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At This Hour

Darren Wilson Says He Had to Shoot; Michael Brown's Parents React to Interview; Breaking Down Darren Wilson's Interview

Aired November 26, 2014 - 11:00   ET

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

JOHN BERMAN, CNN CO-ANCHOR: Hello, everyone, I'm John Berman.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN CO-ANCHOR: And I'm Michaela Pereira. So glad you could join us today.

BERMAN: New this morning, for the first time, we hearing Officer Darren Wilson explaining why he shot and killed Michael Brown and how he feels about it today.

And for the first time this morning we're seeing the impact those words are having on the family of Michael Brown, a dramatic emotional response.

PEREIRA: Officer Darren Wilson spoke with ABC's George Stephanopoulos hours after the grand jury's decision not to indict him. Here's some of his account.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OFFICER DARREN WILSON, FERGUSON, MISSOURI: I told him I had to shoot somebody, and he said why? And I said he grabbed my gun and he had charged me. And he was going to kill me.

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, ABC NEWS: So you killed him first.

WILSON: Yes.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Is there anything you could have done differently that would have prevented that killing from taking place?

WILSON: No.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Nothing?

WILSON: No.

STEPHANOPOULOS: And you're absolutely convinced when you look through your heart and your mind that if Michael Brown were white this would have gone down in exactly the same way.

WILSON: Yes.

STEPHANOPOULOS: No question? WILSON: No question.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: Now we want to play for you some sound from Michael Brown's mom and dad. They reacted to Officer Wilson's comments. They spoke just a short time ago on CBS.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LESLEY MCSPADDEN, MICHAEL BROWN'S MOTHER: He didn't do what he had to do. He did what he wanted to do.

CHARLIE ROSE, CBS NEWS: What he wanted to do?

MCSPADDEN: Yes.

ROSE: In other words, you think he wanted to kill your son.

MCSPADDEN: I don't think he wanted to kill my son, but he wanted to kill someone.

MICHAEL BROWN SR., MICHAEL BROWN'S FATHER: And then in his statement he said he'd do it again.

MCSPADDEN: His conscience is clear. How could your conscience be clear after killing somebody, even if it was an accidental death?

ROSE: And to allow the body to lie there for four hours.

MCSPADDEN: Exactly. I couldn't even -- we couldn't even have my son's organs donated, you understand that? They're wrong. They know they're wrong.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you regret being out with the crowd that night?

MCSPADDEN: No.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You don't?

MCSPADDEN: No. I was out there like everybody else, and it was peaceful. I had some things I wanted to say to Ferguson. Ferguson has never come to me and even gave a condolence to me. Anything.

ROSE: No one in Ferguson?

MCSPADDEN: No one.

ROSE: No one in an official capacity has come to you?

MCSPADDEN: And when I say come to me like me and you are sitting here.

ROSE: Not the police chief, not mayor, not anybody has come to say --

MCSPADDEN: No, nothing. ROSE: -- whatever happened in the grand jury, we are here to tell you

we mourn the loss of your son.

MCSPADDEN: Nothing. Nothing

ROSE: If you spoke to the grand jury, what would you say?

BROWN: We've just been disrespected all around.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: I want to bring in our commentator L.Z. Granderson. He joins us from Ferguson.

L.Z., you've been there for the last 48 hours, you've been on the ground talking to people. I can't imagine what Michael Brown's mother is going through and the pain she must be feeling.

I want to talk about what she said, L.Z.. She said she watched officer Darren Wilson and now she feels is he wanted to kill someone. Not sure I understand what that means, how you get that from Officer Darren Wilson's testimony. Does that make any sense?

L.Z. GRANDERSON, CNN COMMENTATOR: I think you're hearing the words of a grieving mother, grieving parents. Perhaps if she had some more distance she would phrase that differently.

I suspect. I don't know. I haven't spent a great deal of time with the family. But I suspect once this is taking more time, in a year or so perhaps maybe he would characterize that interview differently.

But right now she's still grieving, not getting an indictment with seeing her son die again and so I try not to put too much stock into her exact words at this particular moment.

PEREIRA: And I think that's a fair point, L.Z.. I'm curious what you're hearing there in the community. I know you've been talking to people in Ferguson, you've been interacting with people in social media, hearing from the community at large around the United States. After the release of this interview with officer Darren Wilson, what is the tone of what you're hearing as people react to that?

