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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

More Information Regarding Germanwings Airbus Crash. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired March 26, 2015 - 12:30   ET

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

[12:30:00] RICHARD QUEST, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: There is an internal reporting system in most airlines that you can privately and confidentially both self report and report somebody else that you are concerned about. But what they don't want -- what you've got to be careful off is that you don't create an environment where you're spying on each other. You don't want it to have a level of mistrust in the cockpit.

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN HOST: Well, now I wonder if that's going to change because it's -- look, Les just mention it how horrifying the thought is to not be able to trust the men and women whom you're flying.

DAVID SOUCIE, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Right, right.

BANFIELD: And might that change now?

SOUCIE: But trust goes into the regulatory systems, well you talk about the Aviation Safety and Reporting System, ASRS, which is the voluntary disclosure.

BANFIELD: Voluntary, let's write voluntary.

SOUCIE: Right, so voluntary disclosure goes into this database. Well, that was very good and it worked really well until the congress decided that they were going to ask NASA who is storing this information to release it. They said, "No, no, no, we're not going to do this."

Then within about six or eight years ago, they did release that information which was supposed to be voluntary and protected and it's not.

BANFIELD: So, can I just ask and I don't know if you know the answer tot his question. Is there any sort of monitoring of pilot social media, of their public footprint, anything like that?

SOUCIE: No, yeah, that's privacy information.

BANFIELD: If it's public. It's public.

QUEST: No, no should there be, no should there be. I mean I agree what the events we've seen of the last 48 hours.

BANFIELD: Lead you to think there should be. QUEST: No, no. This is your lone wolf, you know. In another environment when we talk about other activities...

(Crosstalk)

QUEST: This is the outline. This is...

BANFIELD: Whether you believe the Egyptians or the Americans, it happened on Egypt there as well, it also happened on is it Silkair...

QUEST: Silkair was a disagreement of that.

BANFIELD: And there's a disagreement about each, but just well. But my god if this has happened possibly three times isn't not time to change...

QUEST: Three times in the size of aviation, Ashleigh.

SOUCIE: But you're assuming that...

BANFIELD: We're talking about hundreds and hundreds of people dying, maybe three times but hundreds and hundreds of death.

SOUCIE: That's right.

QUEST: But how would you monitor this idea and what...

SOUCIE: Do we know that that -- do we know the psychological testing is effective in weeding out this people and that's...

BANFIELD: That's a good point.

SOUCIE: That's really the question. And I'd like to hear what Les has...

BANFIELD: I want to bring in a question. We invited you to send in your questions. We got a good question from Olga Halaland (ph). I hope I'm pronouncing your name right, Olga (ph) and you've asked this. Will there be an investigation into the co-pilot's family life and mental state.

Tom Fuentes, what's exactly will be happening on that front if anything?

TOM FUENTES, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Absolutely. They'll look at every aspect of the co-pilot's life not just as social media and e- mails and phone calls. But they'll be interviewing everybody that they can find that's close to him that he might have had contact with in trying to determine what type of things he was talking about, did he give indications of having depression or financial problems or other issues that may come into play here or being a depressed person.

And back to the psychological testing, I think what the airlines are hoping is that a flight attendant or a fellow pilot is going to say, "I don't want to be in the air with this guy and endanger my life." So, if they see erratic behavior or see an indication that they might turn that person in themselves for their own safety and the safety of all the passengers.

So, you know, and as David Soucie just said, there's not really great reliable testing, that's a 100 percent full proof anyway.

BANFIELD: For anybody, yeah you're absolutely right. Richard Quest, David Soucie, Les Abend and Tom Fuentes, stay with me if you will.

If that co-pilot did in fact crash this plane on purpose and that seems to be where all the indicators are pointing now. Is he in fact a mass murderer? And if that's the case, does this airline bear any responsibility? That's coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:37:23] Got some breaking news I want to bring to you. This has just come in to CNN from our justice correspondent Evan Perez. A member of the Army National Guard along with his cousin have been arrested. And get this they are facing charges of providing material support to ISIS. This is coming into CNN via a government official.

One man was apparently arrested for trying to yet again get on a flight to join ISIS ranks. Apparently, the second was plotting to use his cousin's military uniform in order to carry out an attack on an Illinois military facility.

