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CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

Six Iraqi Children Killed in Accidental Bomb Explosion; Tests Confirm Cholera Outbreak in Basra; Administration Gave Saudis Warning

Aired May 14, 2003 - 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.
Some headlines from Iraq today, six Iraqi children killed in an accidental bomb explosion.

Tests confirm cholera outbreak in Basra.

Defense Secretary Rumsfeld said: "In most of Baghdad at night the hooligans are out. We've had people shot and killed within the last 48 hours."

The United States is stepping up the war against disorder in Iraq, not a minute too soon for many Iraqis. Their present is chaotic, their future uncertain, and their past clearly terrible. Witness another headline from today, thousands of bodies found in mass grave.

But it's the latest on the attacks in Saudi Arabia that begin the whip tonight. Andrea Koppel at the State Department start us off with a headline please.

ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN STATE DEPARTMENT CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, good evening. The plot thickens. CNN has learned that just two days before the suicide bombing attacks in Riyadh, Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley made a secret trip to the Saudi capital and gave Saudi leaders U.S. intelligence that attacks were imminent. Administration sources say that Mr. Hadley also urged the Saudi leaders to step up security around one of the three housing compounds that was later attacked.

BROWN: Andrea, thank you, back to you at the top tonight.

More on the gruesome discovery in Iraq of another mass grave Jane Arraf on that joining us from Baghdad, Jane a headline.

JANE ARRAF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, about 60 miles south of here in a poor Shia community the ground gives up its secrets. Now, human rights groups say that valuable evidence is being lost but relatives of the missing just keep digging.

BROWN: Jane, thank you.

Another gruesome discovery but this time it's not Iraq it's the United States. The bodies of more than a dozen suspected illegal immigrants, Gary Tuchman reporting the story from Victoria, Texas, Gary a headline.

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, 18 illegal immigrants hoping for a better life in America are dead after being packed into a stifling tractor trailer that was found at this truck stop here in Texas. A possible suspect is in custody -- Aaron.

BROWN: Gary, thank you, back to you and the rest shortly.

Also coming up tonight on NEWSNIGHT, David Ensor on the fear that more terror attacks, attacks beyond Saudi Arabia could be in the works.

From the Pentagon tonight, Jamie McIntyre looks at how the United States plans to bring more law and at least some order to Iraq.

A fascinating story about race and a legal travesty in the town of Tulia, Texas, lives ruined by an out of control drug agent. We'll report the story. We'll also hear from "New York Times" columnist Bob Herbert who has made Tulia something of a cause.

And, an update on a different scandal, this one involving an out of control reporter at "The New York Times," Jeff Greenfield has some thoughts about accountability on a day when "The Times" held a company-wide meeting to talk about the scandal.

And then, there is the fight over golfer Annika Sorenstam and whether she should compete in the PGA tournament next week which she will. Josie Karp reports that and we'll talk with John Feinstein who knows a thing or two about golf and has written a book or two about it as well, all of that to come before we say good night.

We begin with the bombings in Riyadh and the questions about whether the Saudis might have done more to prevent them. Normally, the man doing the asking has a mission of smoothing feathers, not ruffling them but today his job involves sending a message, feathers be damned.

We begin with CNN's Andrea Koppel.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KOPPEL (voice-over): Only days after suicide bombers killed at least eight Americans, the U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia leveled unusually blunt criticism at his Saudi hosts.

Robert Jordan said that just before Monday's attacks, the U.S. had urged the Saudis to step up security around one of the three housing compounds attacked this week.

Administration officials tell CNN the message was delivered in Riyadh last Saturday by Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley who provided Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Abdullah, and senior advisers with intelligence warning terrorist attacks were imminent.

Officials say Hadley asked the Saudis to provide a strong visible security presence to deter any attacks. Saudi Arabia's ambassador told CNN his government did address U.S. concerns.

PRINCE BANDAR BIN SULTAN, SAUDI AMBASSADOR TO THE U.S.: Our security agencies took measures. When they investigated this place, they found it had adequate security. The proof of that is when the attack took place on that compound only and fortunately, sadly, the two guards, one Saudi Air Force guard, one civilian, were killed but the physical barriers stopped the attack to hurt people inside.

KOPPEL: Still, the Saudi foreign minister did deliver a rare mea culpa.

PRINCE SAUD AL-FAISAL, SAUDI FOREIGN MINISTER (through translator): We have to look within, not only as leaders but all of the citizens in order to do what is necessary in order to confront terrorism.

KOPPEL: CNN has learned it was its lack of confidence in Saudi security that prompted the State Department to order the departure of non-essential U.S. personnel and family members from all U.S. diplomatic posts in the Saudi kingdom.

Despite last week's bust by Saudi authorities of this cache of explosives and weapons, and a public appeal to apprehend 19 suspected terrorists, some U.S. officials say the kingdom could have done a lot more and was in denial terrorists would strike on Saudi soil.

Privately, U.S. officials also highlight cultural differences noting the wheels of Saudi bureaucracy turn extremely slowly and orders to, for instance, increase security around western compounds aren't implemented quickly unless they come from the top.

ARI FLEISCHER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Saudi Arabia must deal with the fact it has terrorists inside its own country and their presence is as much a threat to Saudi Arabia as it is to Americans and others who live and work in Saudi Arabia.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOPPEL: U.S. officials say the attacks were a major wake-up call for Saudi rulers and they say that the big question is whether the attacks will accelerate U.S.-Saudi cooperation or cause further fissures. Either way, said one U.S. official, Aaron, it is a breaking point -- Aaron.

BROWN: Why would this attack be any more of a wake-up call than the fact that so many of the 9/11 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia or that the Khobar Towers was attacked a number of years ago? What is it about this one that's different?

KOPPEL: Well, Khobar Towers was considered to be a military housing facility so that was not seen as a civilian housing facility or for that matter something that could be tied, for instance, to the Saudis themselves.

As far as 9/11, that was a big embarrassment for the Saudi government and certainly they did recognize that a lot of the recruits came from the Wahhabi sect, and that being the main sect in Saudi Arabia was something to take note of.

But the idea, officials say, that you would have several housing compounds that, yes, some of them did house a lot of Americans but there were also a lot of Jordanians, a lot of Egyptians, a lot of Arabs, and a lot of non-westerners.

So, the idea and in fact there were a lot of Saudis that were killed. The deputy mayor or governor of Riyadh's son was killed in the attack, so it was a much more personal attack. It really hit home much more than the others.

BROWN: Andrea thanks very much, Andrea Koppel at the State Department.

Some headlines from the region seem to hint at a shift of thought taking place. In the "Arab News," the lead editorial is titled "The Enemy Within." We have to face up to the fact that we have a terrorism problem, it reads. For too long, the editorial goes on to say, we did not want to admit that Saudis were involved in September 11. We can no longer ignore that we have a nest of vipers here.

Scott MacLeod is the Cairo Bureau Chief for "TIME" magazine. He joins us on the phone from Riyadh where he's been working the story as well. Scott it's good to have you back. What is it like for westerners in Saudi Arabia tonight?

SCOTT MACLEOD, CAIRO BUREAU CHIEF, "TIME" MAGAZINE: Well, some of the ones I spoke to say that a sense of paranoia has set in. There are many of these compounds of the sort that were attacked the other night. The security has been reasonably good at these compounds for many years now since the first terrorism attack against Americans in Riyadh in 1995.

But the security is not massive and in this case you had, I think, nine suicide bombers in several vehicles launching these attacks and that's something that's pretty hard to guard against when you're talking about a civilian complex where people have to go back and forth to work every day.

BROWN: Is it your impression, I'm not sure how long and how much you've been able to see, the Saudis don't necessarily make it easy, that security in these other compounds that house westerners has been significantly increased?

MACLEOD: There is a noticeable increase in security but the city is not an armed camp at this stage. They fairly are stepping up their intelligence around these facilities. There are some additional vehicles around, some checkpoints around the city.

It's going to be more difficult for a group to carry out another attack of the sort that we saw two nights ago, but as I say when you're talking about a civilian complex, normal housing complex like you have in any suburb of the United States, it's difficult to make that into an armed fort as it were.

BROWN: Perhaps I should have started with this, anything as you've looked at the capital today and in your reporting has anything surprised you?

MACLEOD: Well, the main thing that surprised me is the sharp reaction that the Saudis -- the Saudi government has had. As you were mentioning to Andrea Koppel there, the Saudis should have had a wake- up call before especially with 9/11 and you have 15 Saudis among the hijackers.

But there's been a very strong tendency in Saudi Arabia, even at the highest levels, to deny that it was a Saudi problem. It's always foreigners that are involved, some foreign head, even if it's Saudis, it was Saudis who were trained abroad and brainwashed abroad.

But what I'm seeing in the very quick reaction from the Crown Prince who's the de facto ruler of the country into the religious leadership in the country and some of the newspaper editorials, like you just mentioned, is a very strong acknowledgement that Saudi Arabia has a problem and that this problem has to be dealt with harshly and immediately.

In effect, the Crown Prince's state of the nation address the other night, last night, was equivalent to what President Bush did after 9/11 when he said you're either with us or you're against us. The Saudi regime is coming down very hard, not only on the terrorists but on people who sympathize with terrorism.

They're sending out the message that any Saudi who thinks that this was a good idea that these foreigners who were killed deserve to be killed because they're infidels are no better than the terrorists and that we're going to crack down on this mentality as well as the terrorists.

Now, it remains to be seen whether that kind of confrontation with this sickness in the Saudi society takes place but clearly the Crown Prince and the government are laying down, throwing down the gauntlet to extremist religious leaders in the country and all sorts of people who make excuses for terrorism, support the suicide bombings in Israel, support the suicide bombings in Chechnya. Now it's come down to downtown Riyadh and the government's reacted very strongly.

BROWN: Scott, be safe there and hopefully we'll talk again. Thank you very much, Scott MacLeod, the Cairo Bureau Chief for "TIME" Magazine who's in Riyadh tonight.

Now onto the chance that this is just the start of something, that there's more to come. American officials began raising the possibility of that before the smoke even began to clear in Riyadh and as we go to air tonight, the State Department is again warning against travel to places around the world, in this case East Africa and Malaysia.

Our National Security Correspondent, here's CNN's David Ensor.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In the wake of the bloody attacks in Riyadh, which the Bush administration says bore the hallmarks of al Qaeda, officials say there is intelligence suggesting there could be additional terrorist attacks soon.

FLEISCHER: It does show that they indeed remain a threat and that's why this administration is working so diligently to prosecute this war against al Qaeda everywhere.

ENSOR: U.S. officials say there is intelligence information about Kenya, scene of the resort attack last year, about the Philippines dealing with a Muslim insurgency there, and in Southeast Asia, particularly Malaysia, where a new State Department travel advisory warns of possible attacks like the one in Bali, Indonesia against locations where westerners congregate.

U.S. officials say there is also intelligence suggesting additional attacks are possible in Saudi Arabia. Saudi officials say they are getting tough.

NAIL AL JUBEIR, SAUDI EMBASSY: We are determined to pursue those people who are haters, who are anti-Islam, anti-Arabs, anti-humanity, regardless of how long it takes.

ENSOR: U.S. officials say the Riyadh attacks may be what 9/11 was for the United States, a wake-up call for the Saudis. Democratic presidential candidate Senator Bob Graham said he hopes the Saudis get the message.

SEN. BOB GRAHAM (D), FLORIDA: They have been an uneven and unpredictable ally in the war against terror.

ENSOR: Saudi officials are reportedly focusing in on this man, Khalid Mohammed Wasalim al-Jahani (ph) as the possible ring leader. A tape of him holding a Kalashnikov and promising to die in a martyrdom terror operation was found in an al Qaeda safe house in Kabul and made public in January of last year.

(on camera): U.S. officials say al-Jahani did indeed make his way back to his homeland and may have played a key role in the Riyadh attacks but they're also looking at a couple of other al Qaeda operatives as the possible mastermind.

David Ensor, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Elsa Walsh recently profiled the Saudi ambassador to the United States Prince Bandar in the pages of the "New Yorker" magazine. Ms. Walsh joins us tonight from Washington.

I've been listening to all of the reporting we have been doing and I have been thinking about some of the things that you've been thinking about and writing about and wondering how you're reacting to it because I think you'd make the argument that 9/11 was the Saudi's 9/11 in a sense.

ELSA WALSH, STAFF WRITER, "NEW YORKER": That is correct. I mean you can always say and, in this particular case, everybody can always do better in the terrorism business.

But if you look at this in real time reporting, which I've spent the last two or three years doing, first with the Khobar Towers investigation, and then more recently with 9/11, what you do see is that at the very highest levels between the Saudi government and the U.S. government, particularly with the FBI and the CIA, that the Saudis were making a real effort to investigate, to capture, to arrest al Qaeda because if you look at what the real target of al Qaeda is, it has always been the Saudi royal family.

BROWN: There are clearly some parts about the Khobar Towers case that I don't remember precisely but one of the things I recall here is that there was frustration on the American side that the Saudi government was not allowing American law enforcement, FBI, to interview suspects or do those interrogations.

