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Justice Department to Release Report about Ferguson Police Department; Opening Statements in the Boston Bombing Trial

Aired March 04, 2015 - 15:30   ET

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

CEDRIC ALEXANDER, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL ORGANIZATION OF BLACK LAW ENFORCEMENT EXECUTIVES: Now as a task force member, if you recall more recently, we just delivered a number of recommendations to the president. A lot of those recommendations in those Pillars, quite frankly, and I encourage the American public and police partners across this country to pull down off the department of justice Web site, COPS Web site, pull the recommendations down and take a look at them. Because what you will find, Ana, is that a lot of those recommendations can help communities like Ferguson move forward. But here again, let me reiterate that there are a number of police departments across this country that do it well. And even for all of us, even in my own department back in DeKalb County, where I'm public safety director, we're going to go through those recommendations. We're going to look at how we can better ourselves as we move forward.

So I am saddened by what we heard today. But I'm also encouraged by the attorney general in terms of actions that he's going to take going forward as it relates to this.

ANA CABRERA, CNN ANCHOR: We are still waiting to get a response from Ferguson officials. But I want to play you some sound, after I sat down with the Ferguson police chief back in September, after this situation regarding Michael Brown's death had really exploded, not just in Ferguson but on a national level. And the focus was on discrimination within communities. I want to you hear what he told me about whether his officers were discriminating.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHIEF TOM JACKSON, FERGUSON POLICE: It's never been the intention of the Ferguson police department of any police department that I know of to intentionally target individuals because of race. If there is that happening it's a crime and it needs to be addressed.

CABRERA: Are you aware of at least some of the vocal people, the protesters included, who would like to see you removed from your position?

JACKSON: Sure, I have and I've talked to a lot of those people. And I've talked to awe lot of people who have initially called for that, and then have changed their mind after having meetings and some discussions about moving forward. Realistically, I'm going to stay here and see this through.

(END VIDEO CLIP) CABRERA: You heard it from the horse's mouth, so to speak, Evan. He says if this is happening, it is a crime, it needs to be addressed. Are you hearing anything more, reaction from that community, Evan?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well you know, Ana, it's sort of remarkable to me that he would survive all of this, if he does, simply because this report really paints a scathing picture of a department that he was running, that he was on top of it. And you know, the racist emails that were being exchanged by some of the top officials in that police department. And according to the justice department those same people are now in-charge of helping to bring some of these reforms, but really, doesn't speak very well of this department, so I don't know whether or not he'll survive this. But it is something that I'm sure the pressure is going to be on to try to do something about that.

I want to suggest one thing in this report the one of the things that the department, the justice department found was that 95 percent of arrests were very minor infractions, like walking in a manner, in a way, basically like jaywalking tickets were against African-Americans. And if you fast forward to what Darren Wilson and Michael Brown really the altercation began over it was because of a simple infraction like this. You know, if Darren Wilson doesn't see Michael Brown walking down the street, again, jaywalking and decides to stop him and initiate a confrontation, we're not here. We are not even talking about this.

Seven months ago, that's exactly what happened. And so this report really describes the department that used these types of interactions with the African-American community as revenue generators, again as ways to harass some of these people, the residents in that community, and that created an atmosphere of distrust, which we saw explode on the streets there.

CABRERA: Sure, and we heard from the attorney general how the small infractions have also really exploded into millions of dollars of revenue.

PEREZ: Exactly.

CABRERA: For this community through the municipal court system. I mean he said that they went back and looked at 2010 and the court fees added up to $1.3 million. But for 2014 revenues are exceeding $3 million and we're talking about parking tickets, jaywalking tickets and he used the example, Sunny, of the one woman who back in 2007 got a parking ticket for 100 bucks, this is a woman who didn't have even 100 bucks to pay. She got piled on, spent time in prison, now paid over $500 and still owes some $500.

SUNNY HOSTIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes. And I wasn't surprised to hear about that because when I was in Ferguson, resident after resident after resident discussed this with me. And I was shocked just to hear all of these people saying that this was going on. I mean, I heard it probably from five to six different people. But I think that we should be very clear when the attorney general said that the department of justice has made certain recommendations. Those aren't necessarily just recommendations. The Ferguson police

department and municipal courts will have to reform. This is a must do situation. We're talking about wholesale reform. If they do not --

CABRERA: What specific reforms could we expect and how will those are reinforced?

