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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown
Witnesses Come Forward in Airline/Secret Service Agent Case; Pakistan Deploys Troops on Indian Border; Summit Kicks Off in Nepal
Aired January 03, 2002 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening again, I'm Aaron Brown. It was clear early this morning and it hasn't changed at all since, that some of the best stories of this day, some of the most interesting ones have nothing to do with September 11th, and I'd be lying if I said that didn't please me.
While there is plenty going on in the war on terror, there are also lots of good stories that have gone unreported or unnoticed, and all of us need to start paying attention to those stories as well.
So perhaps today is a good day for all of us to treat the war on terror in the way we treat all other news stories. When something important happens, when something happens of note, we'll report it, but the story competes with everything else today for space. That way, we get the most important and most interesting coverage of the war, and set the rest aside.
Among those other stories tonight, a controversy in Littleton, Colorado about who really shot a student on that terrible day at Columbine High School. Might it have been the police?
And we'll also spend some time tonight on parents, kids and sports. This on a day when a trial opened, one father accused of killing another father at their son's hockey practice.
And we'll pay our respects to Buddy, the former first dog, the Clinton's dog. Buddy's death really was front-page news in my local paper this morning.
One thing we will not have tonight, and I know this is going to break your hearts, no accordion and no accordion player. You just don't want to overdo a really good thing.
Now on with the whip around the world, and the people covering it. First, the dispute today that got a bit uglier, an accusation of racial profiling by one man against American Airlines. Jeanne Meserve has been reporting the story. Jeanne, a headline please.
JEANNE MESERVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, with accusations flying back and forth between the airline and the agent, two people who claimed to be witnesses to events have now talked to CNN, and what they say seems to bolster the agent's version of events. Aaron. BROWN: Jeanne, thank you. The latest on the hunt for al Qaeda along the border with Pakistan, Kamal Hyder joins us tonight on the videophone. Kamal, the headline.
KAMAL HYDER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, yes. Good morning, Aaron. The deployment on the Pakistani western border is unprecedented, and this comes at a time when the Indian strike formations are poised across the eastern frontier, so we have been traveling through the tribal area and looking into Afghanistan to see if al Qaeda could have entered into Pakistan.
BROWN: Kamal, back with you shortly. Another first for the whip, Kathmandu, Nepal, where Asian leaders are meeting and the big topic is that conflict between India and Pakistan. Michael Holmes is there for us, also on the videophone. Michael, a headline please.
MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Aaron. Yes, a red-letter day in Kathmandu, Nepal as the regional summit kicks off. But no one's writing home about the chances of the leaders of India and Pakistan getting together and meeting even on the sidelines of this summit. No one's holding their breath -- Aaron.
BROWN: Michael, back with you; and finally down under, outside Sydney, Australia the latest on the fires threatening the city, Mitch Catlin. Mitch, the headline from you please.
MITCH CATLIN, CHANNEL 7 CORRESPONDENT: Good evening, Aaron. Well, the Australian wildfire crisis hit flashpoint last night, when three entire townships were evacuated because fireballs of up to 20 meters high were knocking on the back door of hundreds of homes here in the Blue Mountains.
Now firefighters were forced out because conditions were so dangerous. Adding to their problems, the water supply. It was cut because water mains exploded at the wrong time. There are more than 100 fires that continue to burn out of control across New South Wales. This morning, another two teenage arsonists have been arrested, taking to 22 the total number charged with deliberately lighting these blazes. I'll have more details shortly, Aaron.
BROWN: Thank you, Mitch. Back with all of you shortly. But we begin with the latest on this Arab secret service agent, Walied Shater, who was forced off an American Airlines flight.
Today his lawyers laid out what their client says happened to him on Christmas Day, as he tried to get to Crawford, Texas before his boss did. His boss here being the President of the United States.
When you put the agent's account and the pilot's account side by side, you might think we're talking about two separate incidents. Each one says the other was rude and hostile, and how they both behaved will be important in figuring out who in fact was the victim here.
Back to Washington and Jeanne Meserve. Jeanne, good evening. MESERVE: Good evening, Aaron. You told me last night it would be interesting to talk to the agent's seatmate, and now I have. Mark Pushell (ph) claims he was sitting in the same row as Walied Shater. He says he watched the flight attendant pat down a leather jacket the agent had left behind, when he was first pulled off the flight.
She looked at a book the agent had left about the Arab world, and Pushell (ph) says she put it back, making a gesture which led him to believe she found the book offensive. She also made several comments to Pushell about the agent, indicating her discomfort. Was it racial? Pushell (ph) says he thinks so, "he fit a description, and I think he was kicked off the plane because of that."
A woman, Molly Reed (ph), has also stepped forward. She claims she saw and spoke with the agent several times in the terminal and says he was very professional, "I never witnessed any yelling or hostile behavior." But an important note, neither of the alleged witnesses saw the pilot and the agent interact. This as lawyers for Walied Shater laid out his version of events.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN RELMAN, AGENT'S ATTORNEY: Pure and simple, this is a case of discrimination.