WALSH: That's correct. Early on in 1996-97 through '98, the Saudis were reluctant to share some of the information. They say they were very worried because the information was pointing towards Iran as the real power behind that and they wanted to know what the U.S. was going to do.

Subsequently, the Saudis opened up almost all of their files, allowed the U.S. to come in and investigate and interrogate the suspects, and I think if you remember when Louis Freeh made one of his rare, the former FBI director made one of his rare appearances post September, 9/11, he made a very specific mention in thanking the Saudis for helping in that investigation and saying that they did it in fact at their own risk.

BROWN: So what is it or why is it that someone with all of the available information that a Senator like Bob Graham who sits on the Intelligence Committee has, would then say that the Saudis have been uneven and unpredictable allies? Go ahead.

WALSH: Well, one of the problems that you have and a lot of it is the Saudis' own fault. They've got a very opaque society. They do not like to talk about what they're doing intelligence wise.

In particular, they do not like to talk about what they're doing with the American government because in their own country the people on the street are not as pro-American as perhaps the leaders are, and so therefore you see a lot of ill-informed and perhaps incomplete reporting.

All I can tell you is that over the last two or three years in looking at this, again as I said in real time reporting, what you see is this almost hysterical response on the part of the Saudis being very worried about what was going on with al Qaeda.

Let me give you an example of just in the last few months prior to this most recent bombing, Prince Bandar met with President Bush half a dozen times, including once in the end of January, early February, and brought to him a chart which showed what the al Qaeda presence was in Saudi Arabia and what it was in the United States and where the danger lay. And, in fact, there were two people who were on that chart, and they personally briefed Bush on this, who actually are involved now in this most recent bombing. And when they'd go back and see Bush, Bush would always ask them, you know, have you picked up that guy? What's going on with that guy?

So, there was an effort to arrest but what happens in these terrorist investigations when you pick up intercepts and things of that sort, they're very, very hard to pinpoint. Nobody says I'm going to bomb CNN at two o'clock on April 23. It's a much more coded kind of thing.

BROWN: But the administration has also said, the White House spokesman has said, that the Saudis need to do more, for example, to crack down on the fund-raising for terrorists that go on in the country.

WALSH: Yes, they do, you know, but the president has also said that the Saudis have been very helpful. Look, they do have a problem, a major problem, and nobody is more aware of it than they are themselves and I think that again what happens is that because the Saudis do so much of their business at the very highest levels of the U.S. government that, in fact, people don't really know what is going on there.

BROWN: We appreciate having you on the program. Thank you, nice to have you.

WALSH: Thank you.

BROWN: Elsa Walsh who writes for the "New Yorker" magazine.

Ahead on NEWSNIGHT on this Wednesday, a truck turned into a tomb for Mexican immigrants trying to sneak into the United States.

From New York this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It's a scene of unimaginable horror, men, women, children jam-packed in a tiny space with so little air they tried to claw through the insulation to get a fresh breath.

It sounds like it could be something from the Holocaust but this is a scene from today, the back of a truck a few hours away from the U.S.-Mexican border people apparently so desperate for a better future they were willing to gamble their lives on a journey with risks no one could anticipate, too many of them they lost the gamble.

Reporting for us tonight, here's CNN's Gary Tuchman.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TUCHMAN (voice-over): They were human beings packed like livestock into a sweltering truck, perhaps as many as 140. It was parked at a truck stop in Victoria, Texas when police got to the scene.

MICHAEL SHELBY, U.S. ATTORNEY: They weren't expecting there to be a flood of human beings out of there and as soon as the individuals did come out of the vehicle, obviously they were confronted then with a number of individuals who were dead inside.

TUCHMAN: The sight was gruesome, 17 people found dead from dehydration and the lack of oxygen. Thirteen of them were still inside the truck, including a small boy. Four other people were found dead outside the truck. Another man died after being brought to the hospital. A total of 44 people who were in the truck are now being held, a few in the hospital, the rest at the local community center.

Between 40 and 80 of the illegal immigrants from Mexico, Honduras, and El Salvador got away.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is the trafficking of human cargo. This is a smuggling case.

TUCHMAN: And authorities say a man is being held in custody who they believe owned the truck. Officials are not saying if Tyrone Williams of Schenectady, New York was driving the vehicle, but they say federal charges could be leveled against him soon.

SHELBY: If convicted the individuals that are responsible for the trafficking of human beings where an individual dies during that trafficking are looking at a possible life sentence or, if we can prove that the action was done intentionally and that the deaths were caused intentionally, there is the possibility of the death penalty in the federal system.

TUCHMAN: The scene at the truck stop stunned people who live nearby.

THEODORE TIPPIN, LOCAL RESIDENT: I think it's terrible. I think it's one of the most tragic things that I've ever seen.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TUCHMAN: Authorities also say they're looking for another man and a woman in connection with the smuggling, which they say was done for one reason, greed. As far as the immigrants who are at the community center right now, authorities say it's very unlikely any of them will stay permanently in the United States; however, many of them may stay for a while because officials are telling us they could be prosecution witnesses in a case against the suspect or suspects -- Aaron.

BROWN: Gary, thank you very much, Gary Tuchman in Texas tonight.

A few stories from around the country, to add to all of this, beginning with a bit of a scare for those of us here in New York today, New Yorkers are, no surprise, pretty sensitive when they see planes in striking distance of big landmarks.

It seems that a Continental charter jet carrying troops returning from Iraq made a special request to get a better view of the Statue of Liberty. It was too close for comfort for some who saw the plane and the FAA said it would deny such requests in the future.

A development involving the scandal, the sex abuse scandal at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado, a cadet has been charged with rape and sodomy. A hearing held today to determine whether he will face a court martial. A female cadet said she was raped last fall. The father of the accused told one reporter the sex was consensual.

A line we couldn't resist saying, where's the fish? A new study in the Journal of Nature shows that in the past half century, 90 percent of the large fish, including sharks and swordfish, tuna, marlin, have disappeared from the world's ocean. One author of the study said this: "There is nowhere left in the ocean that is not over-fished."

And basketball hall of famer, one of the greats of all time, Dave DeBusschere has died. Dave DeBusschere was a defensive star who helped the New York Nicks win two championships in the '70s. NBA Commissioner David Stern said this: "He was a hard-nosed blue collar hero who gave all of his considerable energy to the game." Dave DeBusschere died of a heart attack it is believed. He was 62.

Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, uncovering the past in Iraq, the relatives of victims of Saddam Hussein look through the Ba'ath killing ground for the remains of their family members.

We take a break first, around the world this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It's easy for us here in the comfort and safety that we live in to think of a high-minded thing like democracy in Iraq. The Iraqis themselves, especially those in Baghdad, have more pressing things to worry about: Can they go to work safely? Can they let their kids play in the streets without fear?

Early on, the United States suggested that the looting and the lawlessness would, with any luck, burn out quickly. Not quickly enough, it turns out. And now the United States is promising to do more to stop it.

From the Pentagon tonight, here's CNN's Jamie McIntyre.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, SENIOR PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In Baghdad, U.S. commanders deny "The New York Times" report suggesting U.S. troops would soon shooting looters on sight but did promise tough new tactics to restore law and order.

MAJOR GENERAL BUFORD BLOUNT, 3RD INFANTRY DIVISION COMMANDER: We are aggressively arresting looters now and holding them for a period of time, usually around three weeks right now.

MCINTYRE: On Capitol Hill, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld seemed to imply that could include deadly force.

DONALD RUMSFELD, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: The forces there will be using muscle to see that the people who are trying to disrupt what's taking place in that city are stopped and either captured or killed.

MCINTYRE: Rumsfeld faced sharp questioning from Democrat Robert Byrd.

SENATOR ROBERT BYRD (D), WEST VIRGINIA: The news reports out of Iraq are using words such as turmoil, chaos, and even anarchy to describe the situation in Baghdad.

RUMSFELD: I think the characterization of anarchy is not accurate. It's a headline writer's phrase. We were told today that maybe two-thirds to three-quarters of the city is stable.

MCINTYRE: In response to criticism the U.S. has failed to secure suspected nuclear sites and mass graves, Rumsfeld argued it's unrealistic to expect perfect security everywhere at once.

RUMSFELD: We cannot make a country that has been badly treated and abused and a people that have been badly treated and abused for decades, we can't make it right, we can't make it like the United States in five minutes. And we know that.

MCINTYRE: And Rumsfeld insisted recent personnel changes, including the arrival of top civilian administrator, Paul Bremer, in Baghdad are not in response to problems.

BYRD: I hope that the recent shakeup in the civilian leadership of the U.S. occupation authority will help the situation and will not amount to merely rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

RUMSFELD: There is no shakeup. This has been part of the plan since the very outset.

MCINTYRE (on camera): As for the big question, "Where are Iraq's weapons of mass destruction?" Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld had a familiar refrain: that he believes they will be only found when someone tells the U.S. where they are.

Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Recently, in "The New York Times," Tom Friedman wrote that, as far as he is concerned, American forces don't have to find a single weapon of weapons of mass destruction to justify the war. Finding a single skull from a mass grave was enough.

Tonight, thousands have been unearthed from a plot of land 60 miles south of Baghdad. Nobody one expects them to be the last. And, for each one, there is, of course, a family without a father or a cousin, without a child.

Reporting for us tonight: CNN's Jane Arraf. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JANE ARRAF, CNN BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): They believe their cries can call their dead children from the ground.

"Where can I find you, my son?" this woman asks the dust. This open grave is huge, but not big enough to absorb the grief unleashed here. They are almost all Shias from poor villages believed to have been executed after a 1991 uprising against Saddam Hussein, encouraged but unaided by the U.S., failed. So far, about 3,000 bodies have been recovered, as this mechanical shovel brings up huge chunks of earth.

Iraqi volunteers reading out the names say only about half of them have been identified. When they don't find their loved ones, they're in despair. When they do find them, it's almost worse. "Look, look in the bag," this woman says. This man's father is in the plastic bag. He says his father was beaten to death by Baath Party members on the road after the 1991 war. "They gave the guns to those bastards and they controlled this country," he says. "Let the world hear and see this."

This man found his father yesterday, but came back with a coffin and the body was gone, people here say. There's no way to console him. Nearby, we found someone who was supposed to have been buried, but wasn't. Nasir (ph) says he hasn't spoken much to anyone in 12 years. He tells us of being taken when he was 11 with his mother, uncle and cousin in '91 to this field. Along with others, they were blindfold and bound. Security people pushed them into a ditch, shot them and shoveled earth over them. They missed Nasir. When he made his way home, bruised and bloodied, his father told him never to talk about it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): For 12 years, I haven't been able to talk or breathe. It was hard for me to go through school or finish my military service. I can't speak to anyone. I'm afraid of party members reporting me, since I was supposed to be executed.

ARRAF: At the mass grave, many were also still afraid of the Baathists and the tribe they said aided in the killing and angry at the United States, they say, for letting them down in 1991 and for being a decade too late.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ARRAF: Now, human rights groups say valuable evidence is being lost that could be used for war crimes, with relatives just coming to dig up those bodies. But the U.S. soldiers are at the site, but they say they're providing whatever they're asked to provide. And so far, the Iraqis have not asked for resistance. They say they want to let them do it the way they want to and this is the way local people want to do it, to get their relatives' bodies as quickly as possible -- Aaron.

BROWN: How was it found?

ARRAF: This is the thing about that site and other sites all over Iraq, and more than mass grave sites. Pretty well every atrocity, it was known. People always knew it was there, but they couldn't speak about it and they could certainly never go and start digging there.

But they certainly knew that that site was there. We talked to people who had witnessed executions and actually witnessed the burials who talked of seeing people being led off of buses into that very field. And they didn't -- they weren't close enough to see them being executed, but they saw the bulldozer leveling the ground. So that site was known, as are many others around the country, which presumably we'll be uncovering this as well, as local people go and start digging there, too -- Aaron.

BROWN: Jane, thank you. And it's nice to see you back in Baghdad. Nice to see you back there. Thank you, Jane Arraf, our Baghdad bureau chief, again.

Quick note on something to look for tomorrow on "AMERICAN MORNING." Larry King has an interview with the Apache helicopter pilots held prisoner in Iraq, then rescued with five other soldiers last month: Chief Warrant Officer David Williams, Chief Warrant Officer Ronald Young.

Here's a taste of the interview.

(BEGIN CLIP, "LARRY KING LIVE")

LARRY KING, HOST: What happened that got you caught?

CHIEF WARRANT OFFICER DAVID WILLIAMS, FORMER POW: Well, as we were flying, we were one of 18 aircraft. And Ron and I were part of the main effort of the attack. And it was kind of surreal. It was just like the first days of first war, Desert Storm, with the tracers. And it was -- actually, it was kind of terrifying, flying into that.

How were you hit, Ronald?

CHIEF WARRANT OFFICER RONALD YOUNG, FORMER POW: We were hit by .23 -- I'm supposing a .23-millimeter fire, but it was fairly large caliber. There were a lot of tracers going through the air. They were passing by our aircraft. And one ended up taking out our engine and then took out our flight controls as it went through, pierced the cockpit, cut Dave's boot and filled the cockpit full of smoke. And we descended and made a controlled crash landing, basically.

