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Dow Drops 200-Plus As Oil Price Plummets; Will Anyone Be Prosecuted for CIA Torture; Civil Rights of Men Ignored in Sexual Assault Allegations.

Aired December 10, 2014 - 14:30   ET

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


ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: We're seeing oil prices crack the $61 a barrel mark for the first time since 2009. A couple of reports that came out have sparked this sell-off in oil, which in turn is causing this sell-off in stock. The latest weekly status report from the government is showing there was a surprise increase in U.S. crude stockpiles. The problem with that is we're seeing demand for oil fall in the Eurozone and China. OPEC's monthly oil market report came out and it's forecasting less demand for oil next year. That's spooking the market even though consumers -- I'm enjoy filling up at the gas tank for much lower -- but it's rattling the energy markets, as you see, as well, rallying stocks. Dow down 235 points.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Definitely rattled.

Alison Kosik, keep a close eye on it for us. Thank you very much.

Go to CNNmoney.com to check numbers on the big board.

Coming up next, will anyone be prosecuted for the CIA's use of torture? Should they be? If that is the case, how high up the ladder will this go?

Plus, as the nation really has been having a huge conversation about rape and sexual assault on college campuses, one female writer is suggesting the civil rights of men are being ignored. This is a provocative argument. She'll join me, live, ahead.

You're watching CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: You are watching CNN. I want to talk more about this Senate torture report. We talked about this during our breaking coverage for two hours yesterday. When you reads this, it says George W. Bush wasn't briefed on these enhanced interrogation techniques until four years after they started. We're talking mid 2006. That's when President Bush reportedly got the word and it made him, in a word, "uncomfortable."

Here now, President George W. Bush one year after that briefing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This government does not torture people. We stick to U.S. law and our international obligations. They are highly trained professionals questioning these extremists and terrorists. Now, we have professionals who are trained in this kind of work to get information that will protect the American people. And by the way, we have gotten information from these high-value detainees that have helped protect you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: That was President Bush 15 months after he was first briefed on enhanced interrogation. "The government, this government does not torture." Those are words of George W. Bush. I also said, "Enhanced interrogations were helping protect the American people."

Let's go to Washington. Constitutional lawyer, Steven Vladek, from American University, has written extensively on the potential for prosecution of various U.S. officials in conjunction with possible human rights violations on the war on terror.

Steven, welcome.

STEVEN VLADEK, CONSTITUTIONAL LAWYER, AMERICAN UNIVERSITY: Thanks, Brooke. Thanks for having me.

BALDWIN: Let's back up for a second. Before we start pointing fingers and asking about prosecuting, how do we even know who was in on all of this? From what I can tell, we don't know who gave orders or the people who carried them all out.

VLADEK: I think that's right. We're learning more and more about the time line and we're learning more and more about which official reported to and which official at which point. The torture report, all we got yesterday was 480-page executive summary. There are thousands and thousands of pages that presumably have more details about the actual identities of some of the folks who were involved.

BALDWIN: How high up could this go?

VLADEK: It's hard to say. The reality is we're not going to see prosecution. President Obama doesn't want to look at the past. He wants to look to the future. The report, the executive summary we saw yesterday suggests this goes as high as senior officials in the Justice Department, senior officials in the CIA, and perhaps even to some people in the White House. Brooke, we may never know without this kind of prosecution and some kind of further investigation.

BALDWIN: You're right.

Josh Earnest, the White House spokesperson, he spoke suggesting a cleansing effect. You mentioned President Obama and his stance on this. He talked about the cleansing effect from the torture report. Here he was.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSH EARNEST, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Certainly, the release of this report is a critically important step because it demonstrates a commitment to transparency. It demonstrates a commitment to accountability.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: You mentioned President Obama wants to look ahead and not focus on the past. Can you get that cleansing effect that Josh was talking about without any prosecution and anyone going on trial?

VLADEK: Brooke, I think you can. A great example here is Japanese- American internment camps from World War II. Most agree today that they were unlawful and abusive and a stain on American history. We never had prosecution. Instead, we had a comprehensive congressional investigation that culminated with hundreds-page-long report that exposed all abuses and all of the decisions made, and that we ultimately had Congress apologize for the internment and pay damages to some victims.

President Obama's position, that model where we trade individual liability for national consensus that this was wrong and we should never do this again, is a better thing to aspire to both in short-term and long-term.

BALDWIN: It was the president who signed this executive order some time ago. When we have a new president, without legislation, could this not come back to haunt us?

VLADEK: It could. I think the question is what precedent are we setting? The release of the torture report should help deter some future officers. But if it stops with the release of the report, that's right, there is always the possibility that this precedent will lie around like a loaded weapon. That's why this report needs to be the beginning of the conversation and not the end, and that prosecutions aren't the way to continue that discussion but rather some kind of broader national consensus.

BALDWIN: Excellent point.

