Return to Transcripts main page
Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
New Details From the Shootout in Waco; Bin Laden's Library Revealed Important Documents; New Details in DC's Quadruple Homicide Mystery; David Letterman's Retirement. Aired 8-9p ET
Aired May 20, 2015 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[20:00:09] ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: Good evening.
Tonight, a medical harsh story that you will have to see to believe. A dentist accused of performing unnecessary and painful procedures on children and making himself millions of dollars doing it. The allegations are sickening, the video heartbreaking and the fact that this doctor is not alone and that should make any patients and any parents stop and think and watch her. Our "Keeping Them Honest" investigation tonight.
Also ahead on this hour, the bikers who say they are getting a bad rap even as authorities recover a thousand weapons, yes 1,000 weapons from the warfare in Waco.
And later, our tribute to the man who made Velcro, the new black, and who brought us more laughs, than human should be allowed to have, David Letterman who is signing off tonight.
First though, no laughing matter, we begin with the 360 "Keeping Them Honest" investigation, a report you'll only see here. It involves a Florida dentist accused of harming the most vulnerable of patients, young children, while collecting millions in Medicaid payments for procedure that these patients didn't need or didn't want. In just a moment, you'll see in graph detail what this dentist allegedly did to some of those children. And as disturbing as the story is, and we warn you, it is hard to watch at times, it may be just the tip of the iceberg.
In a series of reason reports, federal health auditors have found questionable billings among dental providers in five states. Just this week a new report found more than 300 pediatric dentists in California may be overcharging Medicaid. And while these finding aren't proof of fraud or inappropriate care, the office of the inspector general says they raise red flags and merit further investigation which brings us to Florida and the dentist that Victor Blackwell found still licensed and very much under fire. Again, a warning, this report is at times disturbing to watch.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It is a sound no parents like to hear. A child screaming out of fear and possibly pain from the dentist chair. The cell phone video was secretly recorded by the boy's mother. Going to the dentist is a rite of passage but what's alleged to had happen in this office at the hands of 78-year- old Dr. Howard Schneider was not the right of passage, it was horrifying.
For the past three weeks there have been daily protests outside of his Jacksonville Florida practice, one parent still angry she attacked him outside of his office. Schneider said he has done nothing wrong. The firestorm started after Brandi Motley wrote about the day she took her 6-year-old daughter, Briel, to Dr. Schneider to have her one tooth pulled. On the day if surgery in December 2014, Motley says she was not allowed to sit with her daughter.
BRANDI MOTLEY, BRIEL'S MOTHER: The nurse suggested that it is best that the kids act better when the parents are not in the room. They says if we don't like (INAUDIBLE), I care for the procedure.
BLACKWELL: So Motley says she sat in the waiting room for three hours until the waiting turned to worry.
MOTLEY: Finally the nurse went and get me and she said there had been an incident. She was hyperventilating. She had marks all over her and had blood all over her.
BLACKWELL: Angry and unable to get a clear explanation of what happened, Motley says she and Briel left to rushed to an emergency room.
MOTLEY: In the parking lot she takes the gauze out and I note all of her teeth were gone.
BLACKWELL: Motley says Doctor Schneider had pulled not one tooth but seven.
MOTLEY: What happened to all her teeth?
BLACKWELL: According to mom, Briel says Dr. Schneider hit her and choked her and so mom called police twice. And although, department records indicate officers responded and according to police logs one wrote a report, Jacksonville sheriff's office tell CNN no report was written on this incident. Initially, no attorney would take her case.
MOTLEY: So that's when I decided to set her pictures on my facebook and tell everybody what happened.
BLACKWELL: Her story went viral and soon other parents posted their children's pictures and claims of unwanted procedures and abuse at the hands of Dr. Howard Schneider.
AMANDA BARRY, DOMINIC BARRY'S MOTHER: I kept reading and reading until the name Dr. Howard and I knew that was the same dentist.
BLACKWELL: Amanda Barry is deaf. Her 5-year-old son, Dominic, is blind in one eye. Barry says Dominic was referred to Dr. Schneider for a crown in March. The boy is part of a civil suit accusing Schneider of assault and battery. According to the complaint, two front teeth were removed for an unknown reason and Dominic was terrified and told stories of the dentist chocking him.
Did you cry out and scream out.
DOMINIC BARRY, 5-YEAR-OLD: Yes, screamed for my mom.
A. BARRY: That is what bothers me the most because I'm deaf. I can't hear anything. And to know my child was calling for me and my name and I couldn't help him, it makes me feel like lousy, It makes me feel lousy.
Do you know I'm always here for you.
