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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
New Details in Cleveland Investigation; Friendly Fire in Boston Shoot-Out?; New Details on 3 Missing Women Found in Cleveland House; Boston Strong: Adrianne's Journey to Recovery; Multiple Fatalities after Tornado Hits Hood County, Texas
Aired May 15, 2013 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening, everyone. It's 10:00 here in Boston.
And we came to the city tonight because it's been one month since the bombings that changed so many lives. Tonight, we have got new details about the manhunt for the Tsarnaev brothers, what really happened that night in Watertown in the shoot-out with police.
Also tonight, the latest on the investigation, and I speak with Adrianne Haslet-Davis. You may remember her, a dance instructor who lost a leg in the attack. You're going to find out how she's doing one month into her recovery and when she will be able to dance again.
Also tonight, disturbing new information about what allegedly went on inside Ariel Castro's house in Cleveland, how the three women were treated, new word from a law enforcement source about the horror that they endured.
We begin, though, tonight with breaking news, breaking news on two fronts,the IRS scandal and the response to the Benghazi attack that left four Americans dead. Just a short time ago, President Obama spoke out on the IRS scandal over charges that it singled out conservative groups and targeted them for extra scrutiny.
The president announced that the acting commissioner of the IRS was forced out and the president promised that his administration will work with Congress to make sure nothing like this happens again.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I have reviewed the Treasury Department watchdog's report, and the misconduct that it uncovered is inexcusable. It's inexcusable, and Americans have a right to be angry about it, and I am angry about it. I will not tolerate this kind of behavior in any agency, but especially in the IRS, given the power that it has, and the reach that it has in all of our lives.
And, as I said earlier, it should not matter what political stripe you're from. The fact of the matter is, is that the IRS has to operate with absolute integrity. The government generally has to conduct itself in a way that is true to the public trust. That's especially true for the IRS. (END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Also today, the White House released more than 100 pages of e-mail correspondence showing how officials came up with a response to the Benghazi attack.
The e-mails are between the White House, the FBI, the CIA, the State Department and other agencies showing how the so-called talking points changed over time as officials worked on what to tell Congress and the American people about the attack.
Joining me now to talk about it all is chief congressional correspondent Dana Bash, chief White House correspondent Jessica Yellin, and chief political analyst Gloria Borger.
The resignation, first of all, by the acting IRS commissioner, it came about pretty quickly after that audit was released yesterday. What more do we know about it?
DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's right. It came about very quickly.
And it's really because the White House clearly got that there was so much outrage, so many unsatisfied Republicans and Democrats with the inspector general for not assigning blame, despite clear wrongdoing at the IRS. They knew a head needed to roll. That's obvious for a lot of reasons tonight, not the least of which is how aggressive they were in illustrating that they wanted to take action.
So, they put the president out there making a statement. Then they released a terse letter from the Treasury Secretary to Steven Miller explaining why he had to go to restore public trust.
And the other thing that is interesting is that Steven Miller seems to be the one that is getting fired, first of all, because he's the guy at the top of the IRS right now, but also because we're told that one year ago, he know about these -- this targeting and despite the fact that he was in contact with Congress investigating this very thing, he didn't tell them, he didn't disclose it.
COOPER: And he was supposed to testify Friday at this hearing at the House. What happens now?
BASH: He's actually still testifying, surprisingly enough.
He's still going to go on Friday, along with the inspector general of the IRS, who testified before the House Ways and Means Committee. He actually, according to the letter that he sent internally at the IRS that we got today, he's going to stay on it until June. He's technically still an employee there.
They're hoping, I can tell you according to Republican sources on the committee, that maybe because he is not long for this world at the IRS, maybe he will be a little bit more forthcoming. But that might be doubtful, considering the fact that the attorney general made clear that he and others could be subject to criminal probes. COOPER: The thing about this is, OK, so he knew about it for a year without announcing it publicly, but there must have been a lot of other people who knew about it who were actually executing this operation against conservative groups. So, what's happened to them?
BASH: Absolutely.
And that is a big open question. Just because the guy at the top is gone doesn't necessarily mean that justice is done. And everybody, Democrats and Republicans, agree to that.
Our colleague Drew Griffin broke a story earlier today that Steven Miller, who just resigned today, actually told congressional -- congressional investigators, rather, that two IRS employees he described as rogue have been disciplined. We don't know what that means necessarily, but at least two have been disciplined.
And we also know that another House committee has asked for the names and interviews of five specific employees. So they know -- at least have a sense of who's out there, who they want to talk to, so this is definitely just the beginning of the discipline, and again maybe more.
As John Boehner said, he wants people to go to jail. We're probably far from that, but you never know.
COOPER: And, again, it just says they have been disciplined. We don't know if they have been fired or what exactly that means.
BASH: Yes.
COOPER: Jessica, in terms of the Benghazi e-mails that were released today, what stands out to you?
JESSICA YELLIN, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, to a good extent, these e-mails vindicate what the White House has been saying for a long time, which is that the intelligence community made some of the most controversial changes in the talking points, Anderson.
