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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Flooding in Texas; World Soccer Scandal. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired May 27, 2015 - 12:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:00:05] ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome, everyone. I'm Ashleigh Banfield.

Our breaking news takes us to San Marcos, Texas, where they're giving a live update, looking for 11 people. Let's listen in.

KEN BELL, CITY MANAGER, SAN MARCOS, TEXAS: In Caldwell County, just on the county line of Caldwell and Hays, and a male victim last night at 4:00 p.m. at the Ranch Road 12 bridge. It's actually FM 2325 in Wimberley. None of those fatalities have been identified. I suspect that identification is maybe even coming in as we speak. If it happens while we're still here, we will give that information to you. The - otherwise we're going to - we'll send it out after. But if it happens while we're sitting here right now, I told them, interrupt us, let us know what the information is on that, if we get positive identifications. The photos and identification information of the missing persons is on the board over there for you guys when you leave out of here.

Right now, we are still in search mode. Every time that it rains, that poses a problem for our guys on the ground down there. In Wimberley especially, I've talked with the fire chief and his folks continuously, especially overnight. We have over 100 people from state assets, local assets, in the riverways, actively make this happen.

We suspect there will be a transition today with private assets and volunteer forces where they are organized volunteer forces being authorized to come in and work with our resources. It's to the point now where we need to start branching out away from the riverways and such, but we're not looking for volunteers for that purpose. We have volunteer search groups and teams that are organized for that purpose. So that's got to be a coordinated effort. We do not need any more - anybody hurt or worse in this scenario. We're already in a bad way right now and we don't want anything to get - go wrong.

Right now, on the recovery side with our cities, we have several functions in progress, donations, volunteers, and we're trying to manage all of these issues. As you can imagine, there's people all over the United States sending assets and just showing up on our porch, which is wonderful. We appreciate that. Unfortunately, it's hard to manage because we don't know you're coming. So if you plan on doing something like that, please notify us before showing up with an 18-wheeler full of something. Saying we're here to help is great and we appreciate it, but if you can just give us a heads-up on that sort of thing, we can manage it a lot better.

We do have volunteer centers open at San Marcos and Wimberley. In Wimberley the volunteer center for people who want to volunteer or need volunteers at the Cyprus Creek Church on 211 Stillwater. And those are open between 8 and 5 p.m. The San Marcos volunteer center is at the San Marcos Plaza Park, the old fish hatchery, at 206 C M Allen Parkway, also open 8-5. Those also operating coordinated through the various cities and Americorp is helping us out with that.

We have hundreds of people and organizations that are on the ground, thousands I would say, that want to help and do things, and that's great. As the weekend gets closer, we'll be in a better position to facilitate and - those folks and get them where they need to be. These volunteer centers are integral to making this happen. If you're - if you show up in our jurisdiction for volunteer assistance, you've got to check in with our VRC, our Volunteer Resource Center, to help us keep track of who is where and what they're doing.

Today, for example, we'll have a small group of people in San Marcos between 9:00 and 2 p.m., out at Half Price Books, doing a little work here in San Marcos. Wimberley, we're getting - they're still in the midst of the search and rescue operations and we're still trying to get those things coordinated down there.

The call center's been set up at 512-754-2275. Again, that's 512-754- 2275, and that's for disaster related questions that you might have. We have been doing damage assessments overnight and - over the last few days, I should say. We have thousands of homes that are damaged. Some, totally lost. We still don't have firm numbers. I do, anecdotally, for example, in this jurisdiction here in San Marcos, we have 744 homes that were impacted in either a severe or some way.

[12:04:55] We have lost 50 - let's see - what have you got? Thank you, sir.

We have lost several homes here. I know Wimberley has multiple homes with no - they're down to the foundation. It's a pretty devastating scenario.

With that, that's the overview of what we're doing on the ground there, what our recovery operations are and I'm going to open it to questions. I'm sure you have many.

QUESTION: What do you mean when you say you're going to move away from the river in terms of the -

BELL: The search? Well, they're - we have a search grid area where the river was, where it is now. We're going to expand that out a little bit essentially when - in the search operations and that's where the private groups come in real well. We can get some folks on the ground, we call them ground pounders, they can get out there and walk through it and help us out with that.

QUESTION: In regards to the bodies that you recovered, can you give us a timeline of when (INAUDIBLE). BELL: Sure. On the 25th, we had one male. It was in the morning hours and it's in San Marcos. On - or yesterday morning at 8:00 p.m., one female in Caldwell County, at the county line of Hays and Caldwell, in that area. 4:00 last night, one male, FM-2325. That would be in the Wimberley area at the bridge area.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE) FM-23?

