Return to Transcripts main page

At This Hour

Calm in Ferguson as Town Tries to Recover; Discussing Ferguson With Children; Talking Race after Ferguson Decision; Questions about Brown Autopsy Assistant

Aired November 27, 2014 - 11:00   ET

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

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to you. I'm Michaela Pereira. John Berman is off, basting a turkey, I'm told.

Happy Thanksgiving everybody. It is 11:00 a.m. on the East Coast, 8:00 a.m. bright and early out west.

We have two major stories that we're watching @THISHOUR. A big chill moving in behind a powerful nor'easter that has already forced hundreds of flight cancellations and thousands of delays, the big question, will holiday travel, will this nightmare, will it end soon? We'll try and get some answers for you.

Also, the fall out from Ferguson, calm in Ferguson tonight and overnight but more protests and arrests across the country after the grand jury's decision not to indict Officer Darren Wilson.

Michael Brown's grieving mom and dad spoke with CNN, and that is exactly where I want to begin "@THISHOUR."

Michael Brown's parents are spending their first Thanksgiving without their son. His mother, Lesley McSpadden, was overcome with emotion as she talked about what still haunts her about the day her 18-year-old was shot dead.

Here is a portion of her interview with HLN's Nancy Grace.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NANCY GRACE, HLN HOST: Ma'am, you had just said that you wanted to break through that crime scene tape and go to him and do what? What did you want?

LESLEY MCSPADDEN, MOTHER OF MICHAEL BROWNI wanted my son off the ground. I wanted them to show him some respect like we were showing them.

That's my firstborn laying on the ground. That hurt me to my heart to know that somebody hurt him that way and I couldn't help him.

GRACE: When they finally got him off the ground, where did he go and where did you go?

MCSPADDEN: They told us they were taking him to a place called Berkeley. I didn't know what that was. I asked them, what is that?

Once again, disrespect, telling us to calm down. We haven't did anything. We've stood here and waited four and a half hours for you to pick my son off the ground, and I asked you where are you taking his body and then you tell me to calm down.

Why? What? I need to know where he's going to be. We didn't know where he was for two weeks.

GRACE: What was Berkeley?

MCSPADDEN: I still don't know right now to this day.

GRACE: You did not know where his body was for two weeks.

MCSPADDEN: After Berkeley, it was supposed to be with the medical examiner but the question is why didn't we get to see him?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA Michael Brown's parents also sat down with our legal analyst Sunny Hostin. They had some really strong words about the officer who killed their son after hearing Darren Wilson tell his side of the story.

I want you to take a listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SUNNY HOSTIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Officer Wilson said he had a clear conscious about what happened that day. If he head to do it again, he would. What's your response to that?

MICHAEL BROWN SR., MICHAEL BROWN'S FATHER: He's a murderer. That's what that tells me.

HOSTIN: What does that tell you, Lesley?

MCSPADDEN: I hope the Lord have mercy on his soul.

HOSTIN: You're saying ...

BROWN: He's a murderer. The reason why I say that he's a murderer, because if he was conscious of what he was doing, that means he understood his actions. He understood exactly what he was doing. You know?

He didn't have a second thought, a pushback thought or nothing. He was intending to kill someone.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: Harsh words, strong emotions, coming from those grieving parents.

I want to bring in our Sara Sidner right now. She's in Delwood near Ferguson, Missouri. Sara, you've been on the ground, reporting from Ferguson, from that area. You've seen firsthand what has happened there over the last couple of days.

Give us a sense of that and tell us what's behind you?

SARA SIDNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Let's talk about sort of the amount of destruction that's there. There's a lot of people who have this misguided idea that the entire town of Ferguson is burned down. It isn't. There are a couple of streets.

But I want to give you a look, an aerial look, at some of the destruction that happened Monday night. You'll see a bunch of cars there, burning. That is actually in Delwood, which is a few minutes from Ferguson. Those cars burned the night that there was burning and looting here, and really a lot of destruction on West Florissant.

This is also West Florissant. I wanted to give you a daytime look at the same scene now in the daylight. These are the same cars. This is a car lot. And you can see "B and A" on the back. That should indicate that the bomb and arson unit has come out take a look at these cars.

This is just some of the destruction that happened overnight. Our photographer started giving you a look at that hear on this car lot.

Of course there are also businesses that suffered a great deal of damage, some of their buildings destroyed. And we're not just talking about a couple. We're talking about more than a dozen buildings that were burned or looted.

A lot of frustration from the business owners who talked to me to say like, look, we were hoping we would be protected. We were told that our businesses would be protected, and they weren't.

But the responsibility for this, many of them say, lies solely with the people who decided to be criminals and take over this town, at least West Florissant and South Florissant, and do all this destruction.