For example, before the State Department or the White House ever saw the talking points, they were changed in the following ways. The word attack was changed to demonstration. The word al Qaeda, saying that al Qaeda may be behind these attacks was taken out entirely. That was all done by the CIA before either the White House or the State Department ever saw these talking points.
And they did it, we are told by senior administration officials, because the CIA didn't want to in any way compromise the FBI investigation that was under way at the time.
COOPER: So they said they didn't want to compromise the FBI investigation. The White House is obviously hoping these e-mails show that there's no political cover-up. Are there any signs that Republicans are satisfied with that?
YELLIN: No. So already Speaker Boehner's spokesperson has put out a statement saying that this is not at all satisfactory. They are asking for even more documentation. Now, I am told that we have now received all documentation related to these e-mails, that we have every single e- mail, we have all the talking points, this is it. The only thing that would be left would be notes about conversations or notes about talking points, which aren't going to come out.
One thing that you could point to is, there are other e-mails in here that still puts the State Department, for example, on the hook in some of the talking points changes. They called for the removal of other words in the talking points. So you could still see, if you want to, political motives for changing the talking points. And so critics will still have fodder to attack the administration, which will keep this issue alive, I think, for some time to come, Anderson.
COOPER: And, Gloria, has anything been changed by this, cleared up by this?
GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: No, I really don't think so.
As Jess was saying, the Republicans are unsatisfied. I think the only thing that's kind of clear here from looking through these e-mails is how unwieldy the bureaucracy is, for whatever reason, whether it's infighting, whatever reason. The bureaucracy is unwieldy when it tries to come to a point of clarity.
And they were dealing with classified information, some of which had been spoken about, and what we saw in this chain was something that started out as much more complex and nuanced, and that winded up with a piece of information that actually turned out to be untrue.
Congress will continue to look into this, and I think this may move from the question of e-mails to the question of just what went wrong in Benghazi, as you heard Greg Hicks talk about at the congressional hearings, what went wrong,what needed to change, who didn't get the support that they needed from the air. Could they have gotten that support in the heat of battle?
And these are the kinds of questions that I think you're going to start to hear more and more about. I mean, questions about e-mail and political infighting and cover-up and all the rest may take second place to the real issues here, which is -- are about, how do you prevent this from ever occurring again, Anderson?
COOPER: And, Gloria, you have learned about a meeting at the White House tomorrow...
BORGER: Yes.
COOPER: ... with Democratic strategists. What is this?
(CROSSTALK)
BORGER: Right. Well, they have invited in strategists. Chief of Staff Denis McDonough does have weekly meetings with assorted outside groups to kind of take their pulse. No surprise to me that, this time, it's a bunch of strategists who are very good at damage control. We have seen the White House start, as Dana was talking about, on the damage control on the IRS.
They want to try to figure out a way and get some advice about how to get back to their agenda, how do they ever work with Republicans, after all they have gone through, and what steps the president can take proactively to convince the American public that he's working for issues that matter to them.
So they're bringing in these strategists to kind of bend their ears.
COOPER: And, Dana, what's made it all the harder, obviously, with this IRS thing, it just seems like this is early days in this scandal. There's a lot of other names to come out. There's a lot more information to come out of this.
So, in terms of the president's second-term agenda, he needs Republicans. What has this done to that?
BASH: Well, it's a distraction. There's no question about it.
I was talking to a senior Democratic source on Capitol Hill today about that very issue, and the thing that they're most concerned about is the issue that is the most sort of tenuous, but also the most possible to actually get done, and that, of course, is immigration reform.
It was noted to me that, at least on the Democratic side, those who are really knee-deep in this, trying to get -- make sure that there is a bipartisan bill that can get through the Senate and eventually the House, they're being very quiet about these scandals, and particularly about the IRS.
This is -- the IRS certainly is, of all of them, the most bipartisan in terms of the outrage, but if you put it all together, these are distractions and they're not very welcome at all, particularly by Democrats on the Hill.
YELLIN: Anderson...
COOPER: Yes.
YELLIN: ... can I just jump in and point out, the president had John McCain in today? And that's because that is the linchpin to keeping his agenda moving forward.
If he can keep John McCain on immigration reform, and he can get immigration reform done, the belief is here, he has an accomplishment and he can turn this narrative around. The deficit, he had a positive projection on the -- that we have shrunk the deficit more than expected. That pushes off a fight on the debt ceiling.
COOPER: Right.
YELLIN: Maybe he can get guns done. They feel like if they get some accomplishments, the scandals will fade.
COOPER: All right, we will see. Dana Bash, Jessica Yellin, Gloria Borger, thanks very much.
Let us know what you think about that. Follow me on Twitter @AndersonCooper.
There's a lot more in the hour ahead.
Coming up, Boston strong -- one month later, we're here, as I said, on the one-month anniversary of the bombings, new information about the manhunt for the suspects and what really happened that night in the shoot-out in Watertown next.
You're looking at live images from the memorial here on Boylston Street, "Feel Better." A lot of people here. This city is strong and it's moving forward.
Also ahead, the latest from Cleveland, where authorities took more evidence from Ariel Castro's house today. We're getting new information from a law enforcement source about what allegedly went on inside that house.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Welcome back.