BELL: Two-three-two-five. Two-three-two-five.

QUESTION: Do you feel like you know who those people are and you're just not publically identifying them or is it still -

BELL: We - we can't be wrong. Their - you know, I understand a car and who a car belongs to, but other people can be involved in driving those vehicles or borrowing and things. We can't be wrong. The medical examiner's going to be the definitive measure. Do you have that in?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No.

BELL: No? OK. So it has - we were expecting it to come in. We're still waiting for that information. So that's where we're at.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE) a lot of people (INAUDIBLE) peace of mind (INAUDIBLE) -

BELL: Correct.

QUESTION: Are you still hopeful that we can find someone still alive or (INAUDIBLE)?

BELL: We are - have an operations meeting going on as we speak. The - we had FLIR (ph) up last night, forward-looking, our infrared looking devices in helicopter format to look for heat signatures and things. That data's still being assimilated and figured out at the op center. We are still in search and rescue mode. We are still looking for viable victims.

You have to keep in mind also, we've had two events since this event that has put us back into the rescue business multiple times. I know the numbers have been changing of who's missing. We are firm at 11 right now and that's where we've been - we calculated someone saw something or something tangible that puts them as to be a missing person. We had as high as 30-some odd number the other day. The phones finally started turning on, the power started getting turned back on and then folks from out of states finally started getting ahold of people. We've sent officers to people's homes. We searched around the 75 number is what we've had to physically go find and physically lay eyes on these people and make sure that they're OK. And we've done that and that's where we get the 11 from.

QUESTION: The primary rescue efforts that you were talking about transitioning to, that's - when you say organized, you're talking about -

BELL: I'm talking about - QUESTION: Groups like the (INAUDIBLE) Center (INAUDIBLE) -

BELL: Like Techsar (ph) and - right.

QUESTION: What - can you name a few of them? (INAUDIBLE) versus just Joe Blow who wants to come in and help (ph).

BELL: Right. We are not - if you come individually to this site, you will be turned away. If you're not part of Rubicon (ph), Techsar (ph), those kind of groups that are formally organized, uniformed, equipped, trained personnel on the ground, you won't get - you won't get near the river. That's not what that's - this is about. We need people that know what they're doing. We're going to utilize those resources. We always intend to use - to do that.

But the best people in the world to do that is Texas Task Force One, and that's who's here. You give them their - the ability to get in and do their thing and they've - in the midst of all of this, they're organizing and tracking for the future. They know how this is going to work. This isn't the first time that we've had to do these types of search and rescues to organize for the next group. So they're taking care of the more difficult and technical parts of the search. Now we can start letting some of those other groups. That's got to be organized. This isn't a call for those groups. We already know who they are. We already have them in play and we'll bring those out probably this afternoon as that moves on.

[12:09:52] BANFIELD: So this is Ken Bell, the city manager of San Marcos, Texas, about 50 miles northeast of San Antonio, giving an update as to the missing. And, actually, the number has changed. Just before air, it was 12 people missing and he has now confirmed that at least in the San Antonio, San Marcos area, now 11 people missing.

But the statistics have been really nothing short of remarkable. The pictures even more so. Take a look at your screen. This is Wimberley, Texas. We have talked about the death toll now from this series of storms at 18 in the United States, in Texas and Oklahoma. Thirty-one in Texas, Oklahoma and Mexico all told.

Look at the power of the water, literally decapitating that bridge and sending it flying. Imagine the structures, the vehicles, everything in its wake.

In Houston, more than 4,000 properties at this point damaged or destroyed. Five people dead in Houston alone, two people still missing there, two to four inches of rain hitting there in various parts of the area between Wednesday and Sunday. It is still a - it's still an emergency and there is still a rescue and still a recovery.

I want to take you straight to some of the hardest parts of - hardest parts of Texas. Our meteorologist Jennifer Gray is in Wimberley, where you just saw those aerial shots. It's halfway between San Antonio and Austin. And, Jennifer, hold for a moment because I want to get to Rosa Flores who's in Houston right now.

And, Rosa, it may look like you're inside someone's home intact, but this is quite a story. You're going to walk us through one of the most affected structure and what happened to this home in this flood. Take me there.