D. BARRY: Until now, you are with me. Until the dentist (INAUDIBLE), we were apart and I was feeling like sad because I wasn't here with you.
[20:05:01] BLACKWELL: Briel's family at one point was part of that same lawsuit. But have since withdrawn. They are now pursuing a medical malpractice suit represented by attorney John Phillips. Phillips says he also represents dozens of Dr. Schneider's former patients, most of them rely on Medicaid for health insurance.
JOHN PHILLIPS, BRANDI MOTLEY'S ATTORNEY: Medicaid paid him per tooth. So can I cap a tooth twice, yes. Can I then pull it, yes. Cam I then successfully obtain benefits for all three? Absolutely.
BLACKWELL: And Dr. Schneider has made a fortune from Medicaid. State record shows Schneider has received nearly $4 million in Medicaid reimbursements in just the last five years. Now, the Florida attorney general's office has launched a criminal Medicaid fraud investigation and the claims stretch back decades.
A 1995 malpractice suit was settled out of court. It claimed Dr. Schneider unnecessarily placed 16 crowns in the mouth of a 3-year-old. The boy's family was paid $7,500 as part of the settlement agreement. A second malpractice suit was filed that year for the documents from that case have been destroyed and the outcome is unclear.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Somebody who is performing procedures that children don't need and pulling teeth that he knows should still be in the child's mouth, in some cases, we even have where many procedures were done except for what they came in for.
BLACKWELL: Attorney Bust Serris (ph) represents Dominic and he says dozens more of the Dr. Schneider's former patients. This month he filed a potential class-action lawsuit against Schneider on behalf of these children claiming patterns of abuse of the child patients, an accusation that CNN discovered has been made before.
According to this 2013 police report, the mother of a 5-year-old patient was allowed to sit with her daughter during the procedure. The mother told police Schneider grabbed her daughter's face and slap her face several times. The officer acknowledged a small scratch behind the victim's left ear. The alleged offense, battery. Dr. Schneider denied touching the girl. He was not arrested. Instead, the officer referred the mother to the state attorney's office. Nurses who were in the room later denied that anything inappropriate happened. Prosecutors decided not to file charges because of improbable of conviction at trial.
CNN made no fewer than five calls to Dr. Schneider's office to arrange an interview, none was returned. We found him in the parking lot of the office.
What do you think about the allegations?
DR. HOWARD SCHNEIDER, DENTIST: What do I think about them? You don't want to hear.
BLACKWELL: No, sir, I do.
SCHNEIDER: You are not correct. I want to be left alone, OK.
BLACKWELL: Despite the calls to police and the malpractice settlement and the fraud investigation, Dr. Schneider is free to practice. His license is clear. According to the floor of board of dentistry, he is not disciplined by the state. And for these parents that is unacceptable. They want more.
A. BARRY: Go to jail. And never work on any other kids again. To shut his doors and never do this again.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: It is just a stunning, stunning case. Victor Blackwell joins me now along with our senior legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Jeffrey Toobin.
I mean, this is so unbelievable when you see these kids and the parents. How could he practice for so long? How long has he been practicing?
BLACKWELL: Forty five years, he has been practicing.
COOPER: Forty five years.
BLACKWELL: Forty five years, he has been practicing in Jacksonville. And you know, for the first 30 of that, maybe more, there is no social media. There is no facebook. So each of these alleged cases happens in a relative vacuum. You put the allegations of a three, four, five- year-old up against a dentist who has been practicing for so long. It is not until Brandi Motley placed her first story on facebook. And then another parents sees it and they tell the story. And then, as these attorneys are, they build this pattern of abuse, they call it.
COOPER: I just want to put this guy's picture up again because I just think it is important to point these people out. Howard Schneider, that is his name, Dr. Howard Schneider. Why were parents going to this dentist in particular?
BLACKWELL: Well because most of the patients rely on Medicaid for their insurance. There are few other options, if any other options. There is one doctor that is often recommended in Gainesville 70 miles away. Well, these people, many of them don't have cars so they have to rely on public transportation. Another dentist could get them in maybe in four to eight months. One mother, the mother of the 2-year- old you saw in the story, late story there, she said he took out four teeth instead of two as she had expected and then she took them back. And I said why did you take them back? She said there is no other dentist who will sedate my son, so I had no option.
COOPER: Jeff, I mean, the details of this, I mean, as a class action lawsuit, obviously, details are horrifying.
JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I'm not sure I watched the whole thing, I was climbing under the table during some of this. I mean, it is just -- it is such a horrible set of allegations. But you know what he's going to say. He is going to say look, I have a clean record for 40 years, going to the dentist can be unpleasant, but you know, when there are so many allegations, and the combination of the financial incentive testimony incentive to do more procedures.
[20:10:15] COOPER: And to be paid by tooth --
TOOBIN: Exactly. That certainly looks -- it looks very bad.
COOPER: Is the state's attorney's office looking at this?
BLACKWELL: The 2013 case specifically. You will remember that the nurses told the investigators with the state attorney's office nothing inappropriate happened. Well there are reports unconfirmed, but unconfirmed reports that Schneider has shut down his office. The theory is that they said that in 2013 in fear of losing their jobs. If he has shut down the practice , of course, that fear is out of the window and if something actually happened, they are more willing to talk about it now.
COOPER: It is amazing me though, if this had been going on for a long time, that some nurse or assistant isn't willing to come forward, I mean, that -- I don't know, why that wouldn't be.
TOOBIN: That has to be the key to the case if they are going to make a criminal case against him. Because if you remember, assault, these are assaults if they are what the parents said. You know, when you put your hands on someone in a violent unconsented to way, it doesn't matter if you have a white coat or not. That is an assault. Of course, it is also malpractice. It also and something that should result in the loss of a medical license, but it could be a crime as well. The hygienist, the people who work in the office are obviously going to be critical here.
COOPER: What sort of charges could he be brought? Again, I just want to show up again that in case anybody else out there, you know, has experiences that they want authorities to know about.
TOOBIN: Well, the list is long, but it begins with malpractice, civil. Civil battery, possibly criminal assault. Possibly criminal fraud in connection with the Medicaid payments. And of course, the loss of his medical license to the Florida authorities. All of those are possible. And boy, if that is true, the real question is going to be, how did this go on for so long.
COOPER: Also the mom who can't hear her child crying and the little boy -- I mean, I just want to hug him.
Victor Blackwell, appreciate the reporting. We will continue to follow this. Jeff Toobin, thank you as always.
And a quick reminder always, you can set your DVR so you can watch 360 any time you want.
Coming up next tonight, new details from the shootout in Waco, including the arsenal that police are saying they have recovered a thousand weapons and more. We will have the latest on that.
Also tonight, it might be the beginning of the end of the mystery in the murder in fire that took four lives in an upscale Washington neighborhood, word of a possible motive when we continue.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:00:09] COOPER: Leaving three days after the shootout in Waco, we keep getting new reminders to just about how off the charts it was. Numbers that continued to be staggering, including today. Word that more than a thousand weapons that they recovered from the scene of Waco's deadliest violence since the (INAUDIBLE) nightmare.
Kyung Lah has details on the weapons and more, including the identity of one on 170 bikers in custody, the guy who has been his former life in law enforcement. She join us now from Waco.
So first of all, what are you learning about those arrested?
KYUNG LAH, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The 32 years on the police force for the San Antonio police department, that gentleman you are talking about is Martin Lewis. He is a retired police officer, a vice cop who police say they simply were surprised. The officer here said it made his sick to his stomach to think about arresting one of his own. But he is also a bandido, bikes club member. We have learned that they are pharmacy techs, city employees among the arrested, as well as women.
We also found a married couple, Mike and Sandra Lynch. Sandra Lynch also known as drama. They are grandparents. They have children. They are small business owners here. And their son tells me, Anderson, that they think this sort of blanket arrest is simply injustice.
COOPER: And the guns and weapons that authorities said they recovered, what have you heard?
LAH: You mentioned that more than 1,000 weapons. We are talking about knives, handguns, rifles and ak-47s. And what police are telling us is that they were all over this restaurant. They found guns stuffed in between flowerbeds in a bag of tortilla chips. They even found them hidden in the toilets in an attempt to try to dump the evidence, Anderson. COOPER: It is fascinating the new details. Kyung Lah, thank you.
The facts of the case including the hard fact that nine people are dead possible over something as petty as who gets to wear a patch on his or her jackets speak loudly to who these bikers are. So that the violent history, the bandidos and groups like Hell's Angels and others.
However, despite that history, despite this latest incidents, despite those nine lives taken essentially over nothing that would make any sense to any sensible person, some members in the bike community believe they are getting a bomb wrap (ph).
Our Gary Tuchman tonight has that.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is something you might not expect to see. Bikers from rival organizations with names like the patriotic defenders, the booze fighters, the gypsies, the sentinels, evolutions, altogether under one roof peacefully. They are called the motorcycle clubs. The term gang is very insulting to them and so as any insinuation, they are outlaws.