Here in Boston, it's been a month since the bombings at the marathon, a month of grieving for the lives lost at the race, a month of starting to heal for the hundreds more lives that were changed forever.
At 2:50 p.m. today, the moment of the bombings a month ago, the Boston police took the black mourning bands off their badges and observed a moment of silence. Boston police also put their flags back to full- staff.
There has been an outpouring of support for the victims, of course. The One Fund Boston has raised more than $30 million to help the victims and their families. Today, the One Fund said that payments will be made at the end of June.
Now, there's still a lot of questions, a lot of work to be done, of course, in the investigation into the bombings. The widow of the suspect, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, Katherine Russell, is said to be speaking with investigators. We are going to have more on that in a moment.
And, meanwhile, we have learned a lot more the manhunt for Tamerlan and his brother, Dzhokhar, and the shoot-out that night with police that Thursday evening, early Friday morning. We now know that nearly 300 rounds were fired, almost all of them coming from police.
CNN has learned that although the Tsarnaevs had bombs, they had only one gun between them, which was a pistol.
Drew Griffin has more on what exactly happened that night.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DREW GRIFFIN, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is all police knew at the time.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Officer down.
GRIFFIN (voice-over): An MIT officer had been shot and killed. Hours earlier, the FBI had released these pictures of suspected bombers. Tensions were high all across this city, when this alert went out.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shots fired at Watertown. Shots fired at Watertown. Use caution.
GRIFFIN: Get to Watertown. Police raced to the intersection of Laurel and Dexter streets to face what amounted to chaos.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They have explosives, some type of grenades. They're in between houses down here. Loud explosions. Loud explosions. Loud explosions. Shots fired. Shots fired.
GRIFFIN: The Tsarnaev brothers were in the middle of the street, firing bullets, throwing their homemade bombs, and in return facing a massive barrage of police bullets.
Two local law enforcement sources tell CNN the Tsarnaevs had just one gun between them. And when the older brother, Tamerlan, was tackled by police, that one gun was empty. It was the moment his younger brother tried to make a run for it in a stolen SUV.
ANDREW KITZENBERG, EYEWITNESS: There was a lot of gunfire at that point. That was probably the highest point in gunfire. And, really, as soon as that -- as soon as the SUV turned around in the street, it was just accelerated gunfire all coming from the officers.
GRIFFIN (on camera): You grabbed your iPhone and...
KITZENBERG: Yes, I grabbed my phone, and just immediately jumped on to the bed and started taking pictures.
GRIFFIN (voice-over): Andrew Kitzenberg crouched in his second-floor window and taking these dramatic pictures saw that escape. So did an eyewitness named Jane Dyson looking down on officers from a third- floor window. At that moment, she told "The Boston Globe," "It appeared to me that an individual at the corner fell to the ground and had probably been hit by gunfire."
(on camera): That would have been transit officer Richard Donohue, who was standing right here. At the time he was shot, Tamerlan Tsarnaev was laying on the street. His brother, Dzhokhar, was driving away. Only the police were firing.
(voice-over): Officially, state police tell us the matter remains under investigation. Law enforcement sources tell CNN Officer Richard Donohue was struck by a bullet fired by police. Only the heroic actions of his fellow officers to stop the bleeding in his thigh saved his life. It was a close call. There would be many.
That's because when all the shooting finally finished, neighbors surveying the damage in and out of their homes found bullet holes everywhere, in this apartment above the street of the firefight, at this home across the street.
(on camera): This is a half-a-block behind where the Tsarnaevs made their last stand. The home has three bullets. Unless the brothers turned around and fired away from police, these bullets, too, came from law enforcement.
HARRY OHANNESSIAN, RESIDENT OF WATERTOWN: This is the bullet here that penetrated into our dining room.
GRIFFIN: Harry Ohannessian wasn't home the night of the shooting. But his niece was and says she heard and felt the bullets whizzing by inside his house.
(on camera): These are two bullets found in your home.
OHANNESSIAN: Yes, the one -- this one here came through. That landed right near our staircase, near the pedestal, and the other one up in the closet went through one, exited that one, went to the other closet in the other side of the entrance to the house, and landed in front of the staircase as well.
GRIFFIN (voice-over): Those bullets were later recovered by the FBI.
On that night, officers from several police forces converged on this chaotic scene. Nearly 300 rounds of ammunition were fired in minutes, almost all of them by police, a shooting barrage described by experts in just one word, contagious.
JOHN DECARLO, UNIVERSITY OF NEW HAVEN: In contagion shooting, and if you look back at some cases of the past, we find that if one person starts shooting, it immediately causes a contagion or other people to start shooting.
GRIFFIN: John DeCarlo is a criminal justice professor at the University of New Haven. He spent 32 years as a cop, seven of those years as a police chief in Branford, Connecticut. He says he was reluctant to be interviewed, because he, like other critics of what happened on this street, still believe police responded heroically.
DECARLO: In a situation like this, it almost becomes a war zone. And things that occur in the very dynamic moments of a situation like the one that was unfolding in Boston and Watertown are not necessarily, no matter how hard our police work, what they are trained to do.
GRIFFIN: DeCarlo tells us what several experts who wouldn't go on camera also told us. They believe police do not receive enough firearms training, and that local and state forces do not train together enough. The shooting has not dimmed the praise for police who put themselves in harm's way.
