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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

CIA Director Addresses Interrogation Report; Justice Department Report on Students and Rape; Defamation Lawsuit against Cosby; Dying Girl's Own Words Offer Lead

Aired December 11, 2014 - 12:00   ET

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

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Michaela Pereira.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm John Berman. "LEGAL VIEW" with Ashleigh Banfield starts right now.

DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN ANCHOR: Well, it's not something that happens often, if at all. The head of the CIA holding a news conference live at CIA headquarters about to be grilled, not by lawmakers, but by reporters. It is happening today. High-powered pushback to the Senate report to torture.

Also ahead, a Cosby accuser gets creative. She can't sue over the entertainer's alleged offense, so she sues him over his denial.

And police in Mississippi hope a young murder victim's own words can point them to her killer. What did she tell a volunteer firefighter moments before she died?

Hello, everyone. I'm Deborah Feyerick, in for Ashleigh Banfield. Welcome, every one, to LEGAL VIEW.

Well, critics are calling for his resignation, some call him a liar, others say he and his agents are heroes. In an hour and a half, CIA Director John Brennan speaks about the Senate Intelligence Committee's bombshell report on torture. You can bet the questions will be fierce at this rare news conference at the agency's headquarters in Langley, Virginia.

I want to get straight to our senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta.

And, Jim, first of all, what is John Brennan expected to say in light of this scathing report?

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Deb, we don't have an advanced copy of his remarks, no excerpts are being provided. He is going to make some remarks to CIA employees, who are going to be gathered for this event, and then he's going to take questions from the press. But I am gathering, I'm guessing, Deb, that he's going to reiterate what he said in his statement just a few days ago when this report was released by Senator Feinstein's committee, and that is that he does believe that these enhanced interrogation techniques, which some have called torture, the president has called torture, Dianne Feinstein has called torture, that they did save lives, that they did prevent attacks. And that is a view that is not necessarily shared inside this administration. When we pressed the White House on this yesterday, they didn't take a view. They didn't say one way or the other whether these tactics prevented attacks, whether these tactics saved lives.

And it's interesting, just in the last several minutes, President Obama was holding an unrelated event, unrelated meeting here at the White House. The press pool went into that meeting, asked the president, do you believe what your CIA director believes and that is that these tactics saved lives? The president did not answer the question. So, Deb, this White House still very much on the fence, sitting on the sidelines, acting as almost a bystander to this debate right now.

FEYERICK: All right. Well, it's going to be very interesting to see what he does come out with. It also sounds like he's sort of doing a little bit of morale boosting there at the agency, which was doing its job in the wake of 9/11 to prevent those attacks, as he says.

Jim Acosta, thank you so much. Appreciate it.

ACOSTA: You bet.

FEYERICK: And within the past couple of hours, the Justice Department put out a troubling report on rape and sexual assault among college- aged women. You may be shocked at how many victims just never go to police. Our justice correspondent, Pamela Brown, joins me now.

And, Pam, this report looked at students and nonstudents, ages 18 to 24, over an 18-year period. What were the most striking findings?

PAMELA BROWN, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, some of the findings, Deborah, were really startling actually, especially when you look at the reporting statistics. In fact, the most alarming thing that we found in this report is that a scarce number of sexual assaults on college campuses actually get reported to the police. And the report shows that often that is because the victim does not feel comfortable bringing it to the authorities or they may feel reprisal from their attacker.

And according to this report, let's take a look at the numbers here, 80 percent of these cases, that's 80 percent go unreported. And, in fact, 80 percent of campus sexual assaults, the victim knows the offender. And another point in this report reveals that 70 percent of sex assaults happened at either the victim's home or the home of someone the victim knows.

And it's important to point out now as well that this report found that while rape most often happens to women between the age of 18 and 24, men are also victimized. About 17 percent of on campus sexual assaults happen to men. But, again, what's so troubling in this report, Deborah, is the fact that 80 percent don't go reported to police.

FEYERICK: Right. And also that those who do actually report to police, these attacks are happening by people they know in familiar environments, either an apartment or a home.

BROWN: Right, overwhelmingly.

FEYERICK: And it wasn't interesting because it wasn't just campus -- students on campus. They also looked at nonstudents as well. Were they about equal or was there a distinction there?

