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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

Sniper on the Loose: Police Still Unable to Catch Killer

Aired October 22, 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, everyone.
A question or two on the table tonight -- real questions. Here's the first: Why weren't parents told yesterday that the killer was strongly hinting that children were about to be targeted again? Now, this fact was known by many reporters, all of whom were asked not to report it. We did not. I'm not sure we were right. I'm just not sure.

School officials in the Richmond area, we're told, they made a decision to close the schools. School officials in Maryland were also told and decided to open their schools. As a parent -- not as a reporter, but as a parent -- I would have liked that information to make the best judgment for my family, my child.

Another question: Why not release the notes? Let's take a look at them, see what they say, see the handwriting. One of the keys to solving the Unabomber case was his so-called manifesto. When Ted Kaczynski's brother saw that, read those words, an important connection was made: there may be, may be something in the writing style that provides a tip. The handwriting itself may provide a clue.

I would like to know why, what is the risk of releasing theses notes? If the answer is, it may upset the killer, I'm sorry, but the killer is plenty upset already. And I'm not sure this can get a whole lot worse.

I understand the need to keep some things secret. I also understand the right of people to protect themselves and their families. And I think the task force is doing everything it can, everything to catch this nut. I also think it could provide the people of suburban Washington and the rest of the country with a little more information in a timely manner to help.

On to The Whip. We get right to it. Kathleen Koch in Rockville, Maryland again tonight -- Kathleen, a headline, please.

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, chilling revelations in the dialogue between the killer and police. Everyone here wondering just where this conversation is going.

BROWN: Yes they are. Everyone here wondering that too. Back with you in a moment, Kathleen.

A very difficult night for parents and school officials, not to mention kids themselves around the Baltimore, around the Washington, D.C. area. Michael Okwu following that part of the story -- Michael, a headline from you tonight.

MICHAEL OKWU, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, schools in the Richmond, Virginia area remain closed for the second straight day. Meanwhile, back in the Montgomery County, the site of today's possible sniper shooting, they stayed open, although that didn't seem to mind with some parents -- Aaron.

BROWN: Michael, thank you.

And a political story or two tonight, with two weeks to go before Election Day. One of them comes from John Zarrella and the race for governor in the state of Florida. John is in Orlando -- John, a headline from you tonight.

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, Governor Jeb Bush and his Democratic challenger, Bill McBride, in a debate tonight. One last chance to go mono y mono. And if the race for governorship were held today, the vote, it would be too close to call. What a surprise, it's Florida.

BROWN: John, thank you. Back to you and the rest of you coming up shortly.

Also coming up on the program tonight, we believe, a legendary journalist who was in direct communication with a mysterious killer from decades ago, son of Sam. Jimmy Breslin joins us tonight on what he thinks the media should be doing and isn't doing in covering this case. We'll look at the complexities for police trying to negotiate with the killer in public over the airwaves.

We'll talk with a forensic psychologist and hostage negotiator, Harley Stock. And there are other things in the mix. As we said, a couple of political stories. But, again, it is the sniper case that dominates the night.

We are 20 days into this nightmare. The first shooting was October 2. Today, another shooting may be connected. A chilling warning made public. Signs and attempts to communicate with the killer have been frustrating for police, and a stark warning from the head of the investigation that no one's safety can be assured.

Some of today's messages were clear as day. Others were cryptic, understandable only to the shooter. At the end of the day, where we are now, few things are absolutely certain, except that the terror goes on.

We begin again tonight with CNN's Kathleen Koch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KOCH (voice-over): It has become a fascinating if tentative two- way conversation, much of it via the media. Chief Moose sending his most detailed message yet to the sniper.

CHIEF CHARLES MOOSE, MONTGOMERY COUNTY POLICE DEPARTMENT: In the past several days you have attempted to communicate with us. We have researched the option you stated and found that it is not possible electronically to comply in the manner that you're requesting. However, we remain open and ready to talk to you about the options you have mentioned. It is important that we do this without anyone else getting hurt.

KOCH: It's not clear what option the chief was talking about, though CNN has learned the letter left at the Ashland, Virginia shooting site demanded $10 million. Moose asked the killer to call again, saying police could set up a 800 number or post office box to ensure communications. Just hours earlier, the chief gave into intense community pressure after news reports that the sniper's Ashland letter had also included a threat to children.

MOOSE: "Your children are not safe anywhere at any time."

KOCH: It was a chilling revelation on a difficult day. Before dawn, a sniper-style shooting killed a Montgomery County employee, a bus driver. 35-year-old Conrad Johnson, a father of two, was shot standing on the steps of his commuter bus as he prepared to begin his day's route. It happened a half-mile from where the shootings first began 20 days ago and just seven miles from police headquarters.

That, perhaps prompting Moose to admit what has become glaringly obvious.

MOOSE: We have not been able to assure that anyone, any age, any gender, any race, we've not been able to assure anyone their safety with regards to this situation.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOCH: Well Moose's fine message tonight to the killer ended cryptically, saying, "You indicated that this is about more than violence." But we'd love to know what it is all about. And, Aaron, the chief just ended again, asking the killer to call police.

BROWN: I'm sure he was -- actually there were quite testy exchanges early in the day -- asked why not release the text of the message or a photo copy of the message. When asked, what did the chief say?

KOCH: Well, the chief, I haven't spoken to directly about this, but after they made that statement, where they didn't take questions and they came out and said that your children are not safe anywhere at any time, I did go up to the contacts who remained outside as the chief went back into the building and I said, "What is the harm in releasing just that one sentence?"

As you pointed out at the top of the show, it could reveal handwriting, tip someone off that they might actually know the killer. And they said when I last spoke with them that they were considering it. Again, as you said earlier, what harm could it do at this point? The sentence is out, we know what it is, and maybe it could help the case.

BROWN: And on the shooting today, very early this morning, what do we know in terms of ballistics there? When do we expect some sort of statement at all there?

KOCH: We had thought perhaps when the chief came out about 7:15 tonight that that would be the ballistic indication. That there as a connection in these two cases. Apparently they just haven't made it yet. It could be that the bullet is too damaged, but we're not expecting anything on that until perhaps tomorrow's noon briefing at the earliest.

BROWN: Kathleen, thank you. Kathleen Koch, out in Rockville, Maryland, tonight.

More on the sniper's message. We already knew children weren't safe. The shooting two weeks ago of a 13-year-old made that absolutely clear. But the message makes it worse.

The sniper has already demonstrated he can do it. And in his note that he left on Saturday, he says he might want to again. Schools now have to grapple with what to do and parents have to decide whether to keep their children home.

A question, is, well -- we asked it earlier -- why weren't parents told about all of this yesterday? Here again, CNN's Michael Okwu.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

OKWU (voice-over): Fathers don't normally talk this way to their sons.

DEWITT WOOD, FATHER: Do you want to go to school tomorrow? Because I don't know if we're going to let you go to school tomorrow.

OKWU: But these days, there is little that's normal in Montgomery County. Dewitt Wood took his son home early. He's considering keeping him there until the sniper is caught.

WOOD: Yes, I don't know why they opened the school. I wouldn't have opened the school at all. Because, I don't know, you know, this guy, from what I understand, he gave a note to the Virginia police that he's going to start targeting kids.

OKWU: While the schools in Montgomery County stayed open, schools in the Richmond, Virginia area encompassing the 10 districts near Saturday's shooting stayed closed.

MARK EDWARDS, HENRICO COUNTY SCHOOLS SUPERINTENDENT: It is something that we have not dealt with before. We ask parents and the community to be patient and to try to understand the gravity of the significance of this.

OKWU: But though the schools were open back in Montgomery County, many parents simply kept their children home. At this school, in Aspen Hill, just blocks from the most recent shooting, attendance was down 95 percent, with roughly 40 kids showing up in the entire school. This man took his daughters home after his 11-year-old pleaded on the phone.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I was scared because anything could have happened at the school. So I just wanted to be safe with my family.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This could be in there, this could be in there. It doesn't matter if you take your child to a school or if you end up taking them to the mall.

OKWU: Many private schools did close. Some had no choice. Roadblocks after the shooting made it all but impossible to get into five schools in the county. The others remained in code blue. Students locked behind classroom doors, hallways like linoleum ghost towns, but for the shuffle of teachers monitoring movement. Normalcy in the age of is the sniper.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And if I could go back, I probably would have made a strong suggestion that we not have school today. We only have 30 students here today out of our 96 students.

OKWU: Montgomery County schools say attendance overall was at 80 percent, and that they kept the schools open because police recommended no change. But at schools close to the site of Tuesday's shooting, most of the buses left the way they came, empty.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

OKWU: Tomorrow, schools in Montgomery County will remain open and remain in a code blue. Meanwhile, schools in the Richmond area will, for the first time, open their doors since Friday -- Aaron.

BROWN: When you talk to teachers or principals, do they lead you to believe they are actually teaching or that the kids are just absorbed by the fact that nobody else is there and they know what's going on outside?

