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Legal Discrimination in Indiana?; Plane Crash Investigation Continues. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired March 30, 2015 - 15:00   ET

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

[15:00:08] BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Just stunning, frightening video of this firefighter falling through a roof. This is a veteran on the force in Fresno ventilating a roof during a house fire, when suddenly this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, my God!

(SCREAMING)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: You saw him falling through the roof into the garage and then the squadron rushes to just take down the garage doors as the flames engulf the home. The crews got him out in just three minutes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE REYES, WITNESS: Three minutes of his uniform -- his charred uniform, burnt. It would kind of tell a story just by looking at it what hell he went through in those three minutes.

KERRI DONIS, FRESNO FIRE CHIEF: Very traumatic time for the fire service and for the Fresno Fire Department. We are family, brothers and sisters and, as you can see here, we rally around each other.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Just really admire firefighters. We salute them and this firefighter in particular. The 25-year-veteran is listed in critical condition with burns covering just 65 to 75 percent of his body.

We continue on, top of the hour. I'm Brooke Baldwin. You're watching CNN's special live coverage of the downing of Flight 9525. I have some new information, new revelations I want to share with you this about this co-pilot, Andreas Lubitz mental illness, apparent suicidal tendency, injections of antipsychotic medication and the toll of his mental state, what it may have taken on his vision.

This German prosecutor revealing he was suicidal long before he got his pilot's license, so that's a couple of years at least, and long before he steered that Airbus A-320 into the French Alps. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTOPH KUMPA, DUSSELDORF PROSECUTOR: We don't have any documentation that says regarding his sight, any problems that he might have had or might have assumed to have. There isn't any documentation that says that this is caused by an organic illness.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: You heard the prosecutor say it. Any vision problems were not caused by some kind of physical condition, but we have just heard from sources close to this investigation there in Europe that these vision problems were psychosomatic, in other words, caused by stress, mental stress.

On top of all this, we're also getting chilling insight in those terrifying minutes before this plane went down, this cockpit transcription leaked by this German newspaper "Bild."

So, for 10 minutes of sheer terror as this captain is heard yelling -- and I'm quoting him -- "For God's sake, open the door." Passengers are screaming in the background. Loud metallic bangs on the cockpit door. By now, the plane has fallen 15,000 feet; 90 seconds later, another cockpit alarm goes off. The pilot heard screaming, "Open the damn door," and then sounds that are being interpreted as the plane's right wing scrapes a mountaintop. More screams from passengers and then silence.

I want to go to Karl Penhaul, who is near here the crash site.

I know, Karl, you have spoken with some of the family members. We have more on that later this hour, but amid more traumatic revelations about what their relatives went through on this flight, can you tell me what's the latest on getting these -- their loved ones' remains off the mountainside?

KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think on that front, Brooke, perhaps families will be able to find a little consolation. There's been a deal of progress here. First, as you know, this is treacherous, rugged terrain.

And until now, all the recovery teams had to go in by helicopter. On a day like today, there's been high winds and it's been too windy for the helicopters to fly. But now the local mayor, he sent in a backhoe yesterday to carve a track through the mountainside so all- terrain vehicles can get to the crash site and take the teams with them.

The good news is, that track is just 100 yards from completion and only one obstacle to go. And so it could be, by tomorrow morning, recovery teams are riding actually into the crash site on all-terrain vehicles and that means they can bring the remains, the human remains, but also vital fragments of that plane back much more quickly.

Now, in those terms as well, investigators now say that they have identified 78 human remains. The bad news, though, they also warn that some families may not get any remains back because of the speed of that crash. Some of the bodies may have been absolutely pulverized. There is still an amount of human remains lying on that hillside.

[15:05:00] But, again, rescue teams have assured us, don't worry about foxes, about the wolves in those hills, about other predatory animals. They have three guards on that site around the clock to make sure none of the human remains are taken away by animals.

Another good sign as well, today, an Israeli rescue team arrived here on site, eight-man team. They are going to help the French in whatever the French need. We're also expecting two German helicopters to come here in the course of tomorrow as well, so a growing international effort here to try and ensure that this job can get done quickly, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Still, the stories of these lives lost is so important in all of our coverage. I know you talked to some of the family members. We have that, as I mentioned, later this hour. Karl Penhaul, my thanks to you there in France.

Back to this investigation and more what we're learning, more we're learning more about the mental state of this 27-year-old co- pilot. Some questions remain, the obvious, why? Why did he do it? What was the motive and could anything have stopped him?

Joining me now, Elizabeth Cohen, our CNN senior medical correspondent, and John Goglia, a former NTSB board member and aviation safety expert.

Welcome to both of you.

