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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

Police Found Body Believed to be van Dam; Husband of Andrea Yates Testifies

Aired February 27, 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. A viewer who writes us from time to time sent a note along today saying she was having some trouble watching the program this week. The news, she said, seemed unspeakably horrible.

In responding I said I didn't think the program had been overwhelmed by that, but in truth, I didn't argue the point with much conviction. Several of the stories this week have been awful, and they are lingering around still tonight.

What makes two of them so painful is that they deal with the death of children, Danielle van Dam in California, and the five Yates children in Houston, Texas, whose deaths hang over a courtroom there as their mother's lawyers and doctors try and save her life.

Is there anything quite as hard as talking about the death of a child? Most of us thankfully can't imagine what it must be like to be Russell Yates, Andrea Yates' husband. It's hard to imagine he doesn't feel some guilt; some sense that if he'd only done something, or something different, his children might be alive today and his wife might be free.

He must feel that, and at some level, he must know other people, lots of other people it seems, think that. I don't know if that is right or fair, but I know it's true and he must too, and imagine carrying that around these days.

And then there's the murder of Danielle van Dam. A major development there today, and it's where we begin tonight's whip. Charles Feldman has been working the story. He's in San Diego. Charlie, a headline from you.

CHARLES FELDMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, police in San Diego say tonight, a sad development, that in all probability they have found the body of Danielle van Dam. We'll talk more about that in a few minutes.

BROWN: Charlie, thanks. We'll work on the lighting issue. In Houston, the Andrea Yates trial, her husband testifying as we indicated earlier. David Mattingly continues to cover that for us. David's in Houston, a headline please.

DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, the husband of Andrea Yates taking the stand in his wife's defense today, telling us what he didn't know about the severity of her mental illness. After days of clinical, medical testimony, a welling of emotion today in a Houston courtroom. Aaron.

BROWN: David, thank you. More violence in Israel, more focus on a peace initiative that comes from an unlikely source. Rula Amin now in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, a headline please.

RULA AMIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, the U.S. is calling it a note of hope, a Saudi initiative that promises Israelis recognition if Israel withdraws from the land it occupied in 1967. Today, crowned prince Abdullah who proposed the plan says he's going to get Arab leaders meeting at the end of March in Beirut to support it.

BROWN: Thank you, back with you shortly, and finally in the whip tonight, a medical breakthrough and an intriguing story that goes along with it. Medical Correspondent Rhonda Rowland following that. Rhonda a quick headline from you tonight.

RHONDA ROWLAND, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Aaron, for the first time a baby girl's been born who will never develop a type of Alzheimer's. That's because she was tested as an embryo. However her mother will likely develop the disease by age 40, raising new ethical questions. Aaron.

BROWN: They never seem to stop. Thank you very much, back with all of you shortly. The program was packed even before we got the news out of San Diego late this afternoon, early this evening. We saved enough room for an important story that we've been working on for a while here.

Part of the Pacific Northwest has been hit very hard by a drug that's cheap, easy to make, and brutally addictive. It's Meth, a big problem in the '70s, big problem now. We'll meet two young mothers tonight who got hooked. They weren't even around in the '70s. We'll also spend some time with the task force trying to catch the dealers. That's coming up in a bit.

Also tonight, Daniel Pearl remembered by some of those who loved his work, not his writing, his work as a fiddler in a blue grass band, all that and more coming up in the hour ahead.

We begin with the case of Danielle van Dam. Maybe it was this line that was the most painful for us to stomach tonight. The search team found "what appears to be the body of a child," or maybe it was this one, "a positive identification may take several days." San Diego police believe they have found the body of seven-year-old Danielle van Dam. They found it in a desert area this afternoon. Here again, Charles Feldman. Charles.

FELDMAN: Aaron, apparently some very sad news tonight from San Diego. The police and the district attorney saying that some volunteer searchers apparently have found the body of the seven-year- old missing San Diego girl, Danielle van Dam. According to investigators, it is a high probability that the body is that of the missing young girl. And these are the circumstances. It's a very late-breaking story, so here's what we're piecing together, Aaron. Apparently the volunteers, in what was described as a needle-in-a-haystack search, found a body of what appears to be a young child, about 25 miles east of San Diego in a clump of trees alongside a road.

The body was apparently wearing an earring and a necklace believed to be similar to the jewelry that Danielle van Dam was wearing at the time of her disappearance or kidnapping about a month ago. But police are saying it's going to take at least 24 hours if they could identify a positive identification via dental records and several more days if they have to rely on DNA genetic evidence.

