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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Malaysia: Debris "Most Certainly" from 777; New "Death Row Stories", Sunday, 10PM; Cosby Lawyer Speaks to CNN. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired July 31, 2015 - 12:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:30:00] RANDI KAYE, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: We are following the next leg of the arduous journey of the wing flap that experts are pretty well convinced, came from the Boeing 777, and not just any 777, but Malaysia Airlines, Flight 370. Two days after the park washed ashore in Reunion Island in the Southern Indian Ocean, it is being flown to a lab in France where testing may reveal how it came off the plane, and whether that happened in the air, on the water, or even on the ocean floor. Officials say the tests will get under way next Wednesday near the southern city of Toulouse.

Whatever happened to MH370 in March of last year, a U.S. intelligence report then months ago, inferred that it began in the cockpit with somebody, somebody taking the jet off course on purpose. I want to get straight to Reunion Island now and CNN's Nima Elbagir. Nima, a lot of people are so anxious for answers here. I mean, has the flap even left yet for France?

NIMA ELBAGIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're hoping that it will leave in the next few hours. This is such a delicate process, Randi. We actually have video in that shows you how sensitively they're having to handle this. You see a whole escort of police officers standing there while it's being loaded in the crate, loading it very carefully. It's been very carefully wrapped, because everything about this segment of this plane wing is going to important to the investigators.

Any kind of striations on than surface. The plant life, the shellfish, the barnacles that are on this, that will tell them what kind of water it was, the metal deposit levels will give them some kind of geographical locator. Possible where it went down, how long it was in the water, how deep it went.

So all of this is very, very important, and for that our officials are trying to get it to France in as good shape as they can. The hope it is will land first thing tomorrow morning. For a lot of people, the concern is not this delay. Initially, we have thought that they would be able to get some kind of investigation going immediately on arrival. That doesn't appear to be the case or starts on Wednesday. For the families who -- some of those that we've been speaking to, have finally allowed themselves to believe that perhaps they will finally get answers. This does pushes it back a little further away, Randi. KAYE: Yeah, it certainly does. All right, Nima, I appreciate the updates from there. Some have never lost hope, and others want closure. For the families of the 237 people on board Flight 370, the discovery of the wreckage only adds to their heartache. Many have been asking the same question, "Could my loved one somehow still be alive?"

One Chinese woman's daughter and son-in-law were on that flight. She was her only child. She says time has stood still for the past 17 months.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Not a single minute has passed without me thinking about them in the past 500 plus days. No matter if I'm watching TV or chatting, they are in my head every minute. What kept me going until now was repeatedly imagining the moment when I would reunite with my daughter again. She's my only child. She was the first generation of China's one-child policy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: Just heartbreaking. Some families say that even with the new evidence, they won't give up hope until there is 100 percent proof that this is indeed MH370. Our next guest has a firsthand understanding of what the families may be going through. She lost her fiance on TWA Flight 800, which went down just off the coast of Long Island back in 1996.

Heidi Snow is the founder of ACCESS, the aircraft casualty emotional support services. And she's also the author of "Surviving Sudden Loss, Stories from those who have lived it". Heidi, nice to see you. I'm so sorry it's under these circumstances. But tell me, as far as your understanding goes, why do families certainly in this case, why would they hold on to hope for so long?

HEIDI SNOW, AUTHOR OF SURVIVING SUDDEN LOSS: Well, after I lost my fiance, I remember seeing the burning debris in the Atlantic Ocean but it wasn't until actually it was confirmed that he was -- his remains were found, which really let me know that he was truly gone. And until that point, seeing the wreckage, did not quite give me the closure that I needed to actually know that he was really gone.

I really held that hope, I always thought maybe he swam together away, maybe somehow he swam to shore. And I think for these families -- for some of them, this certainly is one step closer to learning about what happened. But until their physical remains, it's hard to truly accept your loved one really is gone.