BROWN: Well, what's interesting is that the number for nonstudents was a little more than double compared to students over the course of the years that they looked at in the study. However, in 2013, it was about equal.

FEYERICK: How interesting.

BROWN: So there was about equal amount of sexual assaults for nonstudents and for students. So it's really troubling, really across the board, Deborah.

FEYERICK: Right. So it would appear it's going up on campuses.

BROWN: Yes.

FEYERICK: All right, Pamela Brown, thank you so much. We appreciate that.

BROWN: Thank you.

FEYERICK: Really interesting. We'll see if anything comes of those numbers. All right, appreciate it.

BROWN: Thank you.

FEYERICK: Well, the Bill Cosby saga is a prime example of women who don't report their alleged sexual assaults until years later. One clear reason, it was Bill Cosby. At least 22 accusers have now come forward, many of them determined to have their day in court. But how? With their cases decades old and the statute of limitations expired, CNN's Susan Candiotti look at one woman's novel attempt to ultimately find justice.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Tamara Green finding a creative way to get around the statute of limitations, largely shielding Bill Cosby from criminal and civil sex charges. Green's suing him for basically calling her a liar.

TAMARA GREEN, COSBY ACCUSER: I want the truth of this matter to be finally established forevermore.

CANDIOTTI: It's a defamation lawsuit claiming that when Cosby's lawyers and publicists issued statements saying he, quote, "didn't know her," and the incident "did not happen in any way, shape or form," branded Green as a liar and damaged her reputation.

GREEN: We shall all now have our day in court. Bill Cosby will also have his day in court. He will have his day in court to defend himself and I look forward to that event.

CANDIOTTI: Her lawyer, Joe Cammarata, who represented Paula Jones in a sexual harassment lawsuit against President Clinton.

JOE CAMMARATA, TAMARA GREEN'S ATTORNEY: She will have to litigate and Mr. Cosby will have to answer the allegation that he, according to Ms. Green, sexually abused her.

CANDIOTTI: Green was an aspiring model and singer. Like so many other accusers, she says Cosby drugged and assaulted her, but she eventually fought him off.

GREEN: The center of my being understood that, you know, he had gone from helping me to groping me and kissing me and touching me and handling me, and, you know, taking off my clothes.

CANDIOTTI: Green, now an attorney, signed on as a Jane Doe to Andrea Constand's lawsuit that Cosby settled in 2006. When the Cosby scandal broke wide open last month, Green spoke out to CNN and others.

GREEN: I hope that women have been saved by not having been victims after 2005.

CANDIOTTI: Cosby himself has not directly responded to his accusers, except to say he should not have to answer to innuendos. In response to Green's lawsuit, Cosby's lawyer issuing this statement, "we are very confident that we will prevail and we will pursue claims against the attorneys who filed this action."

GREEN: This will give us a chance to go to a forum where we will speak our stories and tell our truth. And the most important thing is that Bill Cosby will be required to appear in court and to speak and he will finally be heard.

CANDIOTTI: Susan Candiotti, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FEYERICK: And a new development in an unspeakable crime. A 19-year-old woman burned alive on a dirt road in Mississippi. Investigators are hoping something she whispered to a rescuer will help them crack this case.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

FEYERICK: Well, she was set on fire and then left to die. Now Jessica Chambers' cell phone and a lead she gave firefighters in rural Mississippi are helping investigators close in on her killer. Jessica reportedly got a call Saturday evening which is why she went out in the first place. CNN's Martin Savidge has more on her final hours alive.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BEN CHAMBERS, JESSICA'S FATHER: It's hard for me even -- it's hard to breathe, you know, even think about it. MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A family's anguish

over an almost unspeakable crime. Their teenage daughter burned alive.

LISA CHAMBERS, JESSICA'S MOTHER: They have ripped everything I have.

SAVIDGE: 8:00 p.m. Saturday night, rural north Mississippi, a 911 call reports a burning car on a county road. Within minutes, the volunteer fire department arrives.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We were expecting it to be just a normal car fire.

SAVIDGE: Instead, a horribly burned teen stumbles from the darkness in this small town. They know her.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I realized who the victim was and it was just shocking.

