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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown
Police Make Arrest in Runnion Murder Case; Who Is Alejandro Avila?; Wall Street Investors Take Another Pounding
Aired July 19, 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, HOST: Good evening again, everyone.
A lot of the program tonight is centered again around the kidnapping and the death of 5-year-old Samantha Runnion. The arrest today, and we hope they have the right man. That is our lead.
We have been consumed for weeks now, it seems, by cases of missing kids -- Elizabeth Smart first in Salt Lake City, this week the Runnion case. It has left many parents, including one on this side of the camera, concerned that we are in the midst of some awful epidemic.
There is, we find, some comfort in the facts. We are not in some sort of epidemic of kidnappings. Our kids are not in any more danger now than they have been. Sometimes our coverage -- all the media -- may inadvertently leave that impression on you, but it is not so.
One criminologist compared it to the summer of sharks, when a few dramatic shark attacks last year made it seem like our waters were facing some wholesale invasion. So here are the facts.
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children says there appears to be no increase in stranger kidnappings, and some statistics even point to a drop. Last year the FBI investigated 93 cases. That was down from 115 reported the year before. Other stats on stranger abduction put the figure at a few hundred a year out of a nation of 59 million children.
That is still too many, but it is not the epidemic it seems. We cover stories like Samantha's because they are so rare, and we hope more than anything else they stay that way. We simply refuse to believe otherwise. This is all small comfort on a day like today, but on a day like today small comfort does help.
It is the arrest in the Runnion case that starts the whip off for us tonight. David Mattingly is in Stanton, California, Orange County. David, the headline from you, please?
DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, Orange County investigators 100 percent certain they have got their man. Details coming from an emotional news conference just a few moments ago, and we'll have more about that in just a moment.
BROWN: David, thank you. So who is the suspect in this case? What do we know? Thelma Gutierrez has been working that aspect of the story for us. Thelma, a quick headline from you tonight.
THELMA GUTIERREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, here are the apartment complex where the suspect lives, his mother very emphatically told us she believes her son is innocent. She says he loves kids, that he would never do such a thing, and she says all of this has been a nightmare for her -- Aaron.
BROWN: Thelma, thank you. And we're back with you. It was a miserable day on Wall Street today. A sell-off plus. Allan Chernoff has been covering business stories for us. So Allan, a headline from you.
ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN FINANCIAL NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Another pounding for investors on Wall Street. How much more of this can we take? Well, that question provides a very important clue as to exactly what's happening in the market.
BROWN: Allan, thank you. We keep looking for good news and finding none. A recall of ground beef today, and not one hamburger being pulled, a lot of beef. Rea Blakey is working that for us. Rea, the headline from you, please.
REA BLAKEY, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: E.coli contamination triggers the second largest U.S. meat recall in history. It's already linked to 16 cases of illness -- Aaron.
BROWN: Rea, thank you. Back to you, back with all of you shortly. Also coming up in the hour, the Orange County sheriff with latest on the Runnion case. We'll ask the questions. Hopefully we'll get some answers. This is a difficult time in these investigations for police officers, and, I suppose, reporters too.
Also some perspective on Wall Street, where that may be headed. Lou Dobbs joins us in a bit.
And interesting one tonight from Jamie McIntyre out of the Pentagon, why a group of former Russian sailors have a real problem with Harrison Ford. Well, at least Harrison Ford in his new thriller.
Nissen tonight on the life and work after ground zero. How port authority officers are getting pack to their normal work after months of digging through the rubble at the Trade Center.
And an extraordinary piece of reporting and a frightening story from the "Chicago Tribune" tonight. Paper will report this weekend that tens of thousands of people die each year needlessly because of unsanitary conditions in hospitals. The report will say that death by hospital infection is now the fourth leading killer of adults in the country, and we will have the reporter on that story shortly.
So we have a lot of ground to cover in the next hour. It begins in Orange County, California, the arrest of a suspect in the case of the kidnapping and murder of Samantha Runnion. We'll be joined by the sheriff a bit later in the hour. But first we go to CNN's David Mattingly -- David. MATTINGLY: Hello, Aaron. We have been waiting all day for official details in this case, and we find out now that there aren't many details they are willing to share with us, but what they lack in detail they more than made up for in emotion tonight. Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona saying he is 100 percent certain that 27-year-old Alejandro Avila is the man who abducted and killed little Samantha Runnion.
And in a remarkable punctuation to this intense 4-day investigation, the sheriff had some very personal words to the suspect.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MIKE CARONA, ORANGE COUNTY SHERIFF: ...a message from me. On behalf of Samantha's family, to Mr. Alejandro Avila, and which he didn't realize when we found Samantha's body, and this investigation took place, Samantha became our little girl.
