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ISIS Advancing or Falling Back?; Biker War; D.C. Murder Suspect Caught. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired May 22, 2015 - 15:00   ET

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


[15:00:02]

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: The dramatic manhunt searching for Wint spanned 400 miles. Authorities say they barely missed him at his girlfriend's apartment in Brooklyn. Then he turned back, they say, to Washington, D.C., where they finally nabbed him, along with five other people, late last night.

Our Tom Foreman is outside of the courthouse in Washington, D.C.

Tom, what are these court documents telling us thus far?

TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, they're giving us a few more details, Poppy.

They cite the defendant, of course, Mr. Wint, as 5'7'', 155 pounds. They talk about the firefighters going into the building after seeing these fires and finding the three adults. Unconscious is how they describe them here. We don't know what that means in the end, because we know that in the end they were all killed. And this has been ruled homicide in all four cases.

They describe the young boy, the 10-year-old son, Philip, as being found on the remains of a mattress, remains of a bed where there had been so much burning that the whole bed frame had been consumed by fire, so had most of the mattress, and even the floor underneath it all had been consumed by a tremendous amount of fire.

So these are the details we have so far, Poppy. We just got these documents. We're hoping to a little bit learn more in court here. We're hoping to have a little more details in court. But, basically, what we have so far is a little bit of a laying out of a few more details of what we already knew.

HARLOW: Right.

FOREMAN: And we're waiting right now. We're hoping any minute now that he -- Mr. Wint is actually going to be in front of the judge here in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia -- Poppy.

HARLOW: You think about, Tom, the other people he was found with, five other people, I understand. One, the authorities say, is his brother. What about the other folks? Do we know who he was with and why?

FOREMAN: We don't know the details of why he was with them. We don't know the details of who all they are.

We do know, though, that, at the moment, they're not being charged, that they haven't yet come up with charges on those. That's the word from the authorities here. We're very much hoping that one of the U.S. attorneys is going to come out and have a word to say after this is all done. Maybe we will get some more answers then, Poppy, but this does seem to be complicated in the sense that we don't really know the details.

My experience tells me authorities are also sorting through the details, trying to figure out what they can be told by these various people. So I would expect them to be relatively cagey until somebody opens up and tells them something that really explains all the details of what happened.

HARLOW: Right.

FOREMAN: We don't even know if any of the others were involved in this part. We know right now Mr. Wint is the only one charged in these four homicides -- Poppy.

HARLOW: It's just so tragic. As they focus on the suspect here, you got to remember the family and these four people and this little 10- year-old boy who the authorities say it looks like he was tortured before he was killed. Tom Foreman, thank you very much.

Well, one of Wint's former attorneys says that's not the client he knew. He describes Wint as a gentle man, not mean, a man trying to find his way, and a patriot, the kind of guy, he says, that you take to your grandmother's house for dinner.

But Wint does have a lengthy criminal past, including assault and burglary charges. Investigators first connected Wint to the murders after finding what they say is his DNA on a pizza crust left at the crime scene. His former lawyer says, even if that's true, it doesn't mean that he went inside the mansion or that he killed anyone. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROBIN FICKER, FORMER ATTORNEY FOR DARON WINT: I know him to be a kind, gentle, nonaggressive person, someone you wouldn't mind your grandmother going to lunch with. He's not the guy that did this. I met with him many times. I have observed hundreds of thousands of people in my life, completed 30,000 cases in court. When I'm sitting across from a person for hours at a time, I can tell that they're kind and gentle. He was not a mean, aggressive person at all.

He was a young man finding his way, a student at Prince George's Community College. He tried to get into the Marines. He was patriotic. I have had many cases where the DNA findings have been thrown out of court. We don't know who conducted this DNA and how it was done. It needs to be scrutinized.

Why is -- why are the police letting out piecemeal little bits of evidence in a Chinese water torture method? They need to conduct themselves in court and not keep talking to the media, trying to brand this guy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: So that is Wint's former attorney, who represented him in six different incidents.