[12:35:00] And -- But this is one step closer and with all air disasters, one of the most common threads is the amount of time it takes to really understand what happened. So all information is so helpful but on the flip side this is also very difficult for the families because this does start to resonate with them but their loved ones could be gone. And holding on to hope is what has gotten them through to this point. And all of us at ACCESS walk with them. It brings us all back to day one when we saw the debris in the ocean with Flight 800 and seeing the debris fields with so many other air disasters, this kind of learning this, every step of the way, all new information makes it so you have to start to re-evaluate how you're going to grieve and, you know, how to accept that they're truly gone.

KAYE: It's been so hard for so many of the MH370 family members. Have you been in touch with them? Have any of them reached out to you?

SNOW: Yeah. We've been working with them since it happened. So it is new development. For some people, it definitely -- it's one step closer. But for some people, you know, making sense what happened and for other people it's extremely difficult for them because they really cling on to that hope. And that's how they got through everyday until this point.

KAYE: And what -- you know, obviously this could be one piece but it's no guarantee and if this is a part of MH370 that the rest of the plane or anyone's remains will be found. What is your advice to these families at this point?

SNOW: I mean, for us, what we find to be most helpful is just having other people who have been there before. I founded ACCESS because I needed to talk to somebody else who had been through it. And that's what we offer. We walk with them. We give them hope that they can get through the next day because we did. We have 250 grief mentors who have all lost loved ones and they hold their hand and they talk with them and really provide -- basically role models for them to let them know that they can get through this because other people have survived it.

KAYE: Yeah. And they're not alone, absolutely. Heidi Snow, I appreciate your time. Thank you.

SNOW: Thank you, Randi.

KAYE: And don't miss our special report tonight at 9:00 p.m. eastern time, "Vanished, The Mystery of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370," only on CNN. Up next, how can Bill Cosby continue to deny all the allegations against him? We'll ask his lawyer when she joins me live, coming up.

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[12:40:35] KAYE: This week on "DEATH ROW STORIES" on CNN highlights a triple murder at the home of a popular nightclub owner in Florida leaves police searching for clues. Eventually this man, Seth Penalver, was convicted of the murders and locked up on death row. It took three trials but Penalver was finally acquitted.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just before Seth Penalver's third trial in 2012, he received dozens of boxes of previously undisclosed files related to his murder case. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Seth and I go through those documents (inaudible) page by page.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The documents included a lead sheet containing a confession by to police by a man named Johnny McGill.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: In both of the trials, the state's theory is that Pablo and Seth drove the Mercedes to Palm Beach County. But going through the documentation from the Miramar Police Department, we find a lead sheet. Johnny McGill walks into the Broward County sheriff's office and says "My boss ordered me to drive the Mercedes to West Palm Beach County and set it on fire."

You just walked in and admitted that you've committed arson and a triple homicide and the Broward County sheriff's office let you walk out. You have witnesses who all put Seth and Pablo in sunrise with the Mercedes and Seth's car. The theory was that they were together but it doesn't add up. It doesn't match.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A few days after talking to police, Johnny McGill was murdered at a nightclub in Miami. Police never verified McGill's claims and never told the defense.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: Joining me now from Fort Lauderdale, Penalver's attorney, Hilliard Moldof. Hilliard, why do you think your client was convicted in the first place? I mean, what went wrong there?

HILLIARD MOLDOF, SETH PENALVER'S ATTORNEY: What went wrong was the advent of surveillance tapes. This was I believe the first case in the country where a surveillance tape actually captured a live homicide occurring. So, at that point in time it was so news- shattering. It was so earth-shaking that you couldn't get away from the video. And that was really the biggest problem for us was that video.

KAYE: And what evidence do you think in the end actually convinced the jury to finally acquit him? Was it one piece of evidence or a group of pieces of evidence?

MOLDOF: No, it was a culmination of just enormous amount of things but most importantly, you know, go forward 18 years, video certainly, you know, when you look at it back that way, we could all size up the quality of the video, show that it was really terrible quality then and we were able naturally to gain a lot of advantages technologically where we were -- you know, we have some various pieces of evidence.

