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Terrorists Exploiting "Dark" Encryption; Ex-Cop Guilty of Rape, Sexual Battery; Ben Carson Slides in Polls. Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired December 11, 2015 - 10:30   ET

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

[10:29:50] LORENZO FIDINO, GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY: They provide pretty sophisticated guidelines on what kind of technology to use, what to talk about, how not to get their communications intercepted.

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Text encryption techniques are right out of the show "Homeland".

Matthew Green who teaches Applied Cryptography at Johns Hopkins showed us one way terrorists can make their text disappear on the Telegram app. You can program them to self-destruct in a few seconds. I sent Green a text to meet me somewhere. He reads it. Then --

MATTHEW GREEN, JOHNS HOPKINS: Gone. And just like that you've got no record of the communication.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TODD: Now, what about encrypted plotting in San Bernardino or Paris? Regarding San Bernardino, there is no evidence so far that those attackers used encryption in the plotting. But of course, that is still under investigation.

Regarding Paris, U.S. officials say there is no hard evidence the attackers used encryption to plot those attacks but they suspect they may have because they left behind such a small electronic trail -- Pamela.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Still a lot to learn from both of those investigations.

Brian Todd -- thank you so much.

And tonight on the "SITUATION ROOM", Brian has more about a key ISIS figure. That's at 5:00 p.m. Eastern only on CNN.

So let's discuss this more with CNN counterterrorism analyst Philip Mudd. Philip, we had been talking about this for a while now.

PHILIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: Yes.

BROWN: As it stands now o you think this is a temporary problem that the U.S. government will be able to overcome or a troubling, long-term obstacle? MUDD: Boy, that depends on what happens with the Congress and

with Silicon Valley. I think this is going to have to be resolved eventually because if you want to understand the basics of a terror plot and a terror investigation, one of the key components is intent.

What does someone want to do? Pamela -- you might be able to figure out capability. Do they have access to weapons and explosives? Are they talking to people of interest?

But determining intent, what does someone want to do, for example, with a weapon they acquire is really difficult. You can run a human source against someone. Really inefficient, especially when you're talking about the number of cases the FBI is following.

Much more efficient way to do it, read their e-mails. For example, communication with ISIS to determine whether to say I'm ready to go. I'm going to go this week. The reason I said this is being resolved soon is I fear one of these days we're going to have a tragedy in this country where we learn that the FBI could not read e- mails and all of a sudden Congress and Silicon Valley after a long time of debating are going to have to say, now we have to resolve this because there are too many dead people. We have to figure out a back door as they say into encrypted communications -- Pamela.

BROWN: But even if they figure out this back door, I mean as we just saw in Brian's report, ISIS can create their own encrypted apps with just math skills and some software. I mean this could be beyond the scope of Silicon Valley.

MUDD: I think we're going to see a cat and mouse game over the next decade or two. We've seen that since the beginning of counterterrorism operations as they accelerated against groups like al Qaeda in the 1990s initially intercepting their phones was pretty straightforward. Then they went into better communications avenues. For example, they started using human couriers.

This is one of the biggest problems I've seen I must say. Typically the government with all its capabilities can beat the hackers, but this began accelerating maybe a decade or so ago when the intelligence community talked about what they called about going dark, being unable to read communications.

I don't see an easy resolution to this one. I think this may be with us for some time.

BROWN: And it's probably part of the reason why especially lately we've been hearing officials say to the public, look if you see something, say something. We need your help. How important now in this age of going dark is just old-fashioned human intelligence like you were talking about?

MUDD: It's really important for a couple of reasons. Number one, as you lose that avenue of communications to intercept -- as I mentioned, earlier there's not very many ways you can replace that. The two I can think of, listening to people's phone calls. But a lot of times you have a terrorist in a place like

California, they're not going to pick up the phone and call ISIS. They might be communicating over Twitter or e-mail but not on the telephone. Or you can use a human source.