But they are frustrated that the national guard did not come out earlier when they saw it first starting to try and protect their businesses.

A little ray of hope there, because it is Thanksgiving, some of these businesses including Kathy's Kitchen, which everyone loves here in Ferguson, is open. They've reopened their doors, even with the boarded windows. They've opened up to the public trying to serve the very people who they have come to love here in Ferguson, the residents of Ferguson.

Michaela?

PEREIRA: And that's what communities are built on, right? And what a great sign of -- I don't know -- in light of all that has happened there, that they are still standing and that they refuse to sort of let this define them in Ferguson. A greater conversation needs to be had about what is going to now happen, right? If there's a investigation into what happened with the looting and arson and other crimes, we'll pick that up at a later time.

Sara, thank you so much. And, Sara, happy Thanksgiving. I hope you get home and are close to someone you love at on this Thanksgiving Day, okay?

SIDNER: Thank you.

PEREIRA: All right, ahead @THISHOUR, we're going to take a look at an important discussion that many families are likely wanting to have, already have had.

How do you talk to your kids and your teens about Ferguson, about Michael Brown, about race in America and about the protests that we're seeing?

And you can't ignore the fact that there's some yucky winter weather that has probably changed a lot of your flight plans. We will take a look at flight delays. We certainly hope everybody gets home in time for that big turkey dinner.

We're going to take a look at the results of the nor'easter that left its mark on the East Coast.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PEREIRA: Michael Brown, Trayvon Martin, Jordan Davis, all African- American teenagers shot dead in controversial cases that captured the nation's attention. Maybe the world's attention. It has left many wondering what kind of conversations to have with their children. For many this is intensely personal. It raises many questions in households about how to keep their kids safe.

Before anybody at home says well, my kid is not African-American, Latino, I don't need to be part of this conversation, I actually think we all need to be part of this conversation.

I am not a mother but, LZ, I know you are a father. You have a teenager. You have a teen age boy who is African-American. You wrote very poignantly about feeling afraid for your son's life. I'm curious what the conversation was now after Michael Brown was shot because you had that conversation after Trayvon Martin died?

LZ GRANDERSON, CNN COMMENTATOR: Right so we definitely had a longer reminding conversation after Trayvon Martin. Michael Brown's murder is different in our household for a variety of reasons.

One, my son is a senior in high house. Martin was a different age bracket. Brown just graduated from high school. My son is about to graduate from high school. My son saw even more of myself in this situation than Trayvon Martin. Every time my son leaves the house, I tell him be a good boy.

We recognize that the world views him somewhat hostile depending upon where he is. I remind him in all situations, be a good boy.

PEREIRA: That's part the conversation that needs to be had, but, Wendy, we also know that the world works a little differently. As much as our kids can behave, the world out there is a rough and tough place.

We also know, Wendy, that this is a conversation that needs to be had with all teenagers, irrespective of race because it affects us all.

WENDY WALSH, PSYCHOLOGIST: You know all children, Michaela. My children happen to be biracial. When we have that conversation, it's not about race. It's about respecting police officers and their authority and anybody holding a gun and growing some kind of emotional intelligence.

That means thinking what that person could be perceiving at that moment. Maybe they are feeling a state of fear. I was in a car accident and police came and my daughter tried to run to our car and get her backpack. And she kept going and I had this great teaching moment when I had you stop right now.

When a police officer tells you to do something, you listen.

We want to talk about the feeling of the loss of a family, the fear of both men, this young 18-year-old man, this police officer. His actions based on fear. We want to help children try to understand the emotional consequences of what goes on with everybody in these situations.

PEREIRA: And the fact that there are various people in our communities. There has to be understanding. We have to put away stereotypes. We have to try and foster conversation.

It's interesting because sometimes I find myself getting frustrated that we have to have these conversing as at all. But the fact is, it's today's world.

GRANDERSON: Absolutely. It's today's world. It was yesterday's world. I mean, there are a lot of things that, you know, really has not changed. You know, a lot of people don't know this but I'll share with you, I was on my way to the set of CNN a couple of days ago down in Ferguson, and I was pulled over. And the police officer told me that I looked like someone.

And I had a little skull cap pulled over my locks, and my locks were dangling down, and I had a skull cap on because it was cold outside. But I glanced at myself in the mirror, in the rearview mirror, and I'd looked what I looked like, and I thought to myself, of course I look like someone.

In this situation with all that is around me, of course I look like someone. And it's incredibly frustrating. And you're right, you do have to have empathy for police officers in that given situations. But it's important that those who don't have those experiences, instead of discounting what minorities are saying.

PEREIRA: Yes.

GRANDERSON: Empathize and listen to what we are saying because we're experiencing the world totally differently than you are. And it's good to have an exchange. But if your ears are closed, we're not having an exchange.