MESERVE (voice-over): The Arab-American agent was trying to get to Crawford, Texas ahead of President Bush when he was removed from an American Airlines flight at Baltimore-Washington International Airport for security reasons, despite his secret service credentials.
RELMAN: The pilot assumed because of his appearance that he was not a secret service agent, and everything proceeded from that ground, from that basis, and he was treated in a demeaning manner as you've heard, a humiliating manner, a rude manner.
MESERVE: The attorneys say during a delay of more than an hour, three different law enforcement officers verified the agent's identity, but the captain would not be satisfied, and would not call the secret service directly.
The captain in his account says he was suspicious because paperwork filled out by the agent to carry his weapon on board was unreadable and missing items. But the agent's lawyers say the problem arose when the agent's first flight was canceled and he was sent to a different gate.
CHRISTY LOPEZ, AGENT'S ATTORNEY: The American Airlines agent at that gate had no blank forms that he needed to fill out, so the American Airlines agent decided to use one of the forms that he already had, and simply crossed out the airport, flight, and seat numbers and wrote in the new flight and seat numbers.
MESERVE: The pilot in his account described the agent as very hostile and abusive. Lawyers for the agent say it was the pilot who was rude and unprofessional, and they asked if pilots should have unfettered authority to remove passengers. RELMAN: The question is, if there is no legitimate security risk being posed, does a pilot of an American airline, any American airline have the right to keep someone off of a plane just because he doesn't like the way they look?
MESERVE: On its Web site, American Airlines says these are "frivolous claims of racial profiling." It says it's security "guidelines are applied equally among all passengers, and the company vigorously resents any suggestion of racial discrimination."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MESERVE: The pilot has now filed a formal complaint with the secret service, saying the agent was argumentative, hostile and confrontational, and asking the secret service to address this behavior before the agent interferes with another flight crew and "compromises the safety and security of the crew and passengers aboard" -- Aaron.
BROWN: Jeanne, thanks. Jeanne Meserve in Washington on this story. A little bit later in this hour, we'll talk with the agent's lawyer about some of the discrepancies in these two accounts.
On to other things. We got a reminder today of the new normal on Capitol Hill and just how far from the real normal things still are. There was an anthrax scare on the Hill, probably a hoax, but something seemed awfully real from the men from the hazmat teams and their moon suits, to the sealed off buildings and that same queasy feeling all over again.
CNN's Kate Snow has been working the story on a busy day for Kate. She joins us from Washington. Kate, good evening.
KATE SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good evening, Aaron. You know you could sense that feeling in the voice of the first official I talked to this afternoon when we learned about this letter. He simply did not want a repeat of what happened in mid-October.
Tonight, it looks like it was not a repeat. The FBI saying now a letter discovered this morning in the capitol office of Senator Tom Daschle was likely a hoax.
Government officials say the letter was postmarked in London in late November. It did contain a threatening note, and a powdery substance, but two initial field tests at the capitol today showed no sign of anthrax.
Lieutenant Dan Nichols of the Capitol Police said earlier, it was possible that the material could have been anthrax at one time, and was then irradiated. But a government source now tells CNN, it's unlikely today's tests would have been negative if that were the case. The powder would have still registered as anthrax spores, even if they were irradiated spores.
Now this letter, like all mail now going to the capitol, went through a double check before arriving at Daschle's office. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LT. DAN NICHOLS, CAPITOL POLICE SPOKESMAN: All the letters get through. All the letters that are destined for the Capitol Complex will be sent off for irradiation by the U.S. Postal Service before it even arrives at the Capitol Complex. Once it's -- and that is, of course, intended to kill any hazardous material that may be contained in the letters.
Once the letters arrive within the Capitol Complex, there is additional screening that goes on, actually off site.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SNOW: A congressional source tells us that additional screening process involves a machine that shakes every letter and then makes a small cut in each envelope. Nichols said that that cut is not to look for powder, but rather to be able to test the inside and the contents of any letter for dangerous substances of any kind, not just for anthrax, and he says that's how the letter got through.
It simply didn't contain anything dangerous, so in Nichols' view, the system worked well. The letter has been sent on to Fort Detrick, Maryland for further analysis, and the FBI continues its investigation. But I'm told the Capitol will be open, Aaron, for regular business tomorrow. Aaron.
BROWN: I try and ask one really dumb question a night. I have a feeling this is it. If they go through all of these checks, they radiate them. They cut them open, this and that.
SNOW: Right.
BROWN: Then why do they bring the guys out in the hazmat suits, if they think they've killed it in the first place?
SNOW: Right, well good question but I think it's because, you know, someone opened this letter this morning, got very scared. There was a -- remember there was a threatening note inside the letter. We don't know the contents of that note yet, but we don't know what it said exactly, but it was threatening in nature. Powder spilled out all over the place. She called the authorities -- she or he called the authorities, and that's why they checked it out -- Aaron.
