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New Day

Deadly Tornadoes Rip Through Midwest; New Dash Cam Shows Moments Before Shooting; Hillary Clinton Ready to Announce; Interview with NBA Legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired April 10, 2015 - 06:30   ET

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

[06:30:00] RYAN YOUNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The semi trailer knocked over by the powerful winds here. This has been the focus for a lot of people. That building right there used to be a restaurant and actually people were inside when the powerful tornado came this direction, some folks were trapped, they were rescued.

Police have asked us to stand back this far, because there are power lines that are down throughout this entire area. In fact if we didn't have our light on, you could see nothing for miles. Because the way the lights are not on in this area.

Someone had to be saved out of that building, everyone is okay from the structure. You can see the damage left behind. And, of course, when first light comes up. I'm sure there will be more assessments of the damage -- Michaela.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Ryan, incredible to think that nobody was hurt when you look at the devastation that's left behind. We'll be tuning in back in with you shortly.

We turn to California now. Law enforcement embroiled in another controversy in San Bernardino, California. Video appearing to show man with his hands behind his back being pummeled by deputies, following a bizarre horseback pursuit. The man fell from the horse after being stunned with a laser. We're told the attack went on for two minutes, involving 11 deputies, the incident allegedly stemmed from an identity theft investigation. An internal probe has been launched.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Iran is demanding Saudi Arabia stop its air strikes against Houthi rebels in Yemen. Now, Iran has been suspected of fueling this rebellion. And the ayatollah now calling the strikes against the Houthis criminal genocide. Despite that, there was another round of airstrikes just this morning, the U.N. Security Council could vote as early as today on a resolution to blacklist a Houthi leader and the son of the Yemen's former president, who is fighting alongside them.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Here's a scary story: Oscar winner Sandra Bullock's desperate cry for help. It was played out in court. She made a panicked call to police last June after coming face to face with an alleged stalker inside her home.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

SANDRA BULLOCK, ACTRESS: I'm locked in my closet, I have a safe door in my bedroom and I locked it and I'm locked in the closet right now.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: During Tuesday's hearing, Joshua Corbett was ordered to stand trial on stalking, burglary and weapons charges. He has pleaded not guilty. Bullock and her son, Lewis, who was not in the home at the time, were not harmed.

CUOMO: All right. Of all the disturbing aspects of what happened in South Carolina, what we see in the video now, the one stand-out is when the moment that Officer Slager is seen dropping something near Scott's body, something that looks like a Taser. And it leads to the obvious question of whether or not the officer was trying to set up the situation, for explanation afterwards.

Let's bring in Miller Shealy, a professor at the Charleston School of Law. He's also a former assistant United States attorney for the Department of Justice.

Professor, thank you very much for joining us this morning.

Let's go through the big points of what we see from the video that the young man took and the dash cam video. The stop itself -- anything unusual about it, other than when Walter Scott flees?

MILLER W. SHEALY, PROFESSOR, CHARLESTON SCHOOL OF LAW: No. Actually that looks like a petty standard traffic stop. And I saw nothing unusual about it. In fact, as you watch the film of the dash cam on the police car, you don't see anything really unusual until suddenly, Mr. Scott seems to bolt from the car for some reason.

CUOMO: Now, he bolts, the warrant was for child support. But still, judging that situation, was the officer right to pursue?

SHEALY: I think under those circumstances, when you have a car stopped, lawfully stopped, I think the officers can pursue, it's very odd during a traffic stop like this, when there's certainly no evidence the officer thought anything else was happening other than routine traffic stop for the driver especially with a passenger in the car, to suddenly exit the car and run away for apparently no reason.

CUOMO: Right. So, now, he catches --

SHEALY: That's a good reason to at least --

CUOMO: He catches up to him at some point and there's an altercation. Now, there's a very important fact that's being neglected that we still don't really understand. The officer says he grabbed for my Taser. I was afraid I had to shoot a shot.

Now, that would mean that he was afraid of the Taser. He had a reasonable fear. That would mean that it had to happen that the Taser was grabbed before he used it on Mr. Scott. Isn't that true?

SHEALY: Yes. Unfortunately, we don't have that on film. Squarely, that seems to occur. But obviously at the time that Mr. Scott exits the vehicle and flees, and before the shooting, and I understand that the individual that took this terrible video, has said, has indicated to law enforcement and others, that there was a fight, there was a scuffle.

CUOMO: Yes.

SHEALY: So, you know, it often happens, we don't know whether they were fighting over his gun, his Taser or just fighting and the officer was trying to subdue him. We really don't know that.

CUOMO: He is saying on the tape, Taser, Taser. When an officer is saying Taser, Taser, is that an indication that he's using the Taser? Is that something you would say in the line of using one?