PEREIRA: No. Absolutely. And I think open ears is generally what we all think need to be happening.

And I think there's probably some unfortunate teaching moments coming out of all of this, Wendy, too, right? I mean, when I think about what schools could and can and perhaps should be doing in terms of helping the students -- the student body understand their right to -- you know, we've seen students protesting. We've seen students getting very active in social media about wanting to voice their opinions, et cetera.

There's some good opportunities there, too.

WALSH: I absolutely agree. And I actually love the fact that there are a lot of peaceful protests going on around the country, that social media is being used as an expression of this is how the system is supposed to work, is that we're supposed to talk about our feelings in whatever method we have out there.

And I encourage people actually to go onto CNN.com because there's a great article right now about how racism -- don't ever say that you're not racist because every single person is in some ways. Studies on newborn babies show that they turn their -- their heads turns more towards people who look like them.

I mean, there's this natural way -- doctors give different care to people of the same race or different race. And there's this instinctive things. So we actually, all of us have to go one step further and actually assume we're all racist and make the extra step to be more inclusive, to be more -- you know, I always tell my friends -- my kids look for the one person who's different and make them your friend. They need you. It's very important that we understand that.

PEREIRA: And you need them, too. I mean --

(CROSSTALK)

GRANDERSON: And Michaela, if I could just --

WALSH: Exactly.

PEREIRA: Please.

GRANDERSON: I was just going to say, if I could just add one more thing. I know there are a lot of people that have tweeted me and a lot of white viewers that are saying but why do we have to talk about race, why can't we just see people as people. And I would say to those individuals that it is totally OK to recognize the differences in each other. The problem isn't in recognizing the differences. It is how to respond to those differences. PEREIRA: Absolutely.

GRANDERSON: Exactly.

PEREIRA: That's such an important thing. Look --

WALSH: And judging the differences. Yes.

PEREIRA: Absolutely. And, you know, I see a white lady here. I see an African-American man there, and a swirl girl as I call myself right here. So this is a conversation the three of us can have. And we're welcome to have it any old time you like.

(LAUGHTER)

Thank you, guys. And listen, especially on this Thanksgiving, I'm thankful for this conversation. You two get home to your loved ones and have a great Thanksgiving. OK?

WALSH: Good to see you, Michaela.

PEREIRA: Good to see you.

GRANDERSON: Thank you. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

PEREIRA: Thanks, LZ.

Ahead @THIS HOUR, interesting development here. Forensic assistant at the heart of the Michael Brown autopsy is under fire. You remember seeing this man. Questions are being asked. His answers cannot be missed. We have a CNN investigation, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PEREIRA: A lot of questions about a man who served as an assistant during one of the autopsies on Michael Brown's body. While the handling of the actual autopsy is not in dispute, his qualifications are.

Elizabeth Cohen has more on Shawn Parcell's checkered past.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Michaela, the Ferguson, Missouri, case created a media star out of an assistant pathologist. But a CNN investigation shows, he may not be exactly what he appears to be.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COHEN (voice-over): Out of the death and violence in Ferguson, Missouri, this summer, a turn to be a media star for a man named Shawn Parcells.

SHAWN PARCELLS, ASSISTED IN THE AUTOPSY OF MICHAEL BROWN: First of all, I'm Professor Shawn Parcells.

COHEN: He dazzled with details on the private autopsy of Michael Brown.

PARCELLS: Two gunshot wounds to the head, indicating that Mr. Brown was bending over as they were coming down.

LAWRENCE O'DONNELL, MSNBC'S "LAST WORD": We're back with Shawn Parcells, who assisted in the autopsy of Michael Brown.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now Shawn Parcells --

COHEN: Even here on CNN.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Mr. Parcells, thank you very much.

PARCELLS: Thank you. Thank you.

COHEN: He's appeared in the media time and again as a forensic pathology expert. We know he assisted Dr. Michael Baden in the private autopsy commissioned by Michael Brown's family. Baden said he was a good assistant.

Parcells is not a doctor. We know he calls himself a forensics medical consultant, a medical investigator, and a professor, but is he what he says he is?

(On camera): So you call yourself a professor?

PARCELLS: Yes.

COHEN: Where are you a professor?

PARCELLS: I'm an adjunct professor at Washburn University in Topeka, Kansas.

COHEN (voice-over): But that, as far as we could tell, isn't accurate.

We contacted Washburn University. They say, while he has spoken to nursing students, he's not now and never been an adjunct professor there.

(On camera): Washburn University says that's not true.

PARCELLS: OK, I have a contract that states that it is true.

COHEN: Can you show us that contract?

PARCELLS: I can.

COHEN (voice-over): But he never sent us that contract showing he was an adjunct professor. He later said it was proprietary.