BROWN: Kate, thank you. Kate Snow in Washington on the anthrax hoax apparently. We came across one of those weird facts today that fits in the program right about now.
A poll of visitors at Madame Trousseau's Wax Museum in London shows that for the first time, Hitler is no longer the most hated figure in the world. Osama bin Laden is. No reason to debate that now. It is a reflection of the moment and of two evils for sure.
Hitler we know is dead. The government believes bin Laden is alive and the hunt for him goes on. From the Pentagon tonight, CNN's Bob Franken. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FRANKEN (voice over): Just in case anyone was thinking that the war was over...
DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: Reports about mopping up, meaning sort of the end of the effort in Afghanistan notwithstanding, the War on Terrorism is still in a relatively early phase.
FRANKEN: And while it is true that there is far less bombing these days.
GENERAL RICHARD MYERS, JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: We conducted strikes between 10:00 and 11:00 our time in Afghanistan on a leadership compound that was a fairly extensive compound.
It had a base camp, a training facility, and some cave pieces to that, fairly close to the Pakistani border, as a matter of fact, and that was the last strike in the last several days.
FRANKEN: This was the very same site that was bombed in November by the United States, and attacked with cruise missiles during the Clinton administration in 1998. That was one of the failed efforts to get Osama bin Laden.
The Pentagon did release copies of leaflets dropped in the region. They show impressions of how bin Laden might look now, if he shaved his beard and was wearing western style clothing, and they include captions. One translates to English, "Osama bin Laden, the murderer and coward, has abandoned you."
As for the reports there are negotiations over the fate of that other fugitive #1, Mullah Omar, the reports are persistent, the defense secretary insistent.
RUMSFELD: And I've already said what we would accept. We will accept surrender. These people have killed a lot of people. They deserve to be out of there. They deserve to be punished. And that is what we're there to do.
FRANKEN: Plans are now well underway to transfer some of those already in custody to detention facilities under construction at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba as soon as possible, and as carefully as possible.
RUMSFELD: We plan to transport them, and we plan to use the necessary amount of constraint so that those individuals do not kill Americans in transport or in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
FRANKEN (on camera): Secretary Rumsfeld raise the possibility that some of the other detainees, as they prefer to call them, could be detained at bases in the United States, if the military runs out of room at Guantanamo. This another of the loose ends that reinforces the Secretary's point that the war is still in its early stages.
Bob Franken, CNN, the Pentagon. (END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: There are, by the way, about 250 people in U.S. custody in Afghanistan, but most of the key figures in the Taliban and al Qaeda remain at large. They're among the thousands of Taliban and al Qaeda fighters who are unaccounted for.
And as Bob mentioned, the focus on them is on that border with Pakistan, the Afghan-Pakistani border. So we go back there and CNN's Kamal Hyder, who joins us again on the videophone. Good morning to you.
HYDER: Good morning, Aaron. This morning we saw frost on all our boxes, so a cold morning here. We have been traveling across this border and at certain times crossing into Afghanistan, talking to the authorities on the other side as well.
We have spent the night with the militia forces on a high mountain pass. We could see fires dotting the entire landscape. Every hundred meters away, there were fires burning and the militia forces on alert.
Across the border, the Afghans on alert, look out for al Qaeda fighters or terrorists trying to slip across into Pakistan. The authorities there have conducted serious negotiations with the tribal chieftains, telling them that the territorial integrity of Pakistan and their state and these terrorists must be stopped, and the tribals have reaffirmed their support.
However, the tribals have told the forces that you will not interfere in our tribal laws, and we will assist you in apprehending and stopping any terrorists from crossing into Pakistan. Aaron.
BROWN: And have they, in fact, stopped any terrorists from crossing into Pakistan? Have they found anybody?
HYDER: Yes, Aaron, surprisingly in (UNINTELLIGIBLE) area in the Quram (ph) area, almost 200 have been rounded up. They've been taken to the city of Khohat (ph) where they have been interrogated by American intelligence officials as well. So it's a very large number of al Qaeda fighters, who may have felt comfortable by crossing into Pakistan.
But the mood in Pakistan has changed. People do not trust the Mullahs anymore. They don't trust the politicians anymore. The politicians let them down and people said this time, the Mullahs let us down by taking simple people from the mountains, inciting them, and sending them into a battle that they were not going to win -- Aaron.
BROWN: Kamal, thank you. It's nice to see you again. Kamal Hyder, on the border in Pakistan for us today. America may be involved in a new war but Pakistan, an ally, and India also an ally of ours, continue to fight an old battle over Kashmir, and lately over a terrorist attack on India.
A small sign of the tension today beefed up security around the Taj Mahal, after reports a Pakistani terrorist group had threatened to blow it up. The Taj Mahal by the way is a monument to love.
This is not the kind of dispute America media usually spends much time on, and there is fair debate over why that is. But there's no debate that this increase in tensions and violence between Pakistan and India could not come at a worse time for the United States, which is why it is important to note meetings that begin tomorrow in Nepal, where both countries will send representatives, though it does not appear they will talk face-to-face.
