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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Tropical Storm Erika; Virginia Governor Talks Shooting; Flanagan's Work Record. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired August 28, 2015 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:00] KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: We have made it to the weekend, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us "AT THIS HOUR."

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: LEGAL VIEW with Ashleigh Banfield starts right now.

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone, I'm Ashleigh Banfield, and welcome to LEGAL VIEW.

We want to start this hour with a state of emergency in Florida where Tropical Storm Erika has the potential to cause some very damaging flooding. Right now it is making its way through the Caribbean. It's ravaging the tiny island of Dominica. Have a listen to what we're seeing.

(VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: That building that you're seeing collapsing is a school. Dominica's prime minister says at least 12 people at this stage are dead on his island. More than 20 people are unaccounted for at this time. The pictures are incredible.

Meteorologist Chad Myers is tracking the storm from the CNN Center - the Weather Center in Atlanta.

Chad.

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: You know, Ashleigh, this thing still could be a hurricane, but right now the forecast is for it not to be one because it's going to drive itself over so much land. The first land is going to be the Dominican Republic and Haiti. The second area will be over parts of Cuba. And then the third area will be over Florida. At least that's the center of the cone of uncertainty.

Now, here's where it gets interesting. If the storm misses the cone or stays on the right side of the cone, it could become a hurricane here in the very warm water of the Atlantic because of the Gulf Stream. It could continue to go to the south of Cuba and end up in the Gulf of Mexico. That's still a possibility. This storm has defied all of the models now for the past three to four days. It's either north or south of the model. It's just not reacting properly.

Now, I do think that the storm models are getting a better handle on it today saying probably over Florida for most of its lifetime. If this happens, it will be a 45 mile per hour tropical storm making heavy rain over Florida. That's great. They need the rain. They'll take it because it's in a significant drought. What you're seeing down here in the DR and also Haiti is possibly flooding rainfall, just like they had in Dominica.

We'll keep watching it for you. Have a great weekend.

BANFIELD: All right, Chad, thank you for that. And we will continue to tap in to find out what happens with this storm.

In the meantime, I do want to move on to that live television double murder that happened this week in Virginia and what we are learning about it today. The governor there, Terry McAuliffe, is in Roanoke right now. And I'm going to take you live there in just a moment.

But we are also looking into the solitary, angry, and bizarre life of the man who walked up and gunned down two young TV journalists live on the air. Vester Flanagan, knowingly or not, actually helped the police pinpoint his location when he was on the run after killing Alison Parker and Adam Ward. He texted his friend and said that he'd done, quote, "something stupid." That text, with his phone number attached, probably led police right to him.

It doesn't appear that Flanagan wanted to be caught, strangely enough, because police found all kinds of things in his car that make them think he was trying to get away and stay away, hidden. They found a wig and sunglasses and several different license plates in that rental car.

And this. Look at Vester Flanagan's home. We got access to video of the killer's apartment in Roanoke. There's really not much in there, but there are a lot of pictures of himself, a bare mattress, and a computer.

We have some other material, too. The killer's suicide letter, his work history, what former co-workers are saying about him as well. We're going to try to get inside the man's state of mind, his madness, with a psychoanalyst and former FBI agent. That's coming up in just a moment.

But before that, I want you to listen to the governor of Virginia, Terry McAuliffe, who was on a radio program just a short time ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. TERRY MCAULIFFE, VIRGINIA: I called all the parents. As I say, you know, it's the hardest thing you do when, you know, you get on the phone, you just, first of all, you want to, on behalf of the commonwealth, you know, and it breaks your heart. I mean I have a daughter the same age as Alison. I mean we have five children. I speak for all the parents. You just - you're watching your daughter or your son on TV doing their job. It just breaks your heart.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: CNN's Polo Sandoval is live in Roanoke right now. What is the governor saying to people who are still so shaken up in

that community by what happened to seemingly people that they felt they knew?