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, you were just talking about the power of the water, Ashleigh, and I want to show you what that water can do inside a home. Now, I'm inside the home of Saundra Brown, who's been so gracious to allow us into her home.

So, thank you so much for doing that.

SAUNDRA BROWN, HOMEOWNER: No problem.

FLORES: But let me just give you the lay of the land here. The bayou is about 200 yards - no, 200 feet from us here. So the water rushed in and started rising very quickly. So, Saundra, take us back to that moment. You're here with your family. The water starts rising. What do you do?

BROWN: Well, at first, we got on the couches and were just going to move to the edges of the couches and keep our feet up. But the water kept coming much higher than we ever expected it to.

FLORES: So it was coming in very quickly.

BROWN: Very quickly once it started rising.

FLORES: And I want to show you the floor because you'll see -

BROWN: Right.

FLORES: That the floor - you can see it buckle.

BROWN: Right, this is the water damage.

FLORES: It's packed with water. This is the water damage. So what are you planning to do?

BROWN: We're going to cut out the border and pop up every eighth wood. These are - these are hardwoods. It's white oak. It should dry and we'll be able to salvage it partially that way.

FLORES: But there's a lot to do here. Now, one of the thing that really stands out about this story, so her family includes two dogs.

BROWN: Right.

FLORES: Now, in saving those dogs, I want to take you to the dining area.

BROWN: Right.

FLORES: The table was involved. So what did you do with the table to try to save the dogs, Saundra?

BROWN: OK. Well, after the water was getting too high for the couches and we knew it, we had a family that had gotten stranded, their car was under water. They came in for shelter. We felt bad. We let them in just as all the water was rising. So we were getting them elevated too. First we had people get on the table. Then we had people move to the counters. When we -

FLORES: So let's move over to the counters really quickly so we can kind of show them the damage on this end. So the kitchen, the cabinets almost completely destroyed. Ashleigh, you can see that they buckled. And this family is trying to salvage what they can.

BROWN: Right.

FLORES: And that's what they're doing today. It's a family event. Lots of - lot of their friends and their family coming together to try to help them out in this particular case.

Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: And definitely not an isolated story. I mean so many of her fellow, you know, Texans are going through this crisis right along with her.

Rosa, thank you. Standing by.

I want to go to Jennifer Gray right now, who's standing by in Wimberley.

I made a mistake, and boy was it a big one. I said two to four inches of rain between Wednesday and Sunday. That's additional. An additional two to four inches of rain is expected in this region and I don't know how they're going to be able to deal with that, especially looking at the site behind you, Jennifer.

JENNIFER GRAY, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, you know, that's the worse - that's the last thing they need is more rain, actually, and so we are going to look down at the river, the Blanco River. That's what flooded. It is still raging down. And you can see the water just coming over on the side there behind that tree. That's actually a concrete bridge. And so the water normally flows underneath that, now is just cascading over it.

Today is a day of cleanup across here. We are at Seven Acres Resort where 450 people were at the time of the flood. Luckily they were able to evacuate everyone to higher ground and so everyone here is safe, which is a little nugget of good news with all of this tragedy going on around us.

[12:14:55] And look at these slabs, these empty slabs. These were - these were all cabins. People were staying here. They evacuated. And aren't they glad they did. They couldn't see anything, Ashleigh, because this happened at night. So basically they heard the water getting closer, they heard it raging, they heard the cabins cracking, they heard the trees cracking and those are the sounds that they knew, we need to get to higher ground.

Look all around me. This - this green building right back there, the watermark is to the ceiling. So water was above my head at the time of the flood. And these are the cabins in the back. And you can see the watermark right there on the screen. This is where the water came to during the flood. So people inside these cabins evacuated. Luckily, they are doing OK.

Crews have been out here all morning long. Today is a day of clean-up. They're trying to get things organized, get these cabins cleaned out. Most of these in the front are a total loss, but they do have cabins in the back that are able - that are - they're going to be able to still use.

BANFIELD: Yes. Jen -

GRAY: Yes?

BANFIELD: One of the officials I heard earlier on CNN, I think they were talking to John Berman and Kate in their program, said that the big issue is this additional rain because every time you get a little more rain, the flood levels go up again and they disperse the debris field. So if there's a debris pile, it gets moved, it gets pushed and it changes. And that the searchers who have gone through that area have to come back and do it all again. Are you seeing evidence of that?