Again, it was a French newspaper, "Le Parisien," reports in 2010 this co-pilot received injections of antipsychotic medication.

Elizabeth, can I just back up a half-step and even ask you, what are antipsychotic injections?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, they are injections and the same medicine can be used in a pill form as, well, Brooke, that are meant to work on someone who -- or to help someone who has psychosis.

So, psychosis is often where you have delusions or you're hallucinating or you have manic episodes. These are folks who might have schizophrenia. These are folks who might have bipolar disorder. Sometimes, they're used on folks with depression, where that depression has moved into a psychosis.

I want to emphasize, these are very heavy-duty drugs. This is sort of not a Prozac or just sort of an antidepressant. These are heavy-duty drugs used for people who have serious mental illness.

BALDWIN: So what kinds of serious mental illnesses? Again, we don't know the specifics obvious with privacy and medical laws. But what could fall under a category in which you have to get these sorts of injections?

COHEN: Right. So these kinds of injections, Brooke, are used for people who have manic depression. They're also used for people who have schizophrenia.

They are used for really a variety of different illness, but those are two of the big ones. And, again, what you're concerned about with a psychotic patient is that, to use a layman's word, you have lost a grip on reality. You are hearing hallucinations and having hallucinations and thinking that they are true, you are having delusions and thinking that they are true, that they are reality.

BALDWIN: So, John, if you have -- and again, we don't know. This is prior to -- at least according to this prosecutor, this part was prior to him receiving his pilot's license, having these suicide tendencies, being treated for this kind of depression and also with the antipsychotic injections. Should one be flying?

JOHN GOGLIA, FORMER MEMBER, NATIONAL TRANSPORTATION SAFETY BOARD: Well, of course, someone should not be flying.

We need to have a process that allows us to identify that -- those problems before we give them a pilot's license, before we get pre-employment. The screen process should be able to uncover it. But the laws in this country and in many countries prevent that from happening.

What we really need to do is sit down and start developing a process where there is a reporting system for the authorities, either the government or some entity, to be able to take a look at each individual and say, this person shouldn't be having certain kinds of jobs and put a process in place that can notify employers after they query them, what is named, that they should not be putting this person operating equipment.

BALDWIN: It's been explained to me, you know, when you fill out this paperwork, I think it's online now and you're asked to become a pilot, have you ever been treated for X, Y and Z and it's just checking these boxes and it's really sort of this on your honor system. To your point, obviously there needs to be changes, but how do you think pilots would feel about those changes in terms of privacy and their own rights?

GOGLIA: Well, they are going to be having some concerns in terms of how intrusive it becomes.

We need to make sure we have pilots sitting at the table and representatives from organizations and work our way through it. I don't know of one pilot that is flying today that would like to see a repeat of this event. So they are a reasonable bunch of people normally and I think if we put some reasonable rules in place, that they will go along with it. But we need to make sure that they have input into it, along with the medical professions and the companies and the government to sit down and develop a set of procedures.

BALDWIN: Right. And, Elizabeth, this story also just sort of got me thinking when you think of pilots and captains and co-pilots. These are jobs in which you're carrying people's lives with you. People's lives are on the line.

[15:10:04] What other professions would one have to report a diagnosis like apparently this 27-year-old co-pilot years prior had?

COHEN: You know, Brooke, I don't know that there is a profession where a doctor is required to report to the employer or to authorities.

For example, if a bus driver comes to see a psychiatrist and is clearly psychotic, I don't think that that doctor has any legal duty to report that to the employer or to authorities. And, you know, as you were just talking about with John, you sort of wonder, is that the way that it should work?

For example, if a child shows up at a pediatrician's office and has clearly been abused, that pediatrician, not only can they report it, they have to report it. If you use kind of that as a model, if a pilot or a bus driver or someone in a place of authority who could really -- has a job where people could get hurt, if they are clearly having problems that would interfere with their ability to execute their job, maybe there should be a system where that doctor has to report.

BALDWIN: Elizabeth Cohen, thank you very much. John Goglia, thank you.

Next, more on this story. We will you what the pilot saw as he tried to break into this cockpit. You will see how indestructible these cockpit doors really are.

Plus, as we learn more about the co-pilot's mental state, I will speak live with someone who says, whatever you do, do not blame this on depression. Hear her reasons ahead.

A tensions running high in Indiana, as critics say this new law would not protect religion, but instead allow discrimination against gays and lesbians. We will debate both sides. You're watching CNN.

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[15:15:45] BALDWIN: You're watching CNN. I'm Brooke Baldwin.

Most of this investigation surrounding Germanwings Flight 5925 has really honed in on the co-pilot and his apparent wish to crash a plane into the French Alps. But what about the captain here?

