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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Manhunt News Conference on the Expanding Search for Fugitives; Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired June 17, 2015 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:03] ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone, I'm Ashleigh Banfield and welcome to LEGAL VIEW.

Any minute now we're going to take you live to hear what is happening in the massive manhunt for two escaped murderers in upstate New York. The district attorney, state police, they're going to give a full update, so they say, and tell where the search goes from here and where it goes forward because get a map of North America, why not just get yourself a globe and plunk your finger down anywhere on it.

That's pretty much where Richard Matt and David Sweat could be right about now because now it's day 12 of this hunt and police are expanding the search area, this after telling us the trail has gone cold. Until now, they have been concentrating on a 10,000 acre radius around the prison. The sheriff says he's confident, though, they are not there. So they're moving on but where do they go?

The two fugitives have so far left no clues, no trail, what, a couple of candy wrappers, maybe a footprint. But as far as we know, no one has seen them, interacted with them, or even gotten a whiff of them. They're either hunkered down really well or they are long gone by now.

And then there's Joyce, the woman accused of helping those two dangerous killers break out of prison. A source close to the case says Joyce Mitchell knew darn well that her two locked-up lovers planned to kill her husband after they got out. And that she told that husband all about the plan. For his part, Lyle Mitchell has a lawyer and that lawyer says no way, Lyle knew nothing.

And I want you to look at these artist renditions because the New York state police just let them out to the public. This is what they say Richard Matt and David Sweat may just look like right about now after 12 days on the run and possibly no razors to keep them looking like those mug shots. So get a good look. That's about the only change we may know at this point.

So, again, we are waiting, we're going to update you on the who's and the where's of this massive manhunt. A lot of mikes on that podium, the DA, the sheriff, state police, all of them convening at any moment to give us the update on where this search is moving and where their attention and maybe more so those assets rumored to be around a million dollars a day are going to be spent in the hunt for these two murderers.

CNN's Polo Sandoval is there where the news conference is about to get started.

Do we have any indication that this news conference is going to yield us some tangible information, Polo, at this point, or is it just to update us that we're no farther than we were back the day they broke out?

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Ashleigh. That's right. We're just standing a few feet here from the podium itself. We've seen already several high-level law enforcement officials arrive here at this Justice Complex. Now we can only assume they're speaking to the Clinton County district attorney before this press conference begins.

A few key questions that we are looking to ask here when this gets under way, really. What is the very latest on those search efforts? And also potentially the effort to secure an indictment against this female prison employee, the only person who's behind bars in this case, Joyce Mitchell.

As you mentioned there, Ashleigh, at the top, this press conference now coming just moments after New York state police released these images, what they call this natural progression pictures of these two very dangerous individuals that are still on the run after about a week and a half from their prison escape. And clearly this is indication now that the officials here in upstate New York want to make sure the public has every tool that they need, as many -- really as many images that they have to help investigators because at this point, Ashleigh, after such a long, exhaustive search, no real physical evidence has turned up any real leads and also no confirmed sightings, either.

So it will be very interesting to see exactly what District Attorney Andrew Wylie has to say here as well as several of these other law enforcement officials that have been involved in this very exhaustive search -- Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: So, Polo, I just want to remind our viewers as they see these updated pictures, you call them the natural progression pictures that were released to us, and we take a really good look at that podium where everyone is waiting, that the press corps is waiting for an update.

The reason you don't see Polo is because we're fixated on this news conference that's set to start at any moment. We're going to hear from three different people, we expect, and that's Andrew Wylie, who's the DA, but also the Clinton County sheriff, David Favro, who you've probably seen over the last 12 days giving updates on the news. And then also the New York state police we're going to hear from Major Charles Guess.

You often get a clue as to how critical a story is becoming from the number of mikes and the number of cords that lead to those podiums in advance of a news conference. So clearly this is -- this is critical information. There are a lot of people who live in that area, who have been terrified with two dangerous murderers on the loose. [12:05:06] And then there's the rest of America wondering if they're

making for farther ground to their states. Perhaps even to other countries as well.

Polo, if I could just ask you, and if we could put up those pictures again. There they are on the bottom left-hand corner of your screen, those natural progression pictures. Do we know when the original mug shots were taken? I'm only curious if Matt and Sweat have been able to lose weight since those pictures were taken, gain weight, change their hair color or at least their hairstyles or their length before they were out of prison? I mean, the baseline we're starting from is critical as well.

SANDOVAL: I agree, Ashleigh. In fact that was the very first question that came in mind when I received these pictures here and the New York state police posted those images. The main question is, those initial pictures that were modified by investigators, how old are they? There seems to be indication that they could have been some of the initial booking photos, which may lead us to believe that they're a bit older than we thought.