KING: Were you taken immediately, Ron?

YOUNG: No, we ran for about an hour and a half. We basically took off running from the aircraft, found a ditch to get in, kind of fell off in it as we were running. And we sat there and got -- or made some decisions about what we want to do, which direction we wanted to travel, and how to evade and when we wanted to start trying to contact people to affect our rescue.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BROWN: The entire interview tomorrow morning on "AMERICAN MORNING." "AMERICAN MORNING" starts at 7:00 a.m. Eastern, runs until 10:00 -- that and much more on "AMERICAN MORNING" tomorrow.

Still to come from us tonight: the continuing fallout from the scandal at "The New York Times," as editors try to explain what went wrong when a reporter lied about stories he was working on, lied about every way you could; and the controversy over a woman playing in a male golf tournament. We will talk with John Feinstein about that and more.

NEWSNIGHT continues from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: And next on NEWSNIGHT: pointing the finger of blame in "The New York Times" scandal.

A short break first. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It came out a couple weeks back that Bill Bennett, the longtime crusader for morals in America, was also a longtime gambler. The story resonated for a simple reason. When you demand things of others, you better behave pretty well yourself.

That leads us to the case of "The New York Times." The paper, rightly show, shines the light of scrutiny on bad behavior among the strong and powerful. Well, now with news of a rogue reporter going unchecked, some are wondering "The Times" is shining enough light on itself. Today, the paper held a company-wide meeting on the scandal.

Here's CNN's Jeff Greenfield.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SR. ANALYST (voice-over): If you here in this business of journalism, today's extraordinary meeting, the publisher and top two editors of "The New York Times" meeting with staff, is bound to stir your curiosity.

And the story itself, a major breach of basic journalistic standards at one of the most prestigious papers in the world, has brought with it an armful of questions. Was the paper too eager to promote an appealing young black voice? Did the top brass exempt Jayson Blair from the standards they would have applied to another reporter with so many transgressions on his record?

But there is another issue here, one that goes to the heart of the skepticism so many citizens seem to bring to media. Is "The New York Times," is the press in general, willing to live by the same rules it demands of every other powerful institution? Consider what "The Times" editorial page said last August in the wake of the wave of corporate scandals. When new rules adopted to hold key executives responsible for future wrongdoing, "The Times" said quote: "The move to hold top managers personally liable for any misrepresentations made to investors CEOs is a watershed worth celebrating. CEOs will no longer be able to feign ignorance about the details of their companies' accounting -- unquote.

And when the stories broke last year about sexual abuse on the part of priests, "The Times" wrote -- quote -- "Accountability requires that the people at the top accept responsibility in a manner that goes far beyond mere apologies. Accountability is the reason Kenneth Lay could no longer be in charge at Enron" -- unquote. And "The Boston Globe," which is owned by The New York Times Company, editorially called for Cardinal Law to resign on essentially the same grounds.

But in talking about Jayson Blair's breach of trust, "Times" publisher Arthur Sulzberger was quoted in last Sunday's "Times" as saying quote -- "The person who did this is Jayson Blair. Let's not begin to demonize our executives, either the desk editors or the executive editor or, dare I say, the publisher" -- unquote.

Take a different question: Who should investigate what went wrong? After the space shuttle Columbia disaster, "The Times" wrote quote -- "We remain condition that the board now in charge still lacks there independence needed to give its findings maximum credibility. It was a bad mistake for NASA, whose very future is at stake, to appoint the investigators" -- unquote.

"The "Times" said that its exhaustive investigation into the Blair affair, specific accounts of what went wrong and what mistakes were made, went into the paper without being seen by either of the top two editors. But the reporters and editors who did compile the story ultimately report to those top two editors, Howell Raines and Gerald Boyd.

As a contrast, back in 1998, after CNN retracted its "Tailwind" story that alleged the use of nerve gas by U.S. forces in Southeast Asia, CNN hired outside attorney Floyd Abrams to run an independent review.

(on camera): These essential themes -- accountability, transparency, no cover-ups -- have been staples of editorial pages for decades. At "The New York Times," these had been its editorial demands on everything from Whitewater to 9/11. And now this most honored of all American papers finds itself being asked the very same questions it has so often asked of others.

Jeff Greenfield, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: We should add that, at today's meeting of "The New York Times," Howell Raines, the paper's executive editor, told the staff -- excuse me -- that was coming all night -- told the staff he wouldn't resign because of the scandal, that according to staffers who were there.

Next on NEWSNIGHT, we will talk more about this story with WashingtonPost.com reporter and columnist Terry Neal, who has had a lot to say since the scandal broke.

We'll take break first. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: More now on the story of "New York Times" reporter Jayson Blair and an uncomfortable question: Should the fact that Jayson Blair is black even enter into the discussion? Terry Neal is a columnist for TheWashingtonPost.com. He has been writing about this. And we thought we would talk to him about it.

Good to have you on the program.

TERRY NEAL, THEWASHINGTONPOST.COM: Thanks for having me.

BROWN: Well, Howie Kurtz from "The Post," who did a lot of good reporting on this, through the race question out. Do you think it doesn't belong here at all?

NEAL: You know what? I really -- actually, I don't have that much of a problem with the question being raised, just because I think it's inevitable. And as a reporter and somebody who asks questions for a living, I would never say don't even ask the question.

And I actually think that the news media, the real news media, has done a pretty good job of covering this aspect of the story. I think the race issue mostly has come up by ideologically driven columnists and talking heads and talk radio people. But I think the general media has done a pretty good job. They've raised the question. They've kind of given both sides of it, but the flames are really being, I think, fanned by I would call them ideological opportunists.

BROWN: Well, welcome to modern media, you know what I mean?

Do you think that there is nothing to be said here? One of the things that Howie said was, he wondered if a middle-aged white guy would have been given as many chances with as many mistakes. Do you think that that question or that concern has taken on too large a part of the discussion?

NEAL: I do.

And this is why. I think a lot of the thing -- one of the things that a lot of people who don't know that much about the way newsrooms work or not in journalism, I think they think or have the impression that "The New York Times" knew all along that this guy was lying and making up stuff and fabricating quotes and scenes and things like that and they let him continue to operate and gave him promotions.

That's not really the case, at least my understanding. I don't work for "The New York Times." But my understanding, this is a guy who was a young guy they were pushing clearly faster than he needed to go. And he was making lots of errors and having to write lots of corrections. The stuff that we've found out in the last couple weeks was not necessarily things that "The Times" knew five or six years ago.

Nonetheless, I do think that the corrections he was making, some of the mistakes here was making, certainly should have raised red flags. Now, the question is, did he somehow get further ahead of where someone else might have gotten had they not been African- American? And for that, I turn to "The Weekly Standard," which is a conservative magazine and last week did a little piece that I thought was very interesting and not too many people are talking about.

And that showed that two not just middle-aged, but old white guys, basically, Adam Clymer and Johnny Apple, had a higher error rate than this kid did before this scandal broke. It's something like 6.9 percent of his stories resulted in corrections, compared to 14 percent by R.W. "Johnny" Apple, who is one of their most famous reporters and experienced reporters.

So the question is, yes, certainly, a lot of other reporters had high correction rates and were not fired. It didn't keep them from having great careers. I just think that -- I think it is certainly true that this kid was pushed along faster than he should have. But I'm seeing this phenomena a lot. And I've seen it in my 14 years of journalism a lot. Usually, it is white reporters. And these reporters are brought along very fast.

And a lot of times, they make mistakes. They are not really ready for prime time. But young people get shots. The problem here is that Jayson Blair blew his shot. He was basically a con artist, from what I can see.

BROWN: Do you worry -- obviously, you worry -- this one of those hanging-curve questions -- that this is going to make life for young African-American reporters or people who are aspiring reporters a whole lot more difficult?

NEAL: I have thought about that a lot. I hope that's not the case. But, ultimately, I have faith in most of the people who are in this profession that I'm in that, for every bad person there are, for every person that's going to take what Jayson Blair did and trying and extrapolate it and make this seem like this is what happens when you bring certain people into the newsroom, for every one person like that, I think that there's two people who understand the larger context of things and understand that you can't take the mistake that one person made and sort of extrapolate that to a larger picture just based on race.

(CROSSTALK)

NEAL: I'm sorry. Go ahead.

BROWN: I'm sorry.

I was just going it say, thank you. And I hope that you will come back to talk not just about this and not just about race, but a whole lot of other things as well.

NEAL: Any time.

BROWN: Terrific job. Thank you, Terry Neal.

NEAL: Thank you. Appreciate it.

BROWN: Thank you very much.

Still ahead on NEWSNIGHT: the battle of sexes on the golf course. Should Annika Sorenstam, the best woman golfer on the planet, be playing against the big boys?

We'll take a break first. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It says a whole lot of something that there's a golf story out there these days that doesn't involve Tiger Woods -- at least it should be a golf story -- I'm not sure it is anymore.

The decision by the world's best female golfer, Annika Sorenstam, to play a PGA tournament, a men's event, next week in Texas will be the sports story of the week. And it seems it's going to be a really long week, because it's already started. Some of the men on the tour are, shall we say, a bit miffed that Ms. Sorenstam is teeing it up with them in their event. Others are looking at it with a bit of bemusement.

We'll talk with sportswriter John Feinstein in a moment, but first a little background on this year's version of the battle of the sexes from CNN's Josie Karp.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOSIE KARP, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With his comments this week, golfer Vijay Singh has transformed the battle of the sexes into a roar of words. Singh says it's nothing personal, but he doesn't believe female golfer Annika Sorenstam should play in the PGA's Colonial Golf Tournament next week.

VIJAY SINGH, PGA GOLFER: This is a man's tour. And there are guys out there who are trying to make a living. And it's not a ladies tour. If she wants to play, she's supposed to, you know, she should -- or any woman, for that matter, if they want to play the man's tournament, they should qualify and play like everybody else.

There's no attack on Annika at all. I mean if -- like I said, if I did and she, you know, I'd like to apologize to her. It was not put that way and it just came out the wrong way.

KARP: Singh's comments are the boldest so far by a member of the men's tour. Singh doesn't want Sorenstam to play without qualifying. And, perhaps most telling, he doesn't want her to outplay him.

SINGH: If I miss the cut, I'd rather she miss the cut as well. You know, or hope she missed the cut, because I don't want to go back and another woman beat me.

KARP: Representing the other side is Tiger Woods, who won't run the risk of losing to Sorenstam because he's not playing in Fort Worth.

TIGER WOODS, SORENSTAM SUPPORTER: It's unfortunate Vijay said that. It's very unfortunate. But I left a message for Annika and just told her, Just go out there and play. It's going to be a huge distraction, everything that week's going to be a huge distraction for her. But just go out there and play, compete.

KARP: Since Sorenstam announced her intentions three months ago, she's been under intense scrutiny. All along, she's maintained that the tour players she's heard from have agreed more with Woods than with Singh.

ANNIKA SORENSTAM, WORLD'S NUMBER ONE FEMALE GOLFER: I've talked to a few players. I must say, they've been very positive, at least to me, what I've heard, and the things that they've told me. You know, I had a chance to play with David Frost at the Colonial, and he was very supportive.

LEE JANSEN, CURRENTLY RANKS 116th ON PGA MONEY LIST: I don't think it's a knock on the LPG tour if she doesn't do well, and I don't think it's a knock on us if she makes the cut. You know, it's a one- time deal. It'll be forgotten about six months from now.

KARP: But for now, it's a big story that will only grow over the next eight days, until Sorenstam tees off with the men next Thursday.

Already, CBS is planning an extra hour of its tournament coverage next weekend to document the Sorenstam saga, whether she makes the cut or not.

Josie Karp, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Few writers that we know of get golf the way John Feinstein does. He's the author of a wonderful golf book, "A Good Walk Spoiled." Most recently he's written "Open: Inside the Ropes at Beth Page Black," story of the U.S. Open.

Mr. Feinstein joins us again from Washington tonight.

You think we're hearing much truth from the men on the tour these days, or are they all being -- or most of them being politically correct?

JOHN FEINSTEIN, AUTHOR, "OPEN": Oh, I think most of them are probably being politically correct there. And I think, though, what Vijay Singh said simply isn't true. There's nothing that says the PGA tour is a men's tour, unlike the LPGA, which specifically is a women's tour. Men cannot play on the LPGA tour. The PGA tour is supposed to be for the best players. The other thing is that a lot of players get sponsor exemptions into PGA tour events, which is what Sorenstam's playing on, who have not qualified for the PGA tour. They're young players. They're -- sometimes they're older players who are well known but are no longer exempt on the tour.

That's the purpose of the sponsor exemption, to bring someone into the tent to play who otherwise is ineligible. So really, those who say that she's taking a spot away from someone simply -- it's simply not true in this case.

BROWN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) I can't imagine, honestly, the pressure that she is under right now, and that she's going to be under for at least those two days until we see whether she's part of that half the field that gets paid and makes the cut.

What do you think the -- what is a reasonable expectation of what she can do?

FEINSTEIN: You know, Aaron, I think the fun part of this is that none of us really knows. I mean, I could sit here -- I could throw a number out at you. I could say that I think if she shoots 73-73, which would be 6 over par, she's done well. And I could be 100 percent wrong. She could shoot 10 shots above that or 10 shots under that.