With that as a backdrop, we head back to Nepal. CNN's Michael Holmes who joins us on the videophone from the capitol city of Kathmandu -- Michael.
HOLMES: Hi, Aaron, good evening to you. Good morning from Kathmandu, just getting onto 9:00 a.m. here on a hazy morning. Still no more clarity on whether the Indian and Pakistan sides will meet on any level.
Certainly on the level of prime minister and president, it seems highly unlikely. The Indian side saying there's no reason to talk while Kashmir is still an issue, and violence continues there as it has continued even this week. Twenty people injured earlier this week in a series of grenade explosions.
The summit itself begins in just an hour or so from now, and the leaders of all seven nations here at the regional summit will speak, including of course, India and Pakistan. They're unlikely to mention their specific crisis, of course, and as I said nor are they at this stage likely to meet even on the sidelines. The hope is that perhaps the foreign ministers might meet. I'll mention that later.
The big positive of this summit perhaps is that they're here, and while they're here they're not at home and their armies may be facing up on the border, but the two leaders will be facing off across a table and that's seen as a good thing. It gives some breathing space, if you like, that at least they're in the same town, even if they're not having a private meeting in the same room.
Aaron, there was a news conference here last night by the Indian external affairs minister, that's the foreign minister, Jaswant Singh, and when it was mentioned again that Pakistan has said (UNINTELLIGIBLE) for the first time that it's ready to meet anywhere, anytime, with India. Jaswant Singh, who has in the past said there are no plans for any meetings, even on a foreign minister level, made an interesting comment.
He said, "well, the Pakistanis," essentially what he said was, "the Pakistanis haven't asked for a meeting." Of course, that raised a lot of speculation that hey, if they do ask for a meeting, does that mean you'll consider it. That's not yet clear. He wouldn't go into details, but it was an interesting nuance perhaps.
If the leaders are going to meet, that is the president and the prime minister, it's likely to be tomorrow. It's Friday morning here. Saturday is a private retreat just for the leaders. No cameras. It's behind closed doors in a very secure area. We can't get within miles of it, and it will just be the leaders.
And as a Pakistan official said to me last night, they'll find it hard to avoid each other there -- Aaron.
BROWN: Well, we are, Michael, always intrigued by the language of diplomacy, and so when the Indian minister says they have not asked for a meeting, it does sound like he's almost begging them to ask, and we wonder if the Pakistanis won't find that demeaning, that they have to ask for this meeting.
HOLMES: You know, that's an interesting point. That's exactly what I thought when I heard him say that. It's a real cat and mouse game, Pakistan saying "hey, we'll meet." India saying "well, we have no plans to meet, and anyway they haven't asked for a meeting."
Then Pakistan has to consider its position and say, "well do we then diplomatically put ourselves in the position of having to ask for a meeting." Who asks first? Who blinks? It's a situation politically as well as on the border -- Aaron.
BROWN: Michael, thank you. Michael Holmes in Kathmandu. It is morning there. Thank you for joining us tonight.
Now onto Australia, and the fires that have been burning for more than a week, around Sydney. It's been a very painful thing for Australians to deal with, not just because of the extensive damage to the national forest land, some houses, it's been extensive; but because many of the fires raging appear to have been deliberately set, and so many of the suspected arsonists are quite young. The latest on the fires, Mitch Catlin joins us again. He's with Channel 7 in Australia. I guess it's afternoon there. So good afternoon to you, Mitch.
CATLIN: Good afternoon, Aaron. Good to talk to you again. If you look behind me, I'm in the Blue Mountains at the moment. That normally is a massive mountain range. You can only see about 50 meters in front of you because the smoke here is so bad. It was billowing and basically covered the entire area of Sydney, and visibility is down to about 50 meters at most major centers across the city.
It's that bad, and of course with it, the stinging smoke of firefighters. The conditions are disastrous. They're finding it very, very difficult to battle these blazes. Now there are still more than 100 that continue to burn out of control, across Australia's most populous state of New South Wales.
Now the biggest concern last night was up here in the Blue Mountains. A number of regional little bush retreat communities if you like, several hundred residents, were forced to evacuate their homes around 8:00 last night. So that was sort of around 15, 16 hours ago here in Australia, because there were 20 meter high fireballs that were exploding at their back doorsteps.
So they were forced to flee to a local school to escape these flames. There was fear that it could actually run through a whole valley, because it was three different fires that had joined together, and was threatening to jump the major highway, which links this part of town with Sydney. It's the major road which links both towns.
So it was looking like that could be cut. Amazingly, firefighters somehow managed to contain that fire, but it's still burning out of control at the moment. Luckily no properties have been lost. It's quite amazing in that fire, but the total 220 properties and businesses have been destroyed since these fires began on Christmas Eve.