Joining me now to discuss, defense attorney Randy Zelin. And also former prosecutor and criminal defense as well with us now is Troy Slaten.

Guys, thank you very much for being here.

Troy, let's begin with you.

If this pizza crust is the only DNA that they have in this case, right -- it's sort of shocking to people that if he was in this house for hours and hours, how is there no other DNA? But let's say it's just the pizza crust. Is that enough to get a conviction?

[15:05:02]

TROY SLATEN, FORMER PROSECUTOR: It may not be enough to get a conviction, but it may be enough for probable cause to hold him to answer to these charges, which is a much lower standard.

Of course the DNA will have to be examined to see how it was collected and all the other evidence. But circumstantial evidence is sufficient in a case like this.

HARLOW: Randy, what do you think?

RANDY ZELIN, ATTORNEY: It's so difficult to say.

What we're talking about, first of all, a little evidence 101, the difference between direct evidence and circumstantial evidence. And it's as simple as, if you want to know whether or not it's raining outside, well, if you're outside and the rain is falling on you, that's direct evidence of rain.

If you go into the subway and it's not raining and you're in the subway and you see people coming down and they're wet and they have umbrellas and their umbrellas are wet, you didn't see it rain, you don't have direct evidence, but you can naturally infer it rained.

HARLOW: But, so where does this DNA on pizza crust fall in that?

ZELIN: Well, look, not to be flippant, but if that's all that they have, can you say that there's no other plausible explanation? It is his former boss. Maybe he was in the neighborhood, stopped by. They had pizza. Don't forget the movie "My Cousin Vinny," which is the Sac-O-Suds. You had the wrong people. Those things can happen. So, simply DNA, not enough.

(CROSSTALK)

HARLOW: Troy, he fled. Right. He fled. He knew the authorities were going after him. Right? And the authorities say when they caught him last night, he had $10,000 cash on hand.

SLATEN: Well, that's more circumstantial evidence.

And the fact that he fled, that's called consciousness of guilt. In every single criminal trial, when a person leaves the scene, when they run, when they try and evade the police, they're allowed a specific jury instruction that the prosecutor always gets and is always afforded that says that, when somebody leaves, that means it's consciousness of guilt. They knew what they had done was wrong and they were trying to get away from the authorities.

HARLOW: Randy.

ZELIN: Right. No, but go ahead.

HARLOW: No, no, go ahead. Jump in.

ZELIN: You have to exclude -- in a circumstantial evidence case, every other explanation has to be excluded to a moral certainty. Flight, they found him in Maryland. He went to New York and then came back. I would argue that's, what, risk of coming back?

The fact that he had 10 grand in cash on him? Again, he could have been going to buy a used car. So you cannot at this particular moment exclude every other explanation to prove his guilt right now.

HARLOW: Troy, I think it's interesting. Look, he has a criminal record, as we talked about, but no significant history of violence. There's no murder charges on there. There's no aggravated assault, no kidnapping. You do say crime -- criminal acts tend to increase over time. Explain what you mean.

SLATEN: That's true. I mean, his former attorney said, oh, this is a guy that would be great to have lunch or dinner with grandma. Well, in 2010, he was caught with a machete. And I don't know about Mr. Zelin, but I certainly wouldn't want a guy coming to dinner with my grandma with a machete. So, criminals very often start small and get big.

HARLOW: Randy, put yourself in the shoes. You're going to be the defense attorney, OK, for -- whoever this guy gets for a defense attorney. What do you do? What's the first thing you do?

ZELIN: Well, the first thing I'm going to do is, I'm going to look at evidence. Right now, all we have is the DNA on the pizza crust. So, as my colleague indicated, we're going to tear apart that, from how it was collected to how it was analyzed.

HARLOW: Do we know that's all we have? That's all we, the media, know.

ZELIN: Well, that's all we know right now. And, again, I would not argue that that was consciousness of guilt from a risk of flight standpoint. I would hope that my client made no statements once he was taken into custody. Right now, we don't have a murder weapon. And right now we don't have

a motive. So we have got a long way to go before we start talking about a conviction, certainly beyond a reasonable doubt. And let's not forget he's presumed to be innocent.