Let me give you some of the details. The Army National Guard specialist's name is Hasan Edmonds. He's a U.S. citizen, 22 years old, apparently arrested in Chicago Midway International Airport without incident.

Apparently, the people who made the arrest were Chicago's FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force. He was apparently trying to fly to Cairo in Egypt. The cousin is Jonas Edmonds, also a U.S. citizen, 29 years old and he was arrested without incident not in any airport but instead at his home in Aurora, Illinois.

Hasan Edmonds is a current member of the Illinois Army National Guard. Apparently, the charging documents suggest that he was planning to use his military training to fight on behalf of ISIS.

Jonas Edmonds apparently asked the FBI undercover employee to assist in the attack. And explain that they would use Hasan Edmonds' uniforms and the information that he supplied about how to access the installation and target officers for the attack.

Just getting this information in now, but I'm also told that according to some of these charging documents. And I'll quote here from the assistant attorney general. "In addition, they plotted to attack members of our military within the United States. Disturbingly, one of the defendants currently wears the same uniform of those they allegedly planned to attack."

We're continuing to call the documents to find out more information. But yet again, disturbing news, news that we've heard before but this time, a member of the Army National Guard in Illinois along with his cousin both brought in on federal charges of material support to ISIS. One trying to fly to Cairo, Egypt to join ISIS ranks, the other apparently plotting to use that man's uniforms but it looks like there was an inside job in terms of the federal officials getting inside information by actually doing the works with them to get those quotes and get those plans and then make those arrest. We'll continue to follow that story.

[12:40:02] Other breaking news that we're also following, this airline crash in the French Alps, the pilot who by all accounts the co-pilot who deliberately crashed that passenger plane in those mountains has a name and now we have a picture. Andreas Lubitz, 28 years old from Germany.

Officials leading the investigation say he was alone at the controls despite the captain banging on the cockpit door, begging to be let back in, it remained locked.

149 other people were on that plane and every single one of them is now dead. Crash investigators who have heard the cockpit audio recordings, say the passengers probably did not know what was happening until those final few moments right before the crash. He say's that because he said screams could be heard on the recordings.

And the main thing getting in the way of the recovery is of course this treacherous geography. The Airbus A320 went down a deep ravine far from any roads or towns in the French Alps.

Crews have to be flown their by helicopter, they're dealing with shear cliff and ice and of course are happened to be lowered in by ropes and cables, there is no landing site anywhere near the terrain of the crash zone.

So, the CEO of Lufthansa says it is wrong to call this crash a suicide if indeed the co-pilot intentionally flew the plane into the ground. 149 other people onboard that plane did not want to die that day.

Richard Quest is back with me, HLN Legal Analyst Joey Jackson is here. So, the interesting thing is Joey Jackson I wanted to begin with you is that there was early talk of a criminal investigation that may actually result in some sort of man slaughtered charges. Which to me originally I thought what's the point, the killer himself is dead, if in fact he is intentionally a killer.

But there could be something else to put.

JOEY JACKSON, HLN LEGAL ANALYST: There could be, what happens is, is that when you act as an employee, if you're acting within the scope of your employment and you're doing something that benefits the company, corporations remember very technical point can be considered people within the eyes of the law.

So, as a result of that you might look to impute any type of criminal liability upon the corporation itself. So, we don't know the extent of it, we don't know whether the officials will do that. But in agency law if an employee acts, your acts could be imputed to the corporation. QUEST: In France there is a possibility for corporate manslaughter charges to be brought against the airline. And that's why we heard about it from the French prosecutor, corporate, yes the corporate responsibility. And I reminded it just come to me of course it was eventually thrown out on appeal. But originally Continental Airlines was convicted in the case of Concorde in the Concorde crash in the initial and criminal investigation both the...

BANFIELD: That was an accident. There was something on the runway.

QUEST: Yes, but the thing that was on the runway fell off Continental Airlines DC-10. And the argument was that it haven't been properly repaired when that piece -- or if they reverse thruster. It was a piece of the reverse thruster...

BANFIELD: Continental aircraft.

QUEST: Right, for the Continental Airlines planes. Continental was convicted of corporate manslaughter of something in front.