That's what is fun about sports is that we don't know. And sometimes we get to find out. Next week we'll get to find out. And, you know, sitting around and speculating, to me, is almost a waste of time.

BROWN: Well, that's also what we do in sport, it's a free pass to speculate on almost anything.

Let's talk a bit about the book. The U.S. Open at Beth Page, least -- it was one of those moments, particularly (UNINTELLIGIBLE) you were in New York, particularly given the events of 9/11 as so many events were, that was an extraordinary moment. Now, it began years and years ago. It was -- the decision to bring it to a public course, a true public course, was made years before.

FEINSTEIN: Right, it started, really, in 1994, when David Faye (ph) got a letter from a friend of his, George Eringer (ph), a local amateur, saying, You really ought to look at the Black course. It's in terrible condition right now because the state hasn't spent any money on it. It's a state-owned municipal course, as you mentioned.

But the design is genius. There's genius in the design. And David Faye, the executive director of the USGA, couple months later, happened to be near the Black course. He's heading for a dinner party, had some time to kill.

Went and walked the course, 4:30, late on a November afternoon, and said, You know what? George is right, this is worth trying. It'll take millions of dollars, it'll take all sorts of political maneuvering. But if we could pull it off, it could be a great thing for golf.

And seven and a half years later, through all sorts of machinations, they did pull it off. And I think people would make the argument it was one of the great U.S. Opens ever played because of the venue, because of the fans, because it was at a public golf course, and because the greatest player in the world, Tiger Woods, ended up being the only player to break par.

BROWN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) a tough four days. The book is a terrific story about not just the golf but how the golf ended up there around the Open. Come back, we'll talk about it more. John, thank you very much.

FEINSTEIN: Thanks, Aaron.

BROWN: Thank you.

NEWSNIGHT continues with a look at the headlines. Take a break.

(NEWSBREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We like to believe, we Americans, that we would rather 10 guilty men go free than one innocent man convicted. But after years of seeing innocent men released from prison by DNA testing, we should all know better.

This is a story of how the legal system failed, how, on the word of one man, a man with a troubled past and now a very troubled future, nearly 10 percent of the black population of a small Texas town was arrested, charged, and, in many cases, sent to prison on drug charges.

It is also a story of their vindication. But before we get too excited about that, we should acknowledge how long it has taken despite the evidence that something was wrong, very wrong, in Tulia, Texas.

Here's CNN's Ed Lavandera.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In the late 1990s, law officers say drugs started moving through Tulia faster than the west Texas wind. So when a drug sting busted about 45 alleged cocaine dealers on July 23, 1999, the town celebrated.

Almost all of those arrested that day were African-American.

Billy Wafer says he got a call from a friend that morning, warning him authorities were headed his way.

BILLY WAFER, TULIA DEFENDANT: They wasn't out for justice in the first place. They was ready to just have a lynch mob, you know. Should have put your white hood on and let us know you was coming. That way we might have would have been more prepared. LAVANDERA: Wafer and the others were arrested because of the work of undercover drug agent Tom Coleman, and the cases were prosecuted solely on Coleman's word. Some were convicted, some plead guilty, and other cases were dropped.

Back then, there were few notes, no surveillance video or wiretaps.

And now there may, in fact, have been no evidence. Coleman was indicted in late April on perjury charges related to these arrests, and a Texas appeals court is deciding whether to order new trials.

Retired judge Ron Chapman was appointed by the court to review exactly what happened in Tulia. In his report, Chapman called Coleman "the most devious, nonresponsive law enforcement officer this court has seen," and "entirely unbelievable" as a witness.

Repeated efforts by CNN to reach Coleman have been unsuccessful. But last year, the lawman defended his work.

TOM COLEMAN, FORMER UNDERCOVER OFFICER: I believe we did everything right in Tulia, everything. And I don't think there's anybody -- I don't think there's not anybody in jail that don't deserve to be there, or on probation.

LAVANDERA (on camera): When Tom Coleman came to Tulia, he started hanging around this cattle auction barn. This is where he first started doing some of his undercover works as a narcotics agent, meeting some of the people that he'd soon be arresting.

But no one here knew anything about him, and they certainly didn't know anything about his past.

(voice-over): In a previous job as a sheriff's deputy, his boss told state authorities that Coleman "should not be in law enforcement." Coleman has said his boss had it out for him.

JEFF BLACKBURN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: They were black...

LAVANDERA: Jeff Blackburn works as a defense attorney for some of the Tulia defendants, and wonders how Coleman's testimony could have been enough to convict them.

BLACKBURN: So what we've got here is a complete system breakdown, a breakdown of the defense function, a breakdown of the prosecution function, and a breakdown of the whole judicial system.

LAVANDERA: Fifty-nine-year-old Joe Moore doesn't think what happened to him is fair. He's serving a 90-year sentence. He says he never met Tom Coleman.

(on camera): Did you realize how much trouble you were in then?

JOE MOORE, TULIA DEFENDANT: I really didn't know. I didn't know what was going on. I didn't even know what was going on. Why, I didn't -- still, right from today, I don't know what is going on. LAVANDERA: Joe Moore is one of 13 defendants still in prison. Their lawyers say they all want their names cleared of wrongdoing, and prosecutors say if the appeals court in Texas orders new trials, they will all walk away free.

Ed Lavandera, CNN, Tulia, Texas.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: As Ed Lavandera reported, CNN has been unable to contact Mr. Coleman recently. If and when we do, we would be pleased to have him join us here on the program.

We'll continue our look at the Tulia story in a moment. We'll talk with Bob Herbert of "The New York Times," who has written extensively about the case.

A quick break first. This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: If there's one man who's held the proverbial feet of the town of Tulia, Texas, to the fire, it's "New York Times" columnist Bob Herbert. We talked with Mr. Herbert about the case earlier this week.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: What happened in Tulia?

BOB HERBERT, COLUMNIST, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": Well, this was a case of an investigation gone just totally haywire. I mean, you have these drug task forces, which are financed by the federal government, but which, in many cases, are essentially run by amateurs.

And in this case, it was not just an amateur. I mean, there was this one guy, Tom Coleman, who took the whole thing on his shoulders to run this so-called deep undercover investigation. But it was an amateur with what I think of as extreme personal problems.

And so he targeted a segment of the community in Tulia and just went after them without evidence that they had done anything wrong, certainly not anything criminal.

BROWN: Is it, in your mind, a case of racial malevolence, or was the guy -- I put -- use the word in quotes, was he just "sick"?

HERBERT: It's -- I just can't get into Tom Coleman's head to that extent. I mean, the -- what happened in the investigation, I think, was clearly racist. But if you're asking me what were his motives initially, you know, did he say, Oh, I'm just going to go round up some black folks, I frankly don't know.

What I do know is that he targeted only blacks, or a handful of whites who had relationships with blacks, and they were the only ones that he went after. And in fact, it became so blatant that some of his superiors became concerned and tried to nudge him into what they referred to as other portions of the community in Tulia, and he didn't take the hint, he continued to focus only on blacks.

BROWN: Well, they weren't so concerned that they didn't...

HERBERT: Yes, they...

BROWN: ... pursue the cases and prosecute the cases.

HERBERT: They weren't willing to blow the whistle on him at all, no.

BROWN: Right. And, in fact, they defended him for a long time.

HERBERT: Oh, they absolutely did. I mean, they -- he was defended all the way up the line. I mean, the state attorney general knew about the abuses in this case, had the authority to investigate, and did not.

The attorney general of the United States, John Ashcroft, his office was alerted to this case. They did what they -- they did perhaps a cursory investigation, and there was no -- they never announced that they had found anything wrong. They certainly didn't take any action.

So this just went on and on. And the evidence just began to mount that it was an investigation gone haywire, that innocent people were in prison.

And in fact, there were people who were proved to be innocent. I mean, one woman who was accused who was actually in Oklahoma when she was alleged to have been selling drugs to Tom Coleman in Tulia.

But still, people would not step in.

BROWN: Two more at least here. Do you believe in your heart that if he had walked into the sheriff's office and had 10 percent of the white population as involved in illegal drugs, that the sheriff would have responded in the way the sheriff responded?

HERBERT: No. The sheriff would have responded differently, and the community would have responded differently. There would have been outrage on the ground in Tulia. But also, if 10 percent of the white population in Tulia had been arrested on drug problems, this would have been an enormous national story. You would have had the TV vans lined up in this tiny Texas community, you know, broadcasting the story all across the land.

BROWN: Because of sheer numbers?

HERBERT: Not just because of sheer numbers. I mean, in cases like this, if the target of something, of a clearly -- of an investigation that was -- had clearly gone wrong, if the target, targets were large numbers of whites, the media just, I believe, responds differently to that sort of thing. It would have been seen as a national story from the beginning.

BROWN: Let me ask a question, then, about "The Times." You've been free to write about this.

HERBERT: Right.

BROWN: Has -- have the news pages of "The Times" devoted as much space to this story as they have to, let's say, the Masters controversy over whether women could join Augusta National?

HERBERT: Well, I think that's really mixing apples and oranges. They're such different types of stories. So rather than make that kind of comparison, I would just simply say that I wish "The Times" had devoted more attention to the Tulia story. Now, they did some long stories in "The Times," so the story was definitely not ignored in the news pages of "The Times."

But I thought from the very beginning that this was a very big story. I still think that it's a bigger story than you would guess from the attention that it's getting. I mean, I'm really happy that you're talking about it this evening.

BROWN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE), right. I mean, you have 10 percent of the population of a town...

HERBERT: Right, I guess it was 40-some people were arrested initially, just rounded up in a really humiliating way. They alerted the news media in advance so that the television cameras were rolling. The raids were early in the morning, so they rousted folks out of bed. A lot of them, they were half-dressed, they wouldn't even, you know, allow them to get dressed.

I mean, it was just a deliberate, calculated humiliation of a huge segment of the town. And they thought that they could get away with this. They thought that not many people would pay attention. And in fact, that was true.

The initial stories of the raids were just carried as straight news stories. The assumption was that all of these people were guilty. They were characterized as major narcotics traffickers, which was absurd on its face, you know.

And then the story just sort of went away.

BROWN: Thank you for coming in to talk about it. We appreciate it a lot.

HERBERT: Well, I appreciate it. Thanks for having me.

BROWN: Thank you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Bob Herbert of "The New York Times," a columnist on "The Times," written a lot about this. We were glad to talk to him earlier in the week.

Morning papers, tomorrow morning's papers, coming up, assuming we have a voice for that. Take a break first, muster our resources. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: OK, time for -- if you've done it, just don't tell me, OK? Time to do morning papers, tomorrow morning's papers from around the country and around the world.

A couple of interesting things in the papers. Well, first of all, those of you who think this segment's gone too short, you get your wish tonight. Boy.

"The Cincinnati Enquirer," terrific lead story. "Battered Wife Charged in Shooting, Controversial Defense Likely in Ex-husband's Death." This is a classic battered woman defense murder story. We'll see how they handle it in the state of Ohio. But the woman, when she was arrested, was all beat up, and black eyes and the whole thing. Doesn't mean necessarily she had a right to kill her ex-husband, but that's the facts of the case, and a jury will ultimately decide it.

Now, "Moon Takes Spin in Our Shadow," a lunar eclipse. Our producer, who we love a lot, David Borman (ph), has been telling the staff for a week, it's no big deal, yet here it is on the front page of "The Cincinnati Enquirer," where it belongs.

And one more story, because this will come up again. "Drop That Salt! Blood Pressure Red-Flagged." Now, look at how -- this is a story that they're redoing the calculations on what's safe -- how different newspapers played the blood pressure story.

"The Oregonian," out of Portland, Oregon, huge, man, I mean, they play is about as big as you can, "High Blood Pressure Numbers Sink Lower." That's their big story on the front page. Almost "USA Today"-like, isn't it?

Now, "The New York Times," which doesn't get that excited about any story unless it is enormous, still plays it on the front page. "U.S Guidelines Are Reassessing Blood Pressure," right there on the front page of "The New York Times."

"Miami Herald" -- yes, "Miami Herald," I'm going to do two on this one -- down here at the bottom, "Normal Blood Pressure Level Now Thought Too High, Risky." So they play it on the front page.

Oh, they also have that lunar eclipse story on the front page, David.

DAVID BORMAN, PRODUCER: Thirty.

BROWN: Anyway, their big story in the -- What was that?

BORMAN: Thirty.

BROWN: Thank you.

BROWN: Their big story in "The Miami Herald," "'I'm Finally Going Home,' Judge Frees Man Convicted in Deputy's Murder." It's a young man who -- mentally challenged, was sent to prison, and not clear whether there's evidence to do so.

The best story of the day, "The Detroit News," Denny McLain, the great pitcher, the last pitcher to win 30 games, pitches Slurpees. He's being -- he's in the halfway house, he's had nothing but legal problems, and now he's working part-time at the Seven-11. How they fall.

That's morning papers. Join us again tomorrow, will you, 10:00 Eastern time. Until then, good night for all of us at NEWSNIGHT.