They mentioned arson. Well this morning, another two teenage arsonists have been arrested. That takes to 22 the total number who have been charged since the fires began, and investigations are continuing to see if any more people will be charged as well -- Aaron.
BROWN: Mitch, 15 seconds, no more. How many people are fighting the fires?
CATLIN: There's about 7,000 firefighters on the ground from across Australia. They've all come together to try and battle the worst fires in Australia for more than a decade.
BROWN: Mitch Catlin of Australia's Channel 7, thanks. Good to talk to you again.
Still ahead on NEWSNIGHT, an ugly case no matter how you look at it, one that makes you think especially if you're a parent. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: This story is a tragedy, no matter how it shakes out. Just outside of Boston today a man, a father went on trial for killing another man, also a father, after a brawl at their kids' hockey practice.
Anyone who has every umpired a Little League baseball game or stood on the sidelines at Saturday soccer or attended tryouts for any sport, boys or girls, knows how dumb adults can be sometimes.
Thankfully, their stupidity rarely ends in death, but it did in Boston. Here's CNN's Bill Delaney.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BILL DELANEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Jurors brought to inspect the skating rink outside Boston, where one father killed another, following a dispute over a hockey practice involving mostly 10-year-olds.
Thomas Junta, charged with Manslaughter for beating to death, Michael Costin who had been supervising a mid-summer hockey practice in July, 2000 that three of his sons took part in. They then watched their father die.
In a Cambridge, Massachusetts courtroom, the prosecution alleging Junta's rage over his son's treatment at the practice drove him to violence.
SHEILA CALKINS, PROSECUTOR: He lunged at Mr. Costin, threw Mr. Costin to the floor, kneeled over or sat on Mr. Costin, and proceeded to punch him repeatedly to the left side of his head and neck area.
DELANEY: The defense alleging Junta, while upset about a rough hockey practice, only fought in self defense.
THOMAS ORLANDI, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Thomas Junta senses something to his left. He turns and he'll tell you, he saw a man, now he recognizes as the deceased, his hand is here. It's coming up. His leg is up, and the punch is flying at his face, and Mr. Junta's trying to pull the hand away. Costin is coming up, and Mr. Junta does hit him. He says he does. Three punches, one, two, three, it's over.
DELANEY: In all, more than 35 witnesses expected to be called, 11 of them children, including sons of both the accused and deceased.
Death from over aggressive parents at children's sporting events is very rare, but the behavior itself is not. A November, 1999 study concluded more than half of parents have observed other parents becoming too worked up at children's sporting events, a trend some see reflecting a larger breakdown of civility, values.
STEVE BURKE, NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY: We're a society that's based on winning. People celebrate the winners and they look differently at the losers.
DELANEY: The trial is expected to take about a week. Thomas Junta could go to prison for 20 years.
Bill Delaney, CNN, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: In a moment, we'll talk more about this phenomenon of parents who get out of control, why it happens, why it seems to be getting worse, that and more as NEWSNIGHT continues on a Thursday night.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: Whenever a story like the hockey trial comes along, it's tempting in this business to do something that takes a look at the larger picture, and we will tonight. Sometimes the obvious question is the best one, and the question is: Are we taking sports too seriously? Probably so. We'll talk about that too with Rick Wolff. He's the host of a radio program "The Sports Edge" on WFAN here in New York, chairman of the Center for Sports Parenting at the University of Rhode Island -- and not that this is related, but the son of one of great baseball announcers of all time. It's nice to see you.
RICK WOLFF, CHAIRMAN, THE CENTER FOR SPORTS: You too, Aaron.
BROWN: Well, I guess, the obvious answer is, yes, we take sport awfully serious. WOLFF: Yes.
BROWN: Do we also, in an odd way, take protecting our kids in these situations too seriously?
WOLFF: Well, when people talk about sports parenting rage, which is a phenomenon which is singular to a generation of parents today, didn't happen 15 or 20 years ago. People ask, why do parents go berserk, lose their cool, lose control of their emotions? Yes, it's because they have this protective instinct to take care of their children.
BROWN: But why would we be more protective in the year 2001 than we were in 1956, when I played Little League baseball?
WOLFF: Because when you played back in the '50s, chances are mom and dad didn't go to every one of your games, you weren't playing on a travel team, you weren't trying to get a college scholarship or get a pro contract. That's what's changed.
BROWN: So somehow the stakes themselves have changed. It's not that parenting has changed, it's that the perception of the stakes have changed.
WOLFF: Yes, that's part of it. But yeah, again, the parents -- our moms and dads didn't go and watch us play every Saturday and Sunday in the sand lots. We had problems, we worked them out ourselves, amongst ourselves. There were no officials. There were no uniforms. There were no league standings, just kids playing ball.
It's changed today. I mean, you see your mom and dad on the sidelines, and they see the little one perhaps knocked down to the ground in a soccer game, or perhaps the child is the victim of a poor call by an umpire or the child is not getting enough playing time, you as a parent say, my gosh, if I don't stick up for my child, who is?