Now, there was a news conference here just moments ago. The police attended as did the district attorney. Let's go to a sound byte from that.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PAUL PFINGST, SAN DIEGO DISTRICT ATTORNEY: Detectives have observed a three to four-foot tall young white female apparently with blond hair on her back. The body has a plastic necklace around its neck, similar to the one seen in the missing person flyer that's been distributed throughout San Diego County with Danielle van Dam's picture on it.

One earring is visible and appears to be the same as the one described having been worn by her at the time of her abduction.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FELDMAN: Now events in this case have been happening at almost lightning speed in the past few days anyway, with the arrest of a neighbor of the van Dams, David Westerfield. He of course has now been charged with kidnapping, and they charged him with murder even though they had not found a body, because law enforcement officials in San Diego said the other day that they believed in all probability Danielle van Dam was no longer alive.

Now if this body that was found turns out to, in fact, be that of Danielle van Dam, it will make for prosecutors a much easier case, because it's very difficult to win a case, although it can be done, without a body.

The parents by the way, of the child have been notified by police that they found this body and that there is a high probability, a likelihood that it is their daughter, so, some very sad news tonight from San Diego. Aaron.

BROWN: Charlie, thanks a lot. Charles Feldman who quickly worked the story in San Diego. There's something almost oddly clinical or detached in the way that all sounded. I don't think anybody involved in it feels that way. It's just one of those moments I guess.

In any case, we've been struck over the last month at how much bad feeling there is towards Russell Yates, the husband of Andrea Yates. We talked about this at the beginning a bit. She's on trial, of course, for killing her five children. Many of you have written to say that he, at the very least, should be on trial as well. And while there's nothing scientific about what I'm about to say, women do seem to be a lot harsher on this point than are men, though neither seem to think that Mr. Yates has behaved very well.

We wonder if jurors in some way also think this, if in some way they hold him responsible and, if so, how that might affect his testimony. Today he was on the witness stand, standing by his wife, as he has from the start. Again now, CNN's David Mattingly in Houston.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MATTINGLY (voice over): Russell Yates had been criticized for not showing more emotion in public after his wife, Andrea, drowned their five children. On the witness stand, in his wife's defense, Russell shedding tears as attorneys showed home videos of the children happy and healthy, mother Andrea smiling broadly after the birth of her fifth child.

WENDELL ODOM, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: She was crying almost the entire last hour.

MATTINGLY: Russell Yates offered personal details of how his wife twice declined into serious mental illness, first in 1999 when she twice attempted suicide, then seemed to recover completely, then again last year, two hospitalizations after the death of Andrea's father. Through both episodes, Yates claimed doctors never told him his wife was diagnosed psychotic. Up until the day she was left at home alone for one hour and killed their children, Russell Yates said he never considered Andrea as a threat.

FAIRY CAROLAND, RUSSELL YATES' AUNT: It's hard for anybody to have imagined her to be a danger to anyone at all. She was just always so kind and so giving to everybody, not just the children, but to anybody she knew.

MATTINGLY: Russell Yates' testimony raises more questions now about the care Andrea received in the months prior to the day she drowned her five children. Russell described disagreements over medication, how he believed Andrea was discharged from the hospital too soon, how her doctor ended anti-psychotic medication and offered the advice to think positive thoughts.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MATTINGLY (on camera): Russell Yates returns to the witness stand tomorrow. This time the prosecution will be asking the questions. He will be under cross-examination. Aaron.

BROWN: David, where is this going now? Where is the defense taking this?

MATTINGLY: Well, defense attorneys have been telling us to watch for this sort of technique. It seems that there is a spreading of the blame that is coming out right now with Russell Yates' testimony. We could be seeing more of that tomorrow, but today it was clear that Russell Yates was saying that he was left in the dark as to the extent of her mental illness, and saying that the doctors perhaps toward the end did not have a full grasp of what Andrea was truly going through.

BROWN: OK, David Mattingly covering the Yates trial in Houston, thank you. One of our writers tonight, Marfa Arbetman (ph) looked at this next story and said, "this doesn't make any sense. There is no logic in what Susan Candiotti learned today about the anthrax investigation" and that is true, and so is her reporting.

We've been told the deadly strain could have come from any number of labs around the country. So you would think getting those labs to turn over their samples of anthrax would have been among the first things done. Would it surprise you to learn it has not happened yet? Here's CNN's Susan Candiotti.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Nearly five months after first victim Robert Stevens died, the FBI is only now asking for anthrax samples from labs that could have been the source of the deadly spores.