OKWU: That's an excellent question, Aaron. You talk to teachers and they're very concerned about this environment for the children. They say that the best environment for children is an environment of normalcy. And they know very well when they are kept in their classrooms, as they are during a code blue, and are told not to even leave their rooms, which is what happens in a code blue, they can only leave to go to the bathroom and only then they're accompanied by a teacher.

The teachers say that in moments like that, they cannot really teach the children effectively. And they have to get around it with games to make it more fun for them. So it is very frustrating. They say that the kids are really hanging in there and they applaud them -- Aaron.

BROWN: Understandably. Michael, thank you. Michael Okwu, in our Washington bureau tonight.

We're also joined from Washington tonight by Paul Houston. He's the executive director of the American Association of School Administrators. Give us some of the thinking that goes on with the school people. Welcome to the program, Mr. Houston. I gather this is sort of a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation, whether you keep the schools open or shut them down.

PAUL HOUSTON, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF SCHOOL ADMINISTRATORS: Well, absolutely. There is no right or wrong answer on this. Or perhaps every answer is wrong, to put it more accurately, because, obviously, this killer is in the state of the obvious, something we've known for sometime, which is that no one is safe, and certainly not children. And that's a chilling situation.

On the other hand, do you close the schools and have children out on the street or unsupervised? Or do you bring them into school in a more supervised environment, but take the chance of getting them in and out of the building safely? So it is a difficult call for school leaders.

BROWN: Not to make this too personal, but I remember saying back to my daughter some years back when Columbine happened that I absolutely believed, and I do, that the inside of a school building is perhaps, next too home, the safest place she could possibly be. And I suspect most school people still believe that.

HOUSTON: Well, I think there's no question about it. And, actually, the irony of Columbine is that perhaps schools are even safer today than they were before Columbine, because schools across the country have really had to take the possibility of the impossible happening much more seriously. And so they work much more closely with the police and what have you.

And even statistically, children are statistically safer in schools than they are even at home. But I think this is one of those calls where parents have to look at their own situation. And if they feel that they don't want to send their child out and they're capable of keeping them at home for a while, then certainly schools need to be flexible in allowing that to happen.

But many parents don't have that option because you have a lot of parents that work and they have to go to their jobs. And the safest place for the children to be would be in school. And certainly in this lockdown situation, they're safer, although, as it's been pointed out, it's not the most normal learning environment that you would want to have for children.

BROWN: Right. And I'm not sure that you are precisely the right person, so beg (ph) off if you want to here, but what is it that we can expect kids to, in fact, learn from all of this? They must be almost completely absorbed by the nervousness around them, the regulations around them, the abnormality around them. Is it even reasonable that schools can do anything but just keep them safe?

HOUSTON: Well, I think that certainly it is an unnatural time for children, as it is for all of us in this area that are having to cope with this. On the other hand, the good news, I suppose, is that children tend to be awfully resilient and they tend to be able to seemingly absorb a lot of things that are more difficult even for those of us who are adults to absorb. So I think that the good news in this is that, in fact, they've got a lot of caring teachers out there, teachers who are capability of sort of being sympathetic and working with them, counseling support. And the kids themselves are resilient, but we have to listen to their fears and be sensitive to that. And parents need to listen to their children and be sensitive to them. And the people in schools need to be able to do that as well.

We're in unknown territory right now. We're in an environment that no one has actually sort of had to live through in this country. And, you know, the Washington area sadly has gone through a lot of difficult situations over the last year. And it seems that we just sort of keep being handed new opportunities to rise to the occasion, and I'm afraid this is another one of those.

BROWN: I'm not sure precisely what the question here is, but it's an awful lot to ask of teachers and administrators generally to be able to deal with all of these things.

HOUSTON: It is. I mean, because they're trying to cope with it themselves right now. I mean I work in an adult environment, and that's the big topic of conversation. The people are worried and they're concerned, and no one feels safe. And you don't know what to tell each other, much less to tell your children. So it's a very difficult time for everybody.

BROWN: Sometimes that's the best thing to tell them, is that you're uncertain also. Thank you, Mr. Houston, for joining us tonight. We appreciate it. It is a difficult time.

Ahead on NEWSNIGHT: more on the delicate dance being staged between the police and the sniper. Some of the back story when we come back. This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We've given you the broad overview of the day. Now some of the smaller details, that when strung together, help create a fuller picture of what police have and what they fear and where they may be headed.

Kelli Arena has been working the phones and her sources all day and much of the night. She joins us from Washington now. Kelli, good evening to you. Begin on the note, and tell me what you can about what police know and think.

KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE DEPARTMENT CORRESPONDENT: Well, there are several things that we know about the note that was found in Ashland, Virginia by that Ponderosa restaurant. Sources say that is was long, more than three pages, and handwritten. The handwriting on the note, according to sources, does not match the handwriting on the tarot card that was found at an earlier shooting location.

But government sources say that there was specific language used on both the tarot card and the note that have led investigators to believe that the two communications did come from the same individual. Now, investigators do believe that because of those similarities, that both of these communications are legitimate and they're working on the assumption that the letter did come from the sniper.

Now, the writing in the note was described by sources as stilted. They say that the grammar also was quite bad. As to the content, the note contained a demand, as you know, for $10 million, and it also contained a threat against children

BROWN: And, quickly on the $10 million, what is the task force or what are sources saying about the $10 million?

ARENA: Well, concerning that demand, sources say that they don't know whether this demand for money is legitimate. And that's because it doesn't seem to be consistent with prior actions. One law enforcement official said, well, why didn't we hear about a demand for money earlier in the game? So they are proceeding with great caution on that front.

BROWN: All right. The phone calls, this may be the last thing we get done until the end of the program. But, the phone calls, how many and what do we know about them?

ARENA: Well, sources say that an individual that investigators believe to be the sniper has called into authorities more than once, at least twice that we know, maybe three times. Now, all of the calls have been recorded. And, according to sources, the voice is male and displays an accent.

But investigators say that they're not sure how authentic the accent is, because experts can't agree on its origin. They suggest that it could be a phony accent or maybe even electronically altered.

BROWN: Kelli, for now, let's stop there. And we'll ask you to come back towards the end of the program and go over a few more things and update where we. Thank you, Kelli Arena, in Washington.

Watching Chief Moose go before the cameras every day, we can't help but be struck by how much this resembles a hostage negotiation or trying to talk a jumper off a rooftop, for that matter. Each word is measured just so, each code phrase spoken as if lives depended on it, and they do. And it shows on his face.

This is a difficult and awkward communication. It is one of the things we can talk about with Harley Stock. Mr. Stock is a forensic psychologist and a hostage negotiator. And welcome to the program, sir.

HARLEY STOCK, FORENSIC PSYCHOLOGIST: Thank you.

The objective -- obviously, the objective is to catch this guy. But in these communications with him, what are they trying to do with these carefully chosen words and phrases?

STOCK: Well, the first thing they're trying to do is understand the motivation, not only the motivation of why is he doing this, but the motivation of why is he trying to contact them now. Then what the law enforcement will try to do is be to put together a message so that the person, so the spree killer understands it specifically, but it may seem somewhat awkward to anyone else who is listening.

And, of course, what they're doing is trying to manipulate his behavior, so that eventually they can get to what is called a surrender ritual, where they can get the person to give up.

BROWN: And there is quite a body of knowledge about all of this and a fair amount of work has gone in to developing these models to get people to talk, to say the right things and, ultimately, presumably to give themselves up.

STOCK: That is correct. And there are no words that are being used and they're just thrown out there. For example, when the chief said that he's talking to the person who left the message, he didn't say that the person left a note, he didn't say they left a bullet, he didn't say they carved anything on a tree. He used specifically the words, the message. That was carefully crafted.

Tonight, in his communication, when he said we have options, he didn't say we can do other things. He used the word specifically "options," meaning that there are different things that we can do. He said, for example, that you can -- if you want, we can get a post office box for you, if that will make you feel good.

So, they're very special messages that are called embedded within these communications.

BROWN: And so he is presumably sitting there with a team of hostage negotiator types or psychologist types who are choosing the words and phrases, is that what's going on?

STOCK: Yes. And this is very similar to hostage taking. In fact, if we look at it, the public is being taken hostage. The people from Maryland, Virginia, Washington, D.C., are, in fact, hostages of this situation here. And the person has made a demand, they demanded allegedly $10 million.

What makes this different than a hostage taking is we don't know who the person is, we don't know where he is. Obviously, in a hostage taking you can set up a perimeter. Here we can't do that. But this is moving towards a resolution.

BROWN: You think so?

STOCK: Well, apparently, at some level it is. You know some people...

BROWN: Let me add a little. That presumes -- I think it presumes, you tell me if I'm right -- that the $10 million demand is, in fact, a real demand. I'm not so sure about that, are you?