BROWN: I have to tell you, in about 1970 I earned a little money, umpired Little League baseball games. I had things said to me that -- people screaming at me -- as bad as anything I can imagine -- well, at least until I started doing this. Some cities have taken pretty aggressive actions here. What sort of things are leagues and cities and smart people doing?
WOLFF: First of all, in the town of Jupiter, Florida, they have actually taken a very proactive step of telling the moms and dads in town if you want your child to play Little League baseball, you as the parent must go and take a mandatory seminar in which -- not about the rules of the game or the X's and O's, but basically on how to deal with the ups and downs, the frustrations of watching your kids play sports. Now that, unfortunately, has not become a real sort of epidemic in terms of moving around the country. It's just isolated towns that do this. I wish more towns did take this kind of an approach.
BROWN: I don't remember where I saw this, and it may in fact be the town I lived in, but I think there's a rule where if you want to go watch the kids play soccer, you're more than welcome, but you can't yell or scream. You can't say anything. You just sit there and enjoy it.
WOLFF: There are some towns that use what they call a silent Sunday approach, particularly with soccer. And what happens on a given Sunday, the coaches, the moms and dads are not allowed to make any noise on the sideline. It works wonderfully. My question is, if it works so well on one Sunday, why not do it every Sunday.
BROWN: We got about half-a-minute or so. Do we have any sense how this impacts children?
WOLFF: Children are very much impacted by all of this. Obviously, they see moms and dads go nuts at their games, and the long range impact our children do in fact imitate their parents, and down the road you wonder what happens to our kids when they become parents.
BROWN: Nice to meet you. Thanks for coming in tonight.
WOLFF: My pleasure.
BROWN: Appreciate it very much. Rick Wolff.
Coming up next, a lingering controversy of a very different sort, what went on just outside Columbine high school, April 20, 1999. NEWSNIGHT continues after a break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: "Columbine," an incredibly powerful word. You just say the word "Columbine," everybody knows what we're talking about here. But it was for most of us, even those of us who covered that tragedy, a while ago. It seems that way. But not for the parents of Columbine, and certainly not for the parents of Danny Rohrbough.
Danny was 15 years old, was shot and killed along with 11 other students that day. Only his parents say he wasn't killed by Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris. They believe he was shot by police. Yesterday, they released a audio tape of the conversation between Danny's stepfather and a police officer which they say supports their argument.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DEPUTY JIM TAYLOR: They were just running in mass chaos, and I see a boy drop and that's -- I didn't know who it was. It was Dan and I didn't know that until I seen the photo the next morning in the newspaper, of the boy that I'd seen.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BROWN: Police deny that they were responsible. Prosecutors say there's no evidence of a crime, so they won't convene a grand jury. Colorado's Governor Bill Owens today asked prosecutors to at least reconsider that decision. That is the backdrop to this. From Denver tonight, we're joined by Danny Rohrbough's father, Brian, by the family's attorney, Barry Arrington. And we're also joined by legal analyst and former Denver City -- wait, Denver Chief Deputy District Attorney Craig -- I apologize -- Silverman. Welcome to all of you.
Brian, let me begin I guess with you, you're the dad here. Is the tape in and of itself what convinced you that the police were responsible, or had you believed that for a while?
BRIAN ROHRBOUGH, FATHER OF DANIEL ROHRBOUGH: No, actually we -- or I just heard the conversation from Jim Taylor who's the deputy heard on that tape actually one day after the shooting. In and of itself, what he told me didn't mean anything, until I got the information from the sheriff's department. Once I heard what they were saying, there was a tremendous conflict.
BROWN: When you talked about the information from the sheriff's department, give me an idea of what we're talking about there.
ROHRBOUGH: Well, the sheriff's department -- we had a meeting with them five months after the crime, where they described what happened to Dan. And what they'd described was not even close to what Jim had said he saw that day. So we began to look for the physical evidence, you know, that would give us an answer to what was going on.
BROWN: Mr. Arrington, when I read about this afternoon preparing, that was the question that came to me. Isn't there enough physical evidence here, either forensic or an autopsy, to establish what kind of bullet, what the angle was, where the young man was standing, all of that?
BARRY ARRINGTON, ATTORNEY FOR ROHRBOUGH FAMILY: Well, actually, that's one of the things about the report that the Jefferson County's Sheriff's Department initially submitted that was so wrong. There's no other word for it. The Jefferson County's Sheriff's Department said that Danny was shot, and that the ballistics proved that he was shot by Klebold.
Well, they said that at a time when we didn't have the ballistics report. We filed an open records request under the Colorado statute, and literally had to drag the reports out of Jefferson County Sheriff's Department. Took us months and months and months. When we finally got them, the ballistics report didn't support their own report, their own official version of what happened. Because what happened was they said that Dylan Klebold shot Danny twice at close range.
Well, the ballistics report says that the fatal bullet was never recovered, and the bullet that was recovered might have been consistent with Harris' rifle, but it was definitely not consistent with Klebold's.