But like your show just mentioned, we got 50,000 pages of documents through public records that contained enormously helpful evidence that it was just -- it was a combination of many, many things that we used over the years, put them all together. And in the last trial, we made the video our friend and really attacked it but attacked just on the picture of Mr. Penalver, who they accused to be Mr. Penalver, it just wasn't him. KAYE: Yeah. And do you think that this case, your client's case is an example of why so many say the death penalty should be abolished?

MOLDOF: Yeah. When I started in this business 40 years ago, I was tasked with looking at the new death penalty statute that Florida had enacted at Furman v. Georgia. And I can tell you for the last 40 years, I've been fighting the death penalty. To me it's the most ridiculous form of civilized society in the name of civilization.

We create all these great laws, we're a great country, and we have it all figured out. And then at the end, we become the base animal we're fighting. We go to the worst of the worst, the instinct that we have. You know, clearly, you make a mistake, this is irreversible. You can't have it.

KAYE: Absolutely. Hilliard, thank you very much for your time. Appreciate it.

MOLDOF: Sure.

[12:44:41] KAYE: And you can find out much more about this fascinating case on "DEATH ROW STORIES" when it airs this Sunday night at 9:00 p.m. right here on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KAYE: Testing is due to get under way next Wednesday on the airplane part that from all indications is the first physical trace of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. The part is being flown from Reunion Island near Madagascar to Paris and then to a military lab near the Southern French City of Toulouse. Officials there expect to confirm it's a wing flap from a Boeing 777 and figure out how it separated from the rest of the still-missing airliner.

An update now on the shooting of an unarmed Black man by a White police officer in Cincinnati. Two other officers at the scene when Samuel DuBose was shot will not be charged. That's according to the Hamilton County Prosecutor's Office. The prosecutor says the officers did not see Ray Tensing being dragged by the car. Tensing pled not guilty to murder charges yesterday and he is now free on bond.

A new Ebola vaccine is showing a 100 percent success rate so far in a trial in guinea. The World Health Organization says more research is needed but the vaccine is so promising that officials have decided to start using it immediately on people who may have been exposed to this deadly disease.

Dylann Roof pleaded not guilty to 33 federal charges including multiple hate crimes this morning. Roof is accused of killing nine people at Charleston, South Carolina's Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church back in June 17.

The newly released video shows gunman John Houser buying a ticket and walking into a Louisiana movie theater last week moments before killing two people and wounding nine others before taking his own life. Police have also released the 911 calls from that shooting. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

911 DISPATCHER: 911, what are you reporting?

CALLER: There's a shooting at Grand 16.

911 DISPATCHER: Wait, but ma'am did you have a description of the person with the gun?

CALLER: He was wearing a white polo, I don't know, he's an older man.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[12:50:16] KAYE: In Colorado, a woman is jailed for contempt and also faces a judge on assault charges today for her outburst at the James Holmes' trial. She forced her way toward the front of the court during closing arguments yesterday just before jurors began deliberating the death penalty.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEBORAH CAVE: He's wrong because mental illness is everything. I'm the biological mother. She's a surrogate. They took him away from me. And they adopted him because they knew they had (inaudible). My family's full of FBI. He's got mental illness. Don't kill him. Don't kill him. It's not his fault

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: Deliberations resume Monday in the final phase of the trial to determine if Holmes will face death or life in prison for killing 12 people in a Colorado movie theater.

Up next, Bill Cosby's lawyer joins us. We'll talk with her about the allegations against the entertainer, coming up.

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[12:54:54] KAYE: Thirty-seven women have stood up publicly pointing their finger and said that Bill Cosby has either raped or sexually assaulted them. Many of the stories followed the exact same script. They alleged Mr. Cosby gave them a drink, it incapacitated them, and then he had his way with them.

Cosby, through his lawyers, denies all of the allegations saying that any and all sex he had with these women was consensual. One of his lawyers is here today with me, Monique Pressley represents Bill Cosby and joins me from Washington.