When I told you -- when I told you that we would use every resource that was available to us to make sure that you were brought to justice, when I told you, Mr. Avila, that we would be relentless, when I told you that if you sleep or you stop to eat, we won't, we are going to close in on you, and when I told you that we would hunt you down wherever you were, arrest you and bring you to justice, if you thought for one minute that I was joking, that we were joking, tonight you know we were deadly serious.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MATTINGLY: So what is it that makes them so certain that they have their man? All they will tell us is that their proof is in a combination of the physical evidence they've examined, as well as the information they have collected during their investigation. The suspect, they say, came to their attention by a tip from the public -- more than 2,000 of these tips came in, including that now painful 911 call that was released to us earlier today.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, my God, I found a dead body! Please hurry.
MATTINGLY (voice-over): You can hear the panic in his voice.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ...a baby. I think it might even be the little girl that's been on the news! It's a little girl, I swear, we just looked!
MATTINGLY: The 911 caller whose disturbing discovery of Samantha's body on Tuesday turned a missing child case into a hunt for a murderer.
Today a man arrested living just 10 miles away from the scene. Twenty-seven-year-old Alejandro Avila, a factory worker, was accused and acquitted last year of allegedly molesting two 10-year-old girls, cousins, one of them the daughter of his now ex-girlfriend.
Police took Avila into custody in this case after searching his workplace, his home and his cars.
CARONA: We have made an arrest in connection with the this case.
MATTINGLY: News of the arrest is being met with approval but no sense of relief. Stanton residents contribute to the growing memorial outside the building young Samantha Runnion once called home, many unable to relax.
RAY CARMONA, STANTON RESIDENT: I have two small kids myself, and I don't let them out front unless my wife or I are with them.
MATTINGLY: There are easily hundreds of dollars worth of flowers and stuffed animals, but the sentiments are priceless. An entire community bound by one family's grief.
JENNIFER HAFEN, STANTON RESIDENT: I expected to see someone like some crazed maniac with beady eyes and long hair. You just realize it's the guy next door. That's what's scary.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MATTINGLY: The case now handed to the district attorney. No word yet exactly on when any charges might be filed -- Aaron.
BROWN: So no court appearances yet, but at some point pretty soon he has to be brought before a judge, and does that normally, in Orange County, take place over the weekend, if you know, or do we have to wait until Monday?
MATTINGLY: Well, the sheriff told me it's not likely to happen over the weekend. They are going to look at their options, and possibly Monday or Tuesday, but at this point no exact date.
BROWN: And do we know anything at all about where in the jail he is being kept, how he's being kept, whether a lawyer has been with him, any of that information?
MATTINGLY: There was some questions asked about that, but the sheriff not really being too forthcoming exactly on what's going on. He did say, however, that the suspect has been very cooperative throughout this entire process.
BROWN: Well, I'm not -- yes, I heard that. I'm not precisely sure what that means. We'll ask him when we talk to him in a little bit. David, I know it's been a difficult two days for you down there, as it has been for everybody. These are painful stories to experience and to report on. Thank you for your efforts tonight.
David Mattingly covering that part of the story.
It is, at least to us, I think, somewhat pointless to ask what kind of person could kidnap, molest and kill a 5-year-old. The simple answer, in the way we think of such things at least, is that only a monster could. But rare is the monster if that's what Alejandro Avila turns out to be, rare is the one who abuses only once. As David Mattingly mentioned, this isn't the first time Mr. Avila has been accused of a sex crime. He may not, as he told the "Los Angeles Times" have a criminal record, but of course now he does have a history. Here's CNN Thelma Gutierrez.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
THELMA GUTIERREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Lake Elsinore, California. A small town now under intense scrutiny. The focus? The Lakeview apartments, specifically apartment M-6, where the suspect Alejandro Avila sometimes lives with his mother Avelina (ph). And apartment L-2, where he also stayed with his sister.
From behind her door, Avelina Avila (ph) told us she firmly believes her son is innocent. She says her son is never aggressive, that all the children run to him, even those who don't know him. That he never likes to be alone with kids, because he doesn't want to be accused of anything.
In 1999, Avelina (ph) says her son was accused of molesting his ex-girlfriend's daughter and her cousin. He was later acquitted.
At the Embers, the neighborhood bar, the bartender says when this composite flashed on the screen Wednesday evening, a suspicious patron who resembled the sketch caught his attention.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He got very nervous when 4:30 news came on.
GUTIERREZ: Tom, who doesn't want to reveal his last name, says the patron began to shake.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Immediately after that, he just left abruptly.