HARLOW: Innocent.

Thank you very much.

SLATEN: That's true.

HARLOW: Good to have you both on.

Randy Zelin, Troy Slaten, have a great weekend, guys.

Coming up next: bikers declaring war on some police officers after that shoot-out in Texas, a new warning suggesting that biker gangs, some of them, some of them, may have bombs and grenades and be poised to attack police officers. How are the police preparing? We will talk about that next.

Also, CNN sits down with an interview with a waitress and a former bartender from the Twin Peaks restaurant, including one who saw that entire standoff firsthand. Hear what she has to say.

Also, ISIS advancing, terrorists getting closer and closer to Baghdad, as critics pounce on the president for saying the United States is not losing this war.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:14:06]

HARLOW: A new and frightening warning for law enforcement, the potential use of car bombs planted by revenge-seeking bikers against police officers.

Officers in these places, also all across Texas, got this warning from the state's Department of Public Safety. What the warning also says is that officers' family members could be at risk, as members of the Bandidos and Black Widows may, they say, seek retaliation for Sunday's shoot-out in Waco that left nine of those bikers dead.

A source tells us here at CNN four of those bikers were killed by the police.

Let's go now to CNN's Alina Machado. She joins us from Texas.

And, Alina, when you look at this, some are critical of this information. They say, how realistic of a threat is that really? Where is it coming from, and how seriously are the authorities taking it?

ALINA MACHADO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Poppy, authorities are definitely taking it seriously in light of what happened over the weekend in Waco. [15:15:01]

The bulletin is based on unsubstantiated information from an informant who claims to have obtained it from members of the Bandidos and another group called the Black Widows. You know, the Texas Department of Public Safety issued this warning, saying that they believe that some members of the Bandidos were actually giving the group grenades and C-4 explosives to be used to retaliate against police for what happened in Waco, Texas, over the weekend.

I want you to listen to what the Waco Police Department has to say about this new threat.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

SGT. W. PATRICK SWANTON, WACO POLICE DEPARTMENT: The incident that occurred here Sunday afternoon was an absolute tragedy. However, those that -- those of you that were there know that we did absolutely nothing to start that. We would ask you to remember that and remind you that, although you have totally different ways from us, law enforcement did not start the melee that occurred at Twin Peaks on Sunday afternoon.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

MACHADO: Obviously, the message is, let's keep the peace here. Authorities not just in Waco, by the way, but authorities all over the state of Texas are on alert since this shoot-out happened over the weekend, Poppy.

HARLOW: So, you're in Mingus. And this is a town where there was going to be this huge biker event, a rally that was previously planned here. And then, obviously, because of what transpired last Sunday has been that it's been canceled.

What is the sheriff doing there to prepare in case people show up with any ill intentions?

MACHADO: Yes, the sheriff tells us that he is prepared for the worst, but, again, hoping that nothing will happen, hoping for the best-case scenario.

He's hoping that it will be a quiet weekend. One of the biker groups involved in Sunday's deadly shooting over in Waco, Texas, were the Cossacks. And the Cossacks typically have a meeting, a rally in this town, in Mingus, every year. This year, after what happened, they decided to cancel it.

I want to show you a sign here in town. It says, "The Cossacks have agreed to cancel the Mingus employee blowout," which is the rally, "for the safety of Mingus."

The sheriffs says that he talked to the group and that they agreed to cancel the event. The road leading to the Cossacks' property though is blocked off. It's just down the street from where we are. And so far, we're told that no one has showed up and the hope here is that no one else will show up and that things stay calm in this town, Poppy.

HARLOW: All right, Alina Machado live for us there in Mingus, Alina, thank you very much for that.

And police say that 170 bikers, all of those who were arrested on Sunday in Waco, came there to be violent. But an attorney for one of those men behind bars says his client was a bystander, not a brawler.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAM SMITH, ATTORNEY FOR BIKER: Well, he was in the parking lot. The meeting hadn't started. He heard a gunshot, fell to the ground, and then the melee broke out. That's all he knows. He was there to attend the meeting.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: So what did happen? Obviously, there are a lot of different accounts depending on who you talk to.