STOCK: Well, let's look at this. The note was found after the Ponderosa shooting. That means that the person crafted the note -- the sniper crafted the note prior to the shooting. Why would he do that? Well, he did it to use the shooting as a way to get to that note, to give into this demand.

So there is a cascading series of events that are currently going on that suggest this may in fact be an extortion. And an amazing extortion, where the person set off initially to kill people, to do it in a random way, to terrorize. And the purpose of terror is to psychologically destabilize individuals so they no longer trust the government's ability to protect them. He certainly has done that.

BROWN: He certainly has done that. Mr. Stock, honestly, I can probably think of 50 more things to ask. I hope you'll come back soon and talk about some of them. But I suppose, more importantly, I hope it's not necessary for you to come back soon and talk about any of them.

Thank you for your time tonight. Nicely done.

STOCK: Thank you.

BROWN: Thank you. Harley Stock.

Next on NEWSNIGHT, he was deeply involved in the son of Sam case here in New York. He has some very strong feelings about how the sniper investigation is being handled, the media's role and more. After a break we'll talk with the columnist, Jimmy Breslin.

This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Right now, the rifleman who is causing such pain and fear and anger in the counties around Washington, D.C., has no name, no face, no nationality, no identity at all. He has only an MO.

That was true once in New York City as well. For 13 terrible months a killer made is way from one dark street to another without a face, a name and without an identity. From July of 1976 to august of 1977, he was only what this rifleman is now, only an MO.

We know now, of course, who he is. We have known that for nearly 20 years. At the time, though, we knew only that in letters to newspapers he called himself son of Sam.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): This is who the killer turned out to be: a chubby, bland-faced 23-year-old sometimes security guard from a northern suburb of New York: David Berkowitz. By the time he was caught by police, the combination of hard work and better luck, he had fired 32 bullets from a .44 caliber handgun, always at close range.

In eight separate attacks, he had killed five young women and one young man and wounded seven others.

More than that, he wounded an entire city because the shootings happened mostly in lovers lanes in the city's outer boroughs. Young people stopped sitting in cars, their elders stopped going out or went out only with trepidation when they absolutely had to.

The first few victims were dark haired, so the sales of blond wigs went up.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You know, I'm very frightened especially since I have brown hair.

Mixed with the intense heat of the summer was an intense fear.

Bizarre letters began to appear in the city's newspapers. The writer called himself "a spirit roaming the night, thirsty, hungry, stopping seldom stopping to rest. I love to hunt," he said. "Prowling the streets, looking for fair game, tasty meat."

Some of the letters were addressed directly to Jimmy Breslin, one of the best known columnist in the country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's playing. He's in a game. It's in a game. No question about it. I think he gets a kick out of it.

BROWN: All these years later, Jimmy Breslin still remembers every detail.

JIMMY BRESLIN, COLUMNIST: She held a textbook up to her face and he shot through it and killed her. Two murders four blocks from my house.

BROWN: David Berkowitz is now 49 years old. He is serving several consecutive life sentences, but back before we knew his name, for 13 months for millions of New Yorkers, he poisoned the night.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Jimmy Breslin, a Pulitzer Prize winner writing for "Newsday" these days. Among the most compelling voices of our lifetime is with us tonight.

Mr. Breslin, nice to see you.

BRESLIN: Twenty-five years trying to get years away from that guy and now I'm sitting here looking at him.

BROWN: It's weird, isn't it?

BRESLIN: Frightening, yes.

BROWN: How it comes around.

Talk to me for a bit about media and how you think we are or are not doing here?

BRESLIN: I don't understand this being nice to the police. They dismal failures. They haven't -- they don't have anything. They haven't gotten anywhere and they say they're going to do what the police chief wants. That's nuts. The guy wrote a letter, whoever he is out there. The police chief got the letter, in other words, the guy knows he wrote the letter, the chief knows he wrote the letter. What are you keeping it a secret for?

BROWN: Well, what if -- and this is just hypothetical, but what if the sniper says, I don't want you releasing this letter.

BRESLIN: I don't care what he says. He already shot a guy since you got the letter. That shows you how he acts. Put it out there, Maybe somebody will say, Gee, the way that fella writes reminds me of -- maybe he'll start something going.

The other thing is I haven't seen the newspapers call on the government to be in action. What is George Bush doing campaigning in the state of Maine when a bus driver in Washington in his backyard is being murdered at 5:30 in a morning. A man trying to go to work.

Bush belongs in Washington, set the tone and go for a walk in Maryland and show this bum that we're not afraid and we're going to get him. Because in a turmoil, the streets are live, president of the United States is walking and you're next. We're getting him. So, let's go. What is this cowering in the houses and you can't open schools?

You got school kids -- all you do, you put on your television and they put it in the papers and they kids are in a lockdown. That's a prison term.

BROWN: It sure is.

BRESLIN: It's certainly not just what I wrote every time I go past a school or a prison I feel sorry for the people inside. Now they're proving I'm right. Lockdown.

What is it -- you've got a national guard, why don't you activate them and put them in front of schools. If you have a flood, you have them working. Tell them to have the newspapers start calling for things. Don't put in with the police, because then you're going to make their mistakes. I'll make my own mistakes, thank you.

BROWN: What people -- what readers will say and what viewers will say is, You're not the police, this is what the chief said, in fact, the other day, and you're not the one responsible for catching this guy, we are and until that changes, let us do our job.

BRESLIN: You're not doing your job. You haven't caught him. You don't even know what he looks like. We don't know if it's a man or a boy or anything. I think you're doing a dismal job. You should be replaced, but you haven't been.

So therefore, you try and do your job, I'll do mine.

BROWN: What differently if -- let me ask this more specifically. If you had the specific contents of the note and if police said to you, Jimmy, don't release it.

BRESLIN: Why? Who are they to tell me? It's in. I don't take their -- I don't trust their judgment and the newspaper and the televisions shouldn't either. You're hired to have your own judgment and I don't want the judgment of the police department.

I'm the one, had they canvassed the neighborhood. When I hear that they're walking door to door and people are complaining about their feet hurting because they just did it for 12 hours, I'll know it's an investigation. Until then, I think it's just a fraud.

BROWN: That's very harsh.

BRESLIN: Well are they canvassing any houses?

BROWN: I don't think they know, honestly, where to begin canvasing.

BRESLIN: Well let's get a map. Where is the place? Let's put 1,000 guys and come back when all those houses are canvassed and if somebody is not home, go back to it.

BROWN: Do you think this would be covered differently if this were in New York?

BRESLIN: Well, I will say what I'm saying is what would happen here, yes.

BROWN: You do?

BRESLIN: Absolutely.

BROWN: Even today?

BRESLIN: Yes.

BROWN: In this media environment today?

BRESLIN: Police equal shoe leather, that's all the game is. It isn't press conferences. It isn't hiding letters. It's shoe leather. Get out and knock on doors.

BROWN: Your guy, forgive me for this, Son of Sam, might still be out there today if it was not for an extraordinary piece of luck, a traffic ticket. Would they have gotten him anyway?

BRESLIN: There was a lot of walking around.

BROWN: Would they have gotten him anyway?

BRESLIN: There was a lot of walking around. Sure they were going to get him.

BROWN: It went on for 13 months, this has gone on for three weeks.

BRESLIN: All in one place shooting people everyday. Come on, let's go.

BROWN: You're very tough.

BRESLIN: No, I'm not very tough.

BROWN: No you may be right, but you're very tough.

BRESLIN: The police always equal shoe leather. Always.

BROWN: Don't you believe they're out there working the streets trying to figure this out?

BRESLIN: They've had four dragnets they tell me, right? They know less now than when they started, I think. Why don't they show, I mean, why don't they show anything. Put it out there. I don't believe in anything. If it isn't shoe leather, it doesn't exist.

BROWN: I want to go back to Son of Sam for a second, do you mind?

BRESLIN: Go ahead. He's all yours but I'm here.

BROWN: I know. And how often do I get you, so here we go.

First of all, when this started did you think, Oh, my, this is oddly like Son of Sam. This is that sort of killing. That random killing.

BRESLIN: No dead bodies makes it the same. Yes, I never thought -- I think shooting from a distance was not Berkowitz.

BROWN: No, Berkowitz was so close. But the randomness of it.

BRESLIN: Yes. Maybe the guy -- you know, Berkowitz had a dog in his head telling him when to shoot and he went right past the place I was sitting and he came all the way out there to shoot and the dog told him to go home because it was raining. So...

BROWN: Do you ever hear from him? Do you ever hear from him now?

BRESLIN: Once he sent me a Christmas card from the devil. And that was all. I don't want to hear any more. I didn't even want to -- I never wanted to know about it, Berkowitz has been part of me and now I come here and you open your show with Berkowitz.

BROWN: You're not necessarily a guy I want angry with me.

BRESLIN: No, I'm not angry.

BROWN: No, no. That's fine. I am pleased you're here. Let me go back to where we are then.

BRESLIN: I'm very nice you know.