GUTIERREZ: So a customer grabbed the license plate number. Tom saved the beer bottle the man was drinking, and called police.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everything on television anymore says DNA, and I figured there was saliva on there, fingerprints or something they can work with.
GUTIERREZ (on camera): So you saved the actual bottle of beer and turned that over to authorities?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, I did.
GUTIERREZ (voice-over): Back at the apartment, investigators were still looking for evidence and information on Alejandro Avila, a man few people here seem to know, but are too well aware of what he's accused of.
SHELESIA WATERS, AVILA NEIGHBOR: Everyone though it didn't happen to my baby, thank God, I feel like it was my child, because that was also a baby.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GUTIERREZ: Alejandro's mother told us that authorities removed several bags of clothes from her apartment, along with three vehicles. Now we noticed that a very short time ago, about an hour ago, that authorities impounded a fourth vehicle.
Now, his mother told us that she spoke to her son last night. She said that authorities were trying to get him to confess. She described his demeanor as being "calm." She said that he did not sound nervous. But that was before he was arrested for Samantha's murder -- Aaron.
BROWN: OK. They have taken four cars. Do any of those cars match the description, which as I recall, was an Acura or a Honda that the little girl who was playing with Samantha gave police?
GUTIERREZ: Well, that's interesting, Aaron, because one of the cars that was taken away, his sister's car, is a light green Nissan. The Nissan, not an Acura or a Honda, but a light green Nissan that was taken away.
BROWN: OK. Again, we are going to learn more from the sheriff, we hope. We are going to try in a little bit in the program. Thelma, thank you for your work today as well. Thelma Gutierrez, also in Orange County, California tonight.
We're going to talk to the sheriff in a bit. We're going to move some things around so that when he becomes available, we'll put him on the air pretty quickly. Want to cover some other things before that happens.
The other major story of the day -- it's an odd juxtaposition of stories, we will admit. Talk about the kidnapping and a death of a 5- year-old, the arrest of a suspect, and then make this weird turn to talk about Wall Street. But that's what we are going to do any way.
One money manager summed up the collective mood on the market today by saying, "get me the hell out." A lot of people were trying to get the hell out of the market today, as it turned out. It was the kind of session where the sound of the closing bell was the best thing anyone heard all day. The Dow for a time fell below 8,000, ended down nearly 400 points on the day. Was, in fact, down more than 400 very near the close. Came back just a bit before the end. The single worst day of a pretty rough year. All told, about $325 billion in market value was wiped out. What does that mean, you ask? That is more than the economies of Denmark and Greece combined.
But perhaps the scariest thing is that today is just the worst in a string of losses. The blue chip stocks tonight are at a four-year low.
Now, we begin our coverage by turning to our financial correspondent Alan Chernoff. Getting a lot of work lately from us. What happened out there today? Was it news of something? Was it something in the economy? Or did people go nuts? ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN FINANCIAL CORRESPONDENT: It really had much more to do with psychology than any Wall Street number-crunching today. Because this had been in the works for quite awhile. As you mentioned in the introduction, we had a pretty crummy market over the past few weeks. The Dow had been down nine out of the last 10 sessions, 14 of the past 18 weeks, and for the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq composite, down 15 of the past 18 week. So pressure building up on investors, and people asking themselves, how much of this can I take, how much pain can I take? And eventually people just say, I can't take anymore, I've got to throw in the towel a bit.
BROWN: Was there some -- Friday is always -- because I know so little about these things, OK? Fridays always scare me, because for some reason I think only bad things happen on Fridays in the stock market. Was there some technical or mechanical stock market reason why today was more volatile than yesterday or the day before?
CHERNOFF: Well, there were some factors that added to a tremendous amount of volume, dealing with options explorations, and other Wall Street...
(CROSSTALK)
CHERNOFF: .. which we don't need to get into.
BROWN: But that doesn't necessarily -- it wasn't going to be a good day absent that stuff. It may have been less volume.
CHERNOFF: Right. The one thing that Wall Street has been looking for is some really good profits. The profits that were reported today on the whole not all that great. More profit warnings, so that also depressed the mood.
BROWN: All right. Give us some context about where we are right now.
CHERNOFF: We are way back down. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is actually all the way back to where it was in October of 1998, and the Dow has actually performed much better than the Nasdaq composite. The Nasdaq is back to where it was the year prior to that, in '97. So we have taken a huge hit. The bear market is really dominating; the bull is long history.
BROWN: Allan, thank you very much. A little later, we'll talk to Lou Dobbs about the psychology of this messy market. Thank you very much. Alan Chernoff tonight.