[06:35:01] SHEALY: You might, yes. But, you know, that's something we don't really know in terms of exactly what was going on.

CUOMO: Right.

SHEALY: Was the officer trying to Tase him? Or was he shouting out, trying to get other officers to come and help because he was losing control of the Taser or thought he might.

CUOMO: Because one thing is for sure --

SHEALY: We just don't know that.

CUOMO: One thing is for sure, once he used the Taser, once Officer Slager used the Taser on Walter Scott, it would not be reasonable for him to fear the Taser being used on him anymore, because it had already been discharged and that's why the timing is important. That takes us to what happened after the shooting.

The shooting is horrible. It needs no expert analysis. However, if he does drop that Taser, near the body, afterwards, can it be anything else than an attempt to set up the situation to his own advantage?

SHEALY: It's really hard to explain it in a way that's good for the officer, I'll put it like that. It's tampering with the scene of the crime. It's hard to imagine why an officer would do something like that. It's hard to imagine a good reason.

CUOMO: Do you believe the other officers should be coming under scrutiny? The first one who runs in apparently, an African-American officer runs in first, puts on gloves, he doesn't do CPR. Did he see the shooting? Did he see what was dropped there? The other officers who come subsequently, whose reports don't line up with what they may have said afterwards, should all of that still be investigated thoroughly, even though the obvious is what Slager did?

SHEALY: I think so and I think it will be. I think a lot of people, state and local are going to be looking -- excuse me, state and federal are going to be looking into this and asking what happened and who saw what and why they reported things the way that they did.

So, I don't see any evidence that other officers committed a crime thus far. But certainly there's a question perhaps, about why certain things were reported the way they were, or not reported in the manner that occurred.

CUOMO: Absolutely. Professor, that raises the question of who should be doing these investigations in the first place. That's a conversation for another day.

Appreciate very much, Miller Shealy, being with us this morning.

Alisyn?

CAMEROTA: Well, the game of will she, won't she, Chris, may soon be over. Hillary Clinton may finally make her 2016 presidential run official. But when and how she plans to announce is unusual. We'll examine it.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:41:23] PEREIRA: Hillary Clinton may finally be ready to throw her hat into the 2016 presidential ring. Reports say her big campaign announcement could come as early as this weekend.

You know we want to discuss it. All with Jeff Zeleny, CNN Washington correspondent. Good morning to you.

Also with us, Peter Hamby, CNN national political reporter.

Gentlemen, start your engines. I think we may have something to talk about. So when you hear, Mr. Zeleny, about the who, what, when, and where -- what are insiders saying about the big announcement?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Michaela.

You're right. We know she's running. It is just a matter of when. And I am told a week from now, she will already have been long in the race and will have already traveled to Iowa, New Hampshire, perhaps other early primary states.

So, she is definitely getting in. The announcement video is, has already been shot, we're told. She is going to announce perhaps over the weekend or perhaps early next week, via social media. And then she's going to start traveling and meeting those voters one-on- one that she has to win over.

CAMEROTA: Peter, there are some reports that she will put this out as Jeff just said, via Twitter, and it will happen this Sunday, though we've not confirmed that. If that were to happen, why Sunday, why Twitter?

PETER HAMBY, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER: Well, look, I mean if you look at the Republican contenders, they're all having these announcement events, and there's a reason for that. They need to build name ID. They need to get people to know them and they need to force media to come cover them.

That's not the case with Hillary Clinton. She has universal name ID, everybody knows her. She has sort of learned over the last couple of years, she can put out a tweet and the media will run head- long in that direction and write about it. So, she doesn't have to go through the risk potential of having a roll-out event and a speech.

I mean, let's be honest, Hillary Clinton, despite all the tools in her toolbox and despite her powers of her as a politician, she isn't the greatest political performer. So, having an announcement, a video on her own terms, you know, is probably a good thing. The media will cover it, regardless.

And then, as Jeff said, she'll head off to the early primary states. I talked to one activist in Iowa who said she had already been contacted about having an event for Secretary Clinton. So, remember, she did this in 2007. She announced with that video, "I'm in and I'm in to win."

So, this isn't necessarily something new in politics.

CUOMO: I heard, Jeff, that they're wrestling with a little something of the same thing they did last time, which is that then and now, Hillary felt, their team felt like, we don't know what the upside is to our announcement that everybody knows we're going to run, we're the biggest person in the race, we don't want to match momentum with these lesser players. So, you know, what do we get out of this? How do we limit it from just a bad thing to what it is opposed to everybody else, which is like a boon to the candidacy?

ZELENY: No question about it. I mean, the biggest boon of an announcement is just finally getting in. The reality is we've seen in polls this week, she needs to get in and she needs to start reintroducing herself to voters. The email controversy and everything else has taken a toll on her in battleground states.