BROWN: If media has not done well so far, what is the role of media in a moment like this?

BRESLIN: Criticize the police.

BROWN: Criticize the police?

BRESLIN: Police, look at it. Police at a time like this, you know, have an ego problem too. They're like television anchor people.

BROWN: Come on, that's a low blow.

BRESLIN: First of all, I'm a low person. They do have an ego, though. And now there is a confession of faith. I am in possession of a letter. I'm not going to show it to you that's mine.

You've got to be on them. You can't leave them alone. And you can't -- I saw them, they were like balances on the television today. I couldn't believe what I was looking at. What is this?

And you're dead without your police contacts, see, you can't get your story. What story has it been?

BROWN: Well, the contacts are leaking like sieves on this.

BRESLIN: What have they leaked on this? I don't know the first thing about the case. Neither does anyone else.

I do know they try wonderfully well on television all day, but there is nothing to talk about. Do you know anything about this case at all?

BROWN: I know some detail about the case, some of which is reported and some of which not.

BRESLIN: I don't know anybody who knows anything, really. If they don't know what he looks like, they haven't put out a sketch.

BROWN: They certainly don't know that.

BRESLIN: They don't know anything.

BROWN: Nice to see you.

BRESLIN: Good.

BROWN: Come back, I promise I will not mention David Berkowitz.

BRESLIN: Bet on a shoe leather going. Don't be so astounded at what I'm saying.

BROWN: I'm not astounded.

BRESLIN: Bet all your money on shoe leather.

BROWN: Thank you.

BRESLIN: Good. BROWN: You got it. Don't go quite yet.

BRESLIN: No?

BROWN: You can't leave til we're off the shot.

Still ahead on NEWSNIGHT, Florida's governor's case. And we'll take a look at some of the other stories making news around the country today.

Short break, we're right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, why the government may release some Guantanamo detainees and more. We're right back after this short break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: A section here to quickly look at some of the other stories making news tonight here and around the world.

The government is preparing to free a number of detainees at Guantanamo Bay. No precise word on who or how many. Sources say it will be a fairly small number.

Defense Secretary Rumsfeld said today said those who aren't candidates for prosecution and who don't have intelligence value to offer and don't pose a threat are likely, his words, to come out of the other end of the shoot.

First trial of anyone accused of being directly involved in the 9/11 attacks is under way in Hamburg, Germany. Mohammed el-Motasecket (ph) is charged with abetting in the murder of more than 3,000 people, being a member of a terrorist organization. Prosecutors say he was a member of the so-called Hamburg al Qaeda cell, which included three of the hijackers.

At the U.N. Security Council, tough going still for the U.S. draft of a resolution on Iraq. Today was the first day of debate. Right out of the gate, Russia and France offered up objections to the language allowing for military action without further security council after this negotiation goes on.

In Iraq, a rare protest because it was one not staged by the government. About 70 people gathered to ask what had become of their loved ones who were arrested after the Gulf War. Thousands of prisoners were freed over the weekend, but not those prisoners. It didn't take long for police to break up the protest.

Two other stories closer to home, beginning with the arraignment of those men who have become known as the Buffalo six. Six men in Upstate New York today pleaded not guilty to supporting terrorism. The charges against the six are largely based on allegations they attended a terror training camp in Afghanistan in the spring of 2001. An update on the case of the Rhelia Wilson, the little girl lost by the state of Florida's child welfare system. A relative of one of the women was supposed to be caring for Rhelia reached a plea deal on theft and fraud charges. They hope the man can shed some light on her disappearance which was nearly two years ago.

A different guilty plea, this one from the 15-year-old boy who attacked a Kansas City Royals baseball coach on the field last month with his dad at his side. The boy is now back with his family. The father is still in jail. Dad will be arraigned next month on battery charges.

From South Florida, One blimp and one big drama. The pilot of the Metlife blimp "Snoopy I" was forced to jump from the gondola moments before it crashed. Nobody hurt. Officials blame the crash on high winds.

Some of the other stories that made news today.

Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, we'll update the sniper investigation.

Up next: What may be the tightest governor's race in the country. It comes from Florida. We're right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: One political story tonight, it comes from Florida where election preparations might fool you into believing you've landed in Haiti or Afghanistan. Independent monitors are being deployed and the justice department is playing a role, even the local police in Miami, all to prevent a replay of the election mess we all lived through two years ago.

Seems a good thing when you think about, since another race involving a different Bush is shaping up to be quite a nail biter: the race for governor.

Here's CNN's John Zarrella.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Governor Bush, Mr. McBride, thank you, both, for joining us.

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A final debate, a last chance to go one on one, toe to toe.

Florida's Republican Governor Jeb Bush and his Democratic challenger Bill McBride scare squared off in Orlando and left nothing on the table.

BILL MCBRIDE (D), FLORIDA GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: I'd take more of the budget, across the board, and move it into public schools and human services.

GOV. JEB BUSH (R), FLORIDA: To suggest that you're not going to raise taxes, I think, is just being disingenuous.

ZARRELLA: With two weeks before the election, polls show Bush and McBride in a dead heat, a startling turn of events. Just three months ago, McBride was running a distant second in primary polls to Janet Reno.

Now, he's not only the Democratic nominee, he's got what experts say is a legitimate shot to pull the upset of the political season: beating the president's brother.

BOB POE, FLORIDA DEMOCRATIC PARTY CHAIRMAN: The fact that right now Jeb Bush can't get above 49 points in any single poll shows that he's got a problem.

ZARRELLA: Political scientists say this election may well be a repeat of the 2000 presidential race where every vote was critical.

SUSAN MACMANUS, UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FL. POLITICAL SCIENTIST: ... have an equally divided state between Republicans and Democrats. Even our independent voters seem to split between the two which creates the most competitive political environment in the country.

AL CARDENAS, REPUBLICAN PARTY OF FLORIDA CHRM.: There's not a single voting group in Florida you can ignore. Whether it's African- Americans, Hispanics, seniors, women, all age groups, you name it. We have to go after every single vote because it's Florida.

ZARRELLA: Experts say this race is far more than just about the governorship of Florida. It's an integral part of both parties' strategies for 2004.

MARK SILVA, POLITICAL REPORTER, "ORLANDO SENTENTIAL": The president could not have won the White House without Florida, that's clear. And in 2004 he won't be able to win re-election probably without Florida.

ZARRELLA: To help avert a potential Florida disaster, both the governor's mother and father are canvassing the state for their son. Republican party leaders admit their margin right now isn't comfortable. But they say, it's better than where the other guy is.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ZARRELLA: The latest polls show the governor has about a five- point lead and the political experts tell us, the ultimate outcome may come down to the 7 percent of undecided voters. And the experts say, watch the movements of the president. If he has to come back to Florida to help his brother, that means Jeb could be in trouble -- Aaron.

BROWN: John, a month ago, six weeks ago, eight weeks ago, what were the polls showing?

ZARRELLA: The polls were showing that against Janet Reno Jeb Bush would do extremely well. McBride would do better. In fact, before the primaries Jeb Bush ran commercial-time advertisements against McBride ignoring Reno. That's before the Democratic primary. They were clearly worried about McBride and not so worried about Reno.

So getting McBride -- McBride as his opponent has been a tough one for the governor -- Aaron.

BROWN: John, thank you. John Zarrella in Florida tonight.

And still ahead on NEWSNIGHT in our last session tonight, we'll update the sniper investigation. Kelli Arena joins us. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It's been 20 days since this sniper business began. Kelli Arena joins us again from Washington to take a look at day 20.

Kelli, start with this. Some of the things that Mr. Breslin raised about why police are so reluctance to release any more information than they already have.

ARENA: Well, Aaron, sources say that investigators are really being cautious about the information because of the unpredictability of the case. I mean, this is unlike anything they have ever seen before. They don't know how the sniper is going to react to information that is released. They don't want to the jeopardize the investigation.

So all along the way they're making very careful decisions in terms of balancing the public's need to know, while they retain the credibility of the investigation. It's a very hard line to walk, Aaron.

BROWN: Do you have any sense of that pressure on them, by the way, is building to be a more open or more forthcoming than they are?

ARENA: The frustration level has been growing as the weeks progress. And obviously I'm talking to a lot of the same people on a daily basis. And you can sense that frustration that -- for example, this information that came -- that eventually got out about the generalized threat to children.

Really serious grapple in there. I mean, I had one law enforcement official say, Look, I'm a parent. You know, it's very, difficult to sit here and deal with this knowing this is information that I'd want but we know that children were at risk, so it wasn't, really, they thought, at the end of the day helpful for the public to have to worry even more.

BROWN: Kelli, thank you for that. It is a good thing to remind viewers and all of us that these investigators have lived with this too for 20 days and it is very hard work and they must be frustrated. Kelli Arena in Washington.