Tell me your name.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Bubble.
TUCHMAN: Here in this biker bar called (INAUDIBLE) in Selma, Texas, South of Waco, there is shock about what happened in Waco. While there is no bandidos at this far in this evening, there is a reflex, not to stereo type every member of that group despite all the arrests.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I feel that the bandidos have been unfairly labelled.
TUCHMAN: Why is that?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just because I know a lot of them, that I don't see them that way.
TUCHMAN: Jimmy Graves is a bandido, a high level one at that.
JIMMY GRAVES, BANDIDO MEMBER: We have been stereotypes.
TUCHMAN: U.S. justice department has labelled the bandidos a criminal organization and a serious domestic threat.
GRAVES: They are not thugs. Mainly when we find a thug in our bunch, we get rid of them.
[20:19:56] TUCHMAN: In fact, the bandidos have made a push to get involved in charity and fundraising over the years. An attorney who represented around 100 bandidos more than three decades say it is all in earnest. KENT SCHAEFFER, ATTORNEY: They do provide help for people that need
help. And you know, the government can try to attribute some sort of sinister, you know, version to make these guys look bad, saying they are trying to look good simply because they bad. But they wanted to clean up their image. They didn't want to look bad in the community because they don't feel that they are.
SKIP HOLLANDSWORTH, EXECUTIVE EDITOR, TEXAS MONTHLY: They like being outlaws. They like being renegades.
TUCHMAN: Skip Hollandsowrth is the executive editor of Texas Monthly magazine who had done thorough investigations of the bandidos. HE says their charity work and perhaps a way to keep law enforcement off their backs.
HOLLANDSWORTH: They are not seeing themselves as the second coming of Mother Theresa. They want to be bad asses.
TUCHMAN: The charity work is a major part of life for many motorcycle clubs like the one at the saloon.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But we start originally working with abused and neglected children.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have to take care of our veterans. We have to take care of these guys that serve our country.
TUCHMAN: They even have church services at the bar on Sunday, one, by a member of a Christian biker club.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I ride with the tribe of Judea motorcycle ministry.
TUCHMAN: Also, part of their life, people could judge them for being part of a motorcycle club. Roy Barnett is the saloon owner.
ROY BARNETT, SALOON OWNER: This are shows like sons of anarchy, people watch us. They making things put there all bikers are like that.
TUCHMAN: So, do you dun across people who see in your colors and are scared and try to get away from you.
BARNETT: Yes. I seem to scare people.
TUCHMAN: The people that patronize this bar come from many different motorcycle clubs, but they share a common sentiments, they feel mischaracterized, misunderstood and misappreciated.
And bikers don't expect that to change any time soon, especially with what happened in Waco.
Gary Tuchman, CNN, Selma, Texas.
(END VIDEOTAPE) COOPER: Well, coming up tonight, it has been called bin Laden's library. What newly declassified papers from the man himself revealed about the deadly plans he still have for Americans right until the day that Americans got him.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:25:59] COOPER: We learned today that a what if that might have changed history. Just months before the raid that killed Osama bin Laden who was house hunting, looking for a new hideout for himself and his family, but it was taking a while. Long enough for SEAL team Six to find him. Now, that detail from a letter he sent and part of a new set of documents from bin Laden's library that gives us the clearest window yet into what the Al-Qaeda mastermind was thinking during his years on the run and the attacks he was plotting.
Tom Foreman reports on more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Newly revealed in the now declassified bin Laden papers, Al-Qaeda sent agents to attack targets in the United Kingdom, Europe and even Russia with the emphasis of hitting Americans whenever possible.
So why did the attacks fail? According to the master terrorist, it was bad luck and God wasn't on our side.
The papers show that in all of the years since 9/11, bin Laden's desire to strike America again never led up. One says, these pig eating invaders and their royal dogs are too scared of death to fight us face-to-face, the main reason they continue to kill us is because we do not have the knowledge and the resources to counter their technology.
Bin Laden clearly feared the power of American drones. Warning his commanders to change location only under cloudy skies to avoid detection and he cautioned we should be careful not to send big secrets by email because the enemy can easily monitor it. Computer science is not our science.
He distinctly saw any plan to establish an Islamic state as premature and risky writing that his followers should be prepared for a long struggle for things like food and water shortages.
I'm sure you're aware that climate change is causing drowns in some areas, on floods on others. His online library also revealed in the documents contained nearly 40 books in English, including Obama's wars by Bob Woodward, Bloodlines of the Illuminati (ph) and the rise and fall of the great powers.