OHANNESSIAN: It's right underneath my son's bedroom.
GRIFFIN: But at Laurel and Dexter streets, each bullet hole is a reminder of just how close those heroes came to causing a tragedy.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: And Drew Griffin joins me here now live.
And I think it's important to point out, as you did in the piece, this is not a criticism of the police, but it's important to understand what happened that night, so that the next time, police can learn from it.
GRIFFIN: Learn from it each and every time they have to respond in this coordinated effort.
We have seen this before, Anderson. We have seen this after Katrina on Danziger Bridge. We have seen it a couple of times in New York when you have this contagious or contagion shooting that they're talking about.
This case of the shooting of Richard Donohue, the transit officer, is under investigation by the Middlesex County District Attorney's Office. We're not sure if they're investigating the shootings at the homes. But there was another shooting that night that we're just really now learning about which is even more scary.
A black SUV, unmarked car belonging to the Boston Police Department, this car was on its way to the scene responding to the Watertown incident when it was shot at and hit by state troopers.
COOPER: A vehicle belonging to the Boston Police Department.
GRIFFIN: To the Boston Police Department.
COOPER: Wow.
GRIFFIN: The troopers obviously had no idea. They assumed that these were the Tsarnaevs getting away, but they didn't check. They fired in the car. They hit the car. Nobody was hurt.
But according to the Massachusetts State Police, this is a spokesperson telling us, while it's still under investigation,the theory behind the report of an unmarked truck being fired upon is, 'Yes, in the chaos, an officer or trooper or some combination of personnel mistook it for one of the two suspect vehicles."
That is under investigation. That's pretty scary and pretty dangerous for all involved.
COOPER: Yes. We saw that also in the Christopher Dorner manhunt. There was at least vehicle, I think maybe two vehicles that were shot upon. So, it happens a lot, I guess.
Drew, appreciate the investigation. Thanks.
As we mentioned earlier, Tamerlan Tsarnaev's widow continues to meet with investigators. CNN's Deborah Feyerick has learned that Katherine Russell is not off the hook and investigators say her future really depends on the kind of information and cooperation that she provides.
And sources say the stakes are high for she has obviously a 3-year-old daughter that she wants to see grow up.
Earlier, I spoke with John Miller, senior correspondent of "CBS This Morning."
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: So, John, this news that Tamerlan's widow is not off the hook quite yet, does that line up with what you're hearing?
JOHN MILLER, CBS NEWS: Yes, it does.
There are a number of hoops that she has to jump through to get off the hook, and her lawyers are going to have to work through that with the U.S. attorney and ultimately the FBI. But it still boils down to, she was living with a person who was plotting for at least a couple or a few months in a small apartment where Dzhokhar Tsarnaev told investigators they actually made the bombs.
So there is the question of, how could all of that go on either without her knowing about it or having at least some suspicions that things that were going on were suspicious? She has said she had no idea about the plot.
COOPER: And, you know, 30 days into this, from what you're hearing, how much progress are investigators actually making trying to figure out the extent of these brothers' alleged plot, particularly any overseas connections? Where do things stand?
MILLER: Well, the overseas connections are being filled out. You know, the FBI traveled with the FSB and got some of their documents and the results of some of their interviews over in Moscow.
But it appears as of now that Tamerlan Tsarnaev traveled to Russia for six months in the Dagestan, Chechnya,region, that he made contact with one, possibly two radical people over there, both of whom ended up being killed in subsequent attacks, that he tried to join three separate fighting groups and was rejected.
One was suspicious of him. Another felt he didn't measure up. The third didn't take him. So it appears he went home after that time, thinking, A., it's really dangerous here. The two guys I came to work with were killed. None of the groups want me. And I can launch my fight at home.
COOPER: And these indications that the wounded MBTA officer was likely hit by friendly fire at the Watertown shoot-out and the other damage at the residential homes, at least one police vehicle came from officers, no one is criticizing the police, but they are -- they were that night particularly under an enormous amount of pressure. And it does speak to the chaos of how things unfolded, doesn't it?
MILLER: Well, the police are used to that criticism. They get criticized for an awful lot.
But this certainly was the fog of war. You had people who were shooting at you with one .9-millimeter handgun in the case of Tamerlan Tsarnaev, but also a wild card here, they're throwing improvised hand grenades. So, that is a scene of tremendous chaos.
Now, in a normal tactical environment, you figure out where your subject or suspect, you make a tactical entrance, you come in from one direction, and you deploy in a planned matter. This wasn't that kind of thing. This was a kind of thing where they were engaged in a firefight, they called for help, and help comes from whatever direction it comes from.
Well, if you take Officer Dick Donohue, and his partner, they end up on one side of the street. Many of the other officers who came from the direction, the other direction end up on the other side of the street. So that's ripe for the possibility of crossfire.
It's entirely possible that he was hit by friendly fire or by one of Tamerlan Tsarnaev's bullets. But the bullet is still in his leg, so until the doctors decide there is a time to take that out, we won't really know.
COOPER: John Miller, I appreciate you being on. John, thanks.