However, we also know that really that's going to be very crucial, those images that were modified by investigators, really how much has changed. We've seen several booking photos, in fact, some of the information that's been released to investigators that seem to show other images as well, particularly of one of these fugitives, Richard Matt.

So again, Ashleigh, that's still a question that still unanswered here. How old were those initial photos? But clearly an indication that investigators want to make sure that people have an idea what they could look like after 10 days on the run. You've seen that facial hair, possibly some changes in the hairline as well. But the sheriff here in Clinton County saying this is a fairly unusual move and it does seem to show that investigators -- or at least suggests that investigators could be running out of leads as this trail runs cold.

BANFIELD: You know, I'm also curious as to the way that we have been updated. We've had, you know, periodic bursts of information. I think the most thrilling might have been the fact that they found those wrappers that appear to have come from the prison commissary and the foot or boot or shoe print and the depressed ground. But there's been very little since that time. Do we know if today's news conference is just sort of par for the course because the press is hungry or that they really have something to tell us that's critical?

SANDOVAL: We're hoping that there is some critical information that's released, Ashleigh. Mainly about the manhunt. We've seen really what we -- all we can do is report what we're seeing. Some of these -- or at least New York state police have kept the media up to date with more press releases, not so many press conferences. And we tend to see those every other day or so. So one of the key questions here is what their plan is for this manhunt.

For several days we saw so much of the focus be on the -- or at least be -- so much of the focus was on the near West Plattsburgh which is a community not far from Dannemora, New York, which is where the -- where the Clinton Correctional Facility is. And now yesterday we heard that they're pretty much shifting their strategy here, now focusing more on the area closer to the prison itself.

One of the questions I would like to ask is, is there any hard evidence that led them closer to the initial escape site? And also what about these other leads? These initial lead that we heard about nearly a week ago when we heard from New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and his counterpart in Vermont saying that they are also considering that they may have escaped, at least crossed state lines and escaped into Vermont, a place that they thought would not have at least as high a police presence as we're seeing here.

And then the other potential lead also that takes investigators to the U.S./Mexico border. We've reported some of this information that one of these fugitives, Richard Matt, has family ties and also has contacts in several human smuggling operations along the U.S./Mexico border and so there was very real concern here after this escape happened that they could have slipped right through the net and not only left the area but also left the country -- Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: So, Polo, stand by for a moment as we keep the live picture up of the podium. We expected them to take to those mikes, you know, almost 10 minutes ago so we're going to continue to watch. As we do that, and I'll break into programming right away just as soon as we get this live update, I also want to touch on something with Larry Levine, who's a former federal inmate and the founder of Wall Street Consultants.

Larry, you know, for lack of a better description, you often in your work train people who are off to prison into how they're going to handle it, what it's going to be like on the inside because -- and I'm going to just pause for a moment if I can because the officials have come to the podium.

Larry, I'll speak with you in a moment but let's go right to Plattsburgh, New York, where again the DA Andrew Wylie, the Clinton County Sheriff David Favro and Major Charles Guess of the New York state police are lining up to update us on the latest in this investigation and this search.

ANDREW WYLIE, CLINTON COUNTY, NEW YORK DISTRICT ATTORNEY: Good afternoon, everyone. I appreciate you all being here. At this point in time initially I'd like to address the individuals that are present with me today and some of us will be speaking briefly with you to provide you with an update on the case status of the two escaped inmates, Matt and Sweat, and also status regarding Joyce Mitchell.

[12:10:14] Present obviously to my left is New York State Police Major for Troop B, Major Guess, captain and founder of the New York state police is present with us, Sheriff Dave Favro of the Clinton County Sheriff's Department. We have Chris Grogan with CPP, Tom Gallagher with Air Marine, Norm McHugh with U.S. Border Patrol, Paul Bhongilio, field operations, Tim Dunham with the FBI. We have Colonel Bradford with Docks, Captain North with Docks, Captain

Deraa with DEC Police, Captain Stripe from the State Forest Rangers, Dave McNulty with the U.S. Marshals District and Plattsburgh City police chief Desmond Racicot.

At this point in time to start off I will ask Major Guess to provide a briefing on the status of the search and the initial investigation aspect. Major Guess?

MAJ. CHARLES GUESS, COMMANDER OF POLICE SEARCH TROOP: Thank you, District Attorney. As the DA said, I'm Chuck Guess, the incident commander for this escape. I'll start off with a brief prepared statement. And -- sorry? I'll start off with a brief prepared statement and following that others will address this and then we'll open it up for questions.