The FBI director has talked about 900 cases in the United States. You can't run 900 human sources simultaneously against those cases. So as ISIS moves out into American communities or European communities, there's one avenue left.

The parents of this child, for example, in California, this man, you've got to pick up the phone because the other avenues of investigation are disappearing.

BROWN: Yes. And we have heard that call from the FBI and from the attorney general saying, look, we can't do this alone.

MUDD: Yes, yes.

BROWN: Philip Mudd -- thank you very much.

MUDD: Thanks.

BROWN: And still ahead this Friday morning, a police officer charged with sexually assaulting more than a dozen women and the jury has ruled. More on that verdict -- up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:38:58] BROWN: An ex-police officer who preyed on women in Oklahoma City broke down in tears when he was found guilty of rape and sexual battery.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- procuring lewd exhibitions, the defendant is guilty of the crime of procuring lewd exhibition and punishment is set at --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: Daniel Holtzclaw was convicted on 18 counts for targeting more than a dozen poor black victims with criminal backgrounds. One young woman, only 17 at the time, was raped on her mother's front porch.

CNN's Joey Jackson joins me now. Joey this jury recommended a total of 263 years in prison but one victim's mother fears that he might only be locked up for a few decades.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LATONYA JAMES, VICTIM'S MOTHER: Sure they're going to try to run it together so he won't see nothing but 30 years, and that's not fair to us. It's not fair to my daughter. It's not fair to any of the victims or the people of our community.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: So, Joey, what do you think, could these 263 years be condensed into 30?

JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Good morning -- Pamela.

[10:40:01] I don't think so at all. And obviously you're dealing with the relative of a victim here and so there's major concern as to will the justice system play itself out to its conclusion and will real justice be done?

I do not see ever this defendant seeing the light of day and I say that for several reasons. Number one Pamela, you said right -- the jury recommended 263 years. What did that mean to them? It means that they evaluated exactly what this defendant did and found that his criminal culpability is so severe, that this is what he deserves. Now when the judge takes that up in January that's not going to be lost upon the judge.

Let's not also forget, Pamela, that eight of the 13 victims the judge found guilt associated with. And what does that mean? It means point three, that he will get consecutive time. What does that mean? It means whenever you do something and you -- for example, you're a defendant and you commit a crime, and it's the same transaction in a current, you are entitled concurrent time.

That means any time that you would serve would be served together. So if there are multiple counts, you get 30, 30, 30 -- it's 130. There are eight separate victims he was found accountable for. So I think the judge will give him consecutive time, meaning serve 30 years, serve 30 years, serve 20 years. So, I don't ever see him seeing the light of day again.

BROWN: You see this video of him crying and so emotional. This is a man though who has now been found guilty of raping all these women and abusing his power. You look at that and you think, what did he thing was going to happen here?

In terms of the prosecution, what challenges do they face in this?

JACKSON: You know, Pamela, it's a great point. And I think there were many challenges by the prosecution and the community. Number one, this is a police officer. As a police officer, the victims were saying, you know, even if we went forward, would it matter? Would the police department take my claim seriously?

Well one brave victim certainly did and they investigated in June of last year and, guess what? That investigation revealed that there were 13 total victims. He was fired before the trial. And now you say, well, justice should be served.

But then you have 13 African-American victims and then you get to the jury trial and it was an all-white jury. So the concern would be, would there be some disconnect? Would race play an element? Well, obviously it did not because the jury found accountability.

And then the third point which was a huge challenge was look at the victims. And what happened here is you have victims who had, you know, drug histories, checkered pasts and everything else.

And to that final point, Pamela, that was the defense's greatest strength in the case. They say, look who's accusing him. These are people with drug histories. They have past criminal histories. You can't be believed.

Guess what the prosecution did? They said, a-ha, who else would an officer prey on but people who couldn't be believed, or so he would think couldn't be believed? As a result of that, he abused his authority. You're going to find it when you really peel back the onion in this case.