We'll see you all again tomorrow night at 10:00 Eastern time, we hope. Until then, good night for all of us.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired October 22, 2002 - 22:00   ET
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, everyone.
A question or two on the table tonight -- real questions. Here's the first: Why weren't parents told yesterday that the killer was strongly hinting that children were about to be targeted again? Now, this fact was known by many reporters, all of whom were asked not to report it. We did not. I'm not sure we were right. I'm just not sure.

School officials in the Richmond area, we're told, they made a decision to close the schools. School officials in Maryland were also told and decided to open their schools. As a parent -- not as a reporter, but as a parent -- I would have liked that information to make the best judgment for my family, my child.

Another question: Why not release the notes? Let's take a look at them, see what they say, see the handwriting. One of the keys to solving the Unabomber case was his so-called manifesto. When Ted Kaczynski's brother saw that, read those words, an important connection was made: there may be, may be something in the writing style that provides a tip. The handwriting itself may provide a clue.

I would like to know why, what is the risk of releasing theses notes? If the answer is, it may upset the killer, I'm sorry, but the killer is plenty upset already. And I'm not sure this can get a whole lot worse.

I understand the need to keep some things secret. I also understand the right of people to protect themselves and their families. And I think the task force is doing everything it can, everything to catch this nut. I also think it could provide the people of suburban Washington and the rest of the country with a little more information in a timely manner to help.

On to The Whip. We get right to it. Kathleen Koch in Rockville, Maryland again tonight -- Kathleen, a headline, please.

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, chilling revelations in the dialogue between the killer and police. Everyone here wondering just where this conversation is going.

BROWN: Yes they are. Everyone here wondering that too. Back with you in a moment, Kathleen.

A very difficult night for parents and school officials, not to mention kids themselves around the Baltimore, around the Washington, D.C. area. Michael Okwu following that part of the story -- Michael, a headline from you tonight.

MICHAEL OKWU, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, schools in the Richmond, Virginia area remain closed for the second straight day. Meanwhile, back in the Montgomery County, the site of today's possible sniper shooting, they stayed open, although that didn't seem to mind with some parents -- Aaron.

BROWN: Michael, thank you.

And a political story or two tonight, with two weeks to go before Election Day. One of them comes from John Zarrella and the race for governor in the state of Florida. John is in Orlando -- John, a headline from you tonight.

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, Governor Jeb Bush and his Democratic challenger, Bill McBride, in a debate tonight. One last chance to go mono y mono. And if the race for governorship were held today, the vote, it would be too close to call. What a surprise, it's Florida.

BROWN: John, thank you. Back to you and the rest of you coming up shortly.

Also coming up on the program tonight, we believe, a legendary journalist who was in direct communication with a mysterious killer from decades ago, son of Sam. Jimmy Breslin joins us tonight on what he thinks the media should be doing and isn't doing in covering this case. We'll look at the complexities for police trying to negotiate with the killer in public over the airwaves.

We'll talk with a forensic psychologist and hostage negotiator, Harley Stock. And there are other things in the mix. As we said, a couple of political stories. But, again, it is the sniper case that dominates the night.

We are 20 days into this nightmare. The first shooting was October 2. Today, another shooting may be connected. A chilling warning made public. Signs and attempts to communicate with the killer have been frustrating for police, and a stark warning from the head of the investigation that no one's safety can be assured.

Some of today's messages were clear as day. Others were cryptic, understandable only to the shooter. At the end of the day, where we are now, few things are absolutely certain, except that the terror goes on.

We begin again tonight with CNN's Kathleen Koch.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KOCH (voice-over): It has become a fascinating if tentative two- way conversation, much of it via the media. Chief Moose sending his most detailed message yet to the sniper.

CHIEF CHARLES MOOSE, MONTGOMERY COUNTY POLICE DEPARTMENT: In the past several days you have attempted to communicate with us. We have researched the option you stated and found that it is not possible electronically to comply in the manner that you're requesting. However, we remain open and ready to talk to you about the options you have mentioned. It is important that we do this without anyone else getting hurt.

KOCH: It's not clear what option the chief was talking about, though CNN has learned the letter left at the Ashland, Virginia shooting site demanded $10 million. Moose asked the killer to call again, saying police could set up a 800 number or post office box to ensure communications. Just hours earlier, the chief gave into intense community pressure after news reports that the sniper's Ashland letter had also included a threat to children.

MOOSE: "Your children are not safe anywhere at any time."

KOCH: It was a chilling revelation on a difficult day. Before dawn, a sniper-style shooting killed a Montgomery County employee, a bus driver. 35-year-old Conrad Johnson, a father of two, was shot standing on the steps of his commuter bus as he prepared to begin his day's route. It happened a half-mile from where the shootings first began 20 days ago and just seven miles from police headquarters.

That, perhaps prompting Moose to admit what has become glaringly obvious.

MOOSE: We have not been able to assure that anyone, any age, any gender, any race, we've not been able to assure anyone their safety with regards to this situation.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOCH: Well Moose's fine message tonight to the killer ended cryptically, saying, "You indicated that this is about more than violence." But we'd love to know what it is all about. And, Aaron, the chief just ended again, asking the killer to call police.

BROWN: I'm sure he was -- actually there were quite testy exchanges early in the day -- asked why not release the text of the message or a photo copy of the message. When asked, what did the chief say?

KOCH: Well, the chief, I haven't spoken to directly about this, but after they made that statement, where they didn't take questions and they came out and said that your children are not safe anywhere at any time, I did go up to the contacts who remained outside as the chief went back into the building and I said, "What is the harm in releasing just that one sentence?"

As you pointed out at the top of the show, it could reveal handwriting, tip someone off that they might actually know the killer. And they said when I last spoke with them that they were considering it. Again, as you said earlier, what harm could it do at this point? The sentence is out, we know what it is, and maybe it could help the case.

BROWN: And on the shooting today, very early this morning, what do we know in terms of ballistics there? When do we expect some sort of statement at all there?

KOCH: We had thought perhaps when the chief came out about 7:15 tonight that that would be the ballistic indication. That there as a connection in these two cases. Apparently they just haven't made it yet. It could be that the bullet is too damaged, but we're not expecting anything on that until perhaps tomorrow's noon briefing at the earliest.

BROWN: Kathleen, thank you. Kathleen Koch, out in Rockville, Maryland, tonight.

More on the sniper's message. We already knew children weren't safe. The shooting two weeks ago of a 13-year-old made that absolutely clear. But the message makes it worse.

The sniper has already demonstrated he can do it. And in his note that he left on Saturday, he says he might want to again. Schools now have to grapple with what to do and parents have to decide whether to keep their children home.

A question, is, well -- we asked it earlier -- why weren't parents told about all of this yesterday? Here again, CNN's Michael Okwu.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

OKWU (voice-over): Fathers don't normally talk this way to their sons.

DEWITT WOOD, FATHER: Do you want to go to school tomorrow? Because I don't know if we're going to let you go to school tomorrow.

OKWU: But these days, there is little that's normal in Montgomery County. Dewitt Wood took his son home early. He's considering keeping him there until the sniper is caught.

WOOD: Yes, I don't know why they opened the school. I wouldn't have opened the school at all. Because, I don't know, you know, this guy, from what I understand, he gave a note to the Virginia police that he's going to start targeting kids.

OKWU: While the schools in Montgomery County stayed open, schools in the Richmond, Virginia area encompassing the 10 districts near Saturday's shooting stayed closed.

MARK EDWARDS, HENRICO COUNTY SCHOOLS SUPERINTENDENT: It is something that we have not dealt with before. We ask parents and the community to be patient and to try to understand the gravity of the significance of this.

OKWU: But though the schools were open back in Montgomery County, many parents simply kept their children home. At this school, in Aspen Hill, just blocks from the most recent shooting, attendance was down 95 percent, with roughly 40 kids showing up in the entire school. This man took his daughters home after his 11-year-old pleaded on the phone.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I was scared because anything could have happened at the school. So I just wanted to be safe with my family.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This could be in there, this could be in there. It doesn't matter if you take your child to a school or if you end up taking them to the mall.

OKWU: Many private schools did close. Some had no choice. Roadblocks after the shooting made it all but impossible to get into five schools in the county. The others remained in code blue. Students locked behind classroom doors, hallways like linoleum ghost towns, but for the shuffle of teachers monitoring movement. Normalcy in the age of is the sniper.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And if I could go back, I probably would have made a strong suggestion that we not have school today. We only have 30 students here today out of our 96 students.

OKWU: Montgomery County schools say attendance overall was at 80 percent, and that they kept the schools open because police recommended no change. But at schools close to the site of Tuesday's shooting, most of the buses left the way they came, empty.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

OKWU: Tomorrow, schools in Montgomery County will remain open and remain in a code blue. Meanwhile, schools in the Richmond area will, for the first time, open their doors since Friday -- Aaron.

BROWN: When you talk to teachers or principals, do they lead you to believe they are actually teaching or that the kids are just absorbed by the fact that nobody else is there and they know what's going on outside?