And there is this, an application form for would-be jihadis asking about their education, families, hobbies and do any of your family or friends work with the government? Would they be willing to help us? Do you wish to execute a suicide operation and who should we contact in case you become a martyr? Tom Foreman, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Al-Qaeda apparently have job applications and recruiters. But the outfit that in many ways succeeded them in the global scene, ISIS has raised recruiting to a whole new level. Fortunately, their effort is now meaning some resistance, motivated resistance in the story that Drew Griffin uncovered about a mother with a mission.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DREW GRIFFIN, CNN SENIOR INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Chris Boudreau may not look like it, but right now she is batting ISIS.
CHRISTIANNE BOUDREAU, MOTHER OF ISIS RECRUIT: These recruiters are really slick and they make you believe that it is something different than what it is. And they kept stalking her online and a couple of times she would ignore him and he would blow up.
GRIFFIN: A 23-year-old woman from the U.S. is being stalked, close to joining ISIS and traveling to Syria. The woman's family contacted Boudreau and an intervention began.
In less than two hours in her Calgary home, three separate families reach out to her, desperate for help. They call, they find her, for one reason. She has lived this nightmare.
BOUDREAU: I tried to convince my son to come back. I didn't know what I was doing.
There is Damien raiding the pantry and the fridge again.
GRIFFIN: Three years ago her son became the target of a radical Islam recruiter, Chris Boudreau had no idea.
BOUDREAU: We thought he was going to Egypt to study Arabic and linguistics. I didn't question it. Honestly, I didn't think he was (INAUDIBLE).
GRIFFIN: Her son, Damien and (INAUDIBLE) was raised a catholic. Got into trouble as a teen, even attempted suicide at 17 then found Islam. His mother booked upon his conversion as a blessing. It would soon become a curse.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
Canadian authorities now believe Claremont and several other young Muslims were recruited straight out of a downtown Calgary mosque and literally led to the battlefield without their families suspecting a thing. Chris's son Damien would be dead in months, killed, fighting for ISIS, just outside of Aleppo Syria.
GRIFFIN (on camera): Do you think Damien died wanting to come back?
CHRISTIANNE BOUDREAU, MOTHER OF ISIS RECRUIT: No.
GRIFFIN: He wanted to be there, up until the actual day he died?
BOUDREAU: As far as I know, the last message I got, from him, through Facebook, was how strong his faith was now and his ideas were completely twisted. It was not the same person that I knew.
GRIFFIN: She grieved, kept private, then got angry.
BOUDREAU: How can somebody take such a bright mind, and twist it and convince them that they are doing the right thing, they believe they're doing right.
GRIFFIN: The story that you have is being told all across the world by people who are calling you right now looking for help.
BOUDREAU: Yeah.
GRIFFIN: How do you stop it?
BOUDREAU: We have to lift the taboo. We have to reach out to our youth. Make them realize what this really is before they get approached. Only then can we stop this from happening.
GRIFFIN: Through her organization, she is trying to lift the veil on ISIS recruiting, send a message to parents to look for warning signs and convince families to openly talk about what ISIS really is.
BOUDREAU: It all boils down to one thing, the guys at the top who are greedy and egotistical who want power and money and those guys are the puppet masters that are able to manipulate all of these people and how sick and twisted is that.
GRIFFIN: Drew Griffin, CNN, Calgary.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Well, just ahead tonight, disturbing new details in the D.C. quadruple murder investigation including a motive and what the four victims endured before they were killed.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:36:13]
COOPER: New developments in the quadruple murder mystery that has shaken an upscale neighborhood in Washington, D.C. Whoever set this Porsche on fire after ditching it miles from the crime scene, is still at large tonight. But the motive is no longer in question. And the timeline of the horrifying ordeal, that is coming to focus. With new information about what the four victims endured, Pamela Brown has the latest.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PAMELA BROWN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Investigators of the mystery behind the quadruple homicide inside this Washington, D.C. mansion believe money was a motive. A law enforcement source tells CNN, a separate source with knowledge of the investigation says Amy and Savvas Savopoulos, their ten-year old son Phillip and their housekeeper were bound and held captive inside the home. The source says, there were signs of torture to one of the victims. And while this was going on, law enforcement tell "the Washington Post" that an employee of the husband delivered a package containing 40,000 dollars to the family's house. A law enforcement official tells CNN that the assailants are believed to have gotten away with that amount of money. The deceased housekeeper's husband Bernardo Alfaro tells CNN affiliate WJLA, he went to the home the morning after the incident began and knew something was wrong. He says he saw the family's Porsche that police believe was used just hours later as the getaway car.