DAN MILHALKO, U.S. POSTAL INSPECTOR SERVICE: It's taken us a while to actually get to this point, to realize exactly what we're asking for.

CANDIOTTI: Subpoenas went out this week, so investigators can compare samples from the labs to the spores found in letters sent to media outlets and Capitol Hill. What took so long? The FBI says it first had to work out what to do with the samples once it got them, pointing out serious health risks and potential for danger in handling anthrax.

DR. RONALD ATLAS, AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR MICROBIOLOGY: The critical point here is having the scientific background so that useful analyses can be made.

CANDIOTTI: Among those complying, university and private labs, both here and overseas. Samples are being shipped to the Army's research lab at Fort Dietrich, Maryland, itself a focus of the investigation. Some say the anthrax killer could have had a military background. As the subpoenas go out, scientists are also close to identifying a genetic fingerprint of the anthrax spores. It could lead investigators to one lab, maybe.

JILL TREWHELLA, LOS ALAMOS LABORATORY SCIENTIST: It's feasible. That is certainly feasible. I don't think we can guarantee it.

CANDIOTTI: For months, agents have also been testing hundreds of copy machines, mainly in New Jersey, where the anthrax letters were mailed. So far, the FBI says it has not pinpointed a machine that printed the letters. Investigators are focusing on the Trenton area and have flooded homes and businesses with flyers promising a $2.5 million reward for help. It hasn't.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CANDIOTTI (on camera): Which means the FBI, after nearly five months and hundreds of interviews, is not yet ready to close in on a suspect, someone investigators describe as very clever, and at least for now, uncatchable -- Aaron.

BROWN: Any defensiveness in the bureau's reaction to this, what I think seems to most of us looking at it as a kind of late request for the anthrax?

CANDIOTTI: There is a bit of defensiveness, but the way they explain is this way. It took them a very, long time to first identify which labs had the anthrax material. Subpoenas went out for that information last fall. In between, they said they had to lay out exactly how they would handle it, how it would be shipped, all kinds of testing procedures.

Remember it took them more than three weeks to figure out precisely how they wanted to handle that letter to Senator Patrick Leahy with all the anthrax in it. So they say, "look, we're just doing this by the book to make sure we do it right."

BROWN: Susan, thank you. In fairness to them, they're as new at this as we are. I mean this is a one of its kind of case.

CANDIOTTI: Right.

BROWN: Thank you Susan Candiotti in Washington tonight. Still ahead tonight, Saudi Arabia is next, what may be the beginning of the way out of the mess in the Middle East is getting some attention in the Middle East and in Washington. And then later, we'll go to Washington State and an epidemic of crystal methamphetamine. This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Here's yet another example of how tricky things are in the Middle East. There's a peace proposal being floated around these days, simple, direct. It's being seriously considered from what we can tell. It comes from the Saudis. That's on the one hand.

On the other hand, the same Saudi government that seems to be trying to play peacemaker took to the podium at the United Nations tonight and blasted Israel in terms that left many people at the U.N. shaking their heads.

Saudi ambassadors saying, among other things, Israel's actions against Palestine or Palestinians were "one of the worst forms of injustice and racism in the history of mankind," probably not a statement that will warm the Israeli side to breaking bread with the Saudis.

But tough words aside, there is a plan that covers the entire region. People are talking about it and so are we. Back to CNN's Rula Amin in Saudi Arabia.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

AMIN (voice over): From the heart of the Islamic world and from the crowned prince of Saudi Arabia, a promise to Israelis. The Arab world would recognize Israel if Israel withdraws from the land it occupied in 1967, including East Jerusalem. Not much new in the initiative. The basic idea, land-for-peace, has been floating for more than 30 years. What's new this time is the timing.

The level of violence between Palestinians and Israelis has reached an unprecedented level, with no clear path in sight on how to stop the deterioration. The Saudi initiative also comes at a difficult time for Saudi-U.S. relations, strained in the aftermath of September 11th attacks.

KHAFED MEENA, EDITOR IN CHIEF, ARAB NEWS: I hear reports that it has been done to appease the Americans. You hear reports that it's done to placate the U.S. State Department (inaudible). I don't think so. I think the crowned prince himself is a very (inaudible) person. He does not say much, but he also does not mince words. So what he said, he meant what he said, and I think the time has now come for the other side to look very carefully into this proposal.