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





Tests Confirm Cholera Outbreak in Basra; Administration Gave Saudis Warning>


Aired May 14, 2003 - 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.
Some headlines from Iraq today, six Iraqi children killed in an accidental bomb explosion.

Tests confirm cholera outbreak in Basra.

Defense Secretary Rumsfeld said: "In most of Baghdad at night the hooligans are out. We've had people shot and killed within the last 48 hours."

The United States is stepping up the war against disorder in Iraq, not a minute too soon for many Iraqis. Their present is chaotic, their future uncertain, and their past clearly terrible. Witness another headline from today, thousands of bodies found in mass grave.

But it's the latest on the attacks in Saudi Arabia that begin the whip tonight. Andrea Koppel at the State Department start us off with a headline please.

ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN STATE DEPARTMENT CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, good evening. The plot thickens. CNN has learned that just two days before the suicide bombing attacks in Riyadh, Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley made a secret trip to the Saudi capital and gave Saudi leaders U.S. intelligence that attacks were imminent. Administration sources say that Mr. Hadley also urged the Saudi leaders to step up security around one of the three housing compounds that was later attacked.

BROWN: Andrea, thank you, back to you at the top tonight.

More on the gruesome discovery in Iraq of another mass grave Jane Arraf on that joining us from Baghdad, Jane a headline.

JANE ARRAF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, about 60 miles south of here in a poor Shia community the ground gives up its secrets. Now, human rights groups say that valuable evidence is being lost but relatives of the missing just keep digging.

BROWN: Jane, thank you.

Another gruesome discovery but this time it's not Iraq it's the United States. The bodies of more than a dozen suspected illegal immigrants, Gary Tuchman reporting the story from Victoria, Texas, Gary a headline.

GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Aaron, 18 illegal immigrants hoping for a better life in America are dead after being packed into a stifling tractor trailer that was found at this truck stop here in Texas. A possible suspect is in custody -- Aaron.

BROWN: Gary, thank you, back to you and the rest shortly.

Also coming up tonight on NEWSNIGHT, David Ensor on the fear that more terror attacks, attacks beyond Saudi Arabia could be in the works.

From the Pentagon tonight, Jamie McIntyre looks at how the United States plans to bring more law and at least some order to Iraq.

A fascinating story about race and a legal travesty in the town of Tulia, Texas, lives ruined by an out of control drug agent. We'll report the story. We'll also hear from "New York Times" columnist Bob Herbert who has made Tulia something of a cause.

And, an update on a different scandal, this one involving an out of control reporter at "The New York Times," Jeff Greenfield has some thoughts about accountability on a day when "The Times" held a company-wide meeting to talk about the scandal.

And then, there is the fight over golfer Annika Sorenstam and whether she should compete in the PGA tournament next week which she will. Josie Karp reports that and we'll talk with John Feinstein who knows a thing or two about golf and has written a book or two about it as well, all of that to come before we say good night.

We begin with the bombings in Riyadh and the questions about whether the Saudis might have done more to prevent them. Normally, the man doing the asking has a mission of smoothing feathers, not ruffling them but today his job involves sending a message, feathers be damned.

We begin with CNN's Andrea Koppel.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KOPPEL (voice-over): Only days after suicide bombers killed at least eight Americans, the U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia leveled unusually blunt criticism at his Saudi hosts.

Robert Jordan said that just before Monday's attacks, the U.S. had urged the Saudis to step up security around one of the three housing compounds attacked this week.

Administration officials tell CNN the message was delivered in Riyadh last Saturday by Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley who provided Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Abdullah, and senior advisers with intelligence warning terrorist attacks were imminent.

Officials say Hadley asked the Saudis to provide a strong visible security presence to deter any attacks. Saudi Arabia's ambassador told CNN his government did address U.S. concerns.

PRINCE BANDAR BIN SULTAN, SAUDI AMBASSADOR TO THE U.S.: Our security agencies took measures. When they investigated this place, they found it had adequate security. The proof of that is when the attack took place on that compound only and fortunately, sadly, the two guards, one Saudi Air Force guard, one civilian, were killed but the physical barriers stopped the attack to hurt people inside.

KOPPEL: Still, the Saudi foreign minister did deliver a rare mea culpa.

PRINCE SAUD AL-FAISAL, SAUDI FOREIGN MINISTER (through translator): We have to look within, not only as leaders but all of the citizens in order to do what is necessary in order to confront terrorism.

KOPPEL: CNN has learned it was its lack of confidence in Saudi security that prompted the State Department to order the departure of non-essential U.S. personnel and family members from all U.S. diplomatic posts in the Saudi kingdom.

Despite last week's bust by Saudi authorities of this cache of explosives and weapons, and a public appeal to apprehend 19 suspected terrorists, some U.S. officials say the kingdom could have done a lot more and was in denial terrorists would strike on Saudi soil.

Privately, U.S. officials also highlight cultural differences noting the wheels of Saudi bureaucracy turn extremely slowly and orders to, for instance, increase security around western compounds aren't implemented quickly unless they come from the top.

ARI FLEISCHER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Saudi Arabia must deal with the fact it has terrorists inside its own country and their presence is as much a threat to Saudi Arabia as it is to Americans and others who live and work in Saudi Arabia.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KOPPEL: U.S. officials say the attacks were a major wake-up call for Saudi rulers and they say that the big question is whether the attacks will accelerate U.S.-Saudi cooperation or cause further fissures. Either way, said one U.S. official, Aaron, it is a breaking point -- Aaron.

BROWN: Why would this attack be any more of a wake-up call than the fact that so many of the 9/11 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia or that the Khobar Towers was attacked a number of years ago? What is it about this one that's different?

KOPPEL: Well, Khobar Towers was considered to be a military housing facility so that was not seen as a civilian housing facility or for that matter something that could be tied, for instance, to the Saudis themselves.

As far as 9/11, that was a big embarrassment for the Saudi government and certainly they did recognize that a lot of the recruits came from the Wahhabi sect, and that being the main sect in Saudi Arabia was something to take note of.

But the idea, officials say, that you would have several housing compounds that, yes, some of them did house a lot of Americans but there were also a lot of Jordanians, a lot of Egyptians, a lot of Arabs, and a lot of non-westerners.

So, the idea and in fact there were a lot of Saudis that were killed. The deputy mayor or governor of Riyadh's son was killed in the attack, so it was a much more personal attack. It really hit home much more than the others.

BROWN: Andrea thanks very much, Andrea Koppel at the State Department.

Some headlines from the region seem to hint at a shift of thought taking place. In the "Arab News," the lead editorial is titled "The Enemy Within." We have to face up to the fact that we have a terrorism problem, it reads. For too long, the editorial goes on to say, we did not want to admit that Saudis were involved in September 11. We can no longer ignore that we have a nest of vipers here.

Scott MacLeod is the Cairo Bureau Chief for "TIME" magazine. He joins us on the phone from Riyadh where he's been working the story as well. Scott it's good to have you back. What is it like for westerners in Saudi Arabia tonight?

SCOTT MACLEOD, CAIRO BUREAU CHIEF, "TIME" MAGAZINE: Well, some of the ones I spoke to say that a sense of paranoia has set in. There are many of these compounds of the sort that were attacked the other night. The security has been reasonably good at these compounds for many years now since the first terrorism attack against Americans in Riyadh in 1995.

But the security is not massive and in this case you had, I think, nine suicide bombers in several vehicles launching these attacks and that's something that's pretty hard to guard against when you're talking about a civilian complex where people have to go back and forth to work every day.

BROWN: Is it your impression, I'm not sure how long and how much you've been able to see, the Saudis don't necessarily make it easy, that security in these other compounds that house westerners has been significantly increased?

MACLEOD: There is a noticeable increase in security but the city is not an armed camp at this stage. They fairly are stepping up their intelligence around these facilities. There are some additional vehicles around, some checkpoints around the city.

It's going to be more difficult for a group to carry out another attack of the sort that we saw two nights ago, but as I say when you're talking about a civilian complex, normal housing complex like you have in any suburb of the United States, it's difficult to make that into an armed fort as it were.

BROWN: Perhaps I should have started with this, anything as you've looked at the capital today and in your reporting has anything surprised you?

MACLEOD: Well, the main thing that surprised me is the sharp reaction that the Saudis -- the Saudi government has had. As you were mentioning to Andrea Koppel there, the Saudis should have had a wake- up call before especially with 9/11 and you have 15 Saudis among the hijackers.

But there's been a very strong tendency in Saudi Arabia, even at the highest levels, to deny that it was a Saudi problem. It's always foreigners that are involved, some foreign head, even if it's Saudis, it was Saudis who were trained abroad and brainwashed abroad.

But what I'm seeing in the very quick reaction from the Crown Prince who's the de facto ruler of the country into the religious leadership in the country and some of the newspaper editorials, like you just mentioned, is a very strong acknowledgement that Saudi Arabia has a problem and that this problem has to be dealt with harshly and immediately.

In effect, the Crown Prince's state of the nation address the other night, last night, was equivalent to what President Bush did after 9/11 when he said you're either with us or you're against us. The Saudi regime is coming down very hard, not only on the terrorists but on people who sympathize with terrorism.

They're sending out the message that any Saudi who thinks that this was a good idea that these foreigners who were killed deserve to be killed because they're infidels are no better than the terrorists and that we're going to crack down on this mentality as well as the terrorists.

Now, it remains to be seen whether that kind of confrontation with this sickness in the Saudi society takes place but clearly the Crown Prince and the government are laying down, throwing down the gauntlet to extremist religious leaders in the country and all sorts of people who make excuses for terrorism, support the suicide bombings in Israel, support the suicide bombings in Chechnya. Now it's come down to downtown Riyadh and the government's reacted very strongly.

BROWN: Scott, be safe there and hopefully we'll talk again. Thank you very much, Scott MacLeod, the Cairo Bureau Chief for "TIME" Magazine who's in Riyadh tonight.

Now onto the chance that this is just the start of something, that there's more to come. American officials began raising the possibility of that before the smoke even began to clear in Riyadh and as we go to air tonight, the State Department is again warning against travel to places around the world, in this case East Africa and Malaysia.

Our National Security Correspondent, here's CNN's David Ensor.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In the wake of the bloody attacks in Riyadh, which the Bush administration says bore the hallmarks of al Qaeda, officials say there is intelligence suggesting there could be additional terrorist attacks soon.

FLEISCHER: It does show that they indeed remain a threat and that's why this administration is working so diligently to prosecute this war against al Qaeda everywhere.

ENSOR: U.S. officials say there is intelligence information about Kenya, scene of the resort attack last year, about the Philippines dealing with a Muslim insurgency there, and in Southeast Asia, particularly Malaysia, where a new State Department travel advisory warns of possible attacks like the one in Bali, Indonesia against locations where westerners congregate.

U.S. officials say there is also intelligence suggesting additional attacks are possible in Saudi Arabia. Saudi officials say they are getting tough.

NAIL AL JUBEIR, SAUDI EMBASSY: We are determined to pursue those people who are haters, who are anti-Islam, anti-Arabs, anti-humanity, regardless of how long it takes.

ENSOR: U.S. officials say the Riyadh attacks may be what 9/11 was for the United States, a wake-up call for the Saudis. Democratic presidential candidate Senator Bob Graham said he hopes the Saudis get the message.

SEN. BOB GRAHAM (D), FLORIDA: They have been an uneven and unpredictable ally in the war against terror.

ENSOR: Saudi officials are reportedly focusing in on this man, Khalid Mohammed Wasalim al-Jahani (ph) as the possible ring leader. A tape of him holding a Kalashnikov and promising to die in a martyrdom terror operation was found in an al Qaeda safe house in Kabul and made public in January of last year.

(on camera): U.S. officials say al-Jahani did indeed make his way back to his homeland and may have played a key role in the Riyadh attacks but they're also looking at a couple of other al Qaeda operatives as the possible mastermind.

David Ensor, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Elsa Walsh recently profiled the Saudi ambassador to the United States Prince Bandar in the pages of the "New Yorker" magazine. Ms. Walsh joins us tonight from Washington.

I've been listening to all of the reporting we have been doing and I have been thinking about some of the things that you've been thinking about and writing about and wondering how you're reacting to it because I think you'd make the argument that 9/11 was the Saudi's 9/11 in a sense.

ELSA WALSH, STAFF WRITER, "NEW YORKER": That is correct. I mean you can always say and, in this particular case, everybody can always do better in the terrorism business.

But if you look at this in real time reporting, which I've spent the last two or three years doing, first with the Khobar Towers investigation, and then more recently with 9/11, what you do see is that at the very highest levels between the Saudi government and the U.S. government, particularly with the FBI and the CIA, that the Saudis were making a real effort to investigate, to capture, to arrest al Qaeda because if you look at what the real target of al Qaeda is, it has always been the Saudi royal family.

BROWN: There are clearly some parts about the Khobar Towers case that I don't remember precisely but one of the things I recall here is that there was frustration on the American side that the Saudi government was not allowing American law enforcement, FBI, to interview suspects or do those interrogations.

WALSH: That's correct. Early on in 1996-97 through '98, the Saudis were reluctant to share some of the information. They say they were very worried because the information was pointing towards Iran as the real power behind that and they wanted to know what the U.S. was going to do.