BERNARDO ALFARO, HUSBAND OF VICTIM: I saw the two cars in the garage.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You saw the Porsche.
ALFARO: Yeah, the Porsche, it was on the street and then I was knocking on the door over there in the front, and I knocking, knocking and ringing the bell and my feeling, it was that somebody was inside.
BROWN: But no one answered, he says. Then he received a phone call from Mr. Savopolous.
ALFARO: I'm sorry because I didn't call you last night. Vera told me to call you. She had to stay with my wife because she was feeling bad and she asked to go to the hospital and asking Vera to go with her.
BROWN: It's likely that call was made as Mr. Savopoulos was being held hostage. That same day Amy Savopoulos texted the family's other housekeeper reminding her not to come to work. Three hours later the mansion, right next to NBC (INAUDIBLE) and Vice President Joe Biden's home went up in flames. According to a source, investigators believe the victims were killed before it was intentionally set on fire. Investigators say three of the four victims received blunt force trauma.
HARRY HOUCK, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Somebody that is a pro home invasion person wouldn't kill a family. All they want is the money or the valuables, all right? The fact that these people are dead tells me they are especially brutal.
BROWN: Police have released this grainy video of a person of interest who investigators believe drove the family's Porsche in New Carrolton, Maryland, before setting it on fire in broad daylight.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: And Pamela Brown joins us now. I mean the details of what happened to this family and their housekeeper are brutal. Are police any closer to finding out who did this?
BROWN: Well, police say, Anderson, that they are making progress in this case. We know the people have been calling in leads ever since that video that we just saw showing the person of interest was released to the public and based on those leads investigators are following through on and tracking them down. We know also, Anderson, that they are interviewing people who knew the family and also anyone who may have delivered anything to the home, including a pizza delivery driver who delivered pizza to the house when it is believed the family was being held hostage inside. We know the investigators are also pulling through evidence recovered from the family's home and because it is such a large house and there were so much fire damage police say they will be there on the scene for several more days collecting evidence there. Also, police are saying that there is no signs of forced entry to the home indicating, perhaps, that the suspect or suspects knew the family, Anderson.
COOPER: Just awful. Pamela Brown, thank you. Let's get the latest on some of the other stories we are following. Randi Kaye has a 360 news and business bulletin.
RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Anderson, federal investigators now have Amtrak engineer Brandon Bastian's cell phone.
[20:40:02]
KAYE: They are looking at whether or not he made calls or sent text messages just before the train he was operating derailed in Philadelphia. Eight people were killed and more than 200 others were injured in that accident.
The Florida man who piloted a gyrocopter through Washington's restricted airspace before landing it on the lawn of the U.S. Capitol was indicted and faces six federal charges including felonies. If conducted, Doug Hughes could get more than nine years in prison.
Off the coast of Santa Barbara County California, an oil pipeline has ruptured at St. Beach. Officials estimate up to 105,000 gallons of crude oil has spilled into the Pacific Ocean.
And here is something to make everyone smile. Our first look at the quadruplet clouded leopard cubs born at a Tacoma Washington, zoo. Anderson, it's my favorite video of the day. They were born eight days ago and according to the zoo, they each weigh between 11 and 12 ounces or roughly the weight of a box of corn flakes. Aren't they adorable? Their little pink noses. They are so cute.
COOPER: Randi, thanks very much.
Up next, David Letterman's farewell, stars coming out for his last "Late Night" show taping. An insider tells us who came to say goodbye and we look back at the three decade career of this legendary late- night comedian.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:45:22]
COOPER: Well, tonight is the end of an era. David Letterman is taking his final bow on the late show. In a moment we'll get details on his late show and talk about his legacy. But first a look at Letterman, at his career. He's been at the helm of the show for more than 6,000 shows, interviewing nearly 20,000 guests, including me a couple of times. Along the way, the comedian earned the title of longest serving late night TV host and really transform television. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: He's and always will be the quintessential television paradox. The star revered nightly by an audience of millions and the deeply private man, a little use for the pretenses of show business. His signature style, often bizarre, always hilarious. Transformed comedy. The viral moments of an analog era.
DAVID LETTERMAN: We have breakfast ready.
COOPER: Movie stars, rock stars, one-named megastars, an appearance on Letterman became a status symbol bar none. Many, the stuff of "Late Night" legend.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Is that a rug?
LETTERMAN: Are you talking about my hair? All right. What is that a swim cap? What are you wearing?
(LAUGHTER)
COOPER: He had his favorites to be sure.
LETTERMAN: Everybody who comes on here pretending to be an actress, I say to myself. You are not even close. You couldn't carry Julia Roberts' jock.