BROWN: And just quickly, Barry, if you can, how do the police square these two different accounts if they even try to?
ARRINGTON: They don't try to. They just say, we're right, you're wrong, leave us alone.
BROWN: Craig Silverman, in this conversation, you have no dog in this fight, so let me ask -- you know all the players here. What's your take on what's going on? Is it that the police are -- they know what happened, they don't know what happened, they're covering something up. They're not sure. What do you think this is?
CRAIG SILVERMAN, FORMER CHIEF DEPUTY: They're covering something up, and it's really hard to understand why they're doing it. But those of us here in Denver have witnessed an active campaign of disinformation from the sheriff's department. This latest tape is just the latest example. Why they are telling these misstatements is really the subject of inquiry.
People lie for a reason. If you could figure out the reason why these lies are being told, I think you would get closer to the truth. The possibility of friendly fire killing Danny Rohrbough is a very real possibility.
BROWN: And again, kind of briefly here if you can, is there any sort of legal apparatus absent a grand jury, if that's not going to happen, to sort out the truth here?
SILVERMAN: Well, Brian Rohrbough brought a civil suit, but it ran headlong into the roadblock of governmental immunity, and even this latest shocking development is unlikely to improve that condition. The grand jury is one way to go, but I'm afraid that would be secret and there's the potential of a whitewash.
I think the legislature could get subpoena power, put people under oath, have a legislative hearing, and get at the truth that way.
BROWN: Brian, let me finish off with you, if I can. Whatever happened that day, and let's assume for a second that in fact this was a friendly fire incident, that a police officer shot your son. It certainly was not -- it wasn't something malicious. It was a terrible tragedy if that's what happened. Why is it important to you to know -- or to at least have them step up and acknowledge it?
ROHRBOUGH: I think it's important for, you know, my own peace of mind just to know the truth. But it really speaks of something higher, that our police and law enforcement officers and officials should not be lying to the public about anything. And in this case, you know, nothing gets any worse than what happened to my son. There was never a reason to lie about it.
BROWN: I can't imagine how difficult this must be to live through and to talk about. Mr. Rohrbough, thanks for coming in. Mr. Arrington, Craig Silverman, thank you all for joining us. Thank you.
And this one is no easier. Well, that's not quite true; it is a little bit easier, in fact. Why a Secret Service was forced off an American Airlines flight the other day, Christmas. The agent's account, we'll talk with one of his lawyers, that's coming up next on NEWSNIGHT on Thursday.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: A little bit more now on the case of Walied Shater, the Secret Service agent forced off an American Airlines flight. We should point out, though we hope you know this by now, that we did ask American Airlines if they would provide a spokesman to join us in this conversation tonight. They said no, referred us to the written statement that we reported on earlier in the program.
With that in mind, we're joined now from Washington by co-counsel for the agent, Christy Lopez. She's the lawyer who walked us through the man's account, the agent's account earlier in the piece that we ran, and we're glad she's with us tonight. Nice to see you.
Think about this for a second. Is it possible that both the pilot and your client are in fact telling the truth, that he was in fact more likely than not singled out because he's Arab-American, and that later on in this situation he became a little angered by all that was going on?
CHRISTY LOPEZ, ATTORNEY FOR SECRET SERVICE AGENT: I think it's quite likely that there must be inaccuracies in what the pilot has stated. There's no doubt that what happened here frustrated and made this agent unhappy. But there's no indication initially that had anything to do with the pilot's decision. It's only now that really the facts have come out, and the issues of verification and paperwork have been shown to be really non-issues, that American Airlines is coming out with this new reason, that the pilot -- that the agent was supposedly hostile and verbally abusive.
BROWN: Well, I'm sorry, was he at some point -- I think yesterday someone said he had been asked for his I.D. five times, and that he got frustrated at that. At that point, did he become abusive or loud or angry?
LOPEZ: No. He objected to his treatment in a 10-second exchange. And I think what would have been suspicious if he would have been treated this way throughout and never objected. But in no way did he do anything that can be construed by any rational person as being threatening or somehow dangerous or disruptive.
BROWN: OK, on the subject of the paperwork. This one confused me some today, because the paperwork yesterday seemed to be the center of this. There's no dispute, is there, that for reasons that are not the agent's fault that the paperwork was not precisely correct, that is to say there were things that were crossed out, correct?
LOPEZ: That's right. It appears that some American Airlines agents had crossed some things out because they didn't have blank forms and he had to be on a different flight because of mechanical difficulties with the original flight. But I don't think that there's also any dispute that any perceived inconsistencies or problems with the paperwork could have been cleared up very quickly, and the pilot made no attempt to do so, because the pilot had already decided that he was uncomfortable with this agent on the basis of the agent's ethnicity alone. BROWN: And here -- I don't know if you can answer this, but I fell like asking it anyway, why didn't someone just pick up the phone and call the White House or the Secret Service or somebody, and say, "we got a guy here, and this is what he looks like, he's this height, this weight, and he's carrying I.D., and do you employ him?"