And they certainly did. And as a result, he was convicted. The recommendation is 263 years. We'll see what the judge does in January. But I'm pretty confident that based upon the circumstances and the nature of these offenses, he'll never see the light of day.

BROWN: Yes. They're horrific offenses. Joey Jackson -- thank you very much.

JACKSON: Thank you.

BAIER: Still to come right here in the newsroom, a steep drop in the polls, foreign policy gaffes, is the Ben Carson camp in chaos right now?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:47:33] BROWN: With just days to go until the next Republican presidential face-off, Ben Carson may be looking for ways to give his campaign a much needed boost. A series of high profile foreign policy missteps could be causing the neurosurgeon to tumble in the polls.

The most recent from CBS News and the "New York Times" showing Carson now in third place nationally as we see right here -- that's after surging to the top of the field just two months ago. That decline is reportedly leading to some public bickering among members of his staff.

Let's bring in CNN senior political reporter Nia-Malika Henderson. She joins me now. I was just reading the article that you wrote Nia, basically saying that there is chaos within the Ben Carson campaign.

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER: There is. And you said it comes amid him declining in the polls there. He's lost half his support going back to October. It is because of some of his campaign missteps.

One thing that seems to be happening now is that they're starting to sort of shift focus from some of this internal turmoil that's going on with the campaign to turmoil that's going on with the GOP. We just got a statement from the Ben Carson campaign where they

are going after the GOP. And I can read you a statement here. "If this was the beginning of a plan to subvert the will of the voters and replace it with the will of the political elite, I assure you Donald Trump will not be the only one leaving the party."

He, of course, is talking about reports that the RNC and top Republicans are trying to figure out what it might mean to have a brokered convention. He, of course, thinks that would subvert the will of the people and as Donald Trump, he is threatening to possibly run as an Independent.

BROWN: Very interesting news there. But can you lay out for us, what is the divide within his campaign? What's going on here?

HENDERSON: Well, there are in some ways two campaigns. One informal and that informal campaign really has to do with his relationship with Armstrong Williams, who of course, we have had on our air many, many times. He's a long-time friend of Carson. And in some ways he's the Carson whisperer. He explains his views, he often double downs. He defends Carson and sometimes he criticizes Carson very publicly.

The campaign, the official campaign, which Carson is not technically -- which Williams is not technically a part of -- says that Williams has often not been too helpful to this effort to win the nomination for Carson. But the campaign also says that in some ways they haven't always been that helpful.

[10:49:57] There was that speech Carson gave last week before the Republican Jewish Coalition. He seemed to have problems with that speech. The campaign said, listen, we should have done a better job preparing Carson for that speech.

That's also a criticism that Armstrong Williams levied publicly at the campaign. They now say that they feel like they're a campaign that's all on the same page. That it is a work in progress all the same. And they're focusing on Iowa, getting those 35,000 voters out -- they've got a circle of 103,000. But they say if they can come in maybe at least in third place in Iowa, they feel like they'll be in good place for this campaign.

BROWN: A lot of pressure on him with the final Republican debate --

HENDERSON: That's right.

BROWN: -- of the year coming up in just a few days.

Nia-Malika Henderson, thank you so much.

HENDERSON: Thank you -- Pam.

BROWN: And that debate, by the way, will be live from Las Vegas. It will be moderated by our own Wolf Blitzer. It's going to be Tuesday night at 6:00 p.m. Eastern time only on CNN. Well, the holiday season is here and Christmas decorations can be

seen almost everywhere you go. But now one group is firing back, putting their anti-Christian ideology on full display.

Here's Lisa Ling.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LISA LING, CNN CORRESPONDENT: As a skilled artist, Michael is now using his craft to stand with the temple and their fight for religious freedom. When the Michigan state capitol put up a nativity scene during Christmas time, the satanic temple placed their own symbol of faith on the state capitol lawn. And Michael helped design it.

