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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Deputy Shooting Suspect in Court; Brady And Goodell Settlement. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired August 31, 2015 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:13] ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Ashleigh Banfield. And welcome to LEGAL VIEW.

We're going to begin this hour with this investigation into the murder of a Texas sheriff's deputy. Forty-seven-year-old Darren Goforth, shot in the back, shot in the head while filling up his patrol car near Houston on Friday night. And this morning, extraordinary drama inside a courtroom. The suspect, Shannon Miles, filing into court, shuffling his feet, his first court appearance. And as he walked in, you could see a line of police officers, many of them standing in solidarity with their fallen comrade, Deputy Goforth.

I want to play for you this hearing in its entirety. It is rare for you to be able to see this kind of silent drama as a suspect is led into court. The district attorney laid out details of the crime and we never expected to hear this many. I want to turn your attention, as we play this tape, to the very beginning where you can actually hear the janging (ph) of his shackles as Miles walks into the courtroom.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Good morning. Mr. Miles, is that correct?

SHANNON MILES: Good morning. Yes, ma'am.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. Miles, before you came out, I appointed you counsel. I think they've met with you this morning, is that correct?

MILES: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. Anthony Osso (ph) and Mr. Charles Brown (ph), is that correct?

MILES: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You do not make any statements while you're out here. Any statement that you - any question that you have, refer to your attorneys and they will ask on your behalf. OK, sir?

MILES: Uh-huh.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can I hear probable cause?

DEVON ANDERSON, HARRIS CO., TEXAS, DISTRICT ATTORNEY: Yes, your honor. On August 28, 2015, at around 8:20 p.m., a call dropped on an officer involved shooting at 16050 West Road in Harris County, Texas. That location is a Chevron gas station. When deputies arrived, they found Deputy Darren Goforth face down in a pool of blood, dead from multiple gunshot wounds. He was laying in the parking lot near his patrol car. They identified him by his unit number and from knowing him.

They also found around the body fifteen .40 caliber Agila (ph) shell casings. They contacted a witness at the scene who said that he had pulled up at the gas station with his children in the car. He was getting out of the car when he heard gunshots. He turned and saw a black male with a bald head shooting into a deputy's back, who was down on the parking lot. He got his kids back into the car and then turned and saw the male get into the driver's side door of a red Ford Ranger pickup with an extended cab.

Officers realized that there were surveillance cameras all around the parking lot. They contacted the owner of the gas station who allowed them to view the video. On the video, they saw a red Ford Ranger pickup truck with an extended cab and a white cooler in the bed of the pickup parked in front of the gas station. They watched the video and saw that Deputy Goforth came out of the convenience store, approached his patrol car, and as he got a few feet away from it, they saw a dark-skinned male with - who was bald with red shorts and a white T- shirt run up behind the deputy who clearly did not see him or hear him coming and shot him in the back of the head. Deputy Goforth fell to the ground and the male stood over him and fired several more times into the back of his head and his back.

Aside from the white cooler in the pickup truck, there was another distinctive aspect of the truck, which was an after-market trailer hitch that they noticed on the video. They did a database search for that particular vehicle and the 77095 zip code and got a hit on 8454 Lake Crystal Drive. Deputies went to that scene where they found a house, they saw the pickup truck in the driveway parked. They knocked on the door and a male answered the door, identified himself as Justin Woods. They asked him if he was the owner of the truck and he said, no, that it was his brother's truck. They asked if his brother was at home and he said, no, that he had recently left the home with his mother. They asked if it was OK to look around the house for him and Mr. Woods let them into the house.

As they were in the house, a man and woman drove up in another car. The deputies approached the man and asked him if that was his truck in the driveway and he said it was. They asked him what his name was and he identified himself as the defendant, Shannon Miles. They asked him if he had any guns. He said he had two, a .9 millimeter pistol that he had recently gotten rid of and a .40 caliber gun that was in his garage in a blue baseball bag. Deputies went and got a search warrant for the garage and inside found the white cooler and a .40 caliber Smith & Wesson pistol in the blue baseball bag. Alongside it was a box of Agila .40 caliber bullets, the same brand of casings that was at the scene.