LOPEZ: I think that's our client's number one question. He tried to give the pilot the phone numbers to various places. He tried to give them phone numbers to the White House switchboard, which is an independently verifiable number that the pilot could have called and he would have been directed to the person that could have cleared up his identity.
And in fact, that's what happened when another person that works for American Airlines in their corporate security office did call his supervisor. He was able to verify his identity in less than five minutes, and he was on a flight the next morning. I think the reason it was not done is that the pilot didn't want this person on the flight. He was uncomfortable with this person. He was convinced that there was no rational thing that was going to be able to tell him that this person was safe.
BROWN: Ten seconds. What do you want here? An apology, or money, or what?
LOPEZ: We want to do right by the pilot, by the flight attendants and by the public. We -- the airlines need to provide training to their employees so that Arab-Americans are not bearing the brunt of the very difficult decisions that pilots have to make.
BROWN: Thanks for coming in. I know it's been a very long day for you. Christy Lopez, thank you very much.
LOPEZ: Thank you.
BROWN: And when we come back on NEWSNIGHT, rest in peace for a true friend of Bill. Buddy remembered. Buddy the dog in a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: Well yes, goodbye to Buddy, the one-time presidential dog. I would like to think that this may be the one story we do that mentions Bill Clinton that doesn't generate nasty notes. I'd like to think that, but I'm cynical enough to know better.
Buddy was a beautiful chocolate lab who romped the White House grounds, who played in the Oval Office. The former president may have acted like a dog; Buddy was the real thing, and Buddy got hit by a car outside Mr. Clinton's Chappaqua home. It was not a fair fight. So now Buddy joins a long list of executive pets -- they go all the way back to George Washington, the president's best friend and sometimes a lot more. Here's CNN's Bruce Morton.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRUCE MORTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): President Harry Truman said, "If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog."
And Buddy was a friend to his people -- fought with Socks the cat some, but a friend -- not as historic as some presidential pets. Franklin Roosevelt's Scotch terrier, Fala, rode to an inaugural with him and became a campaign issue when Republicans accused Roosevelt of using a Navy ship to bring Fala from the Aleutian Islands back to Washington during World War II. FDR knew what to say about that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FEDERAL D. ROOSEVELT, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: These Republican leaders have not been content with attacks on me or on my wife or on my sons, no, not content with that. They now include my little dog, Fala.
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MORTON: Richard Nixon used their cocker spaniel, Checkers. Fighting to stay on the ticket as Dwight Eisenhower's running mate after accusations about a slush fund, Nixon told a TV audience about the dog someone had sent them.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RICHARD NIXON: And, you know, the kids, like all kids, love the dog. And I just want to say this right now, that, regardless of what they say about it, we're going to keep him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MORTON: Mail poured in. He stayed on the ticket.
Lyndon Johnson pulled his beagle's ears, made them bark, he said, and told press Secretary George Reedy -- this is a White House audio tape:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LYNDON JOHNSON, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I have more love for dogs that most people. And I hope they didn't misunderstand it. I wouldn't want them to feel that I was a sadistic person.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MORTON: Ronald Reagan's dogs didn't make news exactly, but he did say one had a thing about the Lincoln Bedroom.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RONALD REAGAN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Our little dog, Rex, will start down that long hall toward that room, just glaring as if he's seeing something, and barking. And he stops in front of Lincoln's door.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MORTON: The first President Bush's dog, Millie, had something no other presidential pet had had: her own book -- some help with the writing, of course, but a lot of celebrities hire ghosts -- and then Socks and the late Buddy, and this president's dogs, Barney and Spot. Buddy's advice to them would probably be, stay on that ranch, guys, or in the White House. Bad things can happen outside.
Bruce Morton, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: And finally tonight from us, it's not often that we're going to do this. In fact, I have a feeling we're never going to do this again, but here's the first ever NEWSNIGHT traffic update. Do we have a sound effect, please?
Not that good. There we go. First to skies, where things have been an absolute mess at Hartsfield International Airport in Atlanta, because of snow that hit the area. CNN has confirmed that Hartsfield is, in fact, the busiest airport in the world. At least, it is when planes can take off and land. The situation at the airport there is a mess.
Turning now to roads: Interstate 20 west of Atlanta, same snowfall, another mess. Big back-up there. As we used to say in local television, if you're expecting anyone home for dinner, they're going to be late.
In Los Angeles today -- thank you -- another traffic problem. Police spent a good chunk of the afternoon pursuing this van. Doesn't this sort of chase go on every day in Los Angeles?
And one more, please. In Ohio today, a traffic -- I'll just say it again like you're listening -- in Ohio today, a traffic problem of a different sort, when bras and other undergarments -- my goodness -- were discovered in a pile along Interstate 270 northeast of Columbus.
That's the traffic update. We'll have your five-day forecast in a moment. We'll see you tomorrow at 10:00. Good night.
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