Her soon-to-be advisers have taken focus groups in Iowa and New Hampshire, and perhaps elsewhere, and they know that she has some work to do with voters. Not every Democrat is ready for Hillary. So, that is the biggest reason to get in, to start this conversation, start going on offense a little bit.

PEREIRA: And, Peter, the historic nature of a Hillary run, the potential first, first you know, first woman to be president, I mean do you think they'll go with that? Try to avoid it? Because you can only control that narrative so much.

[06:45:00] HAMBY: I think, we've gotten signals from Clinton and her allies that is very much the direction she intends to go. And remember, again, when she announced in 2008, and 2007 rather, she said, "I'm in and I'm in to win." She sort of projected this air of inevitability. That this was just about winning rather than you know connecting with Democratic voters on the issues they care about. In appearance after appearance over the last two years, whether it was on a book tour, paid speech or political stop, she would talk about equal pay and women's health.

They realize that the path to victory for a Democratic president in 2016, very much depends on the party's built-in demographic advantages, among Hispanics, among African-Americans, among young people and among unmarried women specifically who have drifted very strongly into the Democratic camp.

So I would expect her to talk about that as opposed to that sort of air of inevitability that really troubled her in 2008.

PEREIRA: We'll be watching for that. We also know on the GOP side, Marco Rubio expected to announce next week. So many things for us to keep an eye on.

Peter Hamby and Jeff Zeleny, our thanks to you.

And for you folks at home, let us know what you think. You can send us a tweet @newday, go to our Facebook.com/NewDay page. Add a comment there, we'll be watching it.

CUOMO: All right. We've got some time for CNN Money now, chief business correspondent Christine Romans is here.

So, the Apple Watch, can I try it on my caveman wrist?

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: You can in about two hours. You can officially pre-order the Apple Watch this morning. You can try one on in an Apple Store in a couple of hours. The company's first new product in five years, Chris. So far, around the world, they have opened up to try it on, we're seeing short lines, if lines at all. Nothing like with the iPhone.

Early reviews find it really hard to get used to. A steep learning curve, but worth it if it helps you unshackle you from your phone and checking your phone all the time.

Google is consistently rated the best place to work, right? So, how do you get a job there? The head of people operations Laszlo Bock told me it doesn't matter where you went to college, it doesn't matter what your grades were or if you can answer those famous brain-teas brain-teasers. Remember those brain teasers, those are dumb questions in a job interview he says. What's important? Leadership, cognitive ability and, oh, yes, Googliness, if you fit in to the culture there, guys.

CAMEROTA: I don't know what that means.

PEREIRA: Google it, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: I think we have that.

CUOMO: Having an interesting name is good, too, Laszlo, that's strong, I like that.

CAMEROTA: All right. Christine, thanks so much.

NBA Hall of Famer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar speaking out about what he calls the assassination of Walter Scott. He says that what happened in South Carolina shows racism in police ranks is still very real. So, is there a way to fix the system? We'll ask him all about it.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:51:49] CUOMO: We now know more, it's not just about the video that shows the horrible end to the situation. We know how it began. We see the officer's interaction with Walter Scott, the 50- year-old whose life was taken by Officer Slager. We hear things that lead to the confrontation between them.

So, we're putting the pieces together and people are forming their theories off of it.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, you know him, NBA legend. He believes that it is proof of an assassination of Walter Scott and he joins us now.

Thank you for being on the show. Tell us why do you believe that such a strong word applies in this case?

KAREEM ABDUL-JABBAR, NBA LEGEND: Well, I believe that that word is justified, because there was no attempt to deal with Mr. Scott in a -- in a reasonable way. And his fears really are what led to him bolting. And running away and the police officer seemed to make an assumption that it was OK to shoot this man and he killed him.

It's very callous -- and it's hard to find the correct words to define what he did. But it's certainly seemed like there was no consideration made for this man's life or the fact that he might just be scared, and running because of his fears.

CUOMO: Everything that happens at the end certainly defies any explanation other than the worst ones, but when you say, that there was nothing all along. When we look at the beginning of the tape, Kareem, we don't know why Walter Scott ran. I guess it was because he had a warrant out for him. But do you believe he was in fear of his life when he bolted from the traffic stop?

ABDUL-JABBAR: No, I don't think really he was in fear of his life, I think he was in frayed of going to the jail again, because he had warrants out --

CUOMO: Right.

ABDUL-JABBAR: -- due to his lack of paying his child support. And he had been arrested before for lack of payment.

So I think that that really weighed heavily on his mind and he didn't want to go through it again and he just bolted from his car. He had had a -- a pretty nice car. He just left it there and ran away, because he was facing another trip to jail, I think.