Monique, nice to have you here. Let me start with the deposition from the 2005 civil case against Mr. Cosby which he settled privately, you know, I just want to read a paragraph from that deposition. It starts with a lawyer on the other side saying, "When you got the Quaaludes, was it in the your mind you were going to use these Quaaludes for young women that you wanted to have sex with?" Mr. Cosby says, "Yes." That lawyer follows up, "Did you give any of those young women the Quaaludes without their knowledge?" Mr. Cosby's lawyer objects to the question, restricted to the Jane Does. He says, "Would you please?" The other lawyer says, "No, I will not." And Mr. Cosby's lawyer says, "Do not answer it."

So my question to you is should he have answered that question? And I only asked that because isn't an attorney supposed to tell his client to not answer a question only if it will divulge privileged information or trade secrets or violate a court order?

MONIQUE PRESSLEY, BILL COSBY'S ATTORNEY: Well, it could be any of those things or it could be because it violates some agreement that the parties have about questions that will be answered and will not be answered. And this was one of those instances where questions were only supposed to be about a particular subset of individuals. And I certainly can't go back and second guess the work that was done by able counsel in that deposition.

But what's important there is that the questions that Mr. Cosby did answer in candidly, more candidly than many I've seen in depositions in all the years I've been practicing. Those answers were one, that he never gave a woman a drug without her consent and two, that he did not have non-consensual sex with any other person.

So that's why it's important for me to go to whomever I can who will listen and say that Mr. Cosby as of today is innocent until proven guilty. And there shall not be proof because the statute of the limitations has passed, people waited far too long to want to discuss these matters at all. He's never been charged with a crime, never been convicted of a crime and never admitted a crime.

So, where we stand right now is with people attempting to do through media and through public opinion what they cannot do and have failed to do in a court of law.

KAYE: I understand what you say that your client is saying, that Mr. Cosby is saying, but that fact is that 37 women say that Bill Cosby raped or sexually assaulted them and some say that they were drugged. And I know he says that none of that happened. But are you saying or is your team saying that all of these women are lying?

PRESSLEY: And I'm not calling anyone a liar. What I'm saying is that Mr. Cosby vehemently denies those allegations. And I actually reject the clumping. I know that it's probably more impressive when we say numbers like 35 or 37, but 37 women are not saying that they were raped. Thirty-seven women are not saying that they were sexually assaulted. There, as you said, are a variety of claims that are actually distinct because that are being clump together, I guess, because it's easier than doing what to me should be the hard work and asking the hard questions.

KAYE: They are distinct but none of them are positive when it comes to Mr. Cosby. But let me ask you, have you ever seen a case where 37 separate accusers, even if they have different stories, many of them are close to identical but where they were all making it up?

PRESSLEY: I don't know who's making what up. I'm not really comparing it to any other cases. What I'm saying is that, yes, through the decades, we have seen what we use to call lynch mobs where people turned and point their finger at one person and accused that one person of doing something that they did not do. And they were filed into the court one after another to say, "He did it, he did it, she did it, she did it," when it was not the case. That happened often in the '60s and '70s in this country.

And actually, that's not what's happening now because we can't even go into a courtroom to get these matters resolved. Some say that the statute of limitations has expired and that's convenient for Mr. Cosby. I disagree. I think it's convenient for accusers because then they're not required to do what would happen if they actually had to be brought into court and stand under the scrutiny of examination for the allegations that they're bringing now.

KAYE: Will Mr. Cosby ever come out publicly on his own without a lawyer like yourself speaking for him and say anything about these allegations?

[12:59:55] PRESSLEY: I can't say what Mr. Cosby will or will not do at a point in the future but what I know for sure is that in this country, you're innocent until proven guilty. It's not guilty until proven innocent. Mr. Cosby doesn't have anything to prove. He's speaking through his lawyers so that the record can be set straight but he has the right to say nothing at all.

KAYE: Monique Pressley, thank you very much for your time.

PRESLEY: Thank you for having me.

KAYE: And thank you, everyone, for watching. I'm Randi Kaye, WOLF starts right now.