French prosecutors when Captain Patrick Sondenheimer returned to the cockpit after using the bathroom, the door was locked. And these leaked cockpit transcripts show he could be heard yelling -- I'm quoting him -- "For God's sake, open the door."

This captain's family visited the crash memorial, a site where a small stone has been laid in memory of those who died.

Let me bring in justice correspondent Pamela Brown, who is in Dusseldorf, Germany.

Pam, I know you have been hearing a lot about this co-pilot, learning a lot about that, but let's shift our focus for now to the captain. Tell me more about him.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes. He's really the unsung hero here, Brooke.

As you mentioned, he tried to break down that cockpit door to regain control of the aircraft. He's 34 years old and his name is Patrick Sondenheimer. He has two young children, in fact, one child in kindergarten. There was a memorial service for him this past Friday right near where I am in Dusseldorf.

My colleague Felix Gussone actually spoke to his grandmother, who was very emotional on the phone, as you can imagine. And she said that he was a loving father and hero. She said: "I'm devastated. His death came so sudden and it leaves my whole family in shock. He deserves the German medal of honor for his heroic attempt to break into this cockpit."

Really just so sad and tragic, Brooke.

BALDWIN: There are no words, right? And then you have this co- pilot which do we have to talk about because we're learning more. And you learned about an issue with his vision today.

BROWN: Right. He heard from the prosecutor publicly that he had had a lot of doctor visits recently and what I learned from a source close to this investigation was that he thought he was having trouble with his vision, so he went to the eye doctor thinking there was something physically wrong with him. Turns out the doctor said it was all mental, that it was all in his head, that he had a psychosomatic disorder.

And we also found out that he was going to a neuropsychologist and was telling this doctor the he was overly burdened at work and that he was very stressed out. But interesting to note here, Brooke, authorities are still saying they don't know what a motive is. They haven't found anything in his apartment or anything from talking to his family and friends, his girlfriend and so forth that would indicate he had any other personal problems, anything indicating why he would have done the unthinkable, deliberately crashing this plane into the Alps.

It really remains a mystery, but it's clear he had a history of mental health issues and was suicidal even before he got his pilot's license -- Brooke.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Pamela Brown in Germany. Thank you so much, Pamela.

Could this plane, could the locked cockpit door on Flight 9525, the very safety precaution put in place to protect the flight crew, have contributed to the tragedy on this particular plane? CNN's Stephanie Elam gives us more perspective on how strong

these cockpit doors are and why it's so hard for anyone to gain access once they have been locked out.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Brooke, we want to take you inside the cockpit so we could show you the pilot's perspective of the door.

Obviously, here's the door. It's a slim door. It's got the peephole so they can look outside, see who is coming down the aisle. But there's more to this door. I want to take you outside and show you a little bit more about this door and introduce you to Captain Ross Aimer, who's going to help us learn more about this door.

First of all, how hard is it to destruct this door?

ROSS AIMER, CEO, MYAVIATIONEXPERT.COM: It's pretty hard. It's been tested with a grenade and it didn't open.

ELAM: And it still didn't open.

AIMER: Still didn't open.

ELAM: It's a reinforced solid door. It's a solid door. I can feel it's heavy even when I'm touching it. But there's more to it, like this lock up here. Tell me about this lock.

AIMER: This is basically a deadbolt. That's the final thing that you could turn on. Once you have this deadbolt on, there's no way anybody can open this door from outside.

ELAM: No matter what?

AIMER: No matter what.

ELAM: How would they get in eventually if they needed to?

AIMER: They may have to break the cockpit windows from the outside to get in.

ELAM: It's a serious lock.

AIMER: It's a serious lock.

ELAM: Let's come outside and just take a look at this door from the outside. There's this key up here. How well does that work?

AIMER: That was originally put in there, but after what -- we had keys initially. TSA took all the keys away from the pilots.

ELAM: No one has access to that?

AIMER: No one has access to that. ELAM: OK. And then beyond that, there's also this keypad here

that I want to show, because that keypad was key to letting a pilot in, but there are other parts to it, right?

[15:20:01] AIMER: Yes.

There are obviously codes that are issued periodically. It's changed. And a pilot puts the code in. There's a 30-second delay that he could just get in. After that, again, it's locked.

ELAM: Even if you do know the code, you still could be locked out?

AIMER: You could be locked out, yes.

ELAM: Overall, when you look at what happened with this Germanwings disaster and you look at the door, do you think that the door operated the way it was supposed to?

AIMER: Exactly. It operated the way it was designed, except this time it kept the good guy out.