MILLER: Thanks.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: We're going to more from here in Boston just ahead.
Also, new details in the Ariel Castro investigation. More evidence was taken from the house where he allegedly held three women captive for close to a decade. We're also learning more about what the women may have endured.
Also, as I said, from Boston, three weeks ago, dance instructor Adrianne Haslet-Davis, she was still in the hospital. She lost her foot, part of her lower left leg in the Boston bombings. She told us she would return to the dance floor one day. We're going to talk to her ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: We have a lot more from Boston tonight, but we want to bring you up to date on the latest investigation in Cleveland. The latest information we have today: Investigators went back inside that house at 2207 Seymour Avenue, where those three missing women were held for close to a decade. One of the women, we've learned, is just now discovering, actually, what an iPhone is. That's how cut off she was.
Ariel Castro, who owns the house, has been charged with four counts of kidnapping and three counts of rape. More charges are likely to follow.
His relatives have said they never suspected anything was wrong. Many people find that hard to believe. But some family members have described Castro playing loud music when they came around and not letting them walk around freely in his house, not even letting them go past the kitchen.
One of his daughters, Emily Castro, who herself is serving a 25-year sentence for the attempted murder of her own child, here's what she recently told a private investigator about visiting her father's house.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
EMILY CASTRO, ARIEL'S DAUGHTER: The upstairs was blocked off with a big bass speaker. So I figured that since he lived there alone so long, that he didn't have any need for those -- well, there's four bedrooms upstairs. He didn't have any need for them. So you know, I just kind of like. I was like, "Can I, you know, sleep upstairs in my old bedroom?"
And he said, "No, because it's cold there. It's blocked off. You know, it's dusty." And so I just was like, OK.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Well, just to be clear, Emily Castro says that looking back, all three women were inside the house at the time of that visit.
Tonight we're also learning more about what Amanda Berry, Michelle Knight and Gina DeJesus may have endured at the hands of their alleged abductor. Randi Kaye joins me now, live.
So Randi, what are you hearing? Last night you mentioned there were reports that Michelle Knight might have needed facial reconstruction after all the beatings, but you've learned more about that today?
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, we spoke with an agent for the FBI here in Cleveland. And the agent said that is absolutely not true, that there is no deformity. In fact, she said none of the victims looked weird -- that was her word -- except for the fact that they haven't seen the sunshine in so many years and they are so thin.
But keep in mind, Anderson, we also learned today from law enforcement that Michelle Knight had been beaten by Ariel Castro with all sorts of objects, including hand weights. I apologize for the sirens here. Certainly -- certainly, an emergency underway here, having nothing to do with this case, it seems.
But this FBI agent also clarified some reporting out there that there was some sort of hierarchy in the home, because Amanda was treated slightly better and that maybe the women were divided and not so close even though they were locked up together for so many years.
The agent told us all of them were walking around and talking at the hospital together. They were all concerned equally about each other. And CNN's Pamela Brown has learned that Gina and Michelle have actually communicated by phone at least once since their release. And the agent also added today that the only reason Gina and Michelle didn't follow Amanda out of the house that day when she escaped was because they were so afraid of Ariel Castro. The agent said it was not because they didn't trust Amanda -- Anderson.
COOPER: And Castro's attorneys are now speaking out about their client. What are they saying?
KAYE: They talked with Castro, apparently, for about three hours, at the county jail, where as you know, he's being held in isolation. They say he will plead not guilty. They're a bit worried about whether or not he's going to get a fair trial in this area, but they say they have no fear of repercussion about representing someone who has been vilified in this community. Listen to what they told our affiliate, WKYC.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CRAIG WEINTRAUB, ATTORNEY FOR ARIEL CASTRO: I think that the initial portrayal by the media has been one of a, quote, "monster," and that's not the impression that I got when I talked to him for three hours.
He is a human being, and what's offensive is that the media -- and I don't mean it towards you, but the media and the community wants to -- wants to demonize this man before they really know the whole story. And I think that it's unfair, and it's just not equitable.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KAYE: Anderson, you may remember that one of those attorneys, Jay Schlachet, also represented Cleveland serial killer Anthony Sowell, and that's another very high-profile case.
COOPER: Yes. I mean, they're his attorneys. What else are they going to say? But I should point out that it wasn't the media using those terms. It was actually family members of Ariel Castro who used those terms.
Randi, appreciate the reporting.
Just ahead, you may remember Adrianne Haslet-Davis, a remarkable young woman, a dance instructor who lost her foot in the Boston bombing. She had to have part of her left leg amputated below the knee. She's agreed to let us follow her journey back to the dance floor. She's determined to dance again. There's a lot of work ahead, a lot of rehab. But Adrianne can already see the future.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: So when you're listening to music, do you visualize yourself dancing?
ADRIANNE HASLET-DAVIS, BOMBING SURVIVOR: Yes.
COOPER: It makes you smile?
HASLET-DAVIS: It does. It does.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Believe in Boston. That's what the sign says behind me. There's a lot of pride in this city here on Boylston Street where there's a memorial where still people, on this one-month anniversary of the bombings, are stopping by to pay their respects.
There's a lot of pride, as I said, in this city about how far this city has come and how far the individuals who survived the bombings have come.