HOSTIN: Right. If they do not agree to those recommendations, then they will be sued by the justice department. So these reforms will happen no matter what. The results are the same. So we're hearing things like training to ensure officers don't use bias in policing, officers should practice community policing, police stops should focus on community safety. Those are just some of the recommendations. But to be clear, they are, the justice department sort of uses the word recommendations, these will --

CABRERA: They're mandatory.

HOSTIN: These will be mandates and I would be surprised that any of the leadership remains. It just doesn't make sense. I mean, I think when you see these sorts of consent decrees which is what that would be, this agreement between the department of justice and a city or municipality, you rarely see the leadership remain the same. I mean, think about the LAPD, think about what happened in Detroit.

CABRERA: Well, even when you hear from tom Jackson himself, he seemed to be almost in denial about what was happening.

HOSTIN: Yes. His head was in the sand.

CABRERA: Right there in front of his face.

HOSTIN: I think, you know, the attorney general made it very clear that we will see concrete action. And then I am certainly seeing on twitter and social media people saying well, so what? What is this means? The justice department goes in and says there are problems that nothing is going to happen. That is not going to be the case.

CABRERA: And in fact, he used the word nothing is off the table in terms of reinforcing and enforcing if need be, should these changes not come to fruition.

HOSTIN: This is clearly very important to this attorney general and has been a defining moment I think in his administration.

CABRERA: It almost seemed like he's giving a legacy speech.

HOSTIN: I've never seen anything like that.

CABRERA: Sunny Hostin, thank you so much. Thank you so much as well Cedric Alexander and Evan Perez for joining me. I really do appreciate it.

Up next opening statements in the Boston bombing trial and the defense lawyer begins by pointing her finger at her own client. Hear what she said.

Plus, did nuclear talks with Iran just hit a bump in the road? Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: He believed he was a soldier in a holy war, that's how prosecutors describe Boston bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Opening statements in his federal trial began today. The 21-year-old accused of setting off a series of deadly bombs near the finish line of the 2013 Boston marathon.

Now, three people died, including an 8-year-old boy. More than 260 others were injured, some severely having to lose limbs. Now Tsarnaev's attorney took kind of surprising approach in her opening statement before a packed courtroom. She said her client is guilty, that that he was unduly influenced by his older brother, Tamerlan who died in a police shooting after the bombings.

CNN's Alexandra Field is in Boston who has been following today's proceeding.

Alexandra, what else happened in court today? What stood out to you?

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Ana. The defense isn't even doing cross-exam of a lot of witnesses that the prosecution already brought forward. We're seeing incredibly graphic images of the injuries that were suffered, video of the immediate aftermath of the marathon bombing and we're hearing just incredibly emotional testimony from the survivors, talking about the pain they experienced on that day.

The prosecution opened up the trial today making their opening statement, building their case against Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. And in that opening statement they spoke in just excruciating detail about the extent of the injuries suffered by the three people who died at the finish line, the 260 others who were injured.

The defense, Ana, then got up and said they're not here to dispute the facts of the case. They don't dispute Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's involvement at the marathon, in a carjacking, in the death of an MIT officer, in the shoot-out with Watertown police. But say they are here to draw a distinction about what motivated him to do this. They say that he's a young man unduly influenced by his brother, the mastermind of this.

The prosecution says that in fact Dzhokhar was self-radicalized and that he spewing the rhetoric of Al-Qaeda. He left behind a note that parroted that rhetoric before he was found.

What's the difference here, Ana? Why does all of this matter? Well, it comes down to phase two of this trial which is the penalty part of the trial. Seventeen of these charges come with a possible death sentence. So the defense will work over the next couple weeks or even months to build a sympathetic a portrait as possible of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev -- Ana.

CABRERA: Alexandra Field, thanks you for summing it up for us.

The most talked about email address in politics today is hdr22@Clintonemail.com, that's the private email account of Hillary Clinton. The one she used as secretary of state, according to the Associated Press. This was linked to her own server. And now, her critics are having a field day asking why she didn't use a government account and whether she was trying to hide something.