Subsequently, the Saudis opened up almost all of their files, allowed the U.S. to come in and investigate and interrogate the suspects, and I think if you remember when Louis Freeh made one of his rare, the former FBI director made one of his rare appearances post September, 9/11, he made a very specific mention in thanking the Saudis for helping in that investigation and saying that they did it in fact at their own risk.

BROWN: So what is it or why is it that someone with all of the available information that a Senator like Bob Graham who sits on the Intelligence Committee has, would then say that the Saudis have been uneven and unpredictable allies? Go ahead.

WALSH: Well, one of the problems that you have and a lot of it is the Saudis' own fault. They've got a very opaque society. They do not like to talk about what they're doing intelligence wise.

In particular, they do not like to talk about what they're doing with the American government because in their own country the people on the street are not as pro-American as perhaps the leaders are, and so therefore you see a lot of ill-informed and perhaps incomplete reporting.

All I can tell you is that over the last two or three years in looking at this, again as I said in real time reporting, what you see is this almost hysterical response on the part of the Saudis being very worried about what was going on with al Qaeda.

Let me give you an example of just in the last few months prior to this most recent bombing, Prince Bandar met with President Bush half a dozen times, including once in the end of January, early February, and brought to him a chart which showed what the al Qaeda presence was in Saudi Arabia and what it was in the United States and where the danger lay. And, in fact, there were two people who were on that chart, and they personally briefed Bush on this, who actually are involved now in this most recent bombing. And when they'd go back and see Bush, Bush would always ask them, you know, have you picked up that guy? What's going on with that guy?

So, there was an effort to arrest but what happens in these terrorist investigations when you pick up intercepts and things of that sort, they're very, very hard to pinpoint. Nobody says I'm going to bomb CNN at two o'clock on April 23. It's a much more coded kind of thing.

BROWN: But the administration has also said, the White House spokesman has said, that the Saudis need to do more, for example, to crack down on the fund-raising for terrorists that go on in the country.

WALSH: Yes, they do, you know, but the president has also said that the Saudis have been very helpful. Look, they do have a problem, a major problem, and nobody is more aware of it than they are themselves and I think that again what happens is that because the Saudis do so much of their business at the very highest levels of the U.S. government that, in fact, people don't really know what is going on there.

BROWN: We appreciate having you on the program. Thank you, nice to have you.

WALSH: Thank you.

BROWN: Elsa Walsh who writes for the "New Yorker" magazine.

Ahead on NEWSNIGHT on this Wednesday, a truck turned into a tomb for Mexican immigrants trying to sneak into the United States.

From New York this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It's a scene of unimaginable horror, men, women, children jam-packed in a tiny space with so little air they tried to claw through the insulation to get a fresh breath.

It sounds like it could be something from the Holocaust but this is a scene from today, the back of a truck a few hours away from the U.S.-Mexican border people apparently so desperate for a better future they were willing to gamble their lives on a journey with risks no one could anticipate, too many of them they lost the gamble.

Reporting for us tonight, here's CNN's Gary Tuchman.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TUCHMAN (voice-over): They were human beings packed like livestock into a sweltering truck, perhaps as many as 140. It was parked at a truck stop in Victoria, Texas when police got to the scene.

MICHAEL SHELBY, U.S. ATTORNEY: They weren't expecting there to be a flood of human beings out of there and as soon as the individuals did come out of the vehicle, obviously they were confronted then with a number of individuals who were dead inside.

TUCHMAN: The sight was gruesome, 17 people found dead from dehydration and the lack of oxygen. Thirteen of them were still inside the truck, including a small boy. Four other people were found dead outside the truck. Another man died after being brought to the hospital. A total of 44 people who were in the truck are now being held, a few in the hospital, the rest at the local community center.

Between 40 and 80 of the illegal immigrants from Mexico, Honduras, and El Salvador got away.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is the trafficking of human cargo. This is a smuggling case.

TUCHMAN: And authorities say a man is being held in custody who they believe owned the truck. Officials are not saying if Tyrone Williams of Schenectady, New York was driving the vehicle, but they say federal charges could be leveled against him soon.

SHELBY: If convicted the individuals that are responsible for the trafficking of human beings where an individual dies during that trafficking are looking at a possible life sentence or, if we can prove that the action was done intentionally and that the deaths were caused intentionally, there is the possibility of the death penalty in the federal system.

TUCHMAN: The scene at the truck stop stunned people who live nearby.

THEODORE TIPPIN, LOCAL RESIDENT: I think it's terrible. I think it's one of the most tragic things that I've ever seen.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TUCHMAN: Authorities also say they're looking for another man and a woman in connection with the smuggling, which they say was done for one reason, greed. As far as the immigrants who are at the community center right now, authorities say it's very unlikely any of them will stay permanently in the United States; however, many of them may stay for a while because officials are telling us they could be prosecution witnesses in a case against the suspect or suspects -- Aaron.

BROWN: Gary, thank you very much, Gary Tuchman in Texas tonight.

A few stories from around the country, to add to all of this, beginning with a bit of a scare for those of us here in New York today, New Yorkers are, no surprise, pretty sensitive when they see planes in striking distance of big landmarks.

It seems that a Continental charter jet carrying troops returning from Iraq made a special request to get a better view of the Statue of Liberty. It was too close for comfort for some who saw the plane and the FAA said it would deny such requests in the future.

A development involving the scandal, the sex abuse scandal at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado, a cadet has been charged with rape and sodomy. A hearing held today to determine whether he will face a court martial. A female cadet said she was raped last fall. The father of the accused told one reporter the sex was consensual.

A line we couldn't resist saying, where's the fish? A new study in the Journal of Nature shows that in the past half century, 90 percent of the large fish, including sharks and swordfish, tuna, marlin, have disappeared from the world's ocean. One author of the study said this: "There is nowhere left in the ocean that is not over-fished."

And basketball hall of famer, one of the greats of all time, Dave DeBusschere has died. Dave DeBusschere was a defensive star who helped the New York Nicks win two championships in the '70s. NBA Commissioner David Stern said this: "He was a hard-nosed blue collar hero who gave all of his considerable energy to the game." Dave DeBusschere died of a heart attack it is believed. He was 62.

Coming up on NEWSNIGHT, uncovering the past in Iraq, the relatives of victims of Saddam Hussein look through the Ba'ath killing ground for the remains of their family members.

We take a break first, around the world this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It's easy for us here in the comfort and safety that we live in to think of a high-minded thing like democracy in Iraq. The Iraqis themselves, especially those in Baghdad, have more pressing things to worry about: Can they go to work safely? Can they let their kids play in the streets without fear?

Early on, the United States suggested that the looting and the lawlessness would, with any luck, burn out quickly. Not quickly enough, it turns out. And now the United States is promising to do more to stop it.

From the Pentagon tonight, here's CNN's Jamie McIntyre.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, SENIOR PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In Baghdad, U.S. commanders deny "The New York Times" report suggesting U.S. troops would soon shooting looters on sight but did promise tough new tactics to restore law and order.

MAJOR GENERAL BUFORD BLOUNT, 3RD INFANTRY DIVISION COMMANDER: We are aggressively arresting looters now and holding them for a period of time, usually around three weeks right now.

MCINTYRE: On Capitol Hill, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld seemed to imply that could include deadly force.

DONALD RUMSFELD, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: The forces there will be using muscle to see that the people who are trying to disrupt what's taking place in that city are stopped and either captured or killed.

MCINTYRE: Rumsfeld faced sharp questioning from Democrat Robert Byrd.

SENATOR ROBERT BYRD (D), WEST VIRGINIA: The news reports out of Iraq are using words such as turmoil, chaos, and even anarchy to describe the situation in Baghdad.

RUMSFELD: I think the characterization of anarchy is not accurate. It's a headline writer's phrase. We were told today that maybe two-thirds to three-quarters of the city is stable.

MCINTYRE: In response to criticism the U.S. has failed to secure suspected nuclear sites and mass graves, Rumsfeld argued it's unrealistic to expect perfect security everywhere at once.

RUMSFELD: We cannot make a country that has been badly treated and abused and a people that have been badly treated and abused for decades, we can't make it right, we can't make it like the United States in five minutes. And we know that.

MCINTYRE: And Rumsfeld insisted recent personnel changes, including the arrival of top civilian administrator, Paul Bremer, in Baghdad are not in response to problems.

BYRD: I hope that the recent shakeup in the civilian leadership of the U.S. occupation authority will help the situation and will not amount to merely rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

RUMSFELD: There is no shakeup. This has been part of the plan since the very outset.

MCINTYRE (on camera): As for the big question, "Where are Iraq's weapons of mass destruction?" Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld had a familiar refrain: that he believes they will be only found when someone tells the U.S. where they are.

Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Recently, in "The New York Times," Tom Friedman wrote that, as far as he is concerned, American forces don't have to find a single weapon of weapons of mass destruction to justify the war. Finding a single skull from a mass grave was enough.

Tonight, thousands have been unearthed from a plot of land 60 miles south of Baghdad. Nobody one expects them to be the last. And, for each one, there is, of course, a family without a father or a cousin, without a child.

Reporting for us tonight: CNN's Jane Arraf. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JANE ARRAF, CNN BAGHDAD BUREAU CHIEF (voice-over): They believe their cries can call their dead children from the ground.

"Where can I find you, my son?" this woman asks the dust. This open grave is huge, but not big enough to absorb the grief unleashed here. They are almost all Shias from poor villages believed to have been executed after a 1991 uprising against Saddam Hussein, encouraged but unaided by the U.S., failed. So far, about 3,000 bodies have been recovered, as this mechanical shovel brings up huge chunks of earth.

Iraqi volunteers reading out the names say only about half of them have been identified. When they don't find their loved ones, they're in despair. When they do find them, it's almost worse. "Look, look in the bag," this woman says. This man's father is in the plastic bag. He says his father was beaten to death by Baath Party members on the road after the 1991 war. "They gave the guns to those bastards and they controlled this country," he says. "Let the world hear and see this."

This man found his father yesterday, but came back with a coffin and the body was gone, people here say. There's no way to console him. Nearby, we found someone who was supposed to have been buried, but wasn't. Nasir (ph) says he hasn't spoken much to anyone in 12 years. He tells us of being taken when he was 11 with his mother, uncle and cousin in '91 to this field. Along with others, they were blindfold and bound. Security people pushed them into a ditch, shot them and shoveled earth over them. They missed Nasir. When he made his way home, bruised and bloodied, his father told him never to talk about it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): For 12 years, I haven't been able to talk or breathe. It was hard for me to go through school or finish my military service. I can't speak to anyone. I'm afraid of party members reporting me, since I was supposed to be executed.

ARRAF: At the mass grave, many were also still afraid of the Baathists and the tribe they said aided in the killing and angry at the United States, they say, for letting them down in 1991 and for being a decade too late.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ARRAF: Now, human rights groups say valuable evidence is being lost that could be used for war crimes, with relatives just coming to dig up those bodies. But the U.S. soldiers are at the site, but they say they're providing whatever they're asked to provide. And so far, the Iraqis have not asked for resistance. They say they want to let them do it the way they want to and this is the way local people want to do it, to get their relatives' bodies as quickly as possible -- Aaron.

BROWN: How was it found?

ARRAF: This is the thing about that site and other sites all over Iraq, and more than mass grave sites. Pretty well every atrocity, it was known. People always knew it was there, but they couldn't speak about it and they could certainly never go and start digging there.

But they certainly knew that that site was there. We talked to people who had witnessed executions and actually witnessed the burials who talked of seeing people being led off of buses into that very field. And they didn't -- they weren't close enough to see them being executed, but they saw the bulldozer leveling the ground. So that site was known, as are many others around the country, which presumably we'll be uncovering this as well, as local people go and start digging there, too -- Aaron.

BROWN: Jane, thank you. And it's nice to see you back in Baghdad. Nice to see you back there. Thank you, Jane Arraf, our Baghdad bureau chief, again.

Quick note on something to look for tomorrow on "AMERICAN MORNING." Larry King has an interview with the Apache helicopter pilots held prisoner in Iraq, then rescued with five other soldiers last month: Chief Warrant Officer David Williams, Chief Warrant Officer Ronald Young.

Here's a taste of the interview.

(BEGIN CLIP, "LARRY KING LIVE")

LARRY KING, HOST: What happened that got you caught?

CHIEF WARRANT OFFICER DAVID WILLIAMS, FORMER POW: Well, as we were flying, we were one of 18 aircraft. And Ron and I were part of the main effort of the attack. And it was kind of surreal. It was just like the first days of first war, Desert Storm, with the tracers. And it was -- actually, it was kind of terrifying, flying into that.

How were you hit, Ronald?

CHIEF WARRANT OFFICER RONALD YOUNG, FORMER POW: We were hit by .23 -- I'm supposing a .23-millimeter fire, but it was fairly large caliber. There were a lot of tracers going through the air. They were passing by our aircraft. And one ended up taking out our engine and then took out our flight controls as it went through, pierced the cockpit, cut Dave's boot and filled the cockpit full of smoke. And we descended and made a controlled crash landing, basically.