[12:05:45] They took the gun to the firearms lab. Ballistics testing was done on the weapon and it was determined that it was the gun that fired the cartridges at the scene, the 15 cartridges. The gun magazine holds 14 rounds and there was one in the chamber, so he unloaded the entire weapon into Deputy Goforth. When the deputies recovered the pistol in the garage, it was loaded again. A witness positively identified this defendant, Shannon Miles, as the shooter in a video lineup.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Criminal history, please.

DEVON ANDERSON, HARRIS CO., TEXAS, DISTRICT ATTORNEY: In 2005, in Harris County, Mr. Miles was convicted of the misdemeanor of failure to I.D., February 2005, criminal mischief in August, 2005, and resisting arrest in October 2005, disorderly conduct in 2007, evading detention in May of 2007, trespass of property in May of 2007, resisting arrest again in 2009 and an aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in Travis County in 2012.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. Miles, I know there have been inquiries about your representation, but it's my understanding thus far you have not hired other counsel, is that correct?

MILES: That's right.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Please understand that while you are represented by your appointed counsel, they are your lawyers.

MILES: Uh-huh.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So you can't have (INAUDIBLE) you've got to be careful about multiple representation and be clear on those bounds with your attorneys and whatever hired attorney that - that you may decide to have. You understand that?

MILES: Uh-huh.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You might try addressing the court as "yes, ma'am."

MILES: Yes, ma'am.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you have any questions?

MILES: No.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE).

MILES: No, ma'am.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK. You can take him back.

MILES: Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK, I would like the microphones turned off (INAUDIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Off the record, you just said?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: And look at the faces of those who were lining the walls of that courtroom. There is one thing we did not learn from that hearing, who knows if we'll ever learn it, motive. It's the mystery that everyone is trying to solve. Why would anyone do that? But the why is not going to solve this, the loss of a husband and a father. This sheriff's deputy leaves behind two children, ages five and 12. His wife Kathleen says that he was, quote, "an incredibly intricate blend of toughness and of gentility."

Our Ed Lavandera is live with me now on the phone because he's just emerged from that courtroom.

And, Ed, you were in there for that hearing. I want you to take me inside and really try to give me the picture of what it was like. What the mood and the tension was like in that courtroom?

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Well, Ashleigh, I thought it was rather intense. And what is fascinating also is when inside that courtroom there's actually another trial, another manslaughter - intoxication manslaughter trial for another Harris County sheriff's deputy that was killed earlier this year. So in that room you already had the family of a - of a - the grieving family of another sheriff's deputy who had be killed in the line of duty and that trial was ongoing. This judge happened to be hearing this very same case. So you already had sheriff's deputies in there. You also had more sheriff's deputies, the room was filled with them, that had turned out to also witness and - to witness this particular hearing that didn't last terribly long.

But what really stood out the most is when Shannon Miles was brought into the courtroom, it was so quiet in there that the only thing you could hear was the sound of the shackles around his ankles and around his waists clinging together. And it was so quiet in there and people just staring intensely at him as he made his way up here to stand in front of the judge.

BANFIELD: Yes, Ed, he didn't enter a plea. And every jurisdiction's a little bit different. But what effectively is next in this process? And I don't know if you know the answer to this, but how is this man being held? What kind of custodial setup is there for him?

[12:10:09] LAVANDERA: We're trying to figure a little bit of that out. I thought there was - I think there might be some significant - significance to the color of the - of the - you saw him wearing the all yellow uniform there. I've covered enough cases in Harris County where I think they often wear orange. So I don't know if there's some - something to the fact that he was wearing this yellow prison uniform. So we're trying to find that out.

But also we learned that he basically just met with his court- appointed lawyers for the first time this morning. The judge - I don't know if you were able to notice early on in the hearing - that suggested to him that he be careful about hiring another lawyer. So I don't know if there's some talk of him trying to find another lawyer. We'll try to get to the bottom of that as well, but clearly he had not spent a lot of time.