Let's talk more about this with A.B. Stoddard, the associate editor at "the Hill."

Thanks so much, A.B. Clinton aid say nothing is nefarious what's going on. They turned over email requests. Some 55,000 pages of emails, in fact. Is that a good enough answer?

A.B. STODDARD, ASSOCIATE EDITOR, THE HILL: No, it's not. I mean, even if you give Mrs. Clinton the benefit of the doubt that she's turned over everything, and that even maybe what she did wasn't illegal, I still think you have to look at the political damage it's going to do because of how it looks.

You're the secretary of state. You have been involved in the highest levels of diplomacy with countries all over the globe and you choose not to ever conduct business on your government email, that you're instructed to do so when you arrive on the job.

No one knew better than Hillary Clinton that when you work in government your communications are no longer private and they're no longer yours. That they are archived when you leave, they have to be captured by the system every single day, every single hour. She obviously aggressively worked around the system to conduct her business only in private, from a server of her own that was located in upstate New York. Just look at what this looks like to voters who don't know the Clintons' background, the history of their secrecy especially hers but not interested in anyone in government covering anything up. They want complete transparency. They want all of government online, millenials especially. They don't want their emails and their phones looked at by the government but think the government should be open and don't like any kind of indication that people are playing by another set of rules.

CABRERA: And you do have to wonder, too, if she were thinking about a presidential campaign, didn't she think that this was going to come up at some point?

Now, I want to throw in another presidential contender's name, Jeb Bush. He was very outspoken after this, hammered Clinton tweeting this.

Transparency matters, unclassified Hillary Clinton emails should be released. And you can see mine here.

I mean, he put out some 250,000 plus pages of his own emails. But now we learn that he had his own server as well that he was using and he chose which emails to disseminate. So could that be a problem for him? STODDARD: You know, it's going to be less of a problem for him simply

because there's a huge field of other contenders. Mrs. Clinton certainly knew when she took the secretary of state job in 2009. She was likely to run for president again. It was very, very possible. She didn't know she'd be alone in the field.

But Democrats are worried now that this is something that she is standing in a solo field, sort of the presumptive nominee, not being challenged in a primary process. They're worried she's not even have debates. What this will do to her when she faces someone ultimately in general election like maybe Jeb Bush.

And because she's under investigation by the committee in the Congress over the death of one of our ambassadors and three other people, this story about where these emails are and what they say will be the subject line of her candidacy if, and unless and until she produces the emails.

That's not Jeb Bush's problem right now. She also made her feelings dealing as secretary of state more insecure, subject to hackers from unfriendly nations, all her communications vulnerable by refusing to use a secure system.

CABRERA: Well, in fact, one of the concerns, the exact security measures taken we don't know yet.

STODDARD: And that's not the same as the governor in Florida.

CABRERA: A.B. Stoddard, we got to leave it there. Thank you so much for joining me. I really do appreciate it.

STODDARD: Thanks.

CABRERA: Up next, just a day after a major speech by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, we have new information about the nuclear negotiations with Iran and whether they just hit a snag.

Plus, 56 years later why the NTSB is considering taking a closer look at that infamous plane crash that killed rock star Buddy Holly amongst other famous musicians.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: The quest to stop Iran from getting an atomic bomb is hitting some serious problems. The secretary of state John Kerry and his Iranian counterpart today wrapped up some three days of intense negotiations in Switzerland and Kerry admits significant gaps remain. The talks are due to resume March 15th, but that's just about 15 days ahead of the March 31st deadline.

In a dramatic speech to Congress, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned yesterday the proposed deal quote "would spark a nuclear arms race in the most dangerous part of the planet."

I want to bring in my guest with me now, Rabbi Jonathan Blake, to discuss more about this. Thank you so much for joining me, Rabbi.

RABBI JONATHAN BLAKE, WESTCHESTER REFORM TEMPLE: Thanks, Ana.

CABRERA: I want to ask you first, what did you think about the speech? Do you think it changed any minds?

BLAKE: I think a lot of people went into this speech already kind of in one side or the other about the best way to pursue our shared goal of Iran not obtaining a nuclear weapon. I'm not sure how many minds it changed. I think it moved a lot of hearts. And one thing as a rabbi I can commend Netanyahu for having done is to deliver a very stirring address. In fact, I think other clergy should listen to it for its sermonic value. It was emotionally resonant.