Today the search for escaped inmates Richard Matt and David Sweat will expand and shift to other areas surrounding Dannemora. Personnel are being redeployed to other areas based on information gathered during the investigation. People in the region should expect to see law enforcement in their community as the search expands.

State Police along with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation officers, Forest Rangers, the Department of Corrections and Community Services supervision, the FBI, U.S. Marshals, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the Clinton, Franklin, and Essex County Sheriff's Departments, the Plattsburgh City Police Department have searched 16 square miles. To put that into context, that's over 10,000 acres to date.

All available assets continue to be deployed around the clock, including canine, aviation, and tactical units. More than 1,400 leads have been developed at this point in the investigation. In connection with this redeployment, the portion of Route 374 that was closed in Cadyville was reopened last night. Patrols in the immediate area will continue. Law enforcement personnel previously manning the roadblocks along the closed section of Route 374 will be shifted to other sectors.

The state police want to thank all of our state, federal, and local law enforcement partners, many of who are standing with us here today and continue to provide the much-needed manpower, equipment and expertise for this effort. We also want to thank the communities for their continued patience and support.

As always, the public should not hesitate to report any suspicious activity by contacting 911, your local law enforcement agency or the New York State Police to report any information related to the investigation or using our tip line, 1-800-GIVE-TIP.

As a personal note, I'd like to remind all involved that the volume of purported confidential information provided to the media by unnamed sources or those allegedly close to the investigation does not aid in this investigation. In fact, it imperils the investigation. Those responsible put our law enforcement officers and responders at risk, hampers our ability to get ahead of the fugitives and prolongs the threat to the general public.

In my 25 years of law enforcement experience, I've never witnessed better interagency cooperation. While no incident is perfect, especially with this volume of information, size, scope, and scale of the investigation, we are well coordinated as evidenced by the team behind me.

I'd now like to turn it over to Captain LaFountain who's our BCI captain in Troop B.

CAPT. ROBERT LAFOUNTAIN, NEW YORK STATE POLICE BCI: Good afternoon. I would first of all like to thank all of our partners that are here who have been so instrumental in the investigation to date and continue to do so. I'd also like to thank the public who continue to report suspected sightings or provide us with the information which may prove to be the one lead we know will result in these dangerous criminals' apprehension.

If there's one word that I thought of throughout this investigation, it is relentless. And we are going to pursue every lead and we are going to locate these individuals and they will be apprehended.

On the opening hours, my colleagues locally reached out to me. I didn't even have to reach out to them, and offered whatever assistance they could offer. Plattsburgh City police chief had his detectives dispatched to the prison where they assisted with the interviews that were pertinent to the investigation in obtaining information.

[12:15:18] That was quickly followed by the sheriff's department responding to set up roadblocks and patrols and assist us in responding to the many possible sightings or to help contain the scene. That was followed by our federal partners who have arrived and have remained both locally and throughout the nation to ensure that every single lead that we have received is being followed up on.

The complexity of this investigation cannot be described but I can assure everybody here and everyone who's listening or reading these reports that every lead is being followed up on to its conclusion, no matter where they that lead is. Today we have established approximately 1300 leads that have either been investigated or are under investigation at this time during this conference. We will continue to do so until these people are apprehended.

I would also like to emphasize that in addition to the contingent of personnel that you've seen in Dannemora, for the Bureau of Criminal Investigation for the New York State Police, that's approximately 110 investigators, we have teams of investigators in other law enforcement agencies throughout the state and region who are pursuing leads as they become available.

I can tell you right now as well that we have no information that they have been able to leave the area. That being said, it doesn't mean that they haven't been able to escape this area but we have no information. So therefore we are concentrating our efforts not only in this vicinity but throughout the nation and beyond. WYLIE: Thank you, Captain. At this time, I'd ask that City Police

Chief Desmond Racicot come up to the podium and he's going to discuss with you or at least talk to you initially about the collaborative effort that each of our law enforcement agencies had made and, Chief, I'd ask you to come up, please.

CHIEF DESMOND RACICOT, PLATTSBURGH CITY POLICE DEPARTMENT: Thank you. As Captain LaFountain from the New York State Police said, on the morning of the escape we were in direct contact with his office and they requested that we have investigators from Plattsburgh Police Department respond to the prison where we could assist with in-house interviews of inmates.

At that time obviously we know that they had a head start on us, we've deployed our special response team, as far as other members of the department, to help assist with the perimeter and to respond to issues.

The collaborative effort obviously is a very important part of this and it's what's making all these leads possible to be thoroughly worked through. The one thing I would like to stress is that if you have any information, no matter how small or how insignificant you think it is, to contact 911, contact the police. Last night I had a personal friend of mine pass some information along to me from a third party, and I said well, you've got to call the police right away, don't wait on these things.