GRANDERSON: You know, by and large, black and white, young and old, I've just come across very few people that find his testimony and find the interview to be very credible. There's so many gaping holes that just counter what people know passes the smell test or common sense, the way that people usually behave, particularly with African- Americans.

They are offended by the way he continues to dehumanize Michael Brown in order to make him seem larger than life. Being able to stop guns from being fired and once he's struck by bullets able to power through them because he's an evil possessed Hulk Hogan-like figure.

I find it dehumanizing and dehumanization is one of the things police officers tend to do when they want to justify shooting an unarmed person. They make the person seem larger than life so their fear seems more justifiable.

BERMAN: L.Z., is there anything he could have said that would have swayed your -- or if you were in his shoes, what would you have said to ease some of the tension in the community?

GRANDERSON: I certainly think that the best thing to do would have started with a large apology. Even if you felt attacked, being able to say I empathize with no parent should ever lose their child. They should have to bury their child. That's a painful thing to do.

And I just find it so hard to believe in a post-Trayvon Martin world that the mayor of Ferguson didn't reach out to that family the day after, that he characterized Ferguson as a city with no racial tension, despite the fact that we've now combed through and seen these statistics that shows a racial disparity with the races being pored over.

So it was very disheartening but starting with an apology would have been the best beginning to that interview.

PEREIRA: It would have been. It was interesting to hear they have not heard from Ferguson, if you will. They've heard from the people on the streets of Ferguson but not the officials.

L.Z. Granderson, we always appreciate your voice on our show.

We should also mention that we are hearing more from Officer Darren Wilson. He told ABC's George Stephanopoulos that he feared for his life that hot August day in Ferguson, that Brown charged at him, never putting his hands up, and that he felt he had no choice but to open fire.

BERMAN: Wilson also said that in his mind he did his job, he followed his training, and that right now his conscience is clean.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHANOPOULOS: When you look back, is there anything you could have done differently that would have prevented that killing from taking place?

WILSON: No.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Nothing?

WILSON: No. If he would have gotten on the sidewalk when -- and followed Dorian Johnson to the sidewalk. I probably would have never noticed the cigarillos. I would have gotten lunch, continue my day, he would have continued his.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Some of the witnesses have said they thought you were out of control. That somehow you had snapped.

WILSON: That would be incorrect. There was never -- the only emotion I ever felt was fear and then it was survival and training. STEPHANOPOULOS: And you're absolutely convinced when you look through

your heart and your mind that if Michael Brown were white this would have gone down in exactly the same way?

WILSON: Yes.

STEPHANOPOULOS: No question?

WILSON: No question.

STEPHANOPOULOS: The Brown family came out with a statement last night where they said "we are profoundly disappointed that the killer of our child will not face the consequences of his actions. What do you think when you hear that?

WILSON: I think those are grieving parents that are mourning the loss of their son. I don't think there's anything I could say but, again, I'm sorry their son lost their life. It wasn't the intention of that day, it's what occurred that day. And there's no -- nothing you can say that will make a parent feel better.

STEPHANOPOULOS: It sounds like you don't think you were responsible?

WILSON: I did my job that day.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Do you feel any remorse?

WILSON: Everyone feels remorse when a life is lost. Like I told you before, I never wanted to take anybody's life. That's not the good part of the job. That's the bad part of the job. So, yes, there is remorse.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: It was the first time he fired his gun.

Wilson says he and his new wife are expecting a baby and that he doubts he thinks he in his words that it will be safe for him to work as an officer in Ferguson. He suggested that he thinks if he were to do that it might put other officers in some kind of danger.

PEREIRA: So for now he's still on paid administrative leave. It's not clear how, when, or perhaps even if he will resign.

BERMAN: It's not clear that they want him in the job anymore, either. It's still possible at some point there could be some action or a review of the actions he took.

PEREIRA: Ahead @THISHOUR, we're going to take a look at what Officer Wilson said. These new comments, do they match his testimony?

And what about the way he spoke? His body language? What does that signal? We'll take a look ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) PEREIRA: So we are hearing for the first time directly from Ferguson police officer DarrenWilson about that fatal encounter with 18-year- old Michael Brown.

Wilson spoke with ABC News after a grand jury in Missouri decided not to indict him in the killing of the unarmed teenager.