For so many people, this stretch of pavement here on Boylston Street has a lot of meaning. It's become a dividing line between what was and what will never be the same.
Two hundred and seventy-five people were injured here one month ago. Tonight, six are still hospitalized, and we think of them tonight. More than a dozen bombing survivors lost limbs.
Among them, Adrianne Haslet-Davis, the 32-year-old dance instructor. She lost her left foot in the second explosion. Her left leg had to be amputated below the knee.
Just a week after the bombings, I talked to Adrianne in the hospital. She's one of those people that you can't forget; her spirit, her determination are infectious. She's determined to dance again. I have no doubt she will.
We're going to be following her recovery in the months ahead. Here's how far she's come in just four weeks.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER (voice-over): This was Adrianne just one week after the Boston Marathon bombings.
(on camera): How close were you to the second explosion?
HASLET-DAVIS: I was right in front of it. Right in front of the business where it was. So I felt the direct impact. And it immediately blew off my left foot.
COOPER: How far away was the bomb? Do you know?
ADAM DAVIS, BOMBING SURVIVOR: My guess would have been about five feet.
COOPER: Five feet.
HASLET-DAVIS: Yes. We're lucky to be alive.
COOPER (voice-over): Her strength, along with that of her husband, Adam, who just returned from a tour in Afghanistan with the Air Force and was also injured in the bombing, inspired people around the world.
(on camera): You're determined to dance again, though.
HASLET-DAVIS: I am, yes. Dancing is the one thing that I do that when I do it, I don't feel like I should be doing anything else. Ever. I feel so free.
COOPER: Adrianne agreed to let us follow her recovery on the long road to dancing again.
HASLET-DAVIS: Seventeen, 18, 19, 20. Oh.
COOPER: And while she faces months of grueling therapy, her physical training as a dancer has helped better prepare her for learning to navigate the world with one leg.
She also agreed to videotape her everyday life. Her new normal.
HASLET-DAVIS: I am getting my very first manicure and pedicure in 20 days today since the marathon. And feeling more and more like a girl, and feeling more normal, even though only one of my feet are getting painted. Check those babies out.
COOPER: There are those simple milestones, and there are others that are hard.
HASLET-DAVIS: I'll be going home tomorrow. And it makes me really sad, because I don't feel like I'm ready. I'm nervous. And scared to walk the streets of Boston for the first time after all of this. And I've been living in this bubble of safety. Now I'm just going to go out into the real world and a world with bombs. And strangers and -- memories. That I don't know if I'm ready to face.
COOPER: But two and a half weeks after the bombing, it's time to go home.
HASLET-DAVIS: I really appreciate your encouraging words. Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everybody's out there rooting for you. Show them what can happen.
HASLET-DAVIS: Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Instead of the bad guys.
HASLET-DAVIS: Instead of the bad guys is right.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Good guys are going to win.
HASLET-DAVIS: Totally agree.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You go, girl.
COOPER: And the next day, despite her fears, she returns to Boylston Street where it all happened. HASLET-DAVIS: After seeing the memorial and seeing people there and just paying their respects and hearing people tell me that -- that I was an inspiration, it's very sweet, first of all, that they -- they would want to give me their support. But I think it's also for them. It's important to see that all of us that were affected are moving on and trying to find some sort of normalcy. And for them to be able to kind of have that knowledge that life goes on after such a horrible tragedy.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Well, a lot of people here and around the country are rooting for Adrianne and all the others who were injured. Her co-workers at the Arthur Murray Dance Studio set up a fund to raise money for her expenses. If you'd like to make a contribution, you can go to FundMe.com/AdrianneFund.
We're excited about following Adrianne's journey in the months ahead. I sat down with her again today, the first time we'd seen each other since the week after the bombings.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: It's been a month. How are you doing?
HASLET-DAVIS: Yes, I'm doing better and better every day. Lots of learning about myself and kind of how to function, especially just in the past, gosh, in the past week or week and a half, since leaving rehab hospital.
COOPER: What's been the hardest part?
HASLET-DAVIS: I would say the hardest part on a daily basis, as far as just the function -- day-to-day function is just the simple things, like getting up to go to the bathroom. And showering and getting ready in the morning. Just the simple little things that you have your daily routine. And in the middle of the night, if you have to get up and use the restroom, it is a task.
COOPER: So right now you're using a wheelchair.
HASLET-DAVIS: Yes, yes, I am. Mostly using the wheelchair to get around the city and such. I took a pretty bad fall about four or five days ago. I was not behaving, meaning I was hopping between the bed and the closet, because I just needed to get one thing.
COOPER: So hopping is not behaving?
HASLET-DAVIS: Is not behaving, no. No, not at all. And I hopped and lost my footing and landed directly onto my left leg, and it was excruciatingly painful.
COOPER: So you actually fell right on...
HASLET-DAVIS: I fell right on it. Just all of my weight right onto the top of it. All that tender muscle and stitches and -- nerves that are already painful and angry. And just screamed almost a surprising scream, where you scream and you don't really realize it's you. Because it's that painful.
COOPER: Does it feel real to you at this point? Has it -- has it all sunk in?