If you think something is even remotely suspicious, contact us. Any little piece of information could be significant, could help break the case wide open. Thank you.

WYLIE: As each of you are aware, the only individual at this point in time that is in custody and that has been arrested as far as her participation in the escape is Joyce Mitchell. Joyce Mitchell is presently at the Rensselaer County Jail and I would ask Sheriff Favro to address you relative to her incarceration at this point in time and what the status is of that.

SHERIFF DAVID FAVRO, CLINTON COUNTY, NEW YORK: Thank you. As you look around, I recognize many of the faces and I'm sure on my cell phone and my text messaging I have most if not all of your numbers in there. So as you can see by the volume of people that are here from the media today, take this volume and move this to the jail location, which has one road coming in and one road coming out.

Just because of this massive manhunt and this escape, the business of the city police, the state police, Border Patrol, Customs and the Clinton County Sheriff's Department does not stop. We have to continue our operations. We have to run a safe, secure facility. It makes it very difficult to near impossible to be able to do that when we're inundated with telephone call, cameras, truck equipment, et cetera.

Therefore we had to move her, which we can under Corrections Law 5040 with a substitute jail order down to Rensselaer County. I want to publicly thank my colleagues down there. They've been very cooperative and very helpful, getting us information, anything that we need to assist with the transport and assist with the incarceration.

[12:20:07] To dovetail an awful lot with what my colleagues have said with the change and the scope of the search, with the type of search that we're doing, although this was called by the district attorney and everybody you're referring to it as a press conference, I personally would like to refer to it as a pep rally.

I think we need to let the community know that since we don't have concrete leads indicating they may be outside the area, we still need to stay motivated. We still need the assistance of the eyes and ears giving us your information. As I've stated before and a lot of my colleagues have, individuals know their property better than we ever could. So take a look at your surroundings if something does not look right, something is out of place, doesn't appear to be appropriate, there's tracks where there shouldn't be tracks, please notify the local authorities, let them know that information as expeditiously as possible so one of the agencies can follow up on it.

That's going to be our biggest key to success is keeping everybody motivated and keeping everybody alert and looking. Thank you.

WYLIE: That concludes the -- at least the initial statements that each of us will make at this point in time. And now we'd open the -- basically the floor up to questioning and what I'd ask is that we try to do this in a manner which we can, one, hear your questions with, two, address those with each of you and we're not going to spend an hour out here doing this. We'll take this for a few minutes, probably up to 10 questions or so and we'll try to deal with it in that way. Stewart?

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Can you tell us the number of personnel that would be involved in total and if you have any idea about the direction of travel on this river that you said last time?

WYLIE: OK. I'll turn that over to the major.

GUESS: Presently on the ground we have in excess of 600 law enforcement officers working the scene. Direction of travel, since we've closed the perimeter box after thoroughly sweeping that area our intention is to look at the viable high-speed avenues of egress from Dannemora prison facility into points in all cardinal directions. We're not ruling anything out, we're not taking anything for granted.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Major, is there any plans to (INAUDIBLE)?

GUESS: I will not comment on pending investigations or pending arrests.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: A question for Captain LaFountain, if I may? Hi, Captain. Anna Warner with CBS News.

LAFOUNTAIN: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Given that you're now having to look elsewhere, do you feel like there will be any miscalculations in spending so much time search so close to the prison?

LAFOUNTAIN: Absolutely not. We have to start from the, you know, zero, point zero, which was the Dannemora prison and we expanded. It's based on information that we obtained, you know, throughout the -- during the initial stages of the investigation. We have to exhaust that. As I said, there's no hard evidence that they are outside the area. That being said, I cannot rule that out. But we're going under what I think is the logical belief they can be anywhere. We're not going to rule this area out until we have identified a location that they're at. And verified that.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: So no hunch right now as to where they are?

GUESS: I don't -- I don't operate based on hunches. We operate based on evidence. And that's what we're looking for.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Captain? Captain?

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Are law enforcement looking at surveillance video that came in yesterday of five men in a red van at a convenience store? They say the tape only came in yesterday.

GUESS: We are looking at surveillance video. I can tell you this. There is no technique or law enforcement tool that is not being used by the state police or by our federal agencies. Any avenue that needs to be pursued will be pursued. We're doing it in a joint -- in coordinated fashion and effort. We're reviewing every piece of evidence that we possibly can.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: It's been 12 days since all this began. I think many people hoped for a quick resolution. The fact that it's approaching two weeks and there's been no capture of these escapees has made some people wondering how efficient this process has been. Can you talk about that? Is it unfair to expect a quick resolution and can you guarantee these gentlemen will be arrested eventually?