BANFIELD: It was thrown out.

QUEST: It was thrown out on appeal. So, what is heading for here of course is some form of was that corporate responsibility.

BANFIELD: So, does it make a difference to you if you're hearing this morning that the prosecutor in this case and prosecutors. It's a bit of a different situation were prosecutor has been the lead voice right now on some of the circumstances surrounding the crash.

This is not necessary a prosecutor taking a case to trial.

JACKSON: Right.

BANFIELD: However he did talk about changing these potential charges from involuntary manslaughter to voluntary manslaughter.

JACKSON: Right.

BANFIELD: It would never get to a level of murder would it?

JACKSON: And well, it wouldn't get to a level of murder. But here's the reality.

BANFIELD: Is there such a thing as corporate murder?

JACKSON: No. But no, but what has to happen is this, what needs to change is the dynamic of how you get a person in a cockpit who could do something like this. And I know Richard and I differ on this issue.

But the reality is, is that without psychological training how could you really know that someone is fit to fly. Know that this medical training and I know or certainly medical fitness. And I know that they're evaluated in that regard, I certainly know that they're also evaluated, in terms of their confidence and their proficiency. But the mental dynamic is a very significant one. And when you have someone here where there's no evaluation at all where you don't know if they're mentally fit and I think that first (ph) is the problem. And I think what it'll be looked into is whether or not that should be evaluated moving forward.

QUEST: There was an evaluation when he was employed. That the CEO says, that they do...

BANFIELD: And how could they change the volunteering? My question is, does the -- does an airline now have to rethink it's entire staff to realize my god we could be charged if one of our own wearing a mental of our airline individually makes a split decision or plan a decision on benotes to us.

JACKSON: I really think so.

QUEST: They don't care about whether they're being charged. They care that one of their planes doesn't fall out the sky like this. This is not about whether or not they're worried that they're going to be charged with involuntary manslaughter or not.

[12:45:07] This is about them saying "Hang on," I mean, you know, we -- pilots will be -- will rebel, I mean we can hear that from Les Abend I'm sure. They will rebel at the idea of assistant psychological testing.

JACKSON: They could rebel on it but the issue is not so much the pilot the issue is the safety of the public and the people fly that plane. And I further would believe that an airline would have too, would have to be very concerned about bearing any criminal responsibility for what they do.

And so at a minimum I think it would lead Richard in my view to a reexamination of the process.

BANFIELD: I need to jump in here only because we've just been able to get an interview with the CEO of Lufthansa, someone who you worked with many times in the past Richard Quest.

Obviously so many questions for that CEO and so many issues for that person to deal with as well as the entire staff that his responsible for. After the break, what the CEO has to say and where is this goes, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: As we continue to question what exactly motivated a co- pilot to deliberately fly an Airbus 320 into the mountains killing everyone onboard.

I want to bring in CNN's Fred Pleitgen who has just concluded an exclusive interview with the CEO of the parent airline of Germanwings Lufthansa.

[12:50:05] Fred, that's a great opportunity to try to learn more about what they're finding out. First and foremost, have you learned from the CEO what lead them to make such a conclusive decision so quickly about this co-pilot at his deliberate act?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, absolutely. That was certainly one of the things that I did put to him. We talked about a wider range of issues. And that was certainly one of the center pieces of it.

The other one pertains to the identity of the co-pilot himself, also what kind of guy the co-pilot was. But certainly, the main thing initially that we talked about was how that you could be so sure that he actually did all of this deliberately, how he could be so sure that there was criminal intent behind all of this. Let's listen into what Carsten Spohr has to say about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARSTEN SPOHR, CEO, LUFTHANSA: Apparently, after the pilot -- after the captain has left the cockpit, he try to regain access, where there were knocks on the doors according to the French authorities. And the door was either kept locked or not opened in the way it was supposed to be. And that for sure is a clear indication that the remaining pilot, the co-pilot didn't want to do the captain to return.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PLEITGEN: So, we -- I also asked him whether or not there might have been some sort of way for the captain to try and actually get back into the cockpit. And he said that there might have been some way. But he said that there was a deliberate attempt by the co-pilot to lock everybody else out of the cockpit.