GRAY: Yes. Well, the waters have steadily been going down ever since we've been here. So the debris piles are exactly where they were when the flood waters initially went down. Now, what you don't want, as like you were mentioning, additional rain, several more inches of rain this weekend. That's the last thing you want because then the waters would come back up. And, yes, that's exactly what you would get. A lot of these trees that are down, they may move down stream. You'll get new debris from upstream to come down and wash in with some of this. And so I think that's why a lot of these crews are in here.

You'll see dump trucking everywhere. They're trying to get as much of this out of the way as they can, to clean up as much of it as they can along the riverbanks because they don't know how much rain they're going to get this weekend. It could be less than an inch. It could be several inches. If you get caught in one of those heavy downpours, you know it could be isolated amounts of even higher. So they're just hoping for the best and trying to clean out as much as they can beforehand.

BANFIELD: And I know that you're not necessarily at the structure, the Midlothian Dam that's on Padera Lake, it's near Midlothian. But there was a real worry about it. I think the worry has subsided, but I know I've got a lot of (INAUDIBLE) viewers who are asking me, are we out of the woods yet? Are there a lot of dam structures that are still in peril?

GRAY: Yes, I mean we - the water's high all over central Texas, and that's what we've seen. We've seen a couple of levees breach. We've seen water overtopping those dams. And so, yes, I mean, we're still in a very critical state here where any additional water is going to be a bad thing. The ground is so saturated. It's not going to be absorbed by the soil and so it's just going to run off into these creeks, in these rivers, in the bayous, just as we've seen the past couple of days. And so any additional rain is just going to mean trouble for much of Texas.

BANFIELD: Oh, just hoping the best for them. And I hope that - you know, I usually tell you, I hope your forecast is right, but in this sense, I really hope you're wrong with the predictions. Jennifer Gray doing a great job for us out there. Thank you for that. Also our thanks to Rosa Flores, showing us what the people of Texas are dealing with in the aftermath.

And this is where you come in. You can help. Please, go to cnn.com/impact, cnn.com/impact, help your fellow Americans who need it. This is where you and we can do some differences here. Make a change, make a difference and help out. Impact Your World.

And then coming up next, we're following that other big story that hit your television this morning. A lot of people woke up to a, what? Are you kidding me? The World Cup corruption scandal? The United States attorney takes on the world, and the world's biggest sport, and does she ever announce something big, indictments that could take down some of the biggest names in the business. And, yes, folks, we are talking hundreds of millions of dollars.

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[12:22:42] BANFIELD: An international corruption scandal is rocking the world's biggest sport, soccer to us here, futbal everywhere else. Swiss authorities are actually under a United States indictment right now, yes, the Swiss. The Swiss are actually working under what the Americans have been doing, raiding a hotel in Zurich, a fancy one, arresting 14 people, fancy people, connected to FIFA. That is soccer's governing body. And they've arrested them for racketeering, wire fraud, money laundering conspiracy. Those are serious, folks. The indictment accuses some of FIFA's officials of taking bribes totally more than $150 million for, and I'll quote them, "lucrative media and marketing rights to World Cup tournaments." About an hour ago, the United States attorney general, Loretta Lynch, laid out her case against these top soccer officials.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LORETTA LYNCH, ATTORNEY GENERAL: Now, in many instances, the defendants and their co-conspirators planned aspects of this long- running scheme during meetings held here in the United States. They used the banking and the wire facilities of the U.S. to distribute their bribe payments and they planned to profit from their scheme in large part through promotional efforts directed at the growing U.S. market for soccer.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: The market that's she's talking about for soccer is really growing, not just a little bit, but really growing here in the United States. In case you forgot, more Americans tuned in to watch the 2014 World Cup than ever before. The World Cup is the most popular single sporting event in the entire world. FIFA runs the global tournament and it also decides who gets to host that highly coveted and lucrative sporting event. FIFA also tries to market itself as a virtuous organization that helps bring the world together.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Futbal is the global game. A sport that unites and inspires. A game changes as it grows, so do FIFA's responsibilities. It's flagship event, the FIFA World Cup, provides the finances to sustain FIFA's wider mission, to develop the game, touch the world and build a better future.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[12:24:57] BANFIELD: But these charges seem to conflict with that message, not just a little, a lot. Joining me to talk about the ongoing investigation and the looming court case is CNN justice correspondent Evan Perez in Brooklyn, and also CNN legal analyst Paul Callan.