And if the market isn't enough to make you queasy, consider this. Huge recall of beef. Nice thing to tell you before the weekend when you are going to go barbecuing and stuff. Eighteen million pounds of ground beef recalled just in time for the weekend. It came, all of it, from a single meet packing plant and assembly line, is what it really is. Cattle go in one end; packages of hamburger come out the other. It processes so much so quickly that when something goes wrong, an awful lot of meat sold in an awful lot of places can be contaminated. Here's CNN's Rea Blakey. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
REA BLAKEY, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The class one recall, the most serious, means there's a reasonable probability of serious adverse health consequences, or death.
ANN VENEMAN, SECRETARY OF AGRICULTURE: This action is being taken as a cautionary measure to ensure the protection of public health.
BLAKEY: More than 18 million pounds of ground beef products are being added to a previous smaller voluntary recall. The U.S. Department of Agriculture, in conjunction with the Centers for Disease Control, confirms 16 cases of E. coli bacteria infection in Colorado. Six other cases are suspected in five other states.
USDA tells CNN a routine random sample taken May 9 turned up positive for E. coli. That triggered daily samples for 15 days. The 12th day, another positive. Once it was determined that sample was from ConAgra's Greeley, Colorado plant, inspectors took another sample from an unopened package June 24. Five days later, the sample was confirmed positive for E. coli. June 30, ConAgra voluntarily recalled some 354,000 pounds of possibly tainted beef.
VENEMAN: We have been testing everything since July 11 with no positive results.
BLAKEY: But it's possible that potentially tainted product could be anywhere in the country.
DR. ELSA MURANO, USDA: Some of the product probably was opened up at the stores and repackaged and so forth, so it may be difficult for some consumers just to base what they do on looking for lot numbers or code numbers.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BLAKEY: Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman also said today that a thorough review of the E. coli contamination is under way. As far as the financial impact? Well, one analyst estimates the recall will cost ConAgra about $10 million, Aaron.
BROWN: Rea, do this quickly, but since it's not always clear where the stuff comes from, if I just cook the meet to death, basically, cook it as well done as I can is, am I safe?
BLAKEY: You could be, but you need to make sure of one thing, and that's that the internal temperature is 160 or better. Then you will have cooked it to death, and then you will be safe.
BROWN: OK. Thank you very much. It's actually been a long day for you. We appreciate it. We'll to Sheriff Mike Carona in the Samantha Runnion case right after this short break. This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) BROWN: Few people have had the kind of week Michael Carona has had. He has been the public face of the Samantha Runnion story and, more importantly, of course, the man in charge with catching her killer. It has been a long and difficult week, a long day. We are especially grateful for his time tonight.
Sheriff, thanks for joining us. Congratulations.
You said to me a moment ago, I'm sure I've got the right guy. And tell me why you're so certain, as you can.
MICHAEL CARONA, SHERIFF, ORANGE COUNTY POLICE DEPARTMENT: Well, we have been working this case for the last four days. The investigative teams have up a tremendous amount of evidence, both in terms of investigative leads, and also forensic material that we've analyzed.
A combination of both the investigative side of it as well as the forensic side of it, we are convinced that Mr. Avila is the individual who kidnapped and murdered Samantha Runnion.
BROWN: I think our viewers know what you mean when you talk about forensics -- physical evidence found.
When you talk about the investigative side, give me, as generally as comfortable you're comfortable, the sort of thing you mean there.
CARONA: Well, when we are out in the field investigating leads that the public had given us, we're asking a series of questions. And one of the things that we had asked the public for is some information about the suspect: their behaviors; had there been any changes in their behaviors; where were they at a particular point in time.
And the nice part about it is the responses to all of the questions that the investigators were asking really paint a portrait of the individuals that we were looking at as potential suspects, and were critical in making the determination that Mr. Avila was, in fact, our primary suspect.
BROWN: Can you tell me -- I understand you're not going to probably tell me why you believe this -- but could you tell had me at what point you said to yourself or to your detectives, we got him?
CARONA: Well, there's a couple of different levels of, we got him.
We've worked through the night. There were several suspects that we were looking at early this morning. By about 6:00 the field had narrowed, through a process of elimination, down to two or three. And by -- actually, just before the press conference at 10:00 -- 9:55, to be specific -- there was enough information at that point that we had probable cause to believe that Mr. Avila was the one that committed these crimes.
By just before this press conference, 4:00 or 5:00, we had enough information, having sifted through the investigative side of it as well as the forensic side of it, that we are now positive that Mr. Avila is the individual who committed this crime.
BROWN: That's a very good and fair legal description of something.
I think what I'm really asking is, when did your gut say: I got the guy?
CARONA: My gut said it late this afternoon. My heart and my head said it about 2:00 this morning.
BROWN: So you -- in your heart you knew early this morning.