HASLET-DAVIS: It's -- it's interesting. It felt so much more real since I fell. I don't know if it was me just kind of realizing physically that my leg wasn't there anymore. But it was really hard for me. I think it sort of made me realize that I was a lot weaker than I thought I was, which is a hard -- a hard thing to think about.
It definitely woke me up and made me realize that I am -- I need to take a little bit better care of myself and slow down.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: As you may have noticed, Adrianne is not a sit back and wait kind of person. She's the first to admit, she tends to be impatient.
Just ahead in part two of our interview, we talk about the goal that she has set for herself to dance again and how listening to music no longer makes her sad, which is a sign of healing, she says.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: We were just playing part of my interview with Adrianne Haslet-Davis, and we're going to play more of it just in a second.
When I first met her the week after the bombing, I promised that if she started dancing again, I would take some dance lessons with her, which I badly need. She is determined to hold me to that. I regretted a little bit, making that promise to her. But I very much look forward to those dance lessons. Here is part two of our interview.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Do you think about dancing a lot?
HASLET-DAVIS: Uh-huh.
COOPER: Do you listen to music?
HASLET-DAVIS: I just recently started listening to music again. And being able to really enjoy it. I think I realize now that I am in a process of healing more so than I was before. And I...
COOPER: That's interesting. You're in a process of healing more than you were before.
HASLET-DAVIS: Yes.
COOPER: How do you mean?
HASLET-DAVIS: I think starting to see the swelling going down, and having, you know, graduated from the therapy and becoming stronger physically, because of the physical therapy. And I think all of that combined, I feel like I'm closer and closer to my prosthetic, which means I'm closer and closer to dancing again.
Even though I knew all along that I would be dancing, that I had all these people telling me I would, I think now I'm starting to see it more so.
COOPER: You can envision yourself dancing again?
HASLET-DAVIS: Yes, I can. Which in turn helps me listen to music and impossible for me, as I said before, to listen to music without choreographing it in my head. And because of that, it was very, very sad.
COOPER: So when you listen to music now, do you visualize yourself dancing?
HASLET-DAVIS: Yes.
COOPER: It makes you smile a lot.
HASLET-DAVIS: It does. It does.
COOPER: One of the things we talked about in the hospital, you had said that because you danced for so long, that your foot was like a muscle. And that the prosthetics weren't really built to kind of, I guess, balance in that way.
HASLET-DAVIS: Uh-huh.
COOPER: Have you learned more about it? Do you think you will be able to dance?
HASLET-DAVIS: You know, I -- I -- I definitely remember talking about that. And I don't know -- I haven't learned anything differently since then. So I still have that same concern, but I know I'll be able to dance, for sure. And that makes me ecstatic.
But as far as dancing to the level that I was before, which was what we were talking about with using my muscle in a certain way and using, you know, the inside edge and the outside edge of my foot and pushing off of those muscles and having it work the same way. I'm not quite sure yet.
I have a lot of prosthetic companies that are being just as curious as I am on wanting to build and learn and sort of figure that out with me. So I -- I'm excited to make that happen. Hopefully. And kind of maybe kind of figure it out together and design it together.
COOPER: I know your husband, who was injured also in the blast, was relieved, because he didn't have to take dancing lessons.
HASLET-DAVIS: Yes.
COOPER: He was just about to start dancing lessons. Has he started dancing lessons?
HASLET-DAVIS: He has not started dancing lessons. He can't -- he has an excuse. He can't bear weight...
COOPER: No? OK.
HASLET-DAVIS: ... on his foot yet. Your only excuse is that I don't have a foot yet.
COOPER: Yes, I know. I know. I mean, I want you to get a foot, but I'm nervous about our dance lessons.
HASLET-DAVIS: I know. I'm well on my way. You know, it will take me a while to walk and dance again, though. You're lucky.
COOPER: All right. Well, I might need some -- maybe I'll take some lessons before so I can just say these are my first lessons. It's so funny. So many people have come up to me and said, like, "You said it on camera. You're now going to have to do it."
HASLET-DAVIS: People have come up to me and have been more excited for you to dance than me to dance. Which is funny.
COOPER: I look forward to it, too.
HASLET-DAVIS: Me too. Me too.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: I definitely look forward to it.
There's a lot more happening tonight. Isha is here with a "360 Bulletin" -- Isha.
ISHA SESAY, HLN ANCHOR: Anderson, we have breaking news out of Hood County, Texas, about 40 miles southwest of Dallas/Fort Worth, where the sheriff's office confirmed multiple fatalities after a tornado.
Authorities say at least three homes have been flattened in Granbury, Texas, and at least ten people are injured. This video that you're looking at is from Granbury, Texas, and our affiliate, WFAA.
The Hood County Sheriff's Office says a search-and-rescue effort is underway right now. A state of emergency has been declared in the county. And a triage center has now been opened.
Farther east, the National Weather Service says storm spotters report seeing a mile-wide twister near Cleburne and north of the Rio Vista area. In Hood County, there are also power outages and potential gas leaks.
Again, if you're just joining us, the sheriff's office is reporting multiple fatalities from a tornado there.
And here's video that we want to show you coming to us from KTVT, showing an overturned semi-tractor trailer. When you look at this, when you look at these pictures on your screen, it gives you a sense of just how powerful the storm was.