KING: Were you taken immediately, Ron?

YOUNG: No, we ran for about an hour and a half. We basically took off running from the aircraft, found a ditch to get in, kind of fell off in it as we were running. And we sat there and got -- or made some decisions about what we want to do, which direction we wanted to travel, and how to evade and when we wanted to start trying to contact people to affect our rescue.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BROWN: The entire interview tomorrow morning on "AMERICAN MORNING." "AMERICAN MORNING" starts at 7:00 a.m. Eastern, runs until 10:00 -- that and much more on "AMERICAN MORNING" tomorrow.

Still to come from us tonight: the continuing fallout from the scandal at "The New York Times," as editors try to explain what went wrong when a reporter lied about stories he was working on, lied about every way you could; and the controversy over a woman playing in a male golf tournament. We will talk with John Feinstein about that and more.

NEWSNIGHT continues from New York.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: And next on NEWSNIGHT: pointing the finger of blame in "The New York Times" scandal.

A short break first. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It came out a couple weeks back that Bill Bennett, the longtime crusader for morals in America, was also a longtime gambler. The story resonated for a simple reason. When you demand things of others, you better behave pretty well yourself.

That leads us to the case of "The New York Times." The paper, rightly show, shines the light of scrutiny on bad behavior among the strong and powerful. Well, now with news of a rogue reporter going unchecked, some are wondering "The Times" is shining enough light on itself. Today, the paper held a company-wide meeting on the scandal.

Here's CNN's Jeff Greenfield.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF GREENFIELD, CNN SR. ANALYST (voice-over): If you here in this business of journalism, today's extraordinary meeting, the publisher and top two editors of "The New York Times" meeting with staff, is bound to stir your curiosity.

And the story itself, a major breach of basic journalistic standards at one of the most prestigious papers in the world, has brought with it an armful of questions. Was the paper too eager to promote an appealing young black voice? Did the top brass exempt Jayson Blair from the standards they would have applied to another reporter with so many transgressions on his record?

But there is another issue here, one that goes to the heart of the skepticism so many citizens seem to bring to media. Is "The New York Times," is the press in general, willing to live by the same rules it demands of every other powerful institution? Consider what "The Times" editorial page said last August in the wake of the wave of corporate scandals. When new rules adopted to hold key executives responsible for future wrongdoing, "The Times" said quote: "The move to hold top managers personally liable for any misrepresentations made to investors CEOs is a watershed worth celebrating. CEOs will no longer be able to feign ignorance about the details of their companies' accounting -- unquote.

And when the stories broke last year about sexual abuse on the part of priests, "The Times" wrote -- quote -- "Accountability requires that the people at the top accept responsibility in a manner that goes far beyond mere apologies. Accountability is the reason Kenneth Lay could no longer be in charge at Enron" -- unquote. And "The Boston Globe," which is owned by The New York Times Company, editorially called for Cardinal Law to resign on essentially the same grounds.

But in talking about Jayson Blair's breach of trust, "Times" publisher Arthur Sulzberger was quoted in last Sunday's "Times" as saying quote -- "The person who did this is Jayson Blair. Let's not begin to demonize our executives, either the desk editors or the executive editor or, dare I say, the publisher" -- unquote.

Take a different question: Who should investigate what went wrong? After the space shuttle Columbia disaster, "The Times" wrote quote -- "We remain condition that the board now in charge still lacks there independence needed to give its findings maximum credibility. It was a bad mistake for NASA, whose very future is at stake, to appoint the investigators" -- unquote.

"The "Times" said that its exhaustive investigation into the Blair affair, specific accounts of what went wrong and what mistakes were made, went into the paper without being seen by either of the top two editors. But the reporters and editors who did compile the story ultimately report to those top two editors, Howell Raines and Gerald Boyd.

As a contrast, back in 1998, after CNN retracted its "Tailwind" story that alleged the use of nerve gas by U.S. forces in Southeast Asia, CNN hired outside attorney Floyd Abrams to run an independent review.

(on camera): These essential themes -- accountability, transparency, no cover-ups -- have been staples of editorial pages for decades. At "The New York Times," these had been its editorial demands on everything from Whitewater to 9/11. And now this most honored of all American papers finds itself being asked the very same questions it has so often asked of others.

Jeff Greenfield, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: We should add that, at today's meeting of "The New York Times," Howell Raines, the paper's executive editor, told the staff -- excuse me -- that was coming all night -- told the staff he wouldn't resign because of the scandal, that according to staffers who were there.

Next on NEWSNIGHT, we will talk more about this story with WashingtonPost.com reporter and columnist Terry Neal, who has had a lot to say since the scandal broke.

We'll take break first. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: More now on the story of "New York Times" reporter Jayson Blair and an uncomfortable question: Should the fact that Jayson Blair is black even enter into the discussion? Terry Neal is a columnist for TheWashingtonPost.com. He has been writing about this. And we thought we would talk to him about it.

Good to have you on the program.

TERRY NEAL, THEWASHINGTONPOST.COM: Thanks for having me.

BROWN: Well, Howie Kurtz from "The Post," who did a lot of good reporting on this, through the race question out. Do you think it doesn't belong here at all?

NEAL: You know what? I really -- actually, I don't have that much of a problem with the question being raised, just because I think it's inevitable. And as a reporter and somebody who asks questions for a living, I would never say don't even ask the question.

And I actually think that the news media, the real news media, has done a pretty good job of covering this aspect of the story. I think the race issue mostly has come up by ideologically driven columnists and talking heads and talk radio people. But I think the general media has done a pretty good job. They've raised the question. They've kind of given both sides of it, but the flames are really being, I think, fanned by I would call them ideological opportunists.

BROWN: Well, welcome to modern media, you know what I mean?

Do you think that there is nothing to be said here? One of the things that Howie said was, he wondered if a middle-aged white guy would have been given as many chances with as many mistakes. Do you think that that question or that concern has taken on too large a part of the discussion?

NEAL: I do.

And this is why. I think a lot of the thing -- one of the things that a lot of people who don't know that much about the way newsrooms work or not in journalism, I think they think or have the impression that "The New York Times" knew all along that this guy was lying and making up stuff and fabricating quotes and scenes and things like that and they let him continue to operate and gave him promotions.

That's not really the case, at least my understanding. I don't work for "The New York Times." But my understanding, this is a guy who was a young guy they were pushing clearly faster than he needed to go. And he was making lots of errors and having to write lots of corrections. The stuff that we've found out in the last couple weeks was not necessarily things that "The Times" knew five or six years ago.

Nonetheless, I do think that the corrections he was making, some of the mistakes here was making, certainly should have raised red flags. Now, the question is, did he somehow get further ahead of where someone else might have gotten had they not been African- American? And for that, I turn to "The Weekly Standard," which is a conservative magazine and last week did a little piece that I thought was very interesting and not too many people are talking about.

And that showed that two not just middle-aged, but old white guys, basically, Adam Clymer and Johnny Apple, had a higher error rate than this kid did before this scandal broke. It's something like 6.9 percent of his stories resulted in corrections, compared to 14 percent by R.W. "Johnny" Apple, who is one of their most famous reporters and experienced reporters.

So the question is, yes, certainly, a lot of other reporters had high correction rates and were not fired. It didn't keep them from having great careers. I just think that -- I think it is certainly true that this kid was pushed along faster than he should have. But I'm seeing this phenomena a lot. And I've seen it in my 14 years of journalism a lot. Usually, it is white reporters. And these reporters are brought along very fast.

And a lot of times, they make mistakes. They are not really ready for prime time. But young people get shots. The problem here is that Jayson Blair blew his shot. He was basically a con artist, from what I can see.

BROWN: Do you worry -- obviously, you worry -- this one of those hanging-curve questions -- that this is going to make life for young African-American reporters or people who are aspiring reporters a whole lot more difficult?

NEAL: I have thought about that a lot. I hope that's not the case. But, ultimately, I have faith in most of the people who are in this profession that I'm in that, for every bad person there are, for every person that's going to take what Jayson Blair did and trying and extrapolate it and make this seem like this is what happens when you bring certain people into the newsroom, for every one person like that, I think that there's two people who understand the larger context of things and understand that you can't take the mistake that one person made and sort of extrapolate that to a larger picture just based on race.

(CROSSTALK)

NEAL: I'm sorry. Go ahead.

BROWN: I'm sorry.

I was just going it say, thank you. And I hope that you will come back to talk not just about this and not just about race, but a whole lot of other things as well.

NEAL: Any time.

BROWN: Terrific job. Thank you, Terry Neal.

NEAL: Thank you. Appreciate it.

BROWN: Thank you very much.

Still ahead on NEWSNIGHT: the battle of sexes on the golf course. Should Annika Sorenstam, the best woman golfer on the planet, be playing against the big boys?

We'll take a break first. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: It says a whole lot of something that there's a golf story out there these days that doesn't involve Tiger Woods -- at least it should be a golf story -- I'm not sure it is anymore.

The decision by the world's best female golfer, Annika Sorenstam, to play a PGA tournament, a men's event, next week in Texas will be the sports story of the week. And it seems it's going to be a really long week, because it's already started. Some of the men on the tour are, shall we say, a bit miffed that Ms. Sorenstam is teeing it up with them in their event. Others are looking at it with a bit of bemusement.

We'll talk with sportswriter John Feinstein in a moment, but first a little background on this year's version of the battle of the sexes from CNN's Josie Karp.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOSIE KARP, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With his comments this week, golfer Vijay Singh has transformed the battle of the sexes into a roar of words. Singh says it's nothing personal, but he doesn't believe female golfer Annika Sorenstam should play in the PGA's Colonial Golf Tournament next week.

VIJAY SINGH, PGA GOLFER: This is a man's tour. And there are guys out there who are trying to make a living. And it's not a ladies tour. If she wants to play, she's supposed to, you know, she should -- or any woman, for that matter, if they want to play the man's tournament, they should qualify and play like everybody else.

There's no attack on Annika at all. I mean if -- like I said, if I did and she, you know, I'd like to apologize to her. It was not put that way and it just came out the wrong way.

KARP: Singh's comments are the boldest so far by a member of the men's tour. Singh doesn't want Sorenstam to play without qualifying. And, perhaps most telling, he doesn't want her to outplay him.

SINGH: If I miss the cut, I'd rather she miss the cut as well. You know, or hope she missed the cut, because I don't want to go back and another woman beat me.

KARP: Representing the other side is Tiger Woods, who won't run the risk of losing to Sorenstam because he's not playing in Fort Worth.

TIGER WOODS, SORENSTAM SUPPORTER: It's unfortunate Vijay said that. It's very unfortunate. But I left a message for Annika and just told her, Just go out there and play. It's going to be a huge distraction, everything that week's going to be a huge distraction for her. But just go out there and play, compete.

KARP: Since Sorenstam announced her intentions three months ago, she's been under intense scrutiny. All along, she's maintained that the tour players she's heard from have agreed more with Woods than with Singh.

ANNIKA SORENSTAM, WORLD'S NUMBER ONE FEMALE GOLFER: I've talked to a few players. I must say, they've been very positive, at least to me, what I've heard, and the things that they've told me. You know, I had a chance to play with David Frost at the Colonial, and he was very supportive.

LEE JANSEN, CURRENTLY RANKS 116th ON PGA MONEY LIST: I don't think it's a knock on the LPG tour if she doesn't do well, and I don't think it's a knock on us if she makes the cut. You know, it's a one- time deal. It'll be forgotten about six months from now.

KARP: But for now, it's a big story that will only grow over the next eight days, until Sorenstam tees off with the men next Thursday.

Already, CBS is planning an extra hour of its tournament coverage next weekend to document the Sorenstam saga, whether she makes the cut or not.

Josie Karp, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Few writers that we know of get golf the way John Feinstein does. He's the author of a wonderful golf book, "A Good Walk Spoiled." Most recently he's written "Open: Inside the Ropes at Beth Page Black," story of the U.S. Open.

Mr. Feinstein joins us again from Washington tonight.

You think we're hearing much truth from the men on the tour these days, or are they all being -- or most of them being politically correct?

JOHN FEINSTEIN, AUTHOR, "OPEN": Oh, I think most of them are probably being politically correct there. And I think, though, what Vijay Singh said simply isn't true. There's nothing that says the PGA tour is a men's tour, unlike the LPGA, which specifically is a women's tour. Men cannot play on the LPGA tour. The PGA tour is supposed to be for the best players. The other thing is that a lot of players get sponsor exemptions into PGA tour events, which is what Sorenstam's playing on, who have not qualified for the PGA tour. They're young players. They're -- sometimes they're older players who are well known but are no longer exempt on the tour.

That's the purpose of the sponsor exemption, to bring someone into the tent to play who otherwise is ineligible. So really, those who say that she's taking a spot away from someone simply -- it's simply not true in this case.

BROWN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) I can't imagine, honestly, the pressure that she is under right now, and that she's going to be under for at least those two days until we see whether she's part of that half the field that gets paid and makes the cut.

What do you think the -- what is a reasonable expectation of what she can do?

FEINSTEIN: You know, Aaron, I think the fun part of this is that none of us really knows. I mean, I could sit here -- I could throw a number out at you. I could say that I think if she shoots 73-73, which would be 6 over par, she's done well. And I could be 100 percent wrong. She could shoot 10 shots above that or 10 shots under that.