AMIN: The other side is interested. The Israeli Prime Minister said he is willing to meet any Saudi official to discuss the plan. That's not the kind of response the Saudis had in mind.

ADEL AL-JUBEIR, ADVISER, SAUDI FOREIGN AFFAIRS: The primary, the issue is Sharon has to show seriousness and he doesn't show seriousness by trying to talk about, with actors that are not directly involved. He shows seriousness by talking to Arafat.

AMIN: The President of Israel invited Crowned Prince Abdullah to visit Israel. Concern here what was meant to be a push for Israelis to compromise with the Palestinians may turn into pressure on Saudi Arabia to normalize relations with Israel even before Israel makes a deal with the Palestinians. Editorials in Saudi press say "no way."

MEENA: I don't think there will be any normalization with Israel, unless Israel vacates from the occupied land. I mean, let the Americans, and using Bush's words, "make no mistake about it" that there is no Arab willing to compromise with Israel unless the rights of the Palestinian people are given back.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AMIN (on camera): Now this plan according to many Saudi officials are just ideas. It's not a blueprint. It doesn't spell out how to get there, but it does spell out the game and the endgame and many people here are saying, well how do you get there? How do you stop the violence in order to get the Palestinians and the Israelis to sit and talk and reach this plan?

Now the European foreign policy chief was here in Saudi Arabia today discussing exactly that, with Crowned Prince Abdullah, and according to his spokeswoman, she said that the crowned prince asked for the European support. He got it. And that the crowned prince promised that he will try to get Arab leaders to support this plan when they meet in Beirut at the end of March. Aaron.

BROWN: I want you to go back and reiterate something. Is it that the Saudis want to float this plan but don't want to be directly involved in negotiating the terms of it?

AMIN: Well that is something that Saudi officials have been pointing to. They are saying, "we are not the actors here. The actors are the Palestinians and the Syrians and the Lebanese" because this is something that they emphasized that, when they talk about a plan for peace, they are also including the Golan Heights. And so, they have made it clear they don't want to be involved.

They don't want to sit on the table, but they are saying they are willing to lend a hand but getting Arab leaders to support their promise that there will be full normalization with Israel, something the Israelis have been demanding for a long time. And of course, in many other ways, they will try to help financially by maybe pressuring the Palestinian leaders, but they are making clear they don't want to be on the table. Aaron.

BROWN: Rula, thank you. Rula Amin in Saudi Arabia, in Jeddah tonight. Of more basic things, I guess, in the Middle East, what happened in Israel today would have been unthinkable I guess a year ago, but not anymore.

A Palestinian woman blew herself up at a West Bank checkpoint, wounded at least two Israeli police officers. The injuries are not considered life threatening. Last month another Palestinian woman blew herself up. That was considered somewhat of a turning point in the conflict. She was thought to be the first female suicide bomber, and she was compared to Joan of Arc in some of the Arab press.

The latest now on the case of Daniel Pearl in Pakistan, his wife Mariane met today with the Pakistani President Musharraf, thanked him for his efforts to save her husband, and President Musharraf expressed his grief and describes Pearl's murder as a most barbaric act of terrorism.

Back in Washington, the State Department announced a $5 million reward for any information leading to the arrest and the conviction of those responsible. A little later in the program, we'll show you a tribute to Daniel Pearl, which is going on tonight in Washington. That's coming up in just a little while.

A new front in the War on Terror may soon open in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia. Pentagon sources tell CNN today that as many as 200 U.S. troops could be sent to Georgia, which is now an independent country, in the next few weeks to train Georgian troops who are fighting Chechen guerrillas. This won't be the first former Soviet republic to welcome U.S. troops.

In Kyrgyzstan, the U.S. has begun building a major air base there. We'll have an exclusive look at this new front line in the War on Terror. Tomorrow night on NEWSNIGHT is a fascinating story we've been working on today sometime. Coming up next, perhaps the hardest working lawyer in Washington who's defending Enron's former CEO Jeffrey Skilling. We'll talk to him when NEWSNIGHT continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: People have taken to calling it the "Skilling Grilling." Jeffrey Skilling's latest testimony yesterday before a Senate committee was absolutely something to see. The Senators, to say the least, were aggressive. The former CEO of Enron told his side of the story, but to many who watched him, he came off at times as oblivious and other times as arrogant. He certainly didn't take anything sitting down, if you will.

And Sherron Watkins, who is often characterized in the media as a heroine in this story, a whistle-blower, sat alongside her former boss, occasionally glaring at him.