Steve Vladek, thank you.

VLADEK: Thank you.

BALDWIN: Moving on, on the extremely sensitive subject of rape. It's a risky move speaking out for the rights of those accused of doing this. We'll talk to a woman who is doing that, raising this key question, in protecting women from rape and sex assault, are we as a nation victimizing men? Next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Sex assaults on college campuses framed and in focus after "Rolling Stone" magazine publicly apologized for its article about this alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia. A story perceived to have many holes or there were discrepancies in the accuser, they call Jackie, whose account has been questioned. And many fear this case could be a huge setback for other victims who are hesitant to come forward, one reporter is offering more of a contrarian concern. Could the accused have more to lose?

She's Emily Yoffe, contributing editor for "Slate" magazine and wrote this piece entitled "College Rape over Correction."

Welcome, Emily. Nice to have you back.

EMILY YOFFE, CONTRIBUTING EDITOR, SLATE MAGAZINE: Nice to be back.

BALDWIN: Let me begin where you begin in this piece. You put a face on this whole idea with this University of Michigan student who you found was accused of rape. Tell me about him.

YOFFE: His name is Drew Sterret (ph). I give him a lot of credit for using his name in the lawsuit he brought against the university because a lot of these young men go John Doe, which is perfectly understandable.

What happened to him in the spring of his freshman year, 2012, he was a young engineering student. It was a Friday night. People were hanging around and drinking. No one is really drunk. Late one night a female friend says my roommate has people over. Can I stay in your room? Drew had a roommate. The guy said sure. They thought she would sleep on a mat they had for guests. The guys get into bed and Drew was surprised when she slipped into the bed next to him. They started talking and kissing and you don't need to use your imagination to know what happens.

At one point, she said do you have a condom? He went to a drawer. Got one. The event was so loud and went on so long that the roommate in the upper bunk -- and there rarely are witnesses in the room for these events -- at 3:00 a.m., he got his computer, sent a private Facebook message to Drew saying, "Dude, you two are so obnoxiously loud I can't sleep."

In the morning, they said, "Let's keep this between us." Everything is fine. He's home for the summer in August he gets notified by a school official he needs to do a Skype interview that afternoon. Gets on Skype. Not told what it's about but is asked questions, and it becomes clear there is some problem with that one time event. He's getting asked hostile questions. He says, "Should I get a lawyer?" The administrator says, "If you stop this interview, that will be noted in your file and the investigation will go on without you." That was the beginning.

Turns out this came out in discovery of the lawsuit. The young woman was home over the summer. Her mother found her diary, which detailed drinking, drug use, and her sexual activity, all her sexual activity, and did not mention Drew. Mother was very upset. Something happened between the two women and the mother called University of Michigan and said, my daughter is going to make a complaint, and the mother drove the girl to school and that's how to all got started.

BALDWIN: And fast forward, Drew is now not in school and is having a tough time figuring out what to do.

YOFFE: Drew is now 22 years old. He should be graduating with an engineering degree this spring. He went to school -- he went halfway through his sophomore year and that was it. He was found responsible. He was out of school. Once you are found responsible for sexual misconduct no matter what it was, you essentially cannot get into another university. He tried but he actually got accepted somewhere and they found out about this disciplinary finding and the offer was rescinded.

BALDWIN: I read that it's a very thorough and very long piece in "Slate." It offers a different perspective and an important one to be clear your account definitely comes from court documents and comes from lawyers but your reporting seems like universities and this is part of your issue, it's the universities that are doing heavy lifting in these investigations where do you think it should be police? Would that make it more fair for both sides?

YOFFE: Well, I certainly think if there's a case where campus officials think a serious felony has occurred, you don't want professors looking into it. You want prosecutors looking into it. And we really have to try to divert the more serious cases into the criminal justice system. It's not perfect. As someone I quoted in my story said, "If no one goes to the criminal justice system, you have a zero conviction rate." But what's happening is that sexual conduct laws on campus are written so expansively and cover behavior that's perfectly reasonable and normal outside of campus that young men who are not rapists are getting labeled as such or having committed a sexual misconduct and are being punished for it.

BALDWIN: I hear that voice inside of me wondering, would these proposed changes make it more difficult for a woman to come forward? It's tough enough, right, but would this make it more difficult for a woman to come forward if, in fact, she's telling the truth that she was absolutely raped?

YOFFE: Brooke, these regulations are being put in place on the back of studies. We heard the one-in-five number. Some people heard the --

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: The president uses one-in-five number.

YOFFE: Constantly. One-in-five young women will be sexually assaulted by the time they graduate from college. Another one is one- in-four college students will be raped. So we have very alarmist studies and so it only seems right to make draconian laws to stop this.