(LAUGHTER)
COOPER: And he didn't self ...
LETTERMAN: And Joaquin, I'm sorry you couldn't be here tonight.
(LAUGHTER)
LETTERMAN: Just more and more you see like the mirror - like the Sistine Chapel on the - you know, and this is - it's too much.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm not going for the 16TH chapel look.
LETTERMAN: Canadian high school.
(LAUGHTER)
LETTERMAN: Ladies and gentlemen, here he is, Anderson Cooper.
COOPER: I was a very occasional guest who was always thrilled just to be invited. Each visit, as exciting as the first. Nothing felt better than getting a laugh from the master himself.
COOPER: I was there at the counter all by myself. I was the loneliest, most pathetic person on the planet.
You never knew what he was going to ask you, or where the conversation might end up.
COOPER: She wrote this book all about the guy she hooked up with.
LETTERMAN: Don't say that about your mother.
COOPER: I remember watching on the waterfront with her, and I was like, did you know Marlon Brando?
LETTERMAN: And she'd be like, oh, yes.
(LAUGHTER)
COOPER: I swear to god.
Even being the punchline was an honor.
LETTERMAN: New fall shows now, here we go - number two, Alice Cooper, 360.
More than a talk show host, Letterman is like Johnny Carson before him, a uniquely American looking glass, someone in whom the audience could see themselves, whether he was after his heart surgery.
LETTERMAN: So, it was five weeks ago today that these men and women right here saved my life. And ....
(APPLAUSE)
COOPER: Oh when the country was struck by tragedy.
LETTERMAN: You can feel it. You can feel it. You can see it. It's terribly sad.
COOPER: As he prepares to sign off for the last time after more than 6,000 shows and decades of ground-breaking comedy, we just want to say thank you, Dave, you are an original and we'll always remember all of the laughs, all of the moments you gave us.
LETTERMAN: Good night, everybody.
(APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: Joining me now is Bill Carter, the authority on "Late Night" TV. He has written several books on the topic including "The Late Shift" and "The Work for Late Night" and his hair is as white as mine.
(LAUGHTER)
COOPER: The legacy, first of all, tonight, I mean the tons of stars on, the foo fighters are performing.
BILL CARTER, WRITER & DIRECTOR: A top ten list, list of celebrities, Jerry Seinfeld, Steve Martin.
COOPER: It's going to be amazing. I heard it went quite long.
CARTER: It went 17 minutes long and so that became an issue. Would they be able to accommodate that? I think NBC was probably - CBS was probably making calls to see if they could, you know, get some advertising in.
COOPER: Thank. You did the last job. They should let it go. As long as they want.
CARTER: As far as he wants.
COOPER: No one is going to complain about that. His legacy - and one of the things I always found fascinating about him, is he was one of these "Late Night" host who - a lot of them would come and see you before you went on the show.
CARTER: Yes.
COOPER: He only existed at that desk. You wouldn't see him before - And even Julia Roberts said who was on multiple times, she never saw him outside of being on television?
CARTER: No. He was a different creature on television. Part of the reason, he didn't want to talk to the guests, was he really wanted it to be spontaneous and you could possibly blow an anecdote by telling it ahead of time, but it's also - he wasn't a sociable guy.
[20:50:03]
CARTER: He just wasn't.
COOPER: I like that about him.
CARTER: Yeah. He used to come on the air occasionally and say, you know, I have this social awkward disorder. And people laughed. And I'd be like, no, he's telling the truth there, he does.
COOPER: It was amazing, but Paul Shaffer said that David Letterman told him just minutes before he announced to the entire world that he was going to retire. Right before the show started. Pulled him aside and said, Paul, by the way, I called Les Moonves and we're done.
CARTER: Right. And Moonves told me that they had sort of talked about it happening at some point, and it would be in the future, and all of a sudden he got a call in the middle of the day, it is happening tonight, and that is it.
COOPER: The other thing I always liked about him is he kept his private life private. There were little glimpses of it when things happened, and stuff, and we know he has a son and apparently he shows him tonight.
CARTER: Yes. But actually, I think what is interesting about him if something did happen to him, and it often did, he had a stalker, remember, he had a sex scandal, he had his heart problem, he had -- and he would talk about it on the air, and he would sit at the desk, and because it was in the tabloids. He wouldn't give an interview about it, but he would say I'll talk about it, and he just let it all hang out.
COOPER: And in the age of Instagram and tweeting.
CARTER: Oh, no, he stayed away from that.
COOPER: He wasn't doing any of it.
CARTER: No, no.