CUOMO: Right.

ABDUL-JABBAR: And, you know, that's only my speculation. But it does seem that that's what it was all about.

CUOMO: Right, I want to get to the point of where you say now it's racism. So, the guy bolts from the traffic stop. You're going to get chased by cops in that situation most of the time. The cop chases him.

They get into an altercation, he Tases him and then Walter Scott winds up getting out of the altercation, and leaving again and that's when he gets shot from behind, which doesn't just feel wrong, it also greatly disputes what the officer had said happened, which is probably the best use of the video.

Where do you see the racism kick in in this?

ABDUL-JABBAR: I think the racism kicks in when the cop becomes, I don't know, I can't say exactly what he felt. But it seems to me that he became enraged, that this man was giving him a difficult time. And he understood at that point that killing a black person, you can get away with that if you're a white cop.

[06:55:04] It's not that difficult. It happens too often that black Americans and Hispanic Americans get killed, and people want to believe that what the cop's version of things is the truth. And I think that the cop was relying on that.

And that's only my speculation. But it sure seems that that was the case. He seemed very confident. He didn't seem like he was worried about anything. And in his report, he gave a scenario that usually --

CUOMO: Right.

ABDUL-JABBAR: -- is accepted and people just move on. And without the video, it would have been just another dead black American who ran afoul of the law.

CUOMO: I'm choosing to hope that that last part isn't true. That the officer's story had so many holes in it that the forensics of Walter Scott's body would have showed such a different scenario that he would have still been in trouble. But we won't know that now, because there is the video.

But how do we know he wouldn't have shot this man if he were white? You just feel that history shows us that? I mean when we look at the data, Kareem, as you know, you wind up having more whites shot than African-Americans by police officers. But you believe that there's an easier standard?

ABDUL-JABBAR: It is certainly an easier standard. And they're certainly in the justice system, an assumption that black Americans and minority Americans are a problem and need to be policed in a different way. Usually a more physical and usually involves violence. And that that's, that's very unfortunate, and we have to change that, that dynamic. And have everybody's life be of equal value.

CUOMO: What do you say to the push-back of don't run from the cops. And if you run and get caught, don't fight the cops? And this is not the type of scenario that will befall you. What do you say to that?

ABDUL-JABBAR: Well, that would have to make sense. You'd have to give yourself over to the criminal justice system. And hope that you will be believed, and that you will be seen as credible.

But too many officers when someone disputes them, they feel that their authority is being challenged and they become enraged. And that's not a good way to police people.

CUOMO: I think few could disagree with that last point, that's for sure.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, thank you. We want to direct people to your op-ed, you put a lot of thought into it about how he sees this shooting and what it represents. It's in "TIME" magazine. He also has a new book called "Stealing the Game", and it's a really good read, especially for young readers.

Kareem, thank you very much.

We're following a lot of news, let's get to it for you.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There goes cars.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We quickly went down to the basement and could feel the tornado right over our house.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Big portions of the roof have been ripped off our building and stuck into trees.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Go, go, go!

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He loved being a police officer, I can't imagine him doing something that is just not like him, that's not his character.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't know how this would have turned out without the video. I just want to thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: An historic encounter between President Obama and Raul Castro.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The overall process of establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba, that's going to take some time.

CAMEROTA: Is Elizabeth Warren preparing for a bid for the White House?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D), MASSACHUSETTS: I grew up in America that was investing in our future. I believe in that America.

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY, with Chris Cuomo, Alisyn Camerota and Michaela Pereira.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CAMEROTA: Good morning, everyone. Welcome back to your NEW DAY.

And we do begin with breaking news for you, a violent outbreak of tornadoes leaving a trail of destruction across the Midwest, more than a dozen tornadoes touching down across three states, the hardest hit in Illinois. The force of the storm knocking this tractor-trailer you're about to see over on to its side.

CUOMO: We know of one death already. There are reports that many are still trapped. The situation is developing and so many pictures this morning of twisters doing what they do, as people literally look through the utter devastation of what was once their lives.

Let's get right to CNN's Ryan Young on the phone. One of the hardest-hit areas is where he is, Rochelle, Illinois -- Ryan.

YOUNG (via telephone): Chris, you really have to feel for these people, especially at this restaurant where you know 12 people were hunkering down, as this building was being peeled apart and the wind was blowing it to pieces, they all survived. But, you know, today, they're probably thanking good to be alive.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(EXPLETIVE DELETED)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My God, this is violent.

YOUNG (voice-over): It was the tornado outbreak.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Look, there goes cars.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I saw head lights go flying.

YOUNG: That residents in the heartland feared.

(EXPLETIVE DELETED)