BERMAN: The 28-year-old officer described a number of punches from Brown that he says were thrown through the window of his squad car.

Wilson said that he and Brown wrestled over the officer's gun before Wilson squeezed the trigger and fired into his car door, actually squeezed the trigger a few times before the gun fired, he said.

Here's what Wilson says happen next.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WILSON: He gets even angrier. His aggression, his face, the intensity just increases, and he comes back in at me again.

I wasn't looking at him. I was just, like, expecting another hit, I put my gun up and fired.

Then I go to exit my car, and when I'm getting out, I use my walkie and I say, "Shots fire, send more cars." And I start chasing after Michael Brown.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Why not stay in the car? He's running away.

WILSON: Because he's not -- my job isn't to just to sit and wait. I have to see where this guy goes.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So you felt it was your duty to give chase?

WILSON: Yes, it was. That's what we are trained to do.

STEPHANOPOULOS: And he runs out of the car, gets about 30 or 40 feet. You can now get out of the car, you start to follow him and then he stops?

WILSON: He does stop.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Why?

WILSON: When he stopped, he turned and faced me. And as he does that, his right hand immediately goes into his waistband, and his left hand is a fist at his side, and he starts charging me.

STEPHANOPOULOS: What did you think when you saw that that?

WILSON: I didn't know. My initial thought was, "Is there a weapon in there?"

STEPHANOPOULOS: Even though he hadn't pulled anything out earlier when he was confronting you? WILSON: It was still just the unknown.

PEREIRA: The unknown. Joining us, our CNN legal analyst and criminal defense attorney, Mark O'Mara, and CNN commentator and legal analyst, Mel Robbins. Good to have you both with us. Mark, that unknown, what do you make of Officer Wilson's recollection that he was essentially reacting, in part, based on this unknown?

MARK O'MARA, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well you know, first of all, the adrenaline, the testosterone, the fear is at all time high on both Mike Brown and Darren Wilson. We don't imprint very well good memories when we are at that level of stress. I think if he was dealing with what he was dealing with, don't forget, cops are trained to deal with the worst that might happen, not the best. So I understand where Wilson is coming from when Mike Brown does turn, but, again, you know, these are extraordinarily high-stress situations. I think officer Wilson may probably remember a lot or a bit less than what he now remembers and maybe sort of filling in some gaps, but the stress, I think, carried the day on both of them.

BERMAN: You know, Mark just said filling in some gaps here, Mel. I want to talk about that because a lot of the critics of Darren Wilson right now are saying, well look, he had six weeks to get his story together before he talked to the grand jury. He's had another month before he's spoken publicly to George Stephanopoulos. He's had a lot of time to rehearse his story and have it match with the forensics. Is that a fair criticism?

MEL ROBBINS, CNN COMMENTATOR: No. Well, it's a fair criticism, in terms of the tone and how stiff and prickly and unlikable I found him to be, but what people keep forgetting is the day after the shooting he was interviewed and there were no forensics available at that time and he was interviewed the next day and there were no forensics available at that time and his testimony has not changed since that original interview with him that he gave after the shooting. And so, yes, you can say he was a very believable, I suppose, and effective witness, because clearly the grand jury believed him, but that doesn't mean that he changed his story. It just means that he -- like his story has been consistent from what he told from the very beginning.

PEREIRA: Well it's interesting because -- Mark and I was going to ask you this question -- the testimony, the eyewitness testimony, has been varied. The eyewitness testimony that the grand jury has had to consider. Several of them, in fact, differ from Officer Wilson's very own account. Some of them say that he had his hands up. There are those that argue that if those -- that if this had gone to trial and had been prosecuted that way, that the cross-examination would have allowed those stories to be cross-examined, to be challenged, to be tested.

O'MARA: And that's true, had we gotten to a trial situation. Understand that McCulloch, who's taken a lot of heat for this and why he didn't cross-examine, I think he should have cross-examined more, but don't forget, we cross-examine those witnesses who we don't believe, we don't necessarily cross-examine witnesses who we believe. And I think that that was the tone that was set in the grand jury proceeding. They believed Wilson.