Let's show you the scene in downtown Dallas. Sirens are going off, letting people know of the potential danger. A tornado warning is in effect there until 10:15 local time.
Let's get the very latest on the situation in Hood County now. Sheriff Roger Deeds joins us now on the phone.
Sheriff Deeds, thank you so much for joining us on what is obviously a very busy time for you. What can you tell us about the situation in Hood County right now?
SHERIFF ROGER DEEDS, HOOD COUNTY, TEXAS (via phone): We're trying to make our way in and throughout the subdivision of Rancho Brazos, where we've had the vast majority of our devastation, with the homes being destroyed. That's where we have multiple casualties. I'm not sure how many. We've had multiple injuries and bad injuries, too, with people losing limbs, amputees. So I'm not sure how many injuries we have.
We're trying to coordinate that through a triage area and get them to a hospital, get them all the help we can get out there. So still working on that, clearing roads. Have lots of law enforcement fire, and EMS on the scene right now.
SESAY: All right.
(CROSSTALK)
DEEDS: ... relocation centers, a few churches -- the First Christian Church, on 377. We set up by a tractor supply up by the high school. And the First Methodist Church, out north of town on Highway 51 and the Loop.
SESAY: All right. For our viewers that are just joining us, Sheriff Deeds, you are confirming that there have been fatalities and some serious injuries, but you cannot confirm a number. How wide an area are we talking about here?
DEEDS: From what it looks like right now, it's about a half-mile- square area.
SESAY: A half-mile-square area. We're seeing reports of power outages and gas leaks. What can you tell us about the situation to right that, to right those problems, because those are pretty major problems?
DEEDS: Yes. We're trying to get gas pumpers out there to shut down lines. We have some leaks going on with some high-pressure lines. It's not affecting -- or hurting anybody at this point in time. And then we have multiple propane tanks out in that area. So we're trying to get those loggers in there to shut those type of gas leaks off.
So it's not actually blown-out pipelines. It's just propane tanks that have been toppled over, and we're just trying to get those tanks shut off. SESAY: Sheriff Deeds, we're just getting some information just coming to us right now that, in the Ft. Worth area, that there have been over 100 injuries and several fatalities. That's according to -- we're getting -- I'm going to source that information for you right now. It's coming from Matt Zavadsky, director of public affairs for Medstar Mobile Healthcare.
I want to bring him in right now, Sheriff Deeds, if you can stand by for us a moment.
And Matt Zavadsky, thank you so much for joining us. What can you tell us about the situation. We're getting these numbers of over 100 injured in Ft. Worth and fatalities.
MATT ZAVADSKY, DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, MEDSTAR MOBILE HEALTHCARE (via phone): Yes, ma'am. We actually handle four ambulances in (UNINTELLIGIBLE) -- in this county. So just been with reports that they have of multiple casualties, as the sheriff indicated. And the information that we're getting from the sheriff's office right now is there's as many as 100 people injured with multiple fatalities. So we're (UNINTELLIGIBLE) emergency medical services in Granbury.
SESAY: And Matt, at this stage, what are you hearing about the severity of these injuries? The sheriff was indicating that they could be looking at amputees in some cases?
ZAVADSKY: We're still going through the triage process now. Folks in Granbury have done a phenomenal job of setting up the triage area, sorting through multiple patients, identifying the ones that are most seriously injured, that need to be transported. So we're simply assisting them in that process or find whatever resources that they need to get the patients definitive care or treated at the scene and released back to where they can resume their normal activities in Granbury.
SESAY: And this triage center, can you give us a sense of how well -- those operating it, how well they're coping right now? Because this is -- this is a severe situation with large numbers involved.
ZAVADSKY: Certainly, and the sheriff and his team and all folks in emergency services in Granbury are dealing with not only a lot of unknowns. But it's dark. In many cases there's no power. They're getting conflicting information. So they're doing a really outstanding job of organizing the things that they need to go out and do the search and rescue, identify patients that might not be able to move to make it to the triage center, be able to evacuate those patients to the triage center so they can receive definitive care from the team at the triage center.
SESAY: All right, Matt, stand by for us.
Sheriff Deeds, I want to bring you back in here. The search and rescue operation is ongoing. What can you tell us about that? You mentioned a number of flattened homes.
Sheriff Roger Deeds, do we still have you with us? OK. We seem to have lost Sheriff Deeds. Of course, as you would imagine, this is an extremely busy time for him and for local officials there in that area, but we do still have Matt Zavadsky is with us. He's director of public affairs in Medstar Mobile Healthcare.
Matt, what can you tell us about the damage? We're talking about quite a wide area now. What can you tell us about the scale of the damage that has occurred here?
ZAVADSKY: Yes, it's very difficult to do that assessment, because, obviously, it's dark here. Really what they're doing is having to use all the auxiliary lighting and other means to go out and do the house to house search, find the damage in a very difficult type of operating environment.
And again, you may recognize with these types of tornados, they touch down. They lift up and touch down. They tend to hopscotch. The tornado that you reported being a mile wide, also offers potentially an additional challenge, as those reports may start coming in soon.