But our very own Gary Tuchman sat down with a waitress from the Twin Peaks restaurant where the bikers had gathered. She says she was there when the first shots were fired.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Two women who worked at the Twin Peaks restaurant, one of them a waitress who was there when the shots rang out.

Amy, who doesn't want her real name used, doesn't want her face shown for her safety, she says the trouble started in the parking lot of the restaurant.

AMY, WITNESS: At first, it seemed like it was just a simple fistfight.

TUCHMAN (on camera): And were they yelling and screaming?

(CROSSTALK)

AMY: There was a little bit of yelling. Like, you couldn't hear exactly what they were saying. But you could hear -- you could hear a little bit.

TUCHMAN (voice-over): Amy says almost all of the bikers were on a patio outside of Twin Peaks. A patio that fits about 100 was standing room only.

AMY: Next thing you know is, you just hear the first gunshot go off and then a couple fired after that.

TUCHMAN (on camera): And what are you thinking?

AMY: Thinking -- I didn't know what -- I honestly didn't know what the hell was happening. I didn't know if gunshots were going to become flying in towards the building or if they were just going to be going back and forth between who was shooting.

There was a lot of screaming. We just -- like, you hear all of us, oh, my God, what's going on, like, just start screaming and take off running to the back. Some of the people were, like, down squatting and running -- like, squatting and running at the same time or crawling to the back.

TUCHMAN (voice-over): Employees and some customers hid inside a walk- in refrigerator and freezer.

(on camera): So, you walked into the refrigerator and how many people were in there with you?

AMY: With me, there were seven waitresses and then one customer and like six or seven, maybe eight of the kitchen staff and back of house staff. It was pretty scary, because we were like -- and we were trying to put stuff in, because in the refrigerator where we were, like, we actually had the racks to move in front of the door to kind of barricade ourselves.

So, if anyone were to come in, trying to actually get after everybody, like, we were at least -- we least at were protected.

TUCHMAN: But what were you discussing while you were in the refrigerator with everybody?

AMY: Just if we were even going to make it through.

[15:20:01]

TUCHMAN (voice-over): Amy says, after about 10 or 15 minutes, bikers outside the refrigerator, at least some of whom ended up being arrested, told those in the refrigerator the coast was clear.

(on camera): So, you walked out of the refrigerator in a line, your hands up.

AMY: Yes.

TUCHMAN: Who told you to put your hands up?

AMY: The police did. As we were going through, like, somebody up in the front was told to put their hands up, so they kind of passed the word back. So, we were just passing it back to each other.

TUCHMAN: So, you went out with your hands up. You must have been very relieved.

AMY: A little bit, but it was kind of nerve-racking having guns pointed at you while you're walking out of the building.

TUCHMAN: By the police?

AMY: Mm-hmm.

TUCHMAN (voice-over): Veronica Williams left her job as a bartender a week before the shooting.

(on camera): So it's your opinion, though, that the police gave your bosses fair warning, the possibility of big-time trouble with these guys?

VERONICA WILLIAMS, FORMER RESTAURANT EMPLOYEE: Yes.

TUCHMAN (voice-over): Veronica says she was working in the restaurant last month when cops came to talk to the bosses.

(on camera): Tell me what the police officer told your managers.

WILLIAMS: He said there was conflict between some of the clubs, the motorcycle clubs, and it would be in the best interest to not have any biker events.

TUCHMAN (voice-over): But events continued to be held. The top manager at the Waco Twin Peaks did not return our phone calls. Today, Amy is grateful to be alive.

AMY: I look back at it and I just said, we're all beyond blessed that it wasn't worse than it already was.

TUCHMAN: Gary Tuchman, CNN, Waco, Texas.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: Really, first time we have heard from someone directly who was inside of that restaurant.

All right, coming up next, breaking news in the fight against ISIS. Authorities say they have arrested two would-be terrorists on U.S. soil. We will bring you the details on that next.