It's tempting to think of all of this as simply great theater, but Mr. Skilling's lawyer doesn't see it that way. He says his client's rights are getting trampled. Bruce Hiler thinks opinion and hearsay are being passed off as fact, and he joins us tonight from Washington. Thanks for your time.

I don't want to be accused here of looking a gift horse in the mouth, but you made a number of appearances and you've done a number of interviews lately. Is it that you have a feeling your guy's story has not gotten out very well?

BRUCE HILER, ATTORNEY FOR JEFFREY SKILLING: Well, he has tried to tell the American public his story by testifying in Congress, but Congress isn't really interested in hearing that story.

One of the problems is, what is happening in Congress is they are, indeed, putting forth Miss Watkins' opinion and hearsay as fact. They are dressing it up as fact and they are presenting it to the American public as fact, and that is totally, really irresponsible, and is not what the process is supposed to be all about.

There is also an inability to get fundamental facts correct, either in the congressional questions or the speeches that they like to give.

BROWN: Let me, I want to work through a few facts here. Just stop me when I get this wrong, because honestly I'm trying, I think as many people are, trying to understand some of this, which is in some ways a bit arcane.

HILER: Right.

BROWN: Is it fair to say that while your client acknowledges that he knew of these off-the-book partnerships, he knew they existed when he was the CEO, that he really did not know the details of them? He did not know that his subordinates, in some cases close subordinates, were enriching themselves from them? He simply knew they existed. HILER: He knew they existed, Aaron, and there are board minutes that he was at and he has not denied being at those board meetings where certain details of certain of the transactions are described. But for instance, the general counsel of the group that Mr. Fastow ran testified before Congress several weeks ago that Mr. Fastow told him that my client was not aware of the amount of money that Mr. Fastow was making. So there are fundamental things like that, that people are just missing.

BROWN: OK, and here this is a little more complicated I guess, but is it consistent then with the CEO of a company, someone who's often described as detail oriented, to not know these details of what was going on and at the same time argue that he was fulfilling his moral and legal obligation to shareholders and employees of the company?

HILER: It is absolutely not inconsistent, and every CEO in America must depend upon the people they hire. They hire literally hundreds of experts and this company, in particular, derivatives experts, financial experts, accounting experts, attorneys. Those people complete the transactions; present them to management and to the board. You have to depend on them. You can be hands-on as you want with a company that has $30 billion worth of deals a year, and tens of thousands of transactions, and people can keep things from you.

BROWN: OK, now help me with this one because we're talking about a lot of money. Mr. Skilling sold something like $65 million worth of stock. I assume we'll both agree that's a lot of money. Is it his position that when he did so, he did not believe the company was in trouble?

HILER: Absolutely. That is absolutely his position, and at one point he had what's called an SEC 10-B-51 plan put in place, which allows you to continue selling, even if you did discover material, non-public information, which he did not. He had about 90 percent of his net worth invested in Enron. He owned one common stock, Enron.

BROWN: Was there ever a period of time where he sold as much stock as he sold in this period of time, where he unloaded $65 million worth?

HILER: Well, he didn't unload. He sold the stock over a number of years. He actually also exercised some options that were out of the money and held the stock. He was not unloading. Even in the 1999 time period that Senator Boxer discussed with him at the hearing, he ended up a net 600,000 shares ahead of where he started out when he was selling some of the stock. He didn't dump anything. Stock was a big part of his compensation and he did sell some of his stock.

BROWN: Let me ask you a couple quick things, or I hope they're quick. Any regrets about not taking the Fifth?

HILER: No. You know first of all, my client felt he owed it to the men and women of Enron, to his community and to his family to tell them what happened, and he has done that very courageously in the face of knowing what would happen to him. I have also heard a lot of attorneys who don't know the facts, citing these age old adages about taking the Fifth.

Well, this is new age. This is a new economy case. And I know a lot of people that can take the Fifth all the way to jail. My client has been convicted by Congress already. And he's going to defend himself. And we're going to defend him.

BROWN: And I'm curious how you'll answer this. Do you anticipate he will be indicted at some point?

HILER: I do not anticipate that.

BROWN: Mr. Hiler, thanks for your time tonight.

HILER: Thank you, very much, Aaron.

BROWN: Thank you. It's work for both of us today, thank you.

Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, the devastation from one drug in one county in Washington state. But it's a story that's playing out across the country. We'll take a long look at methamphetamines in rural areas, as NEWSNIGHT continues from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: A remarkable picture in a paper a while back of a gated mansion, one of many now in a places that had never seen mansions before, a tiny Mississippi town. The house, of course, belonged to drug dealers. It's a side effect of what's been a major shift in America's drug problem. A lot of dealers are leaving the cities for smaller areas, where the police aren't quite ready for them.

Entire counties scattered around the nation are now facing the kind of crime that a few years back would have made you think inner city. Recently, we visited one of them, Sohomish County in Washington State. Sohomish is about 40 minutes or so up interstate 5 from Seattle, close to two good size cities. There are plenty of available customers.

And the drug that has taken hold in Sohomish is methamphetamine, or meth, of if you're my age, speed. About one person a day is arrested. And there are countless stories of addicts. And so many of them are so young and so vulnerable. And you're about to meet two.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(voice-over): Valentine's Day in Sohomish County, Washington. A rare view, a sunrise over the Cascades. But today is just another day for local police.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Once secured, any lab sight discovered at the described location shall be processed and dismantled as deemed necessary by the incident commander.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: On a scale of one to 10, 10 being the most severe situation, how would you rate this raid this morning?

DAVE DEWEY, DET. SGT., SPECIAL INVESTIGATIONS UNIT: This is probably about an eight. This is heightened sense of urgency and security for us this morning.

BROWN: This specialized drug task force, a 20-plus assault team, is about to head out on a yet another raid.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We almost should go first so we can get up there and provide security while those guys are going by us.

BROWN: After days of surveillance and weeks of intelligence from informers, the moment has come.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK, let's load it up.

BROWN: There have been a lot of moments like this lately.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Police search warrant open the door.

BROWN: A lot of moments like this, because in this part of western Washington, there is a lot of methamphetamine, meth, speed, crank, highly addictive, cheap to buy, easy to make. The ingredients can be purchased at your neighborhood drugstore or the auto parts shop, then cooked in a makeshift lab. And within 30 minutes, officials say, instant meth.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The people that are involved in the industry, if you will, have come up with a new and better way of doing business. So now anybody and their brother can go out there and cook the dope and be successful at it.

BROWN: One gram of meth is about the size of a restaurant packet of sugar. It can be smoked, injected, even digested. And the high can last as long as 12 hours.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is the number one hardest drug they've ever had to deal with, as far as the effects and the hold on people. They've seen many people which will try the drug once and be hooked.

BROWN: Last year alone, there were more than 300 meth lab busts in the region, close to one a day. More than in New York, Pennsylvania, and New England combined.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That gentleman called. He said he needs to talk to you regarding a delicate issue.

RICK BART, SHERIFF, SHCHOMISH CTY. SHERIFF'S DEPT: A delicate issue.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

BART: Uh-oh.

The wake up call for us with meth was, we were not ready for it. We've always suspected the successful attempts at eliminating the problem in other counties have moved it into other jurisdictions. It's been very much a problem in Pierce Count. And it moved in, in Seattle, and it's crept its way north to us. We really just truly believe that, as the words spreads, that we're experiencing our spike.

KATIE: I was the type of person that was always out hustling and I wasn't, I mean I never really had to think about ways to get meth because I could always get it.

BROWN: This is Katie. She's 17 and a mother of a six-month old boy. And she is something else. She is a meth addict.

KATIE: What did it do for me?

QUESTION: How did it make you feel?

KATIE: It took away all my feelings, feelings that I was scared of. It made me feel like I could get anything done and that I was doing everything right. It just made me numb, as numb as I could possibly get.

BROWN: Katie has been hooked on meth since she was 11. Child protective services, CPS, recently stepped in and took her son away from her. Katie says she didn't care. She felt nothing.

KATIE: When I was high, I mean when I would wake up after a couple of days, I would be heartbroken, I would be so torn up inside. But then anytime, the honest to God truth, anytime that I would get high, I totally would forget about my son. And it's a hard thing because he's my world.

MICHELLE BENNETT: There is no doubt in my mind that, you know, that I'd be dead, because it's such a downward spiral, you know? It just takes you down.

BROWN: Michelle Bennett also got hooked on meth as a young teen. She, too, has a young child. That child also was removed by CPS. Today Michelle is allowed supervised visits, five nights a week. But unlike Katie, who continues to fight off her urges while receiving treatment, Michelle says she has kicked her addiction. Graduation certificates in her home tell her story. Clean now for more than 175 days.