I looked into the studies. I read all of the studies. I read the foot notes. The lead author of the one-in-five study looked at -- surveyed students at two universities. I asked him does your study stand for the experience of the 12 million American young women enrolled in college. He was absolutely unequivocal. No. My study is not representative of the nation. I only looked at two schools. He acknowledged they had a fairly low response rate. It was an online study. I said to him, "Does the president know this?" He said, "Look, policy makers are using the study as they want to. We never made that assertion about the study."

BALDWIN: I feel like we're barely scratching the surface of your piece and all of its findings. Incredibly thorough journalism.

Emily Yoffe, thank you so much.

I encourage everyone to read it, slate.com.

Thank you for coming on.

YOFFE: My pleasure.

BALDWIN: Coming up next, Sue is the largest fossil ever found but her discovery turned into a massive federal fight and, by the way, time in prison for one who found this historic discovery. Hear why, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: This is great story. This whole thing started as an historic scientific discovery and ended with 18 months in prison. This weekend CNN Films presents "Dinosaur 13." This is the story behind Sue, what they named the 13th T-Rex discovered and the most complete T. Rex ever found, and possibly the most controversial because of where it was found.

First, I want you to see how excited these two brothers were when they realized how spectacular this fossil was.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETER LARSON, DISCOVERY T-REX DINOSAUR: I crawl up on the cliff face and I see three articulated vertebrae and from that point on I'm absolutely certain this is going to be the best thing we ever found and it's going to be a complete T. Rex.

NEIL LARSON, DISCOVERED T-REX DINOSAUR: He called up and said, Neil, I need you to bring a lot of plaster and 2 x 4s. I got up there with these materials and he took me over to this big cliff and he said take a look. I looked at it. I looked at him and said, "Is that T. Rex?" He said, "Yes, and I think it's all here."

PETER LARSON: We haven't started digging or moved anything around yet. We have just been looking at it and taking some pictures and trying to figure out how to proceed. There's a real mass of bones here. Most appear to be excellently preserved and I believe the tail is going that way and the skull is going this way. But we're just going to have to dig it up and see.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: One of the people you just saw there, Peter Larson, he and his team were thrilled when they found the fossil in 1990. The government took it after this lengthy legal back and forth. The dinosaur hunter is trying to reunite with his prehistoric baby. And tomorrow night the film, CNN Film, "Dinosaur 13," looks at this battle 67 million years in the making. Here's CNN's Kyung Lah.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KYUNG LAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Follow Peter Larson and you step back in time.

PETER LARSON: This is one of the very coolest things. This is the skull of this T. Rex.

LAH: As in tyrannosaurus rex, an eight ton, more than 66 million- year-old fossil dubbed Murray. Incredibly, the tenth one Larson has collected.

(on camera): When you find an intact skull from a T. Rex, what does that mean?

PETER LARSON: It's like ecstasy. It's pure joy.

LAH (voice-over): He can't contain it.

PETER LARSON: Back here we have more interesting things to look at, the outside of a vertebra, this is filled with pieces of skin. Before we go, this is really cool. This is a big dinosaur. This is one of the biggest.

LAH: As we talk about Murray. It's another name that he keeps mentioning.

PETER LARSON: This is pretty much Sue's size. A very old individual.

LAH (on camera): Does everything come down to Sue in your life?

PETER LARSON: I think so. I think there is before Sue and after Sue, sort of things. I guess you might say that.

LAH: Sue, the single largest and most complete T. Rex fossil ever found. Larson and his team at South Dakota's Black Hills Institute excavated her in 1990. She was found on private property and, as word spread about the historic fossil find, a dispute with the land owner, a Native American tribe, and the federal government led to Sue's seizure from Larson's lab. Sue was sold on the open market.

When the Field Museum in Chicago purchased her for $8 million and Peter Larson never saw a sent and he was sent to federal prison on custom violations unrelated to the T. Rex dinosaur.

For two years, supporters around the world wrote him in prison.

PETER LARSON: That's pretty awesome. She colored a dinosaur picture for him.

LAH: Calling his conviction a witch-hunt. And the Sue sale changed paleontology. And fossils are not always scientific. They are for profit. PETER LARSON: Where the string comes in is where you have a few

unscrupulous individuals breaking laws. It's about finding ways to work together across that scientific or research/commercial divide that benefits everybody.

LAH: Larson is back hunting fossils but carries one regret.

PETER LARSON: It's one of the dreams that I have. And my life would be complete if we can get Sue back in some form.

Isn't that awesome?

LAH: After 22 years, this replica cast of Sue's skull is back with Larson, given to him by a donor. It is, by no means, the full research cast Larson is asking from the Field Museum but a small measure of a long lost love coming home.

PETER LARSON: Good night.

LAH: Kyung Lah, CNN, Hill City, South Dakota.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: Want to you watch the story about Sue, the T. Rex, and shocking the developments after paleontologists discovered this. "Dinosaur 13" airs tomorrow night at 9:00 eastern here on CNN.