And then the other thing I thought was kind of interesting from the get go is that the judge warned him early on not to make any - any statements out loud in the courtroom. That anything he - if he had anything to say, it needed to be directed through the lawyers that were appointed to him. So I don't know if the judge had an indication that perhaps this - the defendant was going to try to say something. We just don't know.

By and large, he just answered the questions that were asked of him directly. The judge, I think you probably heard, at one point admonished him for the way he was speaking with her and said, you need to address me as yes, ma'am or no, ma'am. And after that, you know, he was - he was led out of - out of the courtroom.

And I don't know how much of this you could - you could tell from - from the pool feed that was coming from there, but he definitely had kind of an intense glare before he left the courtroom. He kind of looked around the room, taking it all in. You know, clearly we cannot have any indication of what's going through his mind, but a lot of times you'll see a lot of the defendants just kind of stare straight ahead and walk right out of the courtroom. But Miles definitely took a moment to kind of look around and intentionally look around the courtroom at all the people who were gathered there to watch this proceeding.

BANFIELD: Undoubtedly the camera presence as well. He is in a world of danger right now in terms of the rest of his life and where he is destined after the facts were just read.

Ed Lavandera, thank you for that reporting.

The district attorney, Devon Anderson, she was the woman you heard speaking and laying out the facts as they have them at this early, early hour. She also held a news conference right after the hearing and she stressed how wonderful the community has been in response to this utter tragedy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEVON ANDERSON, HARRIS CO., TEXAS, DISTRICT ATTORNEY: I want to accentuate the positive here that Saturday night and Sunday night the Harris County community came out for law enforcement in a huge way. Saturday night was a prayer vigil for Deputy Goforth and Sunday was a prayer walk and people for - with - from all races, from all around the county came, over a thousand both nights came to support law enforcement. That's what Houston, Harris County is about. This crime is not going to divide us. This crime is going to unite us.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: Let her say it.

So we're going to take small pause here, but there is so much left of this story. For starters, if you heard that case laid out, what possible defense could there be? Who will the attorney be who's got to take this case? And just what kind of uphill battle is it going to be for the man who has made his first appearance and a shocking one at that.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:17:00] BANFIELD: If you just missed within the last hour this breaking news of Shannon Miles being - filing into a courtroom with shackles on his ankles, that suspect of the execution style shooting of a Texas sheriff's deputy, that was the first court appearance for him and it was extremely dramatic. The district attorney saying that his target - this man on your screen - a sheriff's deputy named Darren Goforth, was just going about his business, actually just filling up his patrol car at the Chevron station and did not even see his killer coming. One man did, though, a witness, with his kids, told the police everything he saw. Here, again, the Harris County prosecutor with the details.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEVON ANDERSON, HARRIS CO., TEXAS, DISTRICT ATTORNEY: They made contact with a witness who had - he and his kids had gone to the gas station. He pulled in to park. As he was getting out, and his kids were getting out on the other side, he heard gunshots. And looked up and saw a black male with a bald head shooting, standing over Deputy Goforth and unloading a pistol into him. He ran to get his kids back in the car and turned and saw the male getting into the driver's side of a Ford pickup truck, a red one with an extended cab, and watched him drive away.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: For the legal view on what this means, I want to bring in HLN legal analyst and defense attorney Joey Jackson on the right, and then Wendy Patrick, a California prosecutor and former defense attorney on the left.

And I'll just open it up to both of you. In the biz this is what we call a really bad set of facts and a real upward battle for anybody who's going to be the person chose on the defend him. I don't even know where you begin.

JOEY JACKSON, HLN LEGAL ANALYST: It's a very good question. The fact is, what makes this even more compelling, Ashleigh, is the nature of what occurred. Police go out. They protect and serve every single day. And sometimes in the course of that protection of people, they get killed. We recognize that. It makes it no less tragic. But when you have someone who's filling gas and not otherwise doing anything but that and then, as we've described, executed, I think it makes it even more compelling. It resonates with everyone and it's going to resonate with a jury. And so when you talk about an uphill battle to be fought here, if you look not only at those circumstances, but if you look at what was laid out in that courtroom in terms of what they did, the ballistics at that scene, the 15 cases -

BANFIELD: It sounded like we were at trial.