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right, Ashleigh. I can tell you right now, Governor McAuliffe actually inside the studios of WDBJ, speaking with the station's staff, with the management, offering words of condolence and comfort because really they are some of the other key players in this story. The news team here that has displayed some extraordinary resilience as they continue to cover their market here and I think that truly speaks volumes, especially when we continue to see the support.

[12:05:13] You see one of many makeshift memorials behind me, just behind the podium where we expect Governor McAuliffe to really say a few statements or a few comments here in the next few moments. And we believe that that's what he's doing at this hour according to station manager Jeff Marks, meeting not only with some of the employees here, but also some of the family members here, offering the state's condolences. And as you just heard, he offered that human connection himself, actually having, according to his comments here, a daughter the age of Alison Parker. So clearly a very difficult phone call that he's had to make, not only to her family but also for Adam as well.

So I think that that is what we expect is happening inside right now. Again, we do expect the governor to step out in the next few minutes or so and offer a few comments as well, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: And then, Polo, obviously the microscope has just been searing on this person and his background and his actions. We're starting to learn a little bit more about his purchasing of those guns as well.

SANDOVAL: Right. The weapons that were legally purchased, according to authorities. And as this is all playing out here at the television station, I can tell you that that investigation does continues to press forward. And all the evidence that you've discussed is - it's really answering so many questions, but at the same time it's leading to others. We have that long list of items that was recovered from inside the vehicle. Flanagan, it seems to suggest that he may not have been planning the actual suicide itself but rather perhaps one final desperate move as police were closing in.

BANFIELD: Our Polo Sandoval live for us in Roanoke, Virginia, outside of WDBJ. Thank you for that.

I have spent a lot of this morning reading all about this killer's past, including his work history, the fact that he bounced around from job to job, sometimes just within or around a year, and what his former co-workers and his former bosses have had to say about him, on the record, formally. And now thanks to our access to video and evidence from Flanagan's car and apartment, we can certainly start to piece together a clearer but yet very disturbing picture of this murder.

Jonathan Gilliam is a former police officer and FBI agent and Dr. Gail Salts is a psychologist and psychoanalyst.

Gail, I wanted to just as you, as we were trying to piece together the myriad pieces of information that have come in about - flooded in about this man, we are all confounded by the mixed signals. Suicide notes, suggestions to others, "I'm going out with a bang," and yet, you know, evidence that shows he was planning possibly to be on the run, renting a car -

DR. GAIL SALTZ, COLUMNIST FOR "PSYCHOLOGY TODAY": Right.

BANFIELD: Wigs, shawls, sunglasses.

SALTZ: Right. Right.

BANFIELD: It's all very confusing.

SALTZ: You know, in a way, it's not confusing, because what you see is this pattern of actually - in mental health terms we say paranoia. A person who has long standingly been highly suspicious, interprets everything from the outside world as being an attack against him and becomes very, very angry about that. Easily slighted. Very grandiose with grandiose aspirations that he couldn't meet. And so this plan even that he hatched and committed was also grandiose, to film what he did, to have an idea that he could get away. It all sort of smacks of something that actually - I mean I can't diagnose someone who I've never met -

BANFIELD: Obviously, yes.

SALTZ: But it sounds a lot like paranoid personality disorder. And the important thing that people have to understand is, many people who commit these mass crimes have this style of thinking and they will never come to mental health care.

BANFIELD: It just - but it - right. So the layperson -

SALTZ: They will never be the person who comes.

BANFIELD: You can't understand someone who's on the run and wants to hide and clearly drove 200 miles after this double murder with somebody who's tweeting out real-time what he did, videotaping it and -

SALTZ: Right. It is because it's not a thought of the most important thing is escape. The most important thing is fame, is infamy, is getting my name out there, is being remembered, is being splashy and big in some way. So that is consistent with being grandiose.

BANFIELD: So, Jonathan, with your investigative background, I was looking at the search inventory from the car and I think we may have some of those pictures. The thought is, from early investigators, is that he shot himself while driving and crashed that rental car. And this is the search inventory and return list of what they fund. A Glock pistol, not surprising, six Glock magazines, assorted handwritten and typed letters and notes, 17 different stamped letters, three license plates, the wig, the shawl, the umbrella, the sunglasses, and the rental agreement as well. There's other things in there as well. But those very random collections of things must say a lot more to you than they do to me, even though to me they show a very troubled person who was going to make even more pronouncements. Will these things ever become public, these letters and these handwritten notes that he left behind in that car?