SAVIDGE: Nineteen-year-old Jessica Chambers, described by friends as well-liked, outgoing, high school cheerleader, had been doused with a flammable liquid and set on fire. She would die the next day due to burns covering nearly every inch of her body. But it gets even worse, according to what the family says doctors told them.

B. CHAMBERS: They said that, as far as they could tell, like they squirted fluid down her throat and up her nose, because it just burned on the inside so bad.

SAVIDGE: Incredibly, despite her suffering, Chambers whispered something to firefighters. Many believe it was the name of her attacker.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I can't really disclose any of that information at this time.

SAVIDGE: Authorities will only tell me what the teen said is a lead. Meanwhile, in this small town, the big question is, who could have done it?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, certainly we're looking at murder charges, capital murder charges.

SAVIDGE: Authorities have been retracing where Chambers went that night. This surveillance video shows her stopping at a local gas station where police say she bought a drink and chatted with a few people. Everyone she spoke with has been cleared. The teen's burnt car is being analyzed, as is her phone, recovered inside. Investigators believe a text or last call could be key, especially if it links to her last whispered words.

B. CHAMBERS: I want to see justice, man. Justice, you know.

SAVIDGE: And in this part of Mississippi, they believe justice can be here or the hereafter.

L. CHAMBERS: It's God's judgment and God's punishment. It's going to be far more worse than anything that we can do. (END VIDEOTAPE)

FEYERICK: And that was Martin Savidge reporting.

And, incredibly, Jessica's grandmother says she's willing to forgive her granddaughter's attacker.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIE BERDAIN, JESSICA'S GRANDMOTHER: A lot of people say, well, I hope the killer burns in hell. But I don't. I don't - I don't wish that on anybody. I hope this person or persons would come to God, we see something good come out of this. I don't want anger and hate in my heart.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FEYERICK: Well, a FaceBook page titled "Justice for Jessica" now has more than 90,000 likes. The page states that it was created, quote, "to keep Jessica's name alive and out there." The page also warns visitors about scam sites trying to make money off Jessica.

And just ahead, an ugly encounter with police caught on video.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

POLICE OFFICER: Give me your f-ing hands. Get out of the f-ing car.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are you really -- are you serious?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FEYERICK: Well, now the woman on the receiving end speaks out about what happened and what she wants to happen to the officers involved.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

FEYERICK: And the police officer involved in the fatal takedown of Eric Garner says that he never put Garner in a chokehold. Daniel Pantaleo is being investigated by the NYPD's internal affairs division. Well, his lawyer says that Pantaleo told those officers that what you see him doing is this video is -- what he was taught.

We're actually going to switch gears a little bit. There's a press conference being held in the girl who was set on fire. We're going to go there right now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: At this point, but we do have a wonderful team of investigators, including the sheriff's department, the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation. The U.S. Marshal Service is assisting us. And we're leaving no stone unturned at this point. This is, obviously, in all the years that I've been doing this, this is an absolutely horrendous, horrendous case. You know, as I said the other day, I think, you know, one of the greatest fears people have of dying is to die in a fire. And to have, in this situation, is about as bad as it comes. And we do have a great team of investigators here that are working on

it and we're just taking it step by step. As I classified the investigation at this point as kind of a hit the pavement, pound the pavement type of investigation. We've got to get out there now and just keep following up leads that we're getting.

(INAUDIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're working with rumor control also. I know I've talked to several of you and, you know, things get started up we don't have control of, but a lot of what's being said is not any truth to it. We're, you know, going through the coroner, we're going through the medical examiner and, as far as some of the stories on accelerants and all this stuff, we're -- we've ruled them out. And like I said, that's where we need the most help, is helping rule the rumor control. We can't verify any of that.

I want to assure you as soon as we get full information, man, we will be jumping up and down, calling you, ready to give you all the information that we can. I appreciate your patience. And, you know, you can be of benefit to us too on any information that you can, you know, cause (ph). We're following up on every single tip, regardless of how minute it is and we're going to work on this thing. And we've got some determined investigators here. I've worked with a lot of them before, and I can assure you that we're not going to ever give up on this.