JACKSON: Yes, it did.

BANFIELD: I couldn't believe the facts that we were getting.

JACKSON: Absolutely.

BANFIELD: These are the kinds of things, folks, you hear at trial. The ballistics matched. We found the gun. We saw the cooler. We saw - we have the videos. We have the witness. We did a video lineup with the witness.

Wendy, this sounds like it's almost open and shut now. But the big question is, in a capital case, which this is certain to be because it's an officer in Texas. You kill an officer, it's a capital case. Is this even something that a D.A. would consider for a plea deal?

WENDY PATRICK, DEPUTY D.A., SAN DIEGO COUNTY: Well, you know, you don't really see a reason to consider that. And, you know, I'd hate to have Joey's job right about now because as you say, it does not appear that identity is going to be an issue. Some kind of mental defense will most likely be - be the defense they use.

[12:20:03] But here's what's interesting about this case as far as the recitation of that criminal background. While it's true that most of those crimes were misdemeanors, a lot of them had to do with run-ins with police.

BANFIELD: Here's the list. You can see it right here.

PATRICK: Right.

BANFIELD: Resisting arrest, trespassing, disorderly conduct with a firearm.

PATRICK: So you look at - this is probably a case, not of provocation, obviously, but predisposition. In other words, is this somebody whose past would have predicted he was capable of a crime like this? Because it's true the public arena is looking at the fact that a law enforcement career should not be a death sentence.

JACKSON: At all.

PATRICK: You should not, you know, worry about going home in a casket simply because you are in uniform, yet this assassination -

BANFIELD: Especially, by the way, execution style.

PATRICK: Execution style. The back of the head, like we have here.

BANFIELD: It's not lost on anyone. No.

JACKSON: Ashleigh, just quickly, as it relates to his priors, what will happen is, those priors can't be used in the prosecutor's opening statement in the case.

BANFIELD: Right. JACKSON: They can't be used by the prosecutor, who we call the case in chief. However, if the defendant testifies, some of them may be able to be used. It would be up to a judge to decide whether or not - the public, just to explain that, what happens is, cases have to be about what they're about. And when the jury gets wind of your past and prior dealings, they may have a tendency to base your guilt upon your propensity as opposed to what you did today.

BANFIELD: At that moment. Yes.

JACKSON: And that's why judges are very limiting in terms of what they allow in a defendant's background to come out in a court of law.

BANFIELD: Which goes against human nature because the first thing we always say is, well, what's the guy like?

PATRICK: Well, and -

BANFIELD: Did he do this? And what's the -

JACKSON: Right.

PATRICK: That's right.

BANFIELD: I have to wrap it there, but, clearly, we are going to be talking a lot more about it.

PATRICK: Right.

BANFIELD: Wendy and Joey, thank you for that.

PATRICK: Thank you.

JACKSON: Thank you, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: And we continue to follow that case.

We also have this on the horizon here. Breaking news this hour, Deflategate, a ruling imminent. Tom Brady and the commissioner back in federal court this morning. We've got the very latest from what the judge has to say about these two very important parties.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:25:19] BANFIELD: We could learn as early as tomorrow if Tom Brady is going to sit out four games of the upcoming NFL season.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Beautiful. You look beautiful, baby.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Don't settle (ph).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) Tom.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everyone knows Goodell's a liar! Goodell's a liar and everyone knows it. Don't settle.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: I love this kind of action. Are you kidding me? The New England Patriots quarterback greeted by supporters, all cheering as he returned to federal court in New York this morning. As you'll know, he's in the midst of a fight over that suspension that was handed down by the NFL commissioner and the NFL, Roger Goodell. That because of the underinflated football scandals for that critical Patriots victory last season.