Has he made any statements at all to you and your detectives?
CARONA: That's part of this ongoing investigation, and frankly, I can't tell you about it.
BROWN: I understand that.
Can you tell me anything about -- is he being kept isolated from the rest of the jail population?
CARONA: You know, unfortunately I've been out here with the investigative teams and in the command center, and I have not had a chance to talk to anybody about his housing location.
BROWN: OK.
CARONA: That should be available...
BROWN: We'll go looking for it, that's what we do.
Two more things. I think anybody who watched the press conference or heard the clip that we just ran gets the fact that this became intensely personal to you, to your department, to the other agencies involved.
Is there just a sense of -- there's no joy in this -- I assume there's a sense of relief. Is that right?
CARONA: Absolutely. It's personal for me when anybody commits a crime in my county.
But this one became personal to all of us because as this case started to unfold Samantha Runnion became our little girl. And we all made a commitment to making sure that there were no more Samantha Runnions at the hands of this individual, and that we brought him to justice as quickly as possible.
BROWN: If just I may end this by saying to you, we've watched you all week, we have admired how professionally you've handled this very complicated task. You've done your profession proud this week.
Thank you for joining us tonight Sheriff, we appreciate it.
CARONA: Thank you. BROWN: Sheriff Mike Carona of Orange County, California, south of Los Angeles for those of you unfamiliar.
We have much more ahead. Hospitals that are making patients sicker or worse -- that's in a little bit.
Up next Lou Dobbs joins us to talk about the stock market, or what's left of the stock market.
This is NEWSNIGHT on a Friday from New York.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: Remember when you felt rich, weren't rich, but you felt that way? Your 401(k), your IRA was doing great. Everything was good. The market was going up. It was all on paper. But you figured hang onto it, because some day. We talked to Lou Dobbs tonight about what a mess the market has become.
I heard you say this afternoon that it felt like capitulation. Is that the opposite of irrational exuberance?
LOU DOBBS, HOST, MONEYLINE: It well could be or rational, at this point, capitulation. Aaron, when we see a market with two billion shares run off 400 points on the Dow, almost 400 points, if this isn't capitulation, I'd hate to think what capitulation's going to look like.
BROWN: Is capitulation necessarily bad for the market?
DOBBS: In this case it's actually positive because we have, as you mentioned, irrational exuberance still in this market despite all that we have endured over the course of the past two-and-a-half years. It's really a positive and necessary to setting the stage for a further move up in the market.
BROWN: So what happened today was a big blow out. Everybody panicked?
DOBBS: I don't think you can say panicked, Aaron. But everyone basically said, if you will, the heck with it.
BROWN: Good stocks aren't worth owning.
DOBBS: Good stocks like J&J for example.
BROWN: Johnson & Johnson.
DOBBS: Exactly.
BROWN: Thank you.
DOBBS: And the fact is investors just shed this. This company just reported a magnificent quarter, earning money, one of the great staples of the equity markets. And people sold it off as if it were tissue paper at one point. BROWN: Who is capitulating? Is it - are institutions capitulating? are - am I - in other words, individual investors capitulating?
DOBBS: It's a little bit of both. Your 401(k) may have been part capitulated without your endorsement today. But in point of fact, investors, whether they be institutional or individual, are looking at this market and saying, I can't take any more of this. And this may go on for some time yet. But it looks to me as though the capitulation process, if you will, and I know you must love that word, is under way.
BROWN: So capitulation, I don't know how we sort of centered on one word to describe the whole day, but it's not an event, one single event, it is something that goes on over a period of time?
DOBBS: Capitulation. Let me define it for you in dollars and cents. Over the course of the past two weeks we have lost a trillion- and-a-half dollars in this market. That is one definition of capitulization (sic).
BROWN: Capitulization?
DOBBS: My goodness, we are expanding the form here.
DOBBS: Once you get a Latin derivative, Aaron, as you know, you can take it lots of places.
BROWN: No, I do not know. You went to the fancy Ivy League school. Where do we go here? Where does this go, does it go down more now after a day like today?
DOBBS: I suspect so.
BROWN: In the past, in the past meaning before it all collapsed two-and-a-half years ago, every time the market dipped, then people would run in and say, great time to buy, great time to buy.
DOBBS: It's a momentum play, remember that expression?
BROWN: Yes. What now?
DOBBS: I think we have got momentum but it's obviously moving in the other direction. No one knows which way this market is going to move but the suggestion would be from everything we are looking at that it's going to move lower from here. How much lower? no one knows. But it has to be, it seems to me, a reasonable expectation that we have pretty much run the course here.
BROWN: So this may not be the end but it's closer to the end.