Evan, first to you. Does a lot of this come via the United States authorities because there is this possibility that the U.S. may have lost its bid to host the World Cup, possibly to Qatar, because of scandal?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, Ashleigh, that is when a lot of the whispers, a lot of the allegations began about there being a rigging process in place and there being, frankly, corruption at the center of the way FIFA does its business.

Now, according to the indictment that was handed out here in Brooklyn today, a key part of this is really somebody who didn't pay his taxes. A man by the name of Chuck Blazer, who was a key FIFA official, an American, who ran the soccer federation that includes the United States. According to this indictment, $11 million in unreported income, which got the attention of the IRS and then the FBI. In the end, he turned and wore a wire in meetings with other top officials at FIFA and here is - that is how we got to 14 people now being indicted. People from all over Latino America, from Brazil, Uruguay, Costa Rica and even here in the United States.

And, you know, the U.S. attorney here said that this is an investigation that's only beginning. They didn't really want to get into the loss of the U.S. to Qatar in 2022 for the World Cup - to host a World Cup. They say that that didn't really have to do with this case. But we know, from talking to officials, that that was one reason why they started looking into this, simply because the allegations were that that process was rigged, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: Hold that thought for a moment.

Paul Callan, look, I - I've covered a lot of criminal trials in which people come forward who snitched, who cut a deal, to talk about other people. Sometimes they wear wires and sometimes it's just their own testimony that's evidence against the other players. And we're talking about a bunch of people who, just unsealed today, we're learning have been talking at length about their fellow co-conspirators, who are alleged to be co-conspiriting. So - or co-conspiring. So, how much power does that hold when you're talking about guys who already cut a deal, signed it, got their convictions and probably got a pretty easy road instead of what these guys might face?

PAUL CALLAN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, it makes it a tough case to prove in court in front of a jury. Wherever you're dealing with a snitch who's got a deal, you may have a potential problem. And I think there's another problem here. The U.S. is probably going to take a lot of flak from a lot of countries who say, hey, what is the U.S. doing indicting all of these people from all of these other countries? This is a political indictment by a powerful western country.

BANFIELD: Some people are thrilled, by the way. Piers Morgan, in a daily mail, was going bananas saying finally the United States does what the rest of the world couldn't do for, you know, decades.

CALLAN: I don't know. We have to see what Costa Rica thinks and what Uruguay thinks and a lot of these other smaller countries where, you know, these are probably very prominent people in those countries. So, you know, will it create anti-Americanism because we're swooping in with such an indictment. It's very, very unusual.

BANFIELD: Or maybe cleaning up what they had no idea was so messy, or suspected was messy and now they're seeing evidence through wire taps and snitches, et cetera.

CALLAN: Well, and I would have to think also that the U.S. Justice Department must have conferred - I'd love to know the back story here. There must have been cooperation with other major governments in this. And, of course, there have been rumors about this corruption for years.

BANFIELD: Yes.

CALLAN: So I wonder how much international cooperation went into the investigation.

BANFIELD: Rumors and they say evidence back to 1991.

Quick question, I want to get you to weigh in on it. Evan, I'm going to get you to tag it real quickly and that is extradition. We have struggled mightily dealing with extradition. Even when we have treaties with countries, depending on how severe the crime is, how much work goes into it, how old the crime is, et cetera. And we had some hits and some misses. What do you think the odds are here that there will be extraditions of these player here to the United States?

CALLAN: Well, I think there's a very good chance there will be extradition. There are only 90 countries in the world that we do not have extradition treaties with. Switzerland, by the way, we have an extradition treaty, although there's one famous case where we had a problem. Roman Polanski was not extradited by the Swiss because the Swiss had a problem with the fairness of his court proceeding. So there are always outs under these extradition treaties.

BANFIELD: Evan, did the attorney general address that in her news conference? Did she say anything about the possibility of the extradition and how easy or how they may go after this? PEREZ: Well, she didn't address how easy it's going to be. She said

that that is definitely something that they're going to do. And I think, look, I mean, part of this is going to be a fight in those countries as to whether or not these people will face justice here in the United States. Seven of them, by the way, were arrested by the Swiss and the Swiss were cooperating with the Justice Department.

[12:29:47] And more complicated in places like Trinidad and other smaller countries where, as Paul pointed out, some of these people are top, very prominent officials. Argentina, Brazil. The question is now, can the Justice Department get those countries to cooperate and turn over their citizens and also, frankly, go after some of those people that were involved in - allegedly involved in this corruption, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: Yes, I can just say this, it would have been nice to have the World Cup here. And if we lost it from scandal, I think