DEPUTY GRANT GILLETT, ANDREW COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE: I see him as a fraud. I mean that's the best word I would say to describe Shawn Parcells to me.

COHEN (on camera): How about you? DUSTIN JEFFERS, FORMER ANDREW COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICER DEPUTY:

Manipulator.

GILLETT: A very good con artist is the way I'd put it.

COHEN (voice-over): In Missouri, Deputy Sheriff's Grant Gillett and Dustin Jeffers say Shawn Parcells performed an autopsy procedure in a criminal case without a doctor present.

(On camera): So he introduced himself as a pathologist, as a medical doctor?

GILLETT: That is correct.

COHEN: And he seemed believable?

GILLETT: Very well.

JEFFERS: Very much so, yes.

COHEN: I mean you two are both experienced law enforcement officers. And even you were duped.

GILLETT: That's right.

COHEN (voice-over): The deputies say, without a medical doctor's signature on Robert Forrester's autopsy report, it's not valid.

(On camera): It's been more than two years since the crime. Can you move forward with the prosecution?

GILLETT: We cannot move forward at this time with that case at all.

COHEN: Why not?

GILLETT: Because the autopsy was not performed legally. So we cannot use any evidence found from the autopsy in a court of law to be used to prosecute any suspects on a case.

COHEN (voice-over): That means, according to the deputies, Bobby Forrester, suspected of killing his grandfather, was set free and he went on to beat up his grandmother.

Shawn Parcells says he never told the deputies he was a doctor.

PARCELLS: If they want to think I'm a doctor, that's their issue. People assume stuff all the time, and they may never ask. It's -- it's bad that they're assuming and that they never ask.

COHEN: Parcells, who has a bachelor's degree, says he's supervised by medical doctors, but sometimes they're not present when he performs an autopsy procedure.

(On camera): So you do autopsies where there's not a pathologist or an M.D. anywhere in the room.

PARCELLS: At times. Sometimes a pathologist is there and sometimes they're not.

COHEN: You're not an M.D.

PARCELLS: I'm not an M.D.

COHEN: But it's legal for you to be cutting up bodies, taking organs out, making observations?

PARCELLS: Yes.

COHEN (voice-over): This, even though a letter on his own company's letterhead states unequivocally that "during each and every forensic autopsy conducted, the attending pathologist is present at all times. We always have the attending pathologist present and directing the autopsy examination."

And if you think that's shocking, the owner of this funeral home says Parcells promised to arrange for an autopsy on the remains of an unidentified body, but didn't show up for more than a week. Maggots appeared. And where's that body now? Phelps County Deputy Coroner Lenox Jones would love to know. He says he's not heard from Parcells in more than a year.

When we asked Parcells, where's the body, we got a barrage of obscenities.

(On camera): Lenox Jones says that he's never heard back from you.

PARCELLS: He has. Holy (EXPLETIVE DELETED). Excuse my language, but I've got (EXPLETIVE DELETED) e-mails to prove him and I going back and forth and the fact that he ignores me. He's a (EXPLETIVE DELETED). You want to be truthful? He is a (EXPLETIVE DELETED). And I'm sorry to cuss like this on your cameras, but this particular case pisses me off.

COHEN (voice-over): Parcells added that the coroner can pick up the body from his morgue in Topeka any time.

So with coroners and law enforcement so angry, why haven't they gone after him?

Dr. Mary Case, chief medical examiner for St. Louis County, says prosecutors might be worried. She says some of them may have used his autopsy reports to get convictions, convictions they don't want overturned.

DR. MARY CASE, CHIEF MEDICAL EXAMINER, ST. LOUIS COUNTY: It could be a problem for that prosecuting attorney if that prosecutor has prosecuted somebody based upon Shawn's findings. Of course that's a problem.

COHEN (on camera): For the prosecutor?

CASE: For the prosecutor.

COHEN: So no one wants to go after him. CASE: No one has. No one has to this point.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COHEN: Now one county in Missouri did file a complaint with the state's Medical Licensing Board. The complaint said they expected a pathologist to be at the procedure and instead Parcells did it on his own. The board closed the case without taking any action -- Michaela.

PEREIRA: Wow, Elizabeth, what a story.

We should point out Parcells insists that the Forrester death investigation was, quote, "doomed from the start because the dead man's body had been embalmed prior to the autopsy and because the sheriff's department never turned over records needed for the autopsy report to be completed."

Now at this point we also need to point that no one is questioning the results of the Michael Brown autopsy that the family requested.

All right. Ahead @THIS HOUR, snow and rain canceled hundreds of flights making holiday travel quite a nightmare for many people on the East Coast and beyond.

So what about today? What does the weather hold for today?

We'll get a live report just ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)