DOBBS: Absolutely. One can say with great safety and security and absolute certainly stocks are more of a bargain today than they were in March of 2000.
BROWN: And that is why you have the money show. DOBBS: That's exactly right.
BROWN: Would you be a buyer on Monday?
DOBBS: In point of fact I bought a little stock today.
BROWN: Early in the day or late?
DOBBS: Somewhat later. Somewhat later in the day.
BROWN: So nibbling is not a terrible thing right now.
DOBBS: Nibbling is a terrible thing. Nibbling is a terrible thing. Momentum is a terrible thing. Identifying a company in whose management you believe, in their integrity and their talent and capacity and character, finding a company whose financials you believe and understand and whose products and services you have a reasonable judgment that they have a good profitable prospect, that is perfectly all right in this market environment. Nibbling is not.
BROWN: Would you jot down a few names on your way out and have a great weekend?
DOBBS: I absolutely will.
BROWN: Thank you for staying late.
DOBBS: Aaron, good to be with you.
BROWN: That's Lou Dobbs. Sometimes I feel like he is shaking his finger at me. We have known each other 25 years.
A few stories making news around the country tonight. Noelle Bush, the daughter of Florida's governor, niece to the president, not good news here. She was released from a Florida jail this morning. She had served three days. She was found with prescription drugs at a drug treatment center, violating her agreement. Ms. Bush was arrested in January when she tried to use a fake prescription for the anti- anxiety drug Xanax. She went directly back to the rehab center today after her appearance in court.
A new tape has emerged in Inglewood, California. It was taken by security cameras at the gas station where Donovan Jackson was roughed up two weeks ago. Tape covers minutes before where we see on the videotape taken by Mitchell Crooks. It has been shown hundreds of times. It was handed over to the defense yesterday of the police officer, Jeremy Morse, who entered a not guilty plea to the assault. And his lawyers said it tells the whole story which will vindicate his client.
President Bush was at Fort Drum, New York today, speaking to members of the 10th Mountain Division, many of whom served in Afghanistan. He pressed the Senate to approve his call for the largest increase in defense spending since the Reagan era.
And the gigantic carcass of a blue whale is floating about a mile off the California coast tonight. Marine scientists are hoping they'll get a chance to take a close look so they can find out more about this endangered species. There you go. See it a little better there. Seventy-foot-long corpse was first spotted on Wednesday by a fishing boat. Blue whales are the largest creatures on Earth.
Still to come tonight, Port Authority policemen and the long road back from Ground Zero. Nissan (ph) walks the beat with them on their first few days back on the job. That's coming up later.
Up next, we'll be joined by "Chicago Tribune" investigative reporter and his extraordinary page one report on the risk of going to the hospital.
This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: Late tonight we received a call from an editor at the "Chicago Tribune" telling us about a story that the paper is running this weekend that we feel certain people are going to be talking about for some days to come. The Trib will report that tens of thousands of people die each year in hospitals due to infections contracted in those hospitals, and that most of those deaths, perhaps 75,000 a year, could have been prevented, and should have been.
We're joined now by the reporter on the story. It has been his work for a year-and-a-half, Michael Berens.
Michael, nice to see you.
MICHAEL BERENS, "CHICAGO TRIBUNE": Hello, Aaron.
BROWN: Just give me -- I've taken pretty much the lead from you here -- but give me and give our viewers a quick overview of what the paper will allege when the story hits the streets.
BERENS: Well, what we're going to show in our Sunday edition, Aaron, is that tens of thousands of patients are needlessly dying in America's hospitals, primarily because of the simplest deficiency, such as failure to wash hands, failure to clean your bedrail, failure to clean the walls in your room.
It's just extraordinary how often and how deep these deficiencies go.
BROWN: How do you determine when a death is preventable?
BERENS: We used a variety of government inspection reports, state inspection reports and hospitals' own findings to show that, increasingly, health care has been aware for decades, of course, that patients are needlessly dying.
BROWN: Now, I have never walked into a hospital where I saw a sign that said: "Be careful, infection here could kill you." I assume hospitals are going to say to you, it's not nearly as bad as you're reporting. BERENS: No, actually hospitals will tell you honestly that 2.1 million Americans each year will contract an infection after entering the hospital. The Centers for Disease Control will tell that you 90,000, minimum, will die each year.
BROWN: There are -- I want to move off statistics in a second -- but there is one statistic in the story that just stunned me, which is that in these -- deaths by infection are the fourth-leading cause of death of adults in the country.
BERENS: It's extraordinary. And we quote doctors in our series, saying the public has no idea. This has literally been health care's biggest public secret for decades. They have known for years about this.