That's what is fun about sports is that we don't know. And sometimes we get to find out. Next week we'll get to find out. And, you know, sitting around and speculating, to me, is almost a waste of time.

BROWN: Well, that's also what we do in sport, it's a free pass to speculate on almost anything.

Let's talk a bit about the book. The U.S. Open at Beth Page, least -- it was one of those moments, particularly (UNINTELLIGIBLE) you were in New York, particularly given the events of 9/11 as so many events were, that was an extraordinary moment. Now, it began years and years ago. It was -- the decision to bring it to a public course, a true public course, was made years before.

FEINSTEIN: Right, it started, really, in 1994, when David Faye (ph) got a letter from a friend of his, George Eringer (ph), a local amateur, saying, You really ought to look at the Black course. It's in terrible condition right now because the state hasn't spent any money on it. It's a state-owned municipal course, as you mentioned.

But the design is genius. There's genius in the design. And David Faye, the executive director of the USGA, couple months later, happened to be near the Black course. He's heading for a dinner party, had some time to kill.

Went and walked the course, 4:30, late on a November afternoon, and said, You know what? George is right, this is worth trying. It'll take millions of dollars, it'll take all sorts of political maneuvering. But if we could pull it off, it could be a great thing for golf.

And seven and a half years later, through all sorts of machinations, they did pull it off. And I think people would make the argument it was one of the great U.S. Opens ever played because of the venue, because of the fans, because it was at a public golf course, and because the greatest player in the world, Tiger Woods, ended up being the only player to break par.

BROWN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) a tough four days. The book is a terrific story about not just the golf but how the golf ended up there around the Open. Come back, we'll talk about it more. John, thank you very much.

FEINSTEIN: Thanks, Aaron.

BROWN: Thank you.

NEWSNIGHT continues with a look at the headlines. Take a break.

(NEWSBREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: We like to believe, we Americans, that we would rather 10 guilty men go free than one innocent man convicted. But after years of seeing innocent men released from prison by DNA testing, we should all know better.

This is a story of how the legal system failed, how, on the word of one man, a man with a troubled past and now a very troubled future, nearly 10 percent of the black population of a small Texas town was arrested, charged, and, in many cases, sent to prison on drug charges.

It is also a story of their vindication. But before we get too excited about that, we should acknowledge how long it has taken despite the evidence that something was wrong, very wrong, in Tulia, Texas.

Here's CNN's Ed Lavandera.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In the late 1990s, law officers say drugs started moving through Tulia faster than the west Texas wind. So when a drug sting busted about 45 alleged cocaine dealers on July 23, 1999, the town celebrated.

Almost all of those arrested that day were African-American.

Billy Wafer says he got a call from a friend that morning, warning him authorities were headed his way.

BILLY WAFER, TULIA DEFENDANT: They wasn't out for justice in the first place. They was ready to just have a lynch mob, you know. Should have put your white hood on and let us know you was coming. That way we might have would have been more prepared. LAVANDERA: Wafer and the others were arrested because of the work of undercover drug agent Tom Coleman, and the cases were prosecuted solely on Coleman's word. Some were convicted, some plead guilty, and other cases were dropped.

Back then, there were few notes, no surveillance video or wiretaps.

And now there may, in fact, have been no evidence. Coleman was indicted in late April on perjury charges related to these arrests, and a Texas appeals court is deciding whether to order new trials.

Retired judge Ron Chapman was appointed by the court to review exactly what happened in Tulia. In his report, Chapman called Coleman "the most devious, nonresponsive law enforcement officer this court has seen," and "entirely unbelievable" as a witness.

Repeated efforts by CNN to reach Coleman have been unsuccessful. But last year, the lawman defended his work.

TOM COLEMAN, FORMER UNDERCOVER OFFICER: I believe we did everything right in Tulia, everything. And I don't think there's anybody -- I don't think there's not anybody in jail that don't deserve to be there, or on probation.

LAVANDERA (on camera): When Tom Coleman came to Tulia, he started hanging around this cattle auction barn. This is where he first started doing some of his undercover works as a narcotics agent, meeting some of the people that he'd soon be arresting.

But no one here knew anything about him, and they certainly didn't know anything about his past.

(voice-over): In a previous job as a sheriff's deputy, his boss told state authorities that Coleman "should not be in law enforcement." Coleman has said his boss had it out for him.

JEFF BLACKBURN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: They were black...

LAVANDERA: Jeff Blackburn works as a defense attorney for some of the Tulia defendants, and wonders how Coleman's testimony could have been enough to convict them.

BLACKBURN: So what we've got here is a complete system breakdown, a breakdown of the defense function, a breakdown of the prosecution function, and a breakdown of the whole judicial system.

LAVANDERA: Fifty-nine-year-old Joe Moore doesn't think what happened to him is fair. He's serving a 90-year sentence. He says he never met Tom Coleman.

(on camera): Did you realize how much trouble you were in then?

JOE MOORE, TULIA DEFENDANT: I really didn't know. I didn't know what was going on. I didn't even know what was going on. Why, I didn't -- still, right from today, I don't know what is going on. LAVANDERA: Joe Moore is one of 13 defendants still in prison. Their lawyers say they all want their names cleared of wrongdoing, and prosecutors say if the appeals court in Texas orders new trials, they will all walk away free.

Ed Lavandera, CNN, Tulia, Texas.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: As Ed Lavandera reported, CNN has been unable to contact Mr. Coleman recently. If and when we do, we would be pleased to have him join us here on the program.

We'll continue our look at the Tulia story in a moment. We'll talk with Bob Herbert of "The New York Times," who has written extensively about the case.

A quick break first. This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: If there's one man who's held the proverbial feet of the town of Tulia, Texas, to the fire, it's "New York Times" columnist Bob Herbert. We talked with Mr. Herbert about the case earlier this week.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: What happened in Tulia?

BOB HERBERT, COLUMNIST, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": Well, this was a case of an investigation gone just totally haywire. I mean, you have these drug task forces, which are financed by the federal government, but which, in many cases, are essentially run by amateurs.

And in this case, it was not just an amateur. I mean, there was this one guy, Tom Coleman, who took the whole thing on his shoulders to run this so-called deep undercover investigation. But it was an amateur with what I think of as extreme personal problems.

And so he targeted a segment of the community in Tulia and just went after them without evidence that they had done anything wrong, certainly not anything criminal.

BROWN: Is it, in your mind, a case of racial malevolence, or was the guy -- I put -- use the word in quotes, was he just "sick"?

HERBERT: It's -- I just can't get into Tom Coleman's head to that extent. I mean, the -- what happened in the investigation, I think, was clearly racist. But if you're asking me what were his motives initially, you know, did he say, Oh, I'm just going to go round up some black folks, I frankly don't know.

What I do know is that he targeted only blacks, or a handful of whites who had relationships with blacks, and they were the only ones that he went after. And in fact, it became so blatant that some of his superiors became concerned and tried to nudge him into what they referred to as other portions of the community in Tulia, and he didn't take the hint, he continued to focus only on blacks.

BROWN: Well, they weren't so concerned that they didn't...

HERBERT: Yes, they...

BROWN: ... pursue the cases and prosecute the cases.

HERBERT: They weren't willing to blow the whistle on him at all, no.

BROWN: Right. And, in fact, they defended him for a long time.

HERBERT: Oh, they absolutely did. I mean, they -- he was defended all the way up the line. I mean, the state attorney general knew about the abuses in this case, had the authority to investigate, and did not.

The attorney general of the United States, John Ashcroft, his office was alerted to this case. They did what they -- they did perhaps a cursory investigation, and there was no -- they never announced that they had found anything wrong. They certainly didn't take any action.

So this just went on and on. And the evidence just began to mount that it was an investigation gone haywire, that innocent people were in prison.

And in fact, there were people who were proved to be innocent. I mean, one woman who was accused who was actually in Oklahoma when she was alleged to have been selling drugs to Tom Coleman in Tulia.

But still, people would not step in.

BROWN: Two more at least here. Do you believe in your heart that if he had walked into the sheriff's office and had 10 percent of the white population as involved in illegal drugs, that the sheriff would have responded in the way the sheriff responded?

HERBERT: No. The sheriff would have responded differently, and the community would have responded differently. There would have been outrage on the ground in Tulia. But also, if 10 percent of the white population in Tulia had been arrested on drug problems, this would have been an enormous national story. You would have had the TV vans lined up in this tiny Texas community, you know, broadcasting the story all across the land.

BROWN: Because of sheer numbers?

HERBERT: Not just because of sheer numbers. I mean, in cases like this, if the target of something, of a clearly -- of an investigation that was -- had clearly gone wrong, if the target, targets were large numbers of whites, the media just, I believe, responds differently to that sort of thing. It would have been seen as a national story from the beginning.

BROWN: Let me ask a question, then, about "The Times." You've been free to write about this.

HERBERT: Right.

BROWN: Has -- have the news pages of "The Times" devoted as much space to this story as they have to, let's say, the Masters controversy over whether women could join Augusta National?

HERBERT: Well, I think that's really mixing apples and oranges. They're such different types of stories. So rather than make that kind of comparison, I would just simply say that I wish "The Times" had devoted more attention to the Tulia story. Now, they did some long stories in "The Times," so the story was definitely not ignored in the news pages of "The Times."

But I thought from the very beginning that this was a very big story. I still think that it's a bigger story than you would guess from the attention that it's getting. I mean, I'm really happy that you're talking about it this evening.

BROWN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE), right. I mean, you have 10 percent of the population of a town...

HERBERT: Right, I guess it was 40-some people were arrested initially, just rounded up in a really humiliating way. They alerted the news media in advance so that the television cameras were rolling. The raids were early in the morning, so they rousted folks out of bed. A lot of them, they were half-dressed, they wouldn't even, you know, allow them to get dressed.

I mean, it was just a deliberate, calculated humiliation of a huge segment of the town. And they thought that they could get away with this. They thought that not many people would pay attention. And in fact, that was true.

The initial stories of the raids were just carried as straight news stories. The assumption was that all of these people were guilty. They were characterized as major narcotics traffickers, which was absurd on its face, you know.

And then the story just sort of went away.

BROWN: Thank you for coming in to talk about it. We appreciate it a lot.

HERBERT: Well, I appreciate it. Thanks for having me.

BROWN: Thank you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Bob Herbert of "The New York Times," a columnist on "The Times," written a lot about this. We were glad to talk to him earlier in the week.

Morning papers, tomorrow morning's papers, coming up, assuming we have a voice for that. Take a break first, muster our resources. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: OK, time for -- if you've done it, just don't tell me, OK? Time to do morning papers, tomorrow morning's papers from around the country and around the world.

A couple of interesting things in the papers. Well, first of all, those of you who think this segment's gone too short, you get your wish tonight. Boy.

"The Cincinnati Enquirer," terrific lead story. "Battered Wife Charged in Shooting, Controversial Defense Likely in Ex-husband's Death." This is a classic battered woman defense murder story. We'll see how they handle it in the state of Ohio. But the woman, when she was arrested, was all beat up, and black eyes and the whole thing. Doesn't mean necessarily she had a right to kill her ex-husband, but that's the facts of the case, and a jury will ultimately decide it.

Now, "Moon Takes Spin in Our Shadow," a lunar eclipse. Our producer, who we love a lot, David Borman (ph), has been telling the staff for a week, it's no big deal, yet here it is on the front page of "The Cincinnati Enquirer," where it belongs.

And one more story, because this will come up again. "Drop That Salt! Blood Pressure Red-Flagged." Now, look at how -- this is a story that they're redoing the calculations on what's safe -- how different newspapers played the blood pressure story.

"The Oregonian," out of Portland, Oregon, huge, man, I mean, they play is about as big as you can, "High Blood Pressure Numbers Sink Lower." That's their big story on the front page. Almost "USA Today"-like, isn't it?

Now, "The New York Times," which doesn't get that excited about any story unless it is enormous, still plays it on the front page. "U.S Guidelines Are Reassessing Blood Pressure," right there on the front page of "The New York Times."

"Miami Herald" -- yes, "Miami Herald," I'm going to do two on this one -- down here at the bottom, "Normal Blood Pressure Level Now Thought Too High, Risky." So they play it on the front page.

Oh, they also have that lunar eclipse story on the front page, David.

DAVID BORMAN, PRODUCER: Thirty.

BROWN: Anyway, their big story in the -- What was that?

BORMAN: Thirty.

BROWN: Thank you.

BROWN: Their big story in "The Miami Herald," "'I'm Finally Going Home,' Judge Frees Man Convicted in Deputy's Murder." It's a young man who -- mentally challenged, was sent to prison, and not clear whether there's evidence to do so.

The best story of the day, "The Detroit News," Denny McLain, the great pitcher, the last pitcher to win 30 games, pitches Slurpees. He's being -- he's in the halfway house, he's had nothing but legal problems, and now he's working part-time at the Seven-11. How they fall.

That's morning papers. Join us again tomorrow, will you, 10:00 Eastern time. Until then, good night for all of us at NEWSNIGHT.

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