BENNETT: I went through intensive outpatient, which is three nights a week, three hours a night. And then, I went through that and had dropped out a couple of times, and then finally completed it at the end of August.

BROWN: If the statistics are accurate, about one quarter of all meth users are under the age of 18. And use is rising among youngsters. In Snohomish, at least, there is some help.

BART: It's kind of a forced intervention. I mean, how did these kids, these young adults, have somebody that they have to be accountable to?

BROWN: The somebody is a judge. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good afternoon, please be seated. How many days now clean and sober?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: 10.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's a start.

BROWN: For at least six months, with daily urinalysis tests, kids hooked on drugs head to the only alternative besides imprisonment. It's called juvenile drug court, and the man in charge is Judge Joseph Thibideau.

JOSEPH THIBIDEAU, JUDGE: I mean, you're doing really well in drug treatment. All negative UAs.

This is a relatively new drug and so the ramifications in the future for these young people is still an open question.

BROWN: Before any child appears in Thibideau's court, he will meet first behind closed doors with members of the drug court system, including the prosecutor, the defense attorney, several treatment and probationary workers.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He can continue to use their resources. He can come and use their computer, look on the board for jobs.

BROWN: All to discuss what could be done. 17-year-old Katie is scheduled to appear later in the day.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She got lucky, because I don't think we would've let her in if we had that lab report.

THIBIDEAU: In many respects to the teen, we're the coach, we're the father, we're the disciplinarian, we're the teacher, we're -- we carry many hats in this as a team.

KATIE: I mean, it's hard. I'm a person that doesn't like change. And in order for me to stay sober, I have to change everything. I have to change my friends, my behaviors, my attitude. And that's like real hard thing for me.

BROWN: 3:30. Court is in session, a failure to appear by Katie could mean a trip to jail. Almost certainly it would mean a delay in regaining custody of six-month-old son. But today Katie is right on time.

THIBIDEAU: Katie, how are you doing today?

KATIE: Good, how are you?

THIBIDEAU: Good.

BROWN: The talk goes well, there is a stern message from the bench.

THIBIDEAU: The key, as you know, to being successful in rehabilitation, is to be honest with yourself, to change and to do the things necessary to make it happen.

KATIE: He'd get upset with me before. You know, he'd tell me I'm going to watch you like a hawk. And what are you doing? And you're not going to be able to stay sober. I know that he cares about all of the juveniles that are going there. He has to.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Police search warrant, open the door!

BROWN: Cross-town, it's showtime. The drug task force, armed and ready, moves in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Our first entry team is secure. They're holding at part of the back of the property.

BROWN: Within minutes, their intelligence proves accurate.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was there meth inside?

UNIDENTIFIED: Maybe, a little bit, I don't know.

BROWN: Well, that would depend on your definition of a little bit, wouldn't it? More than 100 grams of finished meth, including syringes, mixing utensils, and a meth lab, are all discovered and seized on the property. Two are charged with unlawful manufacture of a controlled substance, a third charged with possession. And all three have plead not guilty.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No gunfire, no explosions, no resistance as far as we can tell.

BROWN: This is the drug war in rural Washington state, a cheap and nasty drug, made and sold by equally nasty people.

BENNETT: Did you have fun in school today?

BROWN: On the other side, success is measured carefully. Michelle Bennett, meth-free for seven months, reading bedtime stories to her daughter, a step towards custody.

BENNETT: What are they doing?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't know.

BENNETT: They're listening.

BROWN: And each step matters. Success in the addiction business is measured in days and months. Only fools believe the fight ever really ends. And Michelle is no fool. And the craving, seven months later, is no stranger.

BENNETT: They come, no matter what, they come and go. You have dreams about the drugs, probably about once a week, I dream about meth. So it's pretty hard, you know, not to. But you know, after I start working on my steps and get through those, the obsession will go away. It will be lifted. And as long as I keep doing what I'm doing, it gets easier. (END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: The meth story. In a moment, should parents use genetic screening to have healthier children? Harder to answer than you might imagine. This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We like this story because it seems to live in the gap between can and should. There's no question that science can do some miracles. The question is, should it be asked to? And I guess that would depend in the miracle itself.

Is it a miracle that a baby was born, who, thanks to genetic testing, will not go on to develop Alzheimer's? Hard to argue with that, if it were really just that simple. And you already know the answer. It's never that simple.