ELAM: That is so scary -- Brooke, back to you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: Stephanie Elam, thank you.

Just ahead, an expert in psychosomatic medicine says, do not blame this plane crash on depression. She will join me live to explain that.

Plus, the new religious freedom law in Indiana, we have to talk about this, creating fight a firestorm. To critics, they say this will let businesses discriminate against gays, but supporters say it protects religious freedom. We will debate both sides next here on CNN.

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[15:25:18] BALDWIN: Indiana. Let's talk about what is happening there.

The public criticism has apparently gotten through to legislators in that state. The state's lawmakers are promising to amend the controversial religious freedom law so it cannot be used to discriminate against gays and lesbians. And you have the Republican mayor of Indianapolis speaking out last hour calling on the legislature to fix the law and to make sexual orientation a legally protected class. We're going to get more into that in a minute.

This controversy erupted when Governor Mike Pence signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Indiana joined 19 other states with laws designed to prevent the government from intruding on religious liberty unless there is a compelling legal interest. You see all those yellow states there. But listen to this. Indiana's new law has raised a new set of

concerns that it would legalize discrimination against gays and lesbians. For starters, Indiana's law allows a person, even a business, to cite religious beliefs as a legal defense in private disputes, even if no arm of the government is involved.

Also keep in mind here, Indiana has no statewide law protecting gays and lesbians from discrimination.

So I wanted to hear both sides. I have got with me Professor Robert Katz from the Indiana University Law School. And Russell Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Gentlemen, to both of you, thank you for joining me.

RUSSELL MOORE, PRESIDENT, ETHICS AND RELIGIOUS LIBERTY COMMISSION, SOUTHERN BAPTIST CONVENTION: Good to be with you.

ROBERT KATZ, INDIANA UNIVERSITY LAW SCHOOL:

BALDWIN: Robert, Robert, let me just begin with you just on the law. And I just hit this a moment ago. But I want to hear you explain. What is different about the law in Indiana that makes it more objectionable than other religious freedom laws on the books in even more left-leaning states like Connecticut, Rhode Island, because no one apparently really complained too much then?

KATZ: Well, this is nothing that particularly objectionable about the law itself. This isn't about the text of the law. It's about the context.

First of all, the law was passed a couple of months after the U.S. court of appeals eliminated Indiana's ban on same-sex marriage and this law, which is redundant with existing Indiana law, which means that we had essentially the same law on our books, so this law was unnecessary. It was seen as politically valuable as a sort of consolation to the religious groups that oppose same-sex marriage.

So I would say, you know, I don't want to quibble with the law itself because we didn't need it in the first place. And the problem when you start enacting laws for which there is no particular need is you create new problems that you didn't anticipate. And so here the two problems were the terrible reaction to the image of Indiana across the country and also the unintended consequence of, at the end of today, protection for gays and lesbians being strengthened in the state of Indiana.

These are two unintended consequences of the Republicans pushing through a law we didn't need in the first place.

BALDWIN: OK. That's your opinion.

Russell, I want your opinion. And I want to -- I just want to first just get this answer from you. Under this law, would it be legal for an Indiana bakery -- let's just use an example -- for an Indiana bakery to refuse to bake a wedding cake for a same-sex couple, for a same-sex wedding?

MOORE: This one does not speak to that at all. All this law speaks to is the fact that religious freedom is an issue that ought to be brought up in the courts so that religious motivations out to be considered by the courts when they're trying to decide issues for the common good.

Robert is right that this law does not differ substantially from RFRAs in other states, from the federal RFRA. It simply makes clear what the courts have already ruled in other cases.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: But isn't that something that could happen under the law? Pardon my interruption. Isn't that something though that could happen here?

MOORE: Well, that's akin to saying because there are laws protecting the Amish riding horses and buggies on the roads that that means that we no longer have federal highway laws. That's ridiculous.

All this law states is that the government has to show why it is overriding someone's religious exercise, free exercise of religious beliefs and that the government has taken into account the least restrictive way to do that. And so the overreaction to this law is howling at the moon hysterical. I don't think I have ever seen a more ignorant response to a law in my life.

BALDWIN: Let me push you, though, on that. And I hear you and there has been obviously a lot of frustration.

But here's one key difference.

And, Robert, with your legal hat, you can chime in as well, but this is to Russell, because what makes it different in Indiana is that sexual orientation is not covered under Indiana's civil rights law. And I know when -- Governor Pence, when he was pressed on this over the weekend, he said he wouldn't be pursuing that.

As I've mentioned we just heard from the Indianapolis mayor saying, he wants to the law, you know, the one -- pass a lot that protects all who live and work in and visit Indiana to so immediately. So would you be willing to change that part of the law?