[12:10:06] JONATHAN GILLIAM, FORMER FBI AGENT: I don't know. I mean that really depends on the - whoever the prosecutor is and whether or not they feel that's pertinent to release those things.

BANFIELD: I mean we're not prosecute a person anymore. He's dead.

GILLIAM: I know. I know.

BANFIELD: There will be no murder case, you know.

GILLIAM: I don't know. That's - that the political agenda of whoever's handling that case and whether or not they want the exposure for that. I would like to see it so that we can get a little bit of an - you know, an insight into this. I think it's very important for people to see this because what, you know, what I've learned and I think Dr. Saltz will agree with me on this, is that, you know, everybody has anger. It's a natural emotion. But the - if you have really built up anger, if you have anger issues but you do not do exercises to calm those down, you don't seek treatment, that anger threshold will go lower and lower and eventually that turns into rage. And, you know, you can't sustain rage, so you will be angry for a period and then it will boil down but you're still raged on the inside.

And what I've seen with people like this is that, the longer you're raged, the more sporadic your entire life becomes. And so when you look at these different individuals or you look at their home, their homes are a direct reflection. And I think what's interesting about his home is that there's nothing there, yet -

BANFIELD: So, you know what, since you're referencing the home -

GILLIAM: Sure.

BANFIELD: And, Dr. Saltz, this will be great for you.

SALTZ: Yes.

BANFIELD: I know you didn't treat him, but at least you can get a look inside his apartment.

SALTZ: Right.

BANFIELD: It's pretty austere.

SALTZ: Right.

BANFIELD: One thing that really stood out - and this will be a flash- by - is the fridge. It's covered with photographs of himself.

SALTZ: Right. Exactly. BANFIELD: He was also a male model. He was very buff at one point.

SALTZ: Yes. Yes.

BANFIELD: There is discussion of him having run an escort part of his life at one point. But does this help you to understand anything?

SALTZ: You know what - yes, yes, because I think it's consistent with what I was speaking about earlier, the idea that this person was very isolated. He couldn't get along with others. Why? Because every time he tried to relate to others, he felt they were attacking him. Unrealistically so. Maybe even to a psychotic level at some points. And the refrigerator is covered only in him. You know he -

BANFIELD: Dishes - dishes still left in the - in the sink here.

SALTZ: Well, he was - he was clearly spiraling down - downhill. He may have also been depressed. For men who become very depressed, it's often expressed in anger. It often becomes rage. It's clear that he could have used some treatment, but I think what we have to think about going forward is, the mental health system has to be included in this gun discussion because these are the kinds of people that are never going to enter the system voluntarily.

BANFIELD: Yes.

SALTZ: Either a workplace will have to enter them into the system, or we have to look at other methods of gun control.

BANFIELD: Well, all I can say about that is that from legal filings, the station where he was last employed, where he attacked his, you know, former co-workers, implored him -

SALTZ: Yes.

BANFIELD: As part of his deal, by Friday you must see a representative from our health unit, from our mental health unit.

SALTZ: Yes.

BANFIELD: Whether that ever happened, though, and whether that ultimately - there's a bigger argument here, a discussion about publicizing that or recording it for bigger posterity. But, Gail Saltz, thank you for that. Jonathan Gilliam, thank you for your insight as well.

SALTZ: My pleasure.

BANFIELD: We're going to take a pause here, but when we come back, what can or should an employer do after a problem employee is out the door? It turns out, being able to warn future employers is not as simple as it seems or should be. Is that right? Is there any way that can change?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [12:16:49] BANFIELD: By his very own admission, the gunman in the Roanoke TV shootings was a ticking time bomb. Vester Flanagan's former boss says he knew it long before the killings, in fact. WDBJ then news director Dan Dennison called the police to escort Flanagan out of the building on the day that he was fired. He was worried about his own safety, he was worried about the safety of his staff. Mr. Denison calls it the toughest termination he ever ordered.

And all of this raises the question, why don't companies warn prospective employers about potentially dangerous workers that they've had in their buildings? What are their responsibilities to do so, even if they might face possible legal action for doing so?

I want to talk about this with CNN's legal analyst Paul Callan and Mel Robbins.

And before I even begin to ask you questions, I think our viewers deserve to hear what some of the on-the-record facts are about this man's behavior in this newsroom. And you'll have to bear with me, it's remarkable.

In the lawsuit filings that he filed against WDBJ, there is an e-mail from an employer saying, there was a heated confrontation with another reporter inside a station live truck. "You lost your temper and used verbal and body language that left co-workers feeling both threatened and extremely uncomfortable." This from another employee at that station regarding the termination date and what happened. "Bryce pushed away from the table and said, quote, I'm not leaving. You're going to have the call the f-ing police. Call the police, I'm not leaving. I'm going to make a stink and it's going to be in the headlines."

From that same termination day, the termination record of events says, "Bryce stood up abruptly, stormed out of the room and slammed the door. This caused members of the sales team to take shelter in a locked office."

And this might be the most disturbing. "On the termination day, two police officers came into the newsroom and they told Bryce that the company wanted him off the property. The officer began to take the phone and Bryce said, 'take your hands off me. Leave me alone.' The officers continued to tell Bryce he needed to leave. Bryce then tossed a hat and a small wooden cross at Dan," the boss, "and said 'you need this'."

I understand that employers have to be very careful about saying things about former employees because they could be smacked with libel suits. But when it gets to the level where the police are involved and people are afraid and locking themselves in offices, should they be concerned about a libel suit at that point?

PAUL CALLAN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, I don't think they have to be concerned about a libel suit when there's this kind of behavior, except in one circumstance, and this is why I think we've got to the point in the civil lawsuit area where disturbing things are happening. And I've seen a pattern of it and it works this way. He starts a lawsuit making false complaints and there is a quiet settlement negotiated with a confidentiality agreement. And here's what goes into all of those agreements.

[12:19:58] If another employer calls, we will simply confirm dates of employment. We will not answer any questions about your behavior. That is a routine clause in employment litigation and I can't tell you how many cases there are like this with disturbed prior employees who go from one employer to another and no one knows about the history.

BANFIELD: And he did this twice. He settled in two different cases -

MEL ROBBINS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Right.

BANFIELD: With two different stations. This one included after having launched these lawsuits at them. So what - what you're saying effectively, and, Mel, jump in on this, is that the station's hands were tied by the simple agreement that they had to sign?

ROBBINS: Well, they're tied by even more than that because under the Federal Disabilities Act, a mental health issue is actually a protected class. And so you are not under the law allowed to disclose any medical information. You're not allowed to disclose, as Paul was just saying, the terms of any settlement. You also have a very litigious former employee on your hands. Now, that doesn't preclude somebody from saying, yes, he was employed here. Good luck.

BANFIELD: Yes, with a tone of voice.

ROBBINS: Yes, but -

BANFIELD: (INAUDIBLE).

ROBBINS: But if the person's not hired, he could easily sue the former employers and allege, in a lawsuit, that he was defamed and that's why he was not -

BANFIELD: With good luck?

ROBBINS: Well, not with good luck, but I think a lot of employers -

CALLAN: Tone of voice.

ROBBINS: Don't - want to avoid this kind of thing, particularly with an employee that already was this volatile, already this litigious.

BANFIELD: One last question, Paul, and that's this. If a company gets a phone call about a former employee who has any kind of record like this, especially when police were called, I mean police were there. There's a record of that. Can that company say, yes, we'll confirm he worked here, and I refer you to the police department for any further information?

ROBBINS: No.

CALLAN: That would be - that would be - that was a Paul, she said. Paul. BANFIELD: But it's a fact. But it is a fact. There is a police report. It is a fact. It is not a defamatory.

CALLAN: It doesn't - it depends -

ROBBINS: It is illegal to consider somebody's arrest in hiring them in many states. So even if they did a criminal background check and you find that somebody has been arrested, in many states it is illegal to discriminate against somebody in the hiring process because they have been arrested before. This is a very volatile, very tricky legal area for employers, which is why so many employment lawyers advise their civil clients to just say the dates.

CALLAN: The key - the key in this area - and this is very important - we need a change in the law -

BANFIELD: Do we ever.

CALLAN: That doesn't permit confidentiality agreements.

BANFIELD: Yes.

CALLAN: The public has a right to know about the prior history of these people in the court system. We've got to change the law.

BANFIELD: Especially when police are involved and that's public record as well.

Paul and Mel, thank you. I want you to stay with us, if you will, please.

Still ahead on LEGAL VIEW, a prospective Harvard divinity student accused of raping a prep school freshman is awaiting his day of judgment from nine men and three women who at this moment are deciding that young man's fate.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:26:19] BANFIELD: I want to take you live down to where governor of Virginia, Terry McAuliffe, is speaking outside of the television station, WDBJ, about that terrible tragedy that happened two days ago.

GOV. TERRY MCAULIFFE (D), VIRGINIA: I spoke to both Alan and Barbara. We spent a long time with them. But we just wanted to come down and convey our sympathies today.

I have been in touch with the Ward family. I spoke to Tim Gardner yesterday after Vicki has come out of her surgery. They're optimistic about the progress for Vicki, but this is a very, very sad day for the commonwealth of Virginia, our nation and the whole globe when you think about the senseless tragedy.

Dorothy and I have five children. We have a daughter the same age as Alison. And it just - it is so senseless and I just want to remind everybody that we are going to do everything that we possibly can to keep our community safe. And I do want to thank Jeff and all the folks here at WDBJ. The

courage and determination that they showed is truly, truly extraordinary.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE).

MCAULIFFE: You know, it's hard. I mean a lot of the staff crying, rightfully so, and it's a - it's a very, very, very sad time. They lost two colleagues. But, more importantly, lost two friends. We had a conversation with Chris, who's here with us today, and words just can't describe it. And I just want everybody here to understand that we are there for them today, tomorrow, and any time in the future. I said if there's anything of the resources of the commonwealth of Virginia, we will be there for them.

QUESTION: Alison's father has said that he don't want (INAUDIBLE) lost in vane and that he wanted to close loopholes in gun laws -

MCAULIFFE: He did.

QUESTION: For people who are mentally unstable to get a gun. He said he'd talk to you about that. What are your plans?

MCAULIFFE: Well, he did. And we just had another long conversation. He's going to do, as he told me, what Alison would have wanted him to do, to fight to make our community safer. He wants to be a very vocal advocate for universal background checks. And this is something that I've advocated and talked about every single day. It's one of the main planks, why I ran for governor. I talked about it. I introduced legislation. And he really wants to be involved in those efforts because he said that's what Alison would want.

That something came out of this horrible tragedy. Some good come out of it. And if we can work together and do the best we can to keep our communities safer, if we can save one life, than we need to do that. And that is now going to be his passion, as Barbara also mentioned it.

You know, my job as governor is to keep our community safe. When you dropped off a loved one at school or work, you want to know that you have done everything that you possibly can to keep those communities safe. We lose on average 89 individuals a day to gun violence. There are too many guns in America and there's clearly too many guns in the wrong hands. So we're going to continue to do what we can.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE) you say do what you can. What exactly -

MCAULIFFE: Well, I'll introduce legislation, as I did this session. I'll introduce legislation again. And on background checks, as I say, I'm a gun owner. I own three guns. I hunt. I like to take my boys hunting. I've gone through the process of background checks. You hand your license over, it takes maybe two or three minutes. Two or three minutes to find out if there's an issue of mental illness, is there an issue of violence, domestic abuse, stalking, some basic issues of an individual who should not own a firearm.

[12:30:09] And I just think that's a common sense that a vast majority of Americans support.