from a lawsuit that was filed by some players, some retired players. They were -- I believe there were 1,300 players who played from 1969 to 2008 and they allege everything from, you know, bowls full of prescription pills being, you know, basically out there for players to be able to take so they could continue playing. A lot of them say that they are hooked and they now - they want the NFL to pay for some of their medical care, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: Evan Perez, thank you for that. Keep us posted if you hear anything more out of D.C. from the DEA.

PEREZ: Sure.

BANFIELD: And now I want to switch over to the other side of all of this. I'm joined now in New York by former federal prosecutor and CNN legal analyst Sunny Hostin and by the host of CNN's "Unguarded," Rachel Nichols.

First question to you, Rachel. Wait a minute, I thought the NFL was untouchable.

RACHEL NICHOLS, HOST, CNN'S "UNGUARDED": It's amazing. It's as if people criticize them and maybe they just don't do very much about it and then the government has to come in and take some action, which seems to be part of what's going on here.

BANFIELD: I'm sorry, but it just seems weird to the layperson that they're actually at a game and these guys come in.

NICHOLS: Well, there's -- here's the situation. Earlier this year, as Evan mentioned, there was a lawsuit. More than 1,000 former players, including very high-profile guys, Richard Dent, Jim McMahon, suing, saying that thousands of times over their NFL careers they were handed high-level prescriptions without being fully briefed on what they are, which is illegal. A doctor has to explain to you side effects, they have to explain to you whether they're addictive or not, that they were cocktail prescription, prescriptions mixed together that shouldn't have been, and that they were often happened a beer to wash them down with, which is also illegal and not something you should be doing with prescription drugs.

BANFIELD: And I don't know that it makes you a better football player.

NICHOLS: Exactly.

BANFIELD: Call me crazy.

NICHOLS: There's pictures painted in this lawsuit of scenes where the team doctors on the plane, handing out prescriptions on seats. Like basically you would get a pillow and a blanket. They just have a, you know, pills, left pills on the seats for them.

BANFIELD: Like M&Ms.

NICHOLS: Get it done. Right.

BANFIELD: Bizarre.

NICHOLS: And the other issue that the DEA was looking into yesterday was, remember, with high-level prescription drugs, you can only prescribe in the state you're licensed to. So notice it was visiting teams that they came to see yesterday and that is the reason that they did this on Sunday, on game day -

BANFIELD: Oh, well, now you're making perfect sense.

NICHOLS: Because these teams were out of their home state.

SUNNY HOSTIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Right.

BANFIELD: Yes.

NICHOLS: They were supposedly handing out prescriptions, which they're not allowed to do, and that's what they were looking into. Now, in theory, they should be asking the visiting team - the home team doctor and say, hey, could you give our players prescriptions? But that doesn't happen very often.

BANFIELD: But that doesn't happen.

HOSTIN: That's right. That's right.

BANFIELD: So, Sunny, the -- that makes perfect sense.

HOSTIN: Yes.

BANFIELD: But is there an element of, don't mess with us. We will come to your stadium on game day. We are the DEA. And you know what, we've got wind of some pretty ugly things out there and we mean business.

HOSTIN: Well, there's no question. I mean the federal government gets tips all over the place, right? There are tip lines sometimes. But then there are lawsuits that are filed and then the DEA will look at that. I suspect, though, that the DEA is working with the prosecutor's office, probably the southern district of New York. That usually is the office that takes care of these high-profile cases. And let's remember, there is a federal law, the Controlled Substances Act, that -

BANFIELD: That we all have to abide by.

HOSTIN: We all have to abide by that sort of prescribe -

BANFIELD: All of us. Even the NFL.

HOSTIN: Right, that prescribes what the law is.

BANFIELD: Even the NFL.

HOSTIN: So you can't just - you know, there's - you can't sell it. You can't prescribe it. You can't acquire it.

NICHOLS: You can't go across state lines.

HOSTIN: You can't transport it. There are all these regulations. Trainers can't provide it. It has to be a doctor or a nurse. And so the DEA is doing what we want the DEAL to do, especially when we're talking about pain killers. I mean this is a national epidemic, the -

BANFIELD: DEA -- by the way, and its critical because the NFL, obviously peppered by people like Rachel who just don't let up. Great (INAUDIBLE). And the NFL, you know, giving a quote. They're not saying a whole lot, but they are saying this. "Our teams cooperated with the DEA today. We have no information to indicate that irregularities were found."

Both of you quickly on this topic, would the NFL know if there was something -

NICHOLS: Yes, I mean -

BANFIELD: I mean, honestly, would the DEA share anything that they may have gleaned from these interviews with trainers and doctors?

NICHOLS: No. I mean that's just basically saying, hey, we were checked out and to our knowledge nobody has been arrested or fined or prosecuted yet, which they wouldn't be anyway.

HOSTIN: Right. Right.

NICHOLS: And it's possible that they didn't find anyone doing anything wrong. We can't jump to that conclusion because we don't know. And as Sunny said, you're glad that our federal government is checking it out.

BANFIELD: At work. Do you think there's (INAUDIBLE)?

NICHOLS: There's some serious allegations here.

HOSTIN: Oh, they're not finished.

BANFIELD: They're not finished.

HOSTIN: And I think typically when you're the target of an investigation, you don't know about it.

BANFIELD: By the way, when I say they're finished, I meant the DEA. Are they finished, their work, as opposed to is the team finished. I didn't mean that.

NICHOLS: Oh, oh, no.

HOSTIN: No. No, this is just the very beginning.

BANFIELD: OK.

HOSTIN: They're letting them know there is an investigation afoot.

BANFIELD: Yes. And watch your backs.

NICHOLS: Yes.

HOSTIN: Yes.

BANFIELD: That's interesting stuff. Guys, thank so much.

NICHOLS: When you have 1,300 players making an allegation like this -

HOSTIN: You've got to investigate it.

BANFIELD: There's a lot of them.

NICHOLS: It's not just five or six guys saying, hey. This is serious.

HOSTIN: You've got to investigate it.

NICHOLS: And it's an epidemic.

BANFIELD: And the notion that people say, where there's smoke, there's fire. There's got - there's a heck of a lot of smoke out there.

HOSTIN: Yes.

BANFIELD: So, Rachel, Sunny, thank you both. Appreciate it.

HOSTIN: Thank you.

BANFIELD: While Ferguson, Missouri, waits for the grand jury's decision on whether to indict the police officer who shot and killed Michael Brown, some new video has emerged of that officer who we have barely seen but for a photograph. Officer Darren Wilson in the hours immediately after the shooting. Does this mean anything for what is to come?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: We are seeing and we are hearing Officer Darren Wilson for the first time since that shooting and killing of Michael Brown. Stephanie Elam looks at surveillance video that was obtained by "The St. Louis Dispatch," along with police audio that may just shed some light on the final minutes of Brown's life.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): These are the first images of Officer Darren Wilson in the white t-shirt captured just hours after Michael Brown was killed on August 9th. It is unclear in the video if Wilson was suffering from any injuries, but police have said that Wilson sustained bruises and had a swollen face after his alleged struggle with Brown.

BENJAMIN CRUMP, BROWN FAMILY ATTORNEY: From the beginning, Dorian Johnson, who was with Michael Brown Jr., said the officer wasn't hurt that he saw.

ELAM: The surveillance video, obtained by "The St. Louis Post Dispatch," shows Wilson leaving the police station after the shooting for the