BROWN: And just so we're clear here, your reporting is not simply on Chicago hospitals; you have reported the story in many parts of the country.
BERENS: We've taken it to every state in the nation, literally coast-to-coast. And that was from the array of federal and state documents and databases that we put together for the first time to create this comprehensive analysis.
BROWN: Talk to me a little bit about inside journalism. A year- and-a-half ago you go to your editors and you say, I've got an idea for a story?
BERENS: Absolutely. It was a year-and-a-half ago. We were sitting in a meeting with my editors, who are the project editors at the "Chicago Tribune," and we discussed this issue. They felt it was of such depth and sweeping nature that it warranted the time that we spent to detail it.
BROWN: Do you remember the first call you made on the story?
BERENS: My very first call was to an infection control expert in the city of New York. She had done a study on infection control and, ironically, the day I had called her was the day that she had received news that her own cousin had died from a hospital-acquired infection.
BROWN: You find in the reporting of the story that it really is, in some cases, a matter of the simplest things -- washing your hands. And in some cases it's really about budgets and where cuts are made and what priorities are.
BERENS: Well, perhaps the saddest conclusion in the series is that most of the breakdowns or deficiencies in hospitals are also the easiest to fix, the cheapest to fix. And it's not happening.
BROWN: And we're not talking here simply about, like the custodian who comes through. You're talking about hospital personnel from the surgeon to the, I don't know, I guess the clerk, right?
BERENS: We're talking about surgeons who don't wear gloves during surgical procedures. We're talking about doctors who don't wash their hands.
We have an example of a hospital that installed a hidden camera outside their operating room, trying to figure out why so many of their patients were dying. And they found that doctors were literally not washing their hands before surgery.
BROWN: And there's a quote in the piece from a nurse who says, look, we're so busy here, we have to cut somewhere, we have to speed things up; and the 30 seconds you save washing your hands is where we do it. It may not may not be right, but it's what we do.
BERENS: It was, I thought, an amazing admission of honesty by a nurse who very accurately described the reality of health care professionals.
These are not people who want to spread infections. These are people whose jobs basically keep them from the fundamental basics of their tasks.
BROWN: The story will be in Sunday's "Chicago Tribune." We assume other papers around the country will pick it up.
We appreciate your time tonight. Congratulations.
BERENS: Well thank you very much, Aaron.
BROWN: Thank you. Michael Berens reporting the story for the "Chicago Tribune."
Ahead on NEWSNIGHT tonight: a new Cold War-inspired movie starring Harrison Ford has tempers flaring in what was the Soviet Union.
This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: Well now, thankfully comes the lighter part of the program, the Friday part, a movie review. OK, the movie "K-19: The Widowmaker" deals with a moment in history that might have led to World War III, so it's not exactly lighter, and we don't exactly have Roger Ebert either.
Here's CNN's Jamie McIntyre.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SR. PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): K- 19 was the Soviets' first ballistic missile submarine rushed into service in 1961 to match America's Polaris subs.
"K-19: The Widowmaker" starring Harrison Ford and Liam Neeson is Hollywood's version of how the 139 crew members battle deadly radiation to save themselves and their sub after it's suffered a catastrophic coolant leak on its maiden voyage.
But some of the surviving members of the actual crew complain the movie makes them seem drunken and unprofessional.
YURI FILIN, FORMER K-19 REACTOR OPERATOR (through translator): It was a very professional, very emotional scene. You couldn't feel the radiation, but it was there: in the air, in the water, everywhere.
MCINTYRE: Harrison Ford, who plays the sub's commander, met with some of the retired Russian sailors before the filming, and says the movie's producers tried hard to get it right.
HARRISON FORD, ACTOR: One of the interesting things is that no two stories were alike because a submarine is compartmentalized. They were separated after the event and dispersed to different commands. So it was interesting, trying to figure out what really happened.
MCINTYRE: Historians say, while the movie does get the basic facts straight, the implication that a meltdown on the sub might have sparked World War III is implausible. Experts say any thermal explosion would have been easily recognized by the U.S. as an accident at sea, not a nuclear attack.
Most movie versions of history get some things wrong. Historians point out many inaccuracies in "Pearl Harbor" -- everything from U.S. ships being too far apart, to dramatic speeches that were never made, to major historical characters being misplaced for dramatic effect.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "Windtalkers")
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: Your mission is to keep your code talker alive.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MCINTYRE: The script for the movie "Windtalkers" was reworked after the Pentagon complained there were never any orders to kill the Navajo codetalkers to prevent their capture.
"Black Hawk Down" is given high marks for accuracy by military experts, but even that movie combines some characters and shorthanded some events to make the story easier to follow.