OKWU: That's an excellent question, Aaron. You talk to teachers and they're very concerned about this environment for the children. They say that the best environment for children is an environment of normalcy. And they know very well when they are kept in their classrooms, as they are during a code blue, and are told not to even leave their rooms, which is what happens in a code blue, they can only leave to go to the bathroom and only then they're accompanied by a teacher.

The teachers say that in moments like that, they cannot really teach the children effectively. And they have to get around it with games to make it more fun for them. So it is very frustrating. They say that the kids are really hanging in there and they applaud them -- Aaron.

BROWN: Understandably. Michael, thank you. Michael Okwu, in our Washington bureau tonight.

We're also joined from Washington tonight by Paul Houston. He's the executive director of the American Association of School Administrators. Give us some of the thinking that goes on with the school people. Welcome to the program, Mr. Houston. I gather this is sort of a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation, whether you keep the schools open or shut them down.

PAUL HOUSTON, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF SCHOOL ADMINISTRATORS: Well, absolutely. There is no right or wrong answer on this. Or perhaps every answer is wrong, to put it more accurately, because, obviously, this killer is in the state of the obvious, something we've known for sometime, which is that no one is safe, and certainly not children. And that's a chilling situation.

On the other hand, do you close the schools and have children out on the street or unsupervised? Or do you bring them into school in a more supervised environment, but take the chance of getting them in and out of the building safely? So it is a difficult call for school leaders.

BROWN: Not to make this too personal, but I remember saying back to my daughter some years back when Columbine happened that I absolutely believed, and I do, that the inside of a school building is perhaps, next too home, the safest place she could possibly be. And I suspect most school people still believe that.

HOUSTON: Well, I think there's no question about it. And, actually, the irony of Columbine is that perhaps schools are even safer today than they were before Columbine, because schools across the country have really had to take the possibility of the impossible happening much more seriously. And so they work much more closely with the police and what have you.

And even statistically, children are statistically safer in schools than they are even at home. But I think this is one of those calls where parents have to look at their own situation. And if they feel that they don't want to send their child out and they're capable of keeping them at home for a while, then certainly schools need to be flexible in allowing that to happen.

But many parents don't have that option because you have a lot of parents that work and they have to go to their jobs. And the safest place for the children to be would be in school. And certainly in this lockdown situation, they're safer, although, as it's been pointed out, it's not the most normal learning environment that you would want to have for children.

BROWN: Right. And I'm not sure that you are precisely the right person, so beg (ph) off if you want to here, but what is it that we can expect kids to, in fact, learn from all of this? They must be almost completely absorbed by the nervousness around them, the regulations around them, the abnormality around them. Is it even reasonable that schools can do anything but just keep them safe?

HOUSTON: Well, I think that certainly it is an unnatural time for children, as it is for all of us in this area that are having to cope with this. On the other hand, the good news, I suppose, is that children tend to be awfully resilient and they tend to be able to seemingly absorb a lot of things that are more difficult even for those of us who are adults to absorb. So I think that the good news in this is that, in fact, they've got a lot of caring teachers out there, teachers who are capability of sort of being sympathetic and working with them, counseling support. And the kids themselves are resilient, but we have to listen to their fears and be sensitive to that. And parents need to listen to their children and be sensitive to them. And the people in schools need to be able to do that as well.

We're in unknown territory right now. We're in an environment that no one has actually sort of had to live through in this country. And, you know, the Washington area sadly has gone through a lot of difficult situations over the last year. And it seems that we just sort of keep being handed new opportunities to rise to the occasion, and I'm afraid this is another one of those.

BROWN: I'm not sure precisely what the question here is, but it's an awful lot to ask of teachers and administrators generally to be able to deal with all of these things.

HOUSTON: It is. I mean, because they're trying to cope with it themselves right now. I mean I work in an adult environment, and that's the big topic of conversation. The people are worried and they're concerned, and no one feels safe. And you don't know what to tell each other, much less to tell your children. So it's a very difficult time for everybody.

BROWN: Sometimes that's the best thing to tell them, is that you're uncertain also. Thank you, Mr. Houston, for joining us tonight. We appreciate it. It is a difficult time.

Ahead on NEWSNIGHT: more on the delicate dance being staged between the police and the sniper. Some of the back story when we come back. This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We've given you the broad overview of the day. Now some of the smaller details, that when strung together, help create a fuller picture of what police have and what they fear and where they may be headed.

Kelli Arena has been working the phones and her sources all day and much of the night. She joins us from Washington now. Kelli, good evening to you. Begin on the note, and tell me what you can about what police know and think.

KELLI ARENA, CNN JUSTICE DEPARTMENT CORRESPONDENT: Well, there are several things that we know about the note that was found in Ashland, Virginia by that Ponderosa restaurant. Sources say that is was long, more than three pages, and handwritten. The handwriting on the note, according to sources, does not match the handwriting on the tarot card that was found at an earlier shooting location.

But government sources say that there was specific language used on both the tarot card and the note that have led investigators to believe that the two communications did come from the same individual. Now, investigators do believe that because of those similarities, that both of these communications are legitimate and they're working on the assumption that the letter did come from the sniper.

Now, the writing in the note was described by sources as stilted. They say that the grammar also was quite bad. As to the content, the note contained a demand, as you know, for $10 million, and it also contained a threat against children

BROWN: And, quickly on the $10 million, what is the task force or what are sources saying about the $10 million?

ARENA: Well, concerning that demand, sources say that they don't know whether this demand for money is legitimate. And that's because it doesn't seem to be consistent with prior actions. One law enforcement official said, well, why didn't we hear about a demand for money earlier in the game? So they are proceeding with great caution on that front.

BROWN: All right. The phone calls, this may be the last thing we get done until the end of the program. But, the phone calls, how many and what do we know about them?

ARENA: Well, sources say that an individual that investigators believe to be the sniper has called into authorities more than once, at least twice that we know, maybe three times. Now, all of the calls have been recorded. And, according to sources, the voice is male and displays an accent.

But investigators say that they're not sure how authentic the accent is, because experts can't agree on its origin. They suggest that it could be a phony accent or maybe even electronically altered.

BROWN: Kelli, for now, let's stop there. And we'll ask you to come back towards the end of the program and go over a few more things and update where we. Thank you, Kelli Arena, in Washington.

Watching Chief Moose go before the cameras every day, we can't help but be struck by how much this resembles a hostage negotiation or trying to talk a jumper off a rooftop, for that matter. Each word is measured just so, each code phrase spoken as if lives depended on it, and they do. And it shows on his face.

This is a difficult and awkward communication. It is one of the things we can talk about with Harley Stock. Mr. Stock is a forensic psychologist and a hostage negotiator. And welcome to the program, sir.

HARLEY STOCK, FORENSIC PSYCHOLOGIST: Thank you.

The objective -- obviously, the objective is to catch this guy. But in these communications with him, what are they trying to do with these carefully chosen words and phrases?

STOCK: Well, the first thing they're trying to do is understand the motivation, not only the motivation of why is he doing this, but the motivation of why is he trying to contact them now. Then what the law enforcement will try to do is be to put together a message so that the person, so the spree killer understands it specifically, but it may seem somewhat awkward to anyone else who is listening.

And, of course, what they're doing is trying to manipulate his behavior, so that eventually they can get to what is called a surrender ritual, where they can get the person to give up.

BROWN: And there is quite a body of knowledge about all of this and a fair amount of work has gone in to developing these models to get people to talk, to say the right things and, ultimately, presumably to give themselves up.

STOCK: That is correct. And there are no words that are being used and they're just thrown out there. For example, when the chief said that he's talking to the person who left the message, he didn't say that the person left a note, he didn't say they left a bullet, he didn't say they carved anything on a tree. He used specifically the words, the message. That was carefully crafted.

Tonight, in his communication, when he said we have options, he didn't say we can do other things. He used the word specifically "options," meaning that there are different things that we can do. He said, for example, that you can -- if you want, we can get a post office box for you, if that will make you feel good.

So, they're very special messages that are called embedded within these communications.

BROWN: And so he is presumably sitting there with a team of hostage negotiator types or psychologist types who are choosing the words and phrases, is that what's going on?

STOCK: Yes. And this is very similar to hostage taking. In fact, if we look at it, the public is being taken hostage. The people from Maryland, Virginia, Washington, D.C., are, in fact, hostages of this situation here. And the person has made a demand, they demanded allegedly $10 million.

What makes this different than a hostage taking is we don't know who the person is, we don't know where he is. Obviously, in a hostage taking you can set up a perimeter. Here we can't do that. But this is moving towards a resolution.

BROWN: You think so?

STOCK: Well, apparently, at some level it is. You know some people...

BROWN: Let me add a little. That presumes -- I think it presumes, you tell me if I'm right -- that the $10 million demand is, in fact, a real demand. I'm not so sure about that, are you?