MICHAEL: The snake itself used to be representative of Lucifer when he chose to lead man to knowledge in the Garden of Eden. We support the idea of Lucifer as a metaphorical figure and his influence on man.

LING: We live in a nation that is predominantly Judeo-Christian. What's wrong with having a nativity scene on the steps of the capitol during Christmastime?

MICHAEL: There's nothing wrong with it, per se, if other religions can be accepted as well and have their own displays. There can't be one dominating voice to all the voices.

LING: So snake-tivity sat alongside nativity. How was it received?

MICHAEL: A lot of people threatened to destroy it but for the most part it felt like it was met with acceptance and curiosity.

LING: Do you celebrate Christmas?

MICHAEL: I do, actually. I personally just view it as more of a time to be with my family.

LING: You don't think Christmas should go away, even though it is the day that commemorates the birth of Christ?

MICHAEL: No, not at all. I feel like everyone should have the right to celebrate their religion but every voice has to be heard.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: The beliefs of satanists "THIS IS LIFE" airs Sunday night at 9:00 Eastern right here on CNN.

And still to come on this Friday morning. The eagle has landed on Donald Trump. What happens when America's symbol of freedom meets the leading Republican presidential candidate?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(VIDEO PLAYING)

[10:57:20] BROWN: All right. So the first lady dropping a few rhymes with a single message there: Go to college.

In a newly released music video, Michelle Obama otherwise known as MC Flotus, teams up with "Saturday Night Live" star Jay Pharoah.

Take a look.

(MUSIC)

BROWN: This video is part of the first lady's Better Make Room campaign urging 14 to 19-year-olds to seek higher education. Mrs. Obama says she wants to celebrate students the same way we celebrate athletes and celebrities. I think that's a pretty good idea.

Uncle Sam, apparently, by the way, does not approve of the Donald. Jeanne Moos explains.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Donald Trump is great at winging it but now, he's become pray for comedians, thanks to an eagle.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The eagle is agitated because his dead brother is on Donald's head. But --

MOOS: The video is from a "Time Magazine" photo shoot with an eagle named Uncle Sam, as his owner Jonathan Wood helped set up the shots --

TRUMP: How's may hair look?

MOOS: -- more than feathers got ruffled.

You were there to handle the bird, you ended up handling Trump's hair.

JONATHAN WOOD, MASTER FALCONER: Yes, and it's real.

MOOS: But the bird really became a headache when the Donald inadvertently invaded his territory by reaching.

TRUMP: You don't show the aspirin over there, do you?

WOOD: It takes a little courage to work with a bird like that. He's the most difficult bird that I have to work with.

MOOS: Uncle Sam, the eagle, was hit by a car more than 20 years ago and Wood helped rehabilitate him. Now, 27 years old, he's blind in one eye and off balance.

But you can't call the bird a left-winger. He actually had part of his left wing amputated after the car accident.

Turns out Uncle Sam has also snapped at Stephen Colbert and Bill Clinton.

WOOD: Yes, he's an equal opportunity fighter.

MOOS: The Trump Eagle photos were part of a cover story back in August.

So, "Time Magazine" decides to release the outtakes about four months after they were taken. Around the time Trump was criticizing the magazine for picking German leader Angela Merkel as person of the year.

Trump tweeted, "I told you 'Time Magazine' would never pick me despite being the big favorite. They picked the person who is ruining Germany."

Instead of being picked, Trump is being pecked.

JIMMY FALLON, COMEDIAN: After that, Trump was like now I'm now banning all bald eagles from America.

MOOS: And guess whose time has come for bird of the year?

Jeanne Moos, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[11:00:02] BROWN: Well, thank you so much for being here with me today. I'm Pamela Brown.

"AT THIS HOUR" with Berman and Bolduan starts now.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN HOST: Move over Donald Trump. Another candidate now threatening --