CABRERA: Absolutely. Definitely, he's a great orator. I think nobody would disagree with you on that. But are you concerned about the optics of Netanyahu maybe picking partisan sides or appearing to pick partisan sides in the U.S. while at the same time challenging the U.S. president? Is that going to help anything in terms of the situation and what the end game is here?

BLAKE: Well, first of all, I think it's fair to say that I along with much of the American Jewish community, certainly the liberal streams of Judaism in America had concerns about Netanyahu's appearance before Congress, about the circumstances which I have described as less than optimal under which he was invited to speak before Congress.

Now that it's done, I think the focus has to be on not just the effect, but on how we can continue to show that support for Israel among Jews in America and worldwide must continue to be a bipartisan issue and not be driven by partisanship.

My view is that the Jewish people are not strangers to debate and disagreement. In fact, there's a cherished place for disagreement within the Jewish tradition. And at the same time, our abiding love and support for Israel should not be undermined by partisanship.

I don't know if the optics have been good in this respect. But on the other hand, I think the strength of our support for Israel certainly outweighs any partisanship issues that might arise from it. In fact, I really think you can be deemed a lover and supporter of Israel even if you support one side or the other, whether you support the administration --

CABRERA: Unified in terms of that --

BLAKE: Absolutely. The goal is the same, to ensure Israel's not just survival but the fact Israel needs to be a strong thriving western- style democracy in a very dangerous neighborhood, the Middle East.

CABRERA: Rabbi Jonathan Blake, thank you so much for sharing your thoughts with us.

BLAKE: Thanks for having me on the program.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, this is the big bopper. Yes, this is the big bopper, Stephen.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: That was the big bopper, Richie Valens and Buddy Holly at the start of their careers when they died in that infamous plane crash back in 1959. Dubbed the day the music died, the wreck has long been the subject of conspiracy theories. And now the NTSB may be taking one of them seriously. In fact, there's the pilot who isn't speaking to the media right now, but who says several possibilities must be reexamined.

Joining me now to talk more about this is Gary Moore, author of "Hey Buddy," a book about his own quest the research that doomed flight.

You are an expert here. Thank you for being with me. You interview someone from the NTSB, in fact, as you were developing your own theory about what could have happened. Is this new research on to something?

GARY MOORE, AUTHOR, HEY, BUDDY: No, I don't think so. It's very basic. It was an experienced pilot. It was in a high performance airplane, and it was bad weather. These new theories that there was some commotion in the cabin, there's no evidence of that. There were no radio transmissions and all the witnesses to what happened in that cabin died instantly upon impact.

(CROSSTALK)

CABRERA: What about the idea that perhaps the plane exceeded its weight limits? We know Waylon Jennings gave up his seat so the big bopper could get on the plane who we know is a little overweight. Could that have had an effect?

MOORE: That absolutely could have had an effect. It's very, very difficult to trace that back in time and really establish that. That can only remain a theory. But I do think there is some possibility to that.

CABRERA: How hard is it to really do legitimate research about something that happened 56 years ago? Is there any chance we will get some answers?

MOORE: Well, I think that the answers we will get, there's a lot of evidence that the civil aeronautics board at the time was able to document. We know the plane was driving towards the ground at 3,000 feet per minute. We know it struck the left wing. We know that it was probably in a spin. And so, I think that in my book "Hey Buddy" we have really done a very detailed examination of the flight. And I think what they are going to find is the same thing we found. It was a high performance airplane, inexperienced pilot in bad weather. And it is really as simple as that, I think.

CABRERA: Why would the NTSB reopen an investigation, then? MOORE: I don't know if they will, you know. There is nothing

official saying -- the only thing I have heard, they are considering it, and they may reopen it if somebody can find some new evidence. But I don't know where that new evidence would come from other than theory.

CABRERA: All right, Gary Moore, thank you so much for your time. It's an interesting talker, that's for sure. Another mysterious death of those beloved musicians. Thanks again.

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CABRERA: That's going to do it for me. Happy Wednesday. "The LEAD" with Jake Tapper starts right now.