Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsnight Aaron Brown

Family Brings Wrongful Death Suit Against Ford; New Heart Drug Raises Questions About Race

Aired June 16, 2005 - 22:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


AARON BROWN, HOST "NEWSNIGHT": Good evening again.
We begin tonight with a CNN exclusive. Imagine this: Your car is turned off, parked, and suddenly, with no one around, it bursts into flames. That's exactly what's happened to some Ford vehicles built before the year 2000.

Just yesterday, one family filed a wrongful death suit over a fire that family members say started in a 1996 F-150 pickup truck in the garage attached to their Iowa home. That fire killed 74-year-old Darletta Mohlis, and injured her 67-year-old husband. Investigators for Ford and the National Transportation Safety Administration spent hours earlier this week poking through the rubble of the house. The agency has no comment on its findings, but Ford specifically denies the fire was caused by the truck.

Ford, however, does admit it has a problem with some vehicles catching fire when parked and when turned off. The company has already recalled more than a million cars, trucks and SUVs, and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says it is investigating nearly 4 million more vehicles for the same problem.

We begin tonight with CNN investigative correspondent, Drew Griffin, who has uncovered new information on just how many more Ford vehicles may be at risk.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Fire rescue. What is your emergency.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Please, my house is exploded. Something in my car -- my house is on fire.

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A frantic call to 911 at 5:00 in the morning.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, my gosh.

GRIFFIN: A mother in a panic. Her 15-year-old daughter's bedroom wall is in flames.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My house is fire! Please!

GRIFFIN: She makes several more calls to 911 before fire trucks arrive. Within minutes, the fire burned down the Kissimmee, Florida house of Nestor Oyola and his wife Laura leaving their daughter Rotsenmary scarred.

ROTSENMARY OYOLA, HOUSE BURNED DOWN: It's difficult. But you know, we have to accept it.

GRIFFIN: So what went wrong? What could have possibly caused this much destruction

NESTOR OYOLA, FATHER (through translator): I bought the car on Monday and Wednesday it burned everything.

GRIFFIN: The insurance investigation showed the 2001 Ford Expedition Nestor just bought his wife caught fire while it was parked and turned off in the garage. Ken and Michelle Whelpley of Winterhaven, Florida had a similar experience.

KEN WHELPLEY, TRUCK CAUGHT FIRE: How do you park a vehicle, go to bed, sleep all night, and then in the morning, it's on fire?

GRIFFIN: It sounds unusual, but CNN has learned fires like this have occurred all across the country. A neighbor took this picture of the Whelpley's truck.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Flames were shooting all the way up to the top of the garage. I couldn't believe it. I mean, just could not believe it.

GRIFFIN: In Orlando, a used car dealer surveillance camera caught this car bursting into flames. It had been parked overnight.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just come in the morning like a regular day and I see a car all burnt up. I'm like, what the -- it was a shock. I didn't know what to do. I lost all the money.

GRIFFIN: And with many of the cars and trucks sitting in garages, houses are being burned down, too.

WHELPLEY: What if we'd have died in this mess?

GRIFFIN: Four investigations by the National Traffic Highway Safety Administration have compiled 559 reports of Ford fires. And those investigations are focusing on one part under the hood.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sometimes when we're digging through this, we find the remains that failed.

GRIFFIN: Harvey Michel (ph) is a fire investigator and says he's seen about 30 of these Ford cases in just the last year.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Tire damage is more severe on top.

GRIFFIN: We asked him to look at the Whelpleys burned, 2000 Ford F-150 pickup. Within 30 minutes, he finds what he says is the cause.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Here's the part. That is typical of the failure of the switch. GRIFFIN: It's the cruise, or speed control deactivation switch. This is what several fire investigators hired by major insurance companies and auto engineers consulted by CNN say is causing the cars and trucks to ignite.

How? The pressure switch disconnects the cruise control when the driver steps firmly on the brake. That switch is attached to the brake master cylinder on one end and wired to the cruise control on the other.

Ford designed the switch to be powered, or hot at all times even when the vehicle is off and the key is out of the ignition. What separates the electrical components from the brake fluid inside the switch is a thin film barrier. Investigators say the film can crack allowing droplets of brake fluid to come in contact with the hot electrical components, sometimes, say investigators causing a fire.

And those fires can happen whether the vehicle is moving or even parked with the engine off. Firefighters in Deltona, Florida, say you can see it happen in this video. A firefighter was changing a fuse when he noticed the switch in his 1995 F-250 begin to smoke. A co- worker grabbed a video camera.

CHRIS NABICHT, DELTONA CHIEF FIRE MARSHAL: Had we allowed it to continue it would have burst into flames and it would have consumed the vehicle.

GRIFFIN: Chris Nabicht is chief fire marshal for the city of Deltona. He says he's seen at least a half a dozen similar Ford fires.

NABICHT: The concern for people's lives and how fast this can occur, whether you're in the vehicle or not in the vehicle, is kind of scary.

GRIFFIN: Houston attorney Mike Jolly agrees. He represents clients whose vehicles have caught fire while parked.

MIKE JOLLY, ATTORNEY: There's no reason to wire the switch hot because you don't need to turn off the cruise control when the car is stopped and turned off and parked in your garage.

GRIFFIN: Five different auto engineers tell CNN the design is unique to Ford. And Ford has responded to the fires by issuing two separate recalls. The first in 1999 recalled nearly 300,000 Crown Victorias, Mercury Grand Marquis and Lincoln Town Cars.

Then, just this past January, Ford issued a second, larger recall 792,000 vehicles, including 2001 F-Series Super Crews, and 2000 Expeditions, Navigators and top selling F-150 pickups.

(on camera): Beyond those recalls, the federal government is investigating an additional 3.7 million Ford vehicles for the same problem. Now CNN has obtained this Ford document, which the company handed over to federal investigators. It shows a total of 16 million Ford cars and trucks have been built with what the company acknowledges is the same or similar switch.

(voice-over): The list includes recalled and nonrecalled Expeditions, Explorers, F-Series pickups, Crown Victorias, Town Cars and Grand Marquis, some as early as 1992 and as recent at 2003. Also included are thousands of Tauruses, Econoline vans, Rangers and Windstars.

Ford declined our requests for an on camera interview. But in a statement to CNN, Ford says its records show the risk of fire differs for make, model and year. They say, quote, "it's important to understand that all speed control systems are not identical in Ford vehicles. In those populations with an increasing fire report rate, we stopped using the switch through the recall process. The switch has performed well