COOPER: Which I sort of liked that about him. And I also found fascinating is that a lot of these shows, you do preinterviews with the producer, and some of them, Jay Leno stuck exactly with the preinterview, you know, and David Letterman, it did not matter what the preinterview was. I remember one time we went on, I was supposed to talk about Iraq, and he started asking me about clean coal. And I was like, umm, OK, we'll go there.
CARTER: Because he had those interests. That's the thing, he wasn't limited by I'm in show business and I'm interested in cars or whatever. He was interested in all kinds of things. And sometimes he would have very unusual guests on.
COOPER: And he wanted to have real discussions.
CARTER: Real people he would talk to, because he wouldn't talk to them outside of the show, so if he wanted the information, he would have to book you.
COOPER: But it wasn't all just about setting up for a bit, for a joke, he actually would have real discussions.
CARTER: Yes. And that was an interesting evolution for him. Because when he started out, he was not a good interviewer, he was only interested in the comedy. But as the time went on, and he got more interested in things, he wanted to bring on guests that were going to fulfill some need in him. I don't know about this topic and so I'm going to bring this guy out and learn something.
COOPER: And he really, people talk about viral videos, back then, when he started, there weren't viral videos, but he was creating moments that everyone would talk about the next day.
CARTER: People say he didn't have Twitter. He had word of mouth, and boy, was that potent when he was on, because the whole college crowd in America followed that guy.
COOPER: I would stay up late in high school watching him and I'd go to school with bags under my eyes. Bill Carter, great to have you on, thank you so much, appreciate it.
Just ahead, someone you know get hoodwinked by a fairly well known satirical website. What kind of idiot would get hoodwinked by a satirical website? It was me. The Ridiculist is next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Time for the Ridiculist. And tonight I'll let you in on something that's been going on vis-a-vis my relationship with the fickle mistress that is Twitter. So a few days ago I was going through my Twitter feed and found a quote that was attributed to me. It was something I had ostensibly said at a commencement speech. And I quote. "Graduation is a big deal, bigger than getting a hole-in-one while golfing. People might think you are lying about the hole in one, but when you graduate, you get a diploma." I knew I never said that, so naturally I moved swiftly to correct the error. I posted a reply on Twitter using the umm technique, which is the universal signifier of kind of bitchy tweet in progress. "Umm, clickhole, I wrote, did you make this stuff up? I never said this quote and I never spoke to the NYU class of 2015." And that's when everyone on planet earth helpfully pointed out that clickhole is a comedy site, run by the same satirical geniuses who produce the Onion. Thank you, I know.
And I read the Onion and I love the Onion. I've even interviewed the Onion, I've been to the Onion offices. As some say, the name of the site, Clickhole should have been my first clue. Yeah, I know, it should have. Shouldn't have it? Some say I should have done just a teeny bit of clicking around, clicking around said hole and maybe been tipped off by the other headlines. "Nine things James Taylor will never understand." Quiz: Do you enjoy a nice bowl of soup? My daughter is running a fever and keeps coughing up pieces of evidence from the O.J. Simpson trial." But needless to say I didn't read any of those. Now, in my defense, none of those things have my name in them, so why would I have read them? Yes, that is the kind of guy I am.
It is particularly humiliating given the fact I am a fan of the Onion, and I actually have moderated an entire panel with the Onion staff. I show you evidence.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Planned Parenthood opens 8 billion abortion -
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That was just a few weeks ago, actually. People on the extreme right took it seriously and were completely outraged that Planned Parenthood would open its abortion (inaudible).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But they weren't surprised.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Silly people. Falling for a satire site. But really, that was a good discussion. And I get their humor. I promise you, I get their humor.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Anybody you won't pick on? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You of course, because you are the moderator.
(LAUGHTER)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, come on. That is clearly about the warlords.
COOPER: I liked my face in that. I'm sort of resigned.
He was a gentle lover.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: See, I'm a seeker, so I wondered what can this Clickhole misstep teach me? I'm trying to learn from this. Maybe it's a tale of hubris, me a modern-day Icarus flying a little too close to the red hot sun of social media attention. I had just began to ponder this when my assistant emailed to let me know someone called to ask if my refrigerator was running, so obviously that needed my full attention. So I'll just close with a gentle reminder, mostly to myself, don't believe everything you read in life, online and on the Ridiculist. By the way, I corrected myself a few minutes later. And I'm going to give up trying to explain. I'm a loser.
That does it for us. We'll see you again 11:00 p.m. Eastern for another edition of 360. "ANTHONY BOURDAIN: PARTS UNKNOWN" starts now.