STOCK: Well, let's look at this. The note was found after the Ponderosa shooting. That means that the person crafted the note -- the sniper crafted the note prior to the shooting. Why would he do that? Well, he did it to use the shooting as a way to get to that note, to give into this demand.

So there is a cascading series of events that are currently going on that suggest this may in fact be an extortion. And an amazing extortion, where the person set off initially to kill people, to do it in a random way, to terrorize. And the purpose of terror is to psychologically destabilize individuals so they no longer trust the government's ability to protect them. He certainly has done that.

BROWN: He certainly has done that. Mr. Stock, honestly, I can probably think of 50 more things to ask. I hope you'll come back soon and talk about some of them. But I suppose, more importantly, I hope it's not necessary for you to come back soon and talk about any of them.

Thank you for your time tonight. Nicely done.

STOCK: Thank you.

BROWN: Thank you. Harley Stock.

Next on NEWSNIGHT, he was deeply involved in the son of Sam case here in New York. He has some very strong feelings about how the sniper investigation is being handled, the media's role and more. After a break we'll talk with the columnist, Jimmy Breslin.

This is NEWSNIGHT on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Right now, the rifleman who is causing such pain and fear and anger in the counties around Washington, D.C., has no name, no face, no nationality, no identity at all. He has only an MO.

That was true once in New York City as well. For 13 terrible months a killer made is way from one dark street to another without a face, a name and without an identity. From July of 1976 to august of 1977, he was only what this rifleman is now, only an MO.

We know now, of course, who he is. We have known that for nearly 20 years. At the time, though, we knew only that in letters to newspapers he called himself son of Sam.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): This is who the killer turned out to be: a chubby, bland-faced 23-year-old sometimes security guard from a northern suburb of New York: David Berkowitz. By the time he was caught by police, the combination of hard work and better luck, he had fired 32 bullets from a .44 caliber handgun, always at close range.

In eight separate attacks, he had killed five young women and one young man and wounded seven others.

More than that, he wounded an entire city because the shootings happened mostly in lovers lanes in the city's outer boroughs. Young people stopped sitting in cars, their elders stopped going out or went out only with trepidation when they absolutely had to.

The first few victims were dark haired, so the sales of blond wigs went up.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You know, I'm very frightened especially since I have brown hair.

Mixed with the intense heat of the summer was an intense fear.

Bizarre letters began to appear in the city's newspapers. The writer called himself "a spirit roaming the night, thirsty, hungry, stopping seldom stopping to rest. I love to hunt," he said. "Prowling the streets, looking for fair game, tasty meat."

Some of the letters were addressed directly to Jimmy Breslin, one of the best known columnist in the country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's playing. He's in a game. It's in a game. No question about it. I think he gets a kick out of it.

BROWN: All these years later, Jimmy Breslin still remembers every detail.

JIMMY BRESLIN, COLUMNIST: She held a textbook up to her face and he shot through it and killed her. Two murders four blocks from my house.

BROWN: David Berkowitz is now 49 years old. He is serving several consecutive life sentences, but back before we knew his name, for 13 months for millions of New Yorkers, he poisoned the night.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Jimmy Breslin, a Pulitzer Prize winner writing for "Newsday" these days. Among the most compelling voices of our lifetime is with us tonight.

Mr. Breslin, nice to see you.

BRESLIN: Twenty-five years trying to get years away from that guy and now I'm sitting here looking at him.

BROWN: It's weird, isn't it?

BRESLIN: Frightening, yes.

BROWN: How it comes around.

Talk to me for a bit about media and how you think we are or are not doing here?

BRESLIN: I don't understand this being nice to the police. They dismal failures. They haven't -- they don't have anything. They haven't gotten anywhere and they say they're going to do what the police chief wants. That's nuts. The guy wrote a letter, whoever he is out there. The police chief got the letter, in other words, the guy knows he wrote the letter, the chief knows he wrote the letter. What are you keeping it a secret for?

BROWN: Well, what if -- and this is just hypothetical, but what if the sniper says, I don't want you releasing this letter.

BRESLIN: I don't care what he says. He already shot a guy since you got the letter. That shows you how he acts. Put it out there, Maybe somebody will say, Gee, the way that fella writes reminds me of -- maybe he'll start something going.

The other thing is I haven't seen the newspapers call on the government to be in action. What is George Bush doing campaigning in the state of Maine when a bus driver in Washington in his backyard is being murdered at 5:30 in a morning. A man trying to go to work.

Bush belongs in Washington, set the tone and go for a walk in Maryland and show this bum that we're not afraid and we're going to get him. Because in a turmoil, the streets are live, president of the United States is walking and you're next. We're getting him. So, let's go. What is this cowering in the houses and you can't open schools?

You got school kids -- all you do, you put on your television and they put it in the papers and they kids are in a lockdown. That's a prison term.

BROWN: It sure is.

BRESLIN: It's certainly not just what I wrote every time I go past a school or a prison I feel sorry for the people inside. Now they're proving I'm right. Lockdown.

What is it -- you've got a national guard, why don't you activate them and put them in front of schools. If you have a flood, you have them working. Tell them to have the newspapers start calling for things. Don't put in with the police, because then you're going to make their mistakes. I'll make my own mistakes, thank you.

BROWN: What people -- what readers will say and what viewers will say is, You're not the police, this is what the chief said, in fact, the other day, and you're not the one responsible for catching this guy, we are and until that changes, let us do our job.

BRESLIN: You're not doing your job. You haven't caught him. You don't even know what he looks like. We don't know if it's a man or a boy or anything. I think you're doing a dismal job. You should be replaced, but you haven't been.

So therefore, you try and do your job, I'll do mine.

BROWN: What differently if -- let me ask this more specifically. If you had the specific contents of the note and if police said to you, Jimmy, don't release it.

BRESLIN: Why? Who are they to tell me? It's in. I don't take their -- I don't trust their judgment and the newspaper and the televisions shouldn't either. You're hired to have your own judgment and I don't want the judgment of the police department.

I'm the one, had they canvassed the neighborhood. When I hear that they're walking door to door and people are complaining about their feet hurting because they just did it for 12 hours, I'll know it's an investigation. Until then, I think it's just a fraud.

BROWN: That's very harsh.

BRESLIN: Well are they canvassing any houses?

BROWN: I don't think they know, honestly, where to begin canvasing.

BRESLIN: Well let's get a map. Where is the place? Let's put 1,000 guys and come back when all those houses are canvassed and if somebody is not home, go back to it.

BROWN: Do you think this would be covered differently if this were in New York?

BRESLIN: Well, I will say what I'm saying is what would happen here, yes.

BROWN: You do?

BRESLIN: Absolutely.

BROWN: Even today?

BRESLIN: Yes.

BROWN: In this media environment today?

BRESLIN: Police equal shoe leather, that's all the game is. It isn't press conferences. It isn't hiding letters. It's shoe leather. Get out and knock on doors.

BROWN: Your guy, forgive me for this, Son of Sam, might still be out there today if it was not for an extraordinary piece of luck, a traffic ticket. Would they have gotten him anyway?

BRESLIN: There was a lot of walking around.

BROWN: Would they have gotten him anyway?

BRESLIN: There was a lot of walking around. Sure they were going to get him.

BROWN: It went on for 13 months, this has gone on for three weeks.

BRESLIN: All in one place shooting people everyday. Come on, let's go.

BROWN: You're very tough.

BRESLIN: No, I'm not very tough.

BROWN: No you may be right, but you're very tough.

BRESLIN: The police always equal shoe leather. Always.

BROWN: Don't you believe they're out there working the streets trying to figure this out?

BRESLIN: They've had four dragnets they tell me, right? They know less now than when they started, I think. Why don't they show, I mean, why don't they show anything. Put it out there. I don't believe in anything. If it isn't shoe leather, it doesn't exist.

BROWN: I want to go back to Son of Sam for a second, do you mind?

BRESLIN: Go ahead. He's all yours but I'm here.

BROWN: I know. And how often do I get you, so here we go.

First of all, when this started did you think, Oh, my, this is oddly like Son of Sam. This is that sort of killing. That random killing.

BRESLIN: No dead bodies makes it the same. Yes, I never thought -- I think shooting from a distance was not Berkowitz.

BROWN: No, Berkowitz was so close. But the randomness of it.

BRESLIN: Yes. Maybe the guy -- you know, Berkowitz had a dog in his head telling him when to shoot and he went right past the place I was sitting and he came all the way out there to shoot and the dog told him to go home because it was raining. So...

BROWN: Do you ever hear from him? Do you ever hear from him now?

BRESLIN: Once he sent me a Christmas card from the devil. And that was all. I don't want to hear any more. I didn't even want to -- I never wanted to know about it, Berkowitz has been part of me and now I come here and you open your show with Berkowitz.

BROWN: You're not necessarily a guy I want angry with me.

BRESLIN: No, I'm not angry.

BROWN: No, no. That's fine. I am pleased you're here. Let me go back to where we are then.

BRESLIN: I'm very nice you know.