WYLIE: It is -- it is my belief, very my strong belief that each and every one of these members of law enforcement that are out -- have been working since Saturday morning on this case are putting in every effort that they can. We're talking about two men who have been very elusive. They came up with a very elaborate and creative plan to escape from one of the most secure facilities in New York state if not in the United States.

[12:25:03] And so we -- that is what we are defending right now and as far as the efforts of each and every one of these law enforcement officers, you cannot discredit that in one single bit. I fully support the efforts that they have. As Captain LaFountain just indicated, and as the major has talked about, we had a massive perimeter search in an area that we had information that these two men could have been at we haven't totally exhausted that but we need to open this up as the major and the captain have indicated so.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Is it unfair, though, to expect a quick resolution to this? Do you need to prepare the public for this to be a very long weeks, months perhaps search?

WYLIE: Sir, they may be -- you know, they may be located today. We don't know that. We may get that lead today that will allow us to pursue that -- you know, that arrest. I'll leave any further comments to the major, though.

GUESS: The question was, was it a waste of time or did we delay the investigators' effort? That's an emphatic no. Captain LaFountain answered that. But I can tell you, the state police and the men and women of these agencies you see behind here capable of doing more than one thing at a time.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Major, we spoke to residents who are scared, frightened, who are concerned that these individuals haven't been captured. It seems like little progress has been made. How do you comfort them?

GUESS: We comfort them with the appearance of the assets behind and a consistent message that we're doggedly pursuing every lead, we are on the ground having a visible police presence and that we are there in their community even though the roadblocks and perimeter no longer exist we have quadrupled the number of roving patrols. There's still a very strong presence in this region.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Are they safe in their country homes and their hunting camps in the woods?

GUESS: Obviously there are hundreds if not thousands of hunting camps and homes in this region. We've gone door-to-door on a good portion of those and we've used certain techniques to advise the homeowners that we have checked their property and if they haven't been there yet this season we've asked them upon arrival to let us know that. If there are any questions or if they need us to even come to the scene before they make first entry, we're willing to do that to assure their safety.

(CROSSTALK)

GUESS: I'm sorry?

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Are these men receiving help besides Joyce Mitchell now that they're on the outside? Have you developed information that they may have additional outside help?

GUESS: We're looking at everything outside and inside the facility. And I cannot comment beyond that because that would affect our confidential investigation.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Are you scaling back the numbers of officers who are out there searching? At one point you had 800 or more. Are there fewer out there? If so, why?

GUESS: That's a great question. It's roughly 200 less. The reason for that is simple. Since we're no longer containing a hard perimeter, we want to release those individuals back to their facilities. Typically they come from our Department of Corrections and Community Services. So they can go back, refit, and prepare for the next move. The next move may be that we harden up a perimeter someplace and they're immediately deployed.

I will assure you that we've retained the number of tactical, canine, aviation and ground search elements to close in rapidly on any location given the proper lead from our investigators.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Can you talk about Joyce Mitchell's state when she was moved to the county jail? And was she on suicide watch?

GUESS: Let me just answer this gentleman's question first. We'll do that as long as it takes. Sheriff?

FAVRO: She's rather composed given the gravity of what's going on around -- throughout the county. She watches the media, she sees what's happening so of course that can have an effect on somebody. The term "suicide watch" hasn't been used in the facility. We do direct supervision. We put one officer directly on an inmate like this because of everything that's going on.

It's human nature that it could have multiple impacts on somebody, both emotionally and physically, things that none of us could predict, that the medical field couldn't predict. So rather than wait for something to happen we're trying to take a proactive stance and make sure that she's safe and secure.

(CROSSTALK)

RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Captain, Captain, can I ask you about post-it notes? Can you tell us if anything about the Post-it notes that might have been found in the jail cell or along the route? Do they offer any clues as to where these gentlemen are?

LAFOUNTAIN: I have seen articles concerning a Post-It note. We'll verify one was found. I'm not going to speculate on the significance or the meaning behind it.

KAYE: Can you say how many were found?

LAFOUNTAIN: No, ma'am.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: We know that Mr. Lyle was talking to police this morning. Can you tell us whether he is the subject of investigation and whether he may have known about this escape ahead of time?

WYLIE: We have not had -- law enforcement officials that are here today right now have not spoken with. The investigators that are interviewing or had interviewed Lyle Mitchell as far as of today we had no information whatsoever that he had prior knowledge of the escape or that he participated or actively assisted in the escape.