Now, the other interesting thing that he said is that he said it was perfectly normal for the captain to actually be leaving the cockpit. But he said according to Lufthansa's procedures and that is something that the pilot can do when they are in a state that there's no stress on the crew, like for instance, where they were. They had just reached cruising altitude. And he says it's perfectly normal for the captain or for anybody in the cockpit to then go out, give control of the aircraft to the other person flying and then leave for a couple of moment.

So, he said there was nothing unusual about that. But of course, everything that happened afterwards was certainly very much unusual. And he said the airline is absolutely certain that there was criminal intent behind all of this that this was all this was done deliberately and also pretty much immediately after the captain left the cockpit.

BANFIELD: You know, we just think about that the students that, you know, a dozen plus students and two babies onboard and...

PLEITGEN: Yeah.

BANFIELD: ... and still this deliberate act. I just wanted to ask quickly if the CEO said anything about the mental stability or what the airline may or may not have known about this co-pilot's mental state.

PLEITGEN: Yeah. It's very interesting because that was something that I put to him as well. Also in the context of how they evaluated the mental stability of this co-pilot, of Andreas Lubitz. And he said that there don't seem to have been any sort of indications that this person might have been mentally unstable, certainly none that were found during the evaluation process. So, let's listen into what he had to say about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SPOHR: Now, the pilot has passed all his tests, all his medical exams. We have at Lufthansa the reporting system where crew can report without being punished, their own problems or they can report about problems of others without any kinds of punishment that hasn't been used either in this case. So, all the safety nets, all the safety nets we are so proud of here have not worked in this case.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PLEITGEN: So, as you can see, he said that to all the colleagues that this co-pilot flew with never had any issues with him that certainly at least according to their official records. None of the other pilot that he ever flew with seems to have any issues with them.

And so, he said that there's simply was no way for them to know that he might have been mentally unstable. He also kept alluding to the fact, what you guys have been talking about as well, is that he believes this is a single case that was within a framework that is actually working that this was a single case that could have not have been prevented by the safeguards that were in placed.

And, of course, I also asked them Ashleigh, whether or not maybe their system of evaluation was inadequate. And he said, "You know what, it's been working for us for decades." But of course he also said that the airline is going to evaluate and see whether they have to keep taps on the mental fitness of their pilots.

BANFIELD: Fred, I only have 10 seconds, but this is really a yes or no question. Did he say anything about the Norwegian airline's report that they're going to change protocol and not allow single pilots to be alone in a cockpit? Did Lufthansa say that they are considering that as well or is it too early for that?

PLEITGEN: He said -- it's interesting. He said that he believes that the process they currently have in place is working...

BANFIELD: OK.

PLEITGEN: But he also said that they are going to reevaluate those as well.

BANFIELD: Fred Pleitgen doing the job for us. Excellent work in getting that exclusive interview. Fred is in Cologne, Germany for us interviewing the Lufthansa CEO. [12:55:03] At 10:53 A.M. when contact with that plane was lost, a moment of silence was observed in Haltern, Germany. That's the town that lost 18 people from one individual school, 16 of them students, two of them teachers.

That school's website now dedicated as a memorial to all of the victims listing each of their names individually. The Americans onboard who were identified, Yvonne Selke and her daughter Emily, they were on Flight 9525, traveling together in Spain, a European vacation just mother and daughter together. And now family and friends are trying to struggle with this loss a sudden loss.

A friend who lived with Emily for two years spoke with Anderson Cooper last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HALEY HOLMES, SELKE FAMILY FRIEND: I think what people need to know about Emily and Yvonne is not -- I've seen articles saying like the five things you need to know about them. And it's so hard because I don't think there's five things to know about them, to put a person's life into five bullet points. It makes no sense to the people that know them.

And so, I think what people need to know about them and what people should know about them is that they were two -- not two Americans on the plane, not a mother and daughter on a plane, but two, Yvonne and Emily. Two amazing loving people who were left behind, friends and family who love them and miss them a lot. And I think that's the thing that people need to know about them.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: Yeah.

BANFIELD: And states department also says there was a third person from America who was onboard but there's no confirmation yet on that person's name.

Thanks so much for staying with us to this hour. Wolf starts after a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)