Here's CNN's Rhonda Rowland.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RHONDA ROWLAND, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's another case of technology saving trouble, but raising tough ethical questions. Doctors don't change a baby's genes, but they do screen embryos in a lab, and implant in the mother, only those embryos that are free of disease-causing genes. DENA TOWHER, UNIV. OF CA.-DAVIS: And many of the diseases it's been used with are diseases that typically have a very severe neo- natal outcome. These children many times die within the first few years of age.

ROWLAND: It's called pre-implantation genetic diagnoses. And now, for the first time, it's been used to conceive a child free of a gene that predisposes her to a type of Alzheimer's disease. The 30- year-old mother carries a gene that predisposes her to a form of early-onset Alzheimer's. Two of her siblings developed the mind- robbing disease in their 30's.

YURY VERLINSKY, REPRODUCTIVE GENETICS INSTITUTE, CHICAGO: By transferring embryo, which doesn't have this mutation, we definitely cure this problem for this baby.

ROWLAND: But, while the child, who's now a year old, will never develop early-onset Alzheimer's disease, there's almost a 100 percent chance her mother will. And that concerns some ethicists.

TOWHER: She's probably going to be manifesting within the first five years of this child's life and not be able to provide, you know, really good mothering to this child.

ROWLAND: Dr. Towner supports embryo screening technology, but says when it's used, the child's future should be the main priority.

TOWHER: I'm not saying she should have been turned down. You need to discuss very thoroughly that this is what reality is going to be. And she has to accept that.

ROWLAND: Dr. Verlinksy, whose laboratory did the procedure, says the decision should be left to patients.

VERLINSKY: I think it's up to patients to decide if they want to prevent or treat disease, we can't force them to live with disease because we're saying it's unethical to prevent.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROWLAND: The embryo screening technology gives couples the choice of eliminating a particular severe disease. It does not mean the child will be born free of all diseases, raising more ethical questions. Which diseases and most develop in old age do we choose to eliminate? Aaron?

BROWN: Well, let me make it just a little bit harder. How about which gender do we want our child to be? Which hair color do we want our child to have? If this technology exists now, is there any reason why those questions could not be answered in decisions made on them?

ROWLAND: Well, you're exactly right, Aaron. We're talking about designer babies. And I think that's what everybody is concerned about, because this technology could be used, once we map the entire genome, to have select out for intelligence, and hair color and those sorts of things, instead of just the severe diseases.

But the doctors we talk to say that really with this technology, it's not that practical to use in that way. It's very expensive. It costs about $12,000 to try. A woman needs to go through the in vitro fertizilation process. And that's time consuming. It requires drugs. And then you have only a 25 percent chance of pregnancy, each time you return these embryos.

So you do have some practical questions there, Aaron. but certainly we are going down that road as we continue to test for these various diseases.

BROWN: Thank you very much. Something to think about tonight. Thank you.

Coming up, still something you may not have known about Daniel Pearl, but his friends sure did, and they're remembering tonight in Washington, D.C.

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BROWN: Finally from us tonight, remembering Danny Pearl as more than an journalist tonight. We've heard so much about Pearl as the relentless reporter and the witty writer, but he was also a musician. He wrote songs. One was called "The World is Not a Bad Place." It was written for a friend's newborn son.

And he was a fiddle player, who played Bluegrass at a bar in Washington, D.C. And tonight, the bar and the bandmembers who played with him got together to raise money for Pearl's own son. Proving yet again, the world is not all a bad place.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Tonight we wanted to remember Dan and remember the joy of his humanity through the music, which he loved.

AMY VESTAL, BAR MANAGER: Danny used to play here with the Bluegrass band on Wednesdays. And it was just important thing for us to do. He was part of our community here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He served as a guide and a counselor and occasionally drinking buddy. Sometimes all three wrapped into one.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, I think somebody said that music is really the window into the soul of people.

BOB PERILLA, BIG HILLBILLY BLUEGRASS BAND: Dan was a beautiful musician and a beautiful person. And here's to celebrating his life.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We hope tonight is successful. And we hope that those who knew Dan will hold him forever in their hearts as the joyful person we knew him to be.

BROWN: In Washington tonight. Just a couple of quick end notes. Outcast, the rap group that we profiled last night on the program, has won the Grammy for best rap album. We take not credit for that. We talked to the Secretary of Energy today. We taped that. We thought we'd run it tonight, and we ran out of time. We'll run that tomorrow. And we'll also give you a look at a new American Air Base in place there's never been such a thing before. All that tomorrow on NEWSNIGHT.

I hope you'll join us then. Good night.

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