PEREIRA: Stay with us, both of you, Mark O'Mara, Mel Robbins. We want to continue on our conversation because we want to ask if the way he interviewed, if you will, how his appearance, if that changed your opinion about the shooting death of Michael Brown. You can answer us on Twitter. I thought I was teasing what was coming up ahead. I got my tweets confused. We'll be right back.

BERMAN: Tweet us anyway. Tweet us all the time.

PEREIRA: Tweet me now.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: For the first time after all this time, Officer Darren Wilson breaking his silence about the fatal encounter back in August with unarmed teenager Michael Brown.

PEREIRA: Speaking on ABC News, Wilson said he, quote, "Did my job that day." He also was asked whether he feels any remorse for killing the 18-year-old on that street in Ferguson, Missouri.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHANOPOULOS: Do you feel any remorse?

WILSON: Everyone feels remorse when a life is lost. Like I told you before, I never wanted to take anybody's life. You know, that's not the good part of the job, that's the bad part of the job. So yes, there is remorse.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: He just said it, there is remorse. Interesting to hear him say that, perhaps interesting to some that he didn't say more. I want to bring in our legal analyst right now, criminal defense attorney, Mark O'Mara, and also CNN legal commentator Mel Robbins here with us, as well. Mel, is there any legal reason why he could not have expressed more emotion there or said something along the lines of, you know, I wish I'd called in sick that day, I feel so badly that it came down like it did. He said yes, there is remorse. He did say that.

ROBBINS: If he's led to say that. Now, I'm sure he may somewhere feel some level of remorse, but I found this interview to be so troubling to watch as a human being. And, look, you asked a legal question, could he get himself in trouble? There still is going -- there's going to be an open federal investigation, so potentially he could get himself in trouble, but he's not going to get himself in trouble for saying what I think any human being would feel, which is, look, I wish I didn't get out of bed that day. Of course, I didn't want that kid to die. Of course, I didn't want him to hit me. Of course, I didn't want him to charge - I mean, this is a terrible situation. But you know what else he said that really also bothered me? He said if only they had listened and gone back on the sidewalk, I never would have seen the cigarillos. And so, there's this continued thing -- PEREIRA: And that's the part that a lot of people have issue with, is if you had flipped the script. Right, Mel? If the teenagers were white and the officer was black, or even different races, how would this have played out?

ROBBINS: Well, if he had said if he was white and he punched me and assaulted me in my car and if he was white and he came charging back at me, I would have done the exact same thing. If he would have kind of explained it - look, he's a believable witness because he's consistent and he's confident and certain and maybe that's what is holding him through this situation. I've got to be absolutely sure that I did the right thing, and so I'm going to not waiver at all. But as a human being looking at that, I say wow.

BERMAN: But Mark, play devil's advocate here. I know you've talked to a lot of police officers over the years, you know them, I assume you know many who have had an opportunity to fire their gun. If again, -- to play devil's advocate -- he really did feel threatened here, if he felt his life was at risk and that he could be dead right now if he didn't behave differently, was his reaction then reasonable?

O'MARA: Well, I don't know how you react and how you explain yourself on national TV to a traumatic event where you caused a death and how much that informs how he presents, but I will agree with Mel that his flat affect come across very poorly. Again, I think the idea of saying, "I would have done anything else but have to fire my gun there." You know, he is in the center, like we talked about, of this firestorm and actually could have said something that may have had a more positive effect and the fact that we have an entire community, entire nation, looking at this event and trying to figure out, not only an explanation for it, but where we're going to go from here. And unfortunately, that interview doesn't give us a jumping off point to go anywhere positive.

BERMAN: Not at all.

PEREIRA: No, and I think a lot of people were watching and hoping for a measure of that. A little humanity, as you said, Mel. Mel Robbins, Mark O'Mara, thanks so much for your time and your legal expertise, as always. Ahead @THISHOUR, what he said and what he didn't say. What might Officer Wilson's body language tell us about what happened that day? We'll take a look at that.

BERMAN: Plus, it's coming. 46 million --

PEREIRA: It's already here, look at that.

BERMAN: -- people expected to travel today. Look at that. You know what, if you haven't left already, you're in big, big trouble. Michaela Pereira will be the bearer of bad news.

PEREIRA: No, you're going to share the bad --

BERMAN: I'll try to make it better for you, but she is going to ruin your holiday.

PEREIRA: Look at Virginia. Oh, my goodness. Look at that.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)