(on camera): It should go without saying that movies are entertainment, not documentaries. And when a movie says "based on a true story," it doesn't mean true in every detail.
But when it comes to fanciful accounts of history, many military historians would nominate the 1965 movie "The Battle of the Bulge" for a special award: a movie so riddled with inaccuracies that retired President Eisenhower denounced it at a press conference.
Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: And when we come back, a group of September 11 heroes return to the daily beat, and (UNINTELLIGIBLE) as NEWSNIGHT wraps it up for another week. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: Finally from us tonight, it was inevitable that this moment would come. Life settling back to a more normal routine for the thousands of workers who gave their extraordinary effort for so many months down at ground zero.
You hear so often about the horror of the place, but you also hear from the workers about the incredible purpose that they had in their time there, the devotion to finding their fallen brothers. If that is not a higher calling, we simply do not know what that phrase means.
But now, how do you go back to the every day, the 9:00 to 5:00, after experiencing what they have experienced? Beth Nissen has been following a group of Port Authority police officers along every step of the way.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BETH NISSEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For these Port Authority police officers, the commuter train stations they patrol seem a world away from where they were working just weeks ago. Then, they were part of the army of recovery workers at ground zero, sifting through 1.8 million tons of rubble of human remains.
OFFICER ED MCQUADE, PORT AUTHORITY POLICE: Eight weeks ago, I was raking through two inches of rubble and debris, trying to figure out for five minutes whether something was organic or synthetic.
You know, you'd be picking things up and looking at it and trying to figure out what it was and what was a bone, what was plastic. I mean, when you think about it now, it almost seems so far away and distant.
NISSEN: It is fading in memory for these men. The 12-hour days, six days a week, 37 weeks in all. Hard truths are fading, too, that they failed to recover all the human remains, even though they did all that was humanly possible.
OFFICER RICHARD DEPIETRO, PORT AUTHORITY POLICE: The last thing that I saw down there was a man with a broom sweeping the bottom of that hole, right onto the cement. And there was nothing left.
NISSEN: Nothing left but the final ceremonies six weeks ago closing ground zero. Nothing left but to go back to work, go back to workplaces profoundly changed.
Few places were more changed than the Port Authority Police Command Center in New Jersey, just across the river from where the World Trade Center once stood.
LT. MICHAEL BROGAN, PORT AUTHORITY POLICE: On September 11, at roll call, we had 19 police officers. Thirteen of the 19 police officers that we turned out at 6:45 that morning on the 11th were killed. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This has transformed from a police station into a cathedral, in a way. Every place you go in this facility is a reminder of a person, a place, a moment, an event, things that you did together. I can't walk through this hole...
DEPIETRO: Just a feeling. Just walking into this room. All the times we have just sat here and, you know, had laughs together. You know, that brings back the memories.
NISSEN: In one of the meeting rooms, there's a bulletin board of photos, a pictorial roll call of the lost.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is Liam Callahan (ph). Waldon Stewart (ph). He was only here probably six or seven months when he was killed. Joe Nabbus (ph) is here on the end. That's Sergeant Bob Coffers (ph). Tommy Gorman (ph), Joe Nabbus (ph), Paul Lezinsky (ph) and Greg Frohman (ph). All four of those men were lost on September 11. There is a lot of memories here. A lot of good memories.
NISSEN: And more than a few haunting ones. The Port Authority police lost 37 of its officers on September 11. Only now is that loss beginning to register with the men who worked for months to recover their remains and the remains of thousands of others lost that day.
BROGAN: At ground zero, we really didn't have the time to process it. We had a job to do, and we were extremely focused. Now we have time; things slowed down a little bit. And there is a lot of down time to police work, and you have a lot more time to think.
NISSEN: All Port Authority police have had the crucial benefit of debriefing sessions and seminars on post-traumatic stress. These officers know symptoms often don't show up until 10, 12, 18 months after the traumatic event. So far, few are showing signs of profound stress -- just melancholy, sadness, weariness.
Routine patrols take the Port Authority police to the commuter train station, now closed, that used to leave to the World Trade Center. They would stop. Look across the river.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right in between the round dome building and the pyramid dome building is where the two towers stood. On the other side of it.
NISSEN: They see there, in the blank space of sky, the ghosts of the Twin Towers the Port Authority once owned, the 110 stories times two that used to stand there, the 2,843 personal stories that ended too soon. And they, like hundreds of fellow recovery workers, like millions of fellow Americans, try still to understand what may never make sense.
Beth Nissen, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: That's the report for tonight and for the week. Have a wonderful weekend. Terrific weekend. We are all back here on Monday. We hope you will join us as well, 10:00 o'clock Eastern time. Good night from all of us at NEWSNIGHT.
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