My heart goes out to the family. It's personal because I know him personally and I have two daughters of my own. And we're going to get there. These guys are so determined. We've used every avenue and it's still early stages to a certain extent and we are going to stay here until we find out who did it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let me kind of give you an update about where we are right now. Obviously everybody knows that she was found Saturday night. She was burned. And she passed at -- some time later after being life flighted out of here.

We immediately began the investigation and we're at the point that we are talking to people right now and there are a lot of people that we are talking to as far as this is concerned. And the one thing I think that we commented on this morning is, there's just not a lot of street talk out there. You know, I've been doing this a long time and there's not a lot of street talk out there about who may or may not have done this. So it's making our job a little bit more difficult. And that's why we're appealing to the public.

I know that Crime Stoppers does have a reward for this. So anybody with information, we're asking to please come forward. The Courtland community is a small community, so we feel like somebody out there knows something or has heard something that just may -- has not come forward yet. And we're asking the community to help us with this.

You know, this is a horrendous crime. This is a 19-year-old girl who was just beginning life and she had just graduated from high school and beginning her life and nobody deserves to dies this way. I don't care, you know, who you are. So we're appealing to the public to please assist us. And if you do have any information, it doesn't matter whether you think it's insignificant or not, let us know so that we, you know, can follow up on it.

And I'll open it up now to anybody that's got some questions.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is there - you made the statement as far as an accelerant, there being rumors, was there no accelerant used?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As far as, you know, internally, no, we're not - you know, I can't answer that right now because we're still working with the crime lab. But as far as, you know, the rumor that we're hearing of taking accelerant and putting on her, we've not had any confirmation on that through the crime lab and -

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have a lot of things that are -- or the ATF's assisting us with this. We're going to have the use of their laboratory in Atlanta. I believe it's going to be Atlanta. We'll have the use of their laboratory. But, you know, it was -- we're definitely treating this as an arson. We're still trying to determine through lab results as to what was the source of the arson.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So you've been questioning people. Can you tell us an approximate number of people you've brought in here for questioning?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm not going to comment on that. We have - we have -- you know, people are hesitant when they pull up in the parking lot, see all these cameras out here, they're sometimes hesitant to talk to us. But, you know, there -- we've talked to many, many people.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You got people in there right now?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've got - we've talked to many, many people.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can you talk about the role of the U.S. Marshals in this case at this point. I know they're assisting, but what - what is -- what's their --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm not going to discuss what their role is. They are assisting us with some of the technology they have available to us. They're certainly helping us with some of the phone stuff because of their technology. But they are providing wonderful assistance to us. It's a great example of the cooperation that we all have amongst each other, especially in this area of the state.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'd also like to thank the general public, in every area, every race that we have here. And, you know, this has been national. (INAUDIBLE) tremendous here. The black ones and the white ones have worked together. They're personal to us. And they're reaching out. And I tell you what, whatever the rest of the world thinks, we haven't got it here. And they've been excellent on assisting us and waiting and their hearts. But we're as Christian nation here. I mean, as far as the county, we believe in Jesus, OK. I'll make that very specific. And that's what we rely on. And it's going to work out. And we're bonding and bringing each other closer together more than ever before. Whatever you hear in the rest of the world, we're not doing it here.

But I want to say thank you to all of you. And the concerns are there. We're a tremendous county here. We're powerful as far as the relationships and personal. And if they find out, regardless of who they are, they will let us know.

So we've got a lot of footwork to do. We don't know at any time. We can't, you know, release anything right now because we ain't got - we've got to be sure. And we have the best of the best here. They're -- like I said, they're determined. And I'm proud of them and I appreciate them. And I've worked around these people before. I know what they represent. And I'm hoping for the time that we can call you back, and we will, and let you know what we have.

FEYERICK: And authorities have said no arrests have been made. Investigators do believe that the attacker got into the car with Jessica. They also say that she suffered head trauma and about 98 percent of her body was burned before she passed.

Well, now back to one of our top stories. The report on CIA torture. My next guest is former Senator Bob Kerrey, a co-chair of the 9/11 Commission, says the new report missed a huge opportunity. We're going to talk with him about that straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

FEYERICK: And we are just an hour away from the CIA, which is going to have a press briefing, talking about this torture report.