Also, the first round of Hillary Clinton's e-mails while she was secretary of state have been released to the public. She is now responding to them -- what she said straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:25:50]

HARLOW: All right, this just into us here at CNN. Two men from Orange County have been arrested on federal charges of conspiring to provide material support to ISIS.

It's something we have heard far too much about lately across many states across this nation. The feds say that one of these men in California tried to go to the Middle East, that they both used social media to discuss potential terror attacks, and that they both wanted to die as martyrs. Both of them are due in court this afternoon. As soon as we get more updates, we will bring them to you of course right here.

Also, right now, ISIS terrorists are even closer to the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, first taking Ramadi, now taking a town near a very critical military base. President Obama saying -- quote -- "I don't think we're losing," referring to the war against ISIS.

But these maps paint a different picture. Last year, take a look. This was ISIS' presence across the Middle East, the group scattered across Syria and Iraq. Today, look at this, a lot more red because ISIS has taken a lot more territory across the region. Their presence is growing in Libya, in Tunisia, in Yemen. And, as for Syria, the terrorists are now apparently in control of half, half of the entire country of Syria.

Joining me now to talk about it, Steven Bucci, director of the Center for Foreign Policy Studies at the Heritage Foundation. Also with us in Washington -- excuse me -- Steven is also a former Army Special Forces officer and a top Pentagon, former top Pentagon official during the Iraq War. And also with us in Washington is Ahmed Ali, a senior fellow at the Education for Peace in Iraq Center.

Gentlemen, thank you both for being here.

Ali, I want to begin with you, because -- Ahmed, because you penned a very, very interesting op-ed in "The New York Times." And you argue that even with 50 percent of Syria under ISIS' control, even with the fall of Ramadi and Fallujah in Iraq, you say that people are overblowing the advances that ISIS has made. How can that be?

AHMED ALI, EDUCATION FOR PEACE IN IRAQ CENTER: Well, Poppy, it's good to be with you.

I think, if you look at Iraq, there's certainly a mixed picture when it comes to the war against ISIS. Even though ISIS took over control of Ramadi last Sunday, you see that in other parts of the country over the last five to six months, ISIS has been firmly contained. It has been pushed back. It has been rolled back.

It -- and it decided as a result of all of these setbacks to shift its effort to Ramadi and to Anbar. Therefore, I do not see the shift to Anbar as a sign of strength by ISIS. It is, in fact, a sign of desperation. And that's what I say in my op-ed.

HARLOW: Yes, that part really stood out to me. You write, the attack on Ramadi was an attack of desperation, not strength. I wonder sort of why you come to that assessment.

ALI: Because of the situation in Ramadi. We do have to keep in mind that ISIS did not blitz into Ramadi. The city did not fall under ISIS control in three days. It has been contested by ISIS since January 2014, which is about 16 months. And it has fought -- ISIS has fought the anti-ISIS forces in Ramadi, including the Iraqi security forces and tribes that are against ISIS, for 16 months.

And, therefore, these forces were very exhausted. And they -- ISIS knew that issue, knew those difficulties, and it saw Ramadi as a target of opportunity. It was not necessarily a show of strength by ISIS.

HARLOW: Steven, we did see a coalition and U.S. forces come out successful in Kobani, right, in Syria, where you just had this bombardment in terms of the air campaign. And, ultimately, they were able to push ISIS out. But you did, at the same time, have Mosul fall in June of last year.

Do you agree with Ahmed's assessment that perhaps the media and others are overblowing these advances that ISIS is making?

STEVE BUCCI, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: Well, I wish I could be as optimistic as my colleague Ahmed, but, unfortunately, I can't.

This doesn't mean that, because Ramadi fell, that all of Iraq is going to fall apart. He's right. It did take them longer to do. They showed some great sophistication, waited until the -- there were sandstorms, which lessened the effect of the American airpower.

They used some very sort of innovative suicide vehicles to do this, bulldozer, things of that nature. So, these guys are thinking.