BROWN: If media has not done well so far, what is the role of media in a moment like this?

BRESLIN: Criticize the police.

BROWN: Criticize the police?

BRESLIN: Police, look at it. Police at a time like this, you know, have an ego problem too. They're like television anchor people.

BROWN: Come on, that's a low blow.

BRESLIN: First of all, I'm a low person. They do have an ego, though. And now there is a confession of faith. I am in possession of a letter. I'm not going to show it to you that's mine.

You've got to be on them. You can't leave them alone. And you can't -- I saw them, they were like balances on the television today. I couldn't believe what I was looking at. What is this?

And you're dead without your police contacts, see, you can't get your story. What story has it been?

BROWN: Well, the contacts are leaking like sieves on this.

BRESLIN: What have they leaked on this? I don't know the first thing about the case. Neither does anyone else.

I do know they try wonderfully well on television all day, but there is nothing to talk about. Do you know anything about this case at all?

BROWN: I know some detail about the case, some of which is reported and some of which not.

BRESLIN: I don't know anybody who knows anything, really. If they don't know what he looks like, they haven't put out a sketch.

BROWN: They certainly don't know that.

BRESLIN: They don't know anything.

BROWN: Nice to see you.

BRESLIN: Good.

BROWN: Come back, I promise I will not mention David Berkowitz.

BRESLIN: Bet on a shoe leather going. Don't be so astounded at what I'm saying.

BROWN: I'm not astounded.

BRESLIN: Bet all your money on shoe leather.

BROWN: Thank you.

BRESLIN: Good. BROWN: You got it. Don't go quite yet.

BRESLIN: No?

BROWN: You can't leave til we're off the shot.

Still ahead on NEWSNIGHT, Florida's governor's case. And we'll take a look at some of the other stories making news around the country today.

Short break, we're right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, why the government may release some Guantanamo detainees and more. We're right back after this short break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: A section here to quickly look at some of the other stories making news tonight here and around the world.

The government is preparing to free a number of detainees at Guantanamo Bay. No precise word on who or how many. Sources say it will be a fairly small number.

Defense Secretary Rumsfeld said today said those who aren't candidates for prosecution and who don't have intelligence value to offer and don't pose a threat are likely, his words, to come out of the other end of the shoot.

First trial of anyone accused of being directly involved in the 9/11 attacks is under way in Hamburg, Germany. Mohammed el-Motasecket (ph) is charged with abetting in the murder of more than 3,000 people, being a member of a terrorist organization. Prosecutors say he was a member of the so-called Hamburg al Qaeda cell, which included three of the hijackers.

At the U.N. Security Council, tough going still for the U.S. draft of a resolution on Iraq. Today was the first day of debate. Right out of the gate, Russia and France offered up objections to the language allowing for military action without further security council after this negotiation goes on.

In Iraq, a rare protest because it was one not staged by the government. About 70 people gathered to ask what had become of their loved ones who were arrested after the Gulf War. Thousands of prisoners were freed over the weekend, but not those prisoners. It didn't take long for police to break up the protest.

Two other stories closer to home, beginning with the arraignment of those men who have become known as the Buffalo six. Six men in Upstate New York today pleaded not guilty to supporting terrorism. The charges against the six are largely based on allegations they attended a terror training camp in Afghanistan in the spring of 2001. An update on the case of the Rhelia Wilson, the little girl lost by the state of Florida's child welfare system. A relative of one of the women was supposed to be caring for Rhelia reached a plea deal on theft and fraud charges. They hope the man can shed some light on her disappearance which was nearly two years ago.

A different guilty plea, this one from the 15-year-old boy who attacked a Kansas City Royals baseball coach on the field last month with his dad at his side. The boy is now back with his family. The father is still in jail. Dad will be arraigned next month on battery charges.

From South Florida, One blimp and one big drama. The pilot of the Metlife blimp "Snoopy I" was forced to jump from the gondola moments before it crashed. Nobody hurt. Officials blame the crash on high winds.

Some of the other stories that made news today.

Ahead on NEWSNIGHT, we'll update the sniper investigation.

Up next: What may be the tightest governor's race in the country. It comes from Florida. We're right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: One political story tonight, it comes from Florida where election preparations might fool you into believing you've landed in Haiti or Afghanistan. Independent monitors are being deployed and the justice department is playing a role, even the local police in Miami, all to prevent a replay of the election mess we all lived through two years ago.

Seems a good thing when you think about, since another race involving a different Bush is shaping up to be quite a nail biter: the race for governor.

Here's CNN's John Zarrella.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Governor Bush, Mr. McBride, thank you, both, for joining us.

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A final debate, a last chance to go one on one, toe to toe.

Florida's Republican Governor Jeb Bush and his Democratic challenger Bill McBride scare squared off in Orlando and left nothing on the table.

BILL MCBRIDE (D), FLORIDA GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: I'd take more of the budget, across the board, and move it into public schools and human services.

GOV. JEB BUSH (R), FLORIDA: To suggest that you're not going to raise taxes, I think, is just being disingenuous.

ZARRELLA: With two weeks before the election, polls show Bush and McBride in a dead heat, a startling turn of events. Just three months ago, McBride was running a distant second in primary polls to Janet Reno.

Now, he's not only the Democratic nominee, he's got what experts say is a legitimate shot to pull the upset of the political season: beating the president's brother.

BOB POE, FLORIDA DEMOCRATIC PARTY CHAIRMAN: The fact that right now Jeb Bush can't get above 49 points in any single poll shows that he's got a problem.

ZARRELLA: Political scientists say this election may well be a repeat of the 2000 presidential race where every vote was critical.

SUSAN MACMANUS, UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FL. POLITICAL SCIENTIST: ... have an equally divided state between Republicans and Democrats. Even our independent voters seem to split between the two which creates the most competitive political environment in the country.

AL CARDENAS, REPUBLICAN PARTY OF FLORIDA CHRM.: There's not a single voting group in Florida you can ignore. Whether it's African- Americans, Hispanics, seniors, women, all age groups, you name it. We have to go after every single vote because it's Florida.

ZARRELLA: Experts say this race is far more than just about the governorship of Florida. It's an integral part of both parties' strategies for 2004.

MARK SILVA, POLITICAL REPORTER, "ORLANDO SENTENTIAL": The president could not have won the White House without Florida, that's clear. And in 2004 he won't be able to win re-election probably without Florida.

ZARRELLA: To help avert a potential Florida disaster, both the governor's mother and father are canvassing the state for their son. Republican party leaders admit their margin right now isn't comfortable. But they say, it's better than where the other guy is.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ZARRELLA: The latest polls show the governor has about a five- point lead and the political experts tell us, the ultimate outcome may come down to the 7 percent of undecided voters. And the experts say, watch the movements of the president. If he has to come back to Florida to help his brother, that means Jeb could be in trouble -- Aaron.

BROWN: John, a month ago, six weeks ago, eight weeks ago, what were the polls showing?

ZARRELLA: The polls were showing that against Janet Reno Jeb Bush would do extremely well. McBride would do better. In fact, before the primaries Jeb Bush ran commercial-time advertisements against McBride ignoring Reno. That's before the Democratic primary. They were clearly worried about McBride and not so worried about Reno.

So getting McBride -- McBride as his opponent has been a tough one for the governor -- Aaron.

BROWN: John, thank you. John Zarrella in Florida tonight.

And still ahead on NEWSNIGHT in our last session tonight, we'll update the sniper investigation. Kelli Arena joins us. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It's been 20 days since this sniper business began. Kelli Arena joins us again from Washington to take a look at day 20.

Kelli, start with this. Some of the things that Mr. Breslin raised about why police are so reluctance to release any more information than they already have.

ARENA: Well, Aaron, sources say that investigators are really being cautious about the information because of the unpredictability of the case. I mean, this is unlike anything they have ever seen before. They don't know how the sniper is going to react to information that is released. They don't want to the jeopardize the investigation.

So all along the way they're making very careful decisions in terms of balancing the public's need to know, while they retain the credibility of the investigation. It's a very hard line to walk, Aaron.

BROWN: Do you have any sense of that pressure on them, by the way, is building to be a more open or more forthcoming than they are?

ARENA: The frustration level has been growing as the weeks progress. And obviously I'm talking to a lot of the same people on a daily basis. And you can sense that frustration that -- for example, this information that came -- that eventually got out about the generalized threat to children.

Really serious grapple in there. I mean, I had one law enforcement official say, Look, I'm a parent. You know, it's very, difficult to sit here and deal with this knowing this is information that I'd want but we know that children were at risk, so it wasn't, really, they thought, at the end of the day helpful for the public to have to worry even more.

BROWN: Kelli, thank you for that. It is a good thing to remind viewers and all of us that these investigators have lived with this too for 20 days and it is very hard work and they must be frustrated. Kelli Arena in Washington.

We'll see you all again tomorrow night at 10:00 Eastern time, we hope. Until then, good night for all of us.

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