So the two sides now unable to reach a settlement over it and the federal judge, Richard Berman, says, fine, fine, then it will be me. I'll have to do it. And that's likely to happen, I don't know, maybe tomorrow, Wednesday. September 4th is a definite do or die date. That's when the punishment has to come down. As to whether this punishment that Brady got was legal under the NFL's collective bargaining agreement.

It is a little complicated even though it sounds a little simple, but there's somebody who's brilliant at this stuff, it's Rachel Nichols, CNN Sports.

You know the most about everything with regard to this. All the arcane and things that really matter.

RACHEL NICHOLS, CNN SPORTS: Yes.

BANFIELD: So here's what I want to drill down on. They - they are supposed to play -

NICHOLS: That's really what I wanted my career to be about, by the way, is Tom Brady's Deflategate sports law.

BANFIELD: The law, (INAUDIBLE). But you never figured (ph).

NICHOLS: But, yes, I agree, I am an expert.

BANFIELD: Well, and when it comes down to this, they're supposed to play, I think it was against - what was it, next Thursday, they're playing -

NICHOLS: They're playing the season opener next Thursday night against the Pittsburg Steelers.

BANFIELD: Pittsburg Steelers. So effectively if either side doesn't like -

NICHOLS: Yes.

BANFIELD: What they hear by September 4th, they both have the right to appeal, but what does that mean for the guy and playing?

NICHOLS: Right. Well, there's the illusion that our long national nightmare may finally be over tomorrow or Wednesday.

BANFIELD: Right.

NICHOLS: But that's probably actually not the case. Both sides are expected, if they lose this case, to appeal because there is so much precedent that may be set here. Now, if the NFL side wins and Tom Brady loses, he is effectively suspended starting Saturday, can't even go into the building, Gillette Stadium. Now, his side will apply for an injunction to say, hey - because the whole issue is whether he plays or not -

BANFIELD: Sure.

NICHOLS: Let's put on hold whether he plays or not until the appeals court makes a decision.

BANFIELD: Because how unfair would it be if ultimately it resolves in his favor -

NICHOLS: Great (INAUDIBLE).

BANFIELD: But I can't replay those last 10 games - four games, rather.

NICHOLS: Replay those games again. Exactly. So -

BANFIELD: Yes.

NICHOLS: So there's an expectation that that might, in fact, happen if the NFL side wins. If the Brady side wins, the NFL, theoretically, could re-suspend him. All this case is, is whether the suspension that's sitting there now gets vacated or not. It's not over whether they could suspend him again. Now that's, of course -

BANFIELD: And would suspend (ph) him all over again?

NICHOLS: Right, that is a bad PR move, but it is, in theory, what they could do or they could just appeal and sit and wait and see what happens.

BANFIELD: So if - let's just say, if it doesn't go his way, and he decides to appeal, and then down the pike it doesn't go his way again -

NICHOLS: Sure. Absolutely.

BANFIELD: The games get a lot more important.

NICHOLS: They do. But that appeals court historically takes a really long time. You know on this show the wheels of justice, they're not just slow, they're microscopic sometimes in how forward they move.

BANFIELD: Yes. Glacial.

NICHOLS: So the expectation is - and, look, it is a gamble, but the expectation is, if he appeals and they got that injunction, that that appeals decision might not come until next summer. We could be on this show talking about this for another year, Ashleigh Banfield.

BANFIELD: It is a good thing I like you so much and I adore when you come on the program.

NICHOLS: Exactly.

BANFIELD: I invite you any day of the week. In fact, if you're not busy on the Fourth, it would be great if you'd come back.

NICHOLS: Hey, we'll come - we'll come on in. We'll talk a little bit more.

BANFIELD: I think we're going to have something to talk about on the Fourth.

NICHOLS: Exactly.

BANFIELD: Thank you, Rachel.

NICHOLS: Sure.

BANFIELD: Good to see you. Thank you.

We are also tracking the candidates because polling is not only a parlor game, it's now almost a de facto drinking game. It's going crazy, folks. You won't believe how close these two are. And then, yes, again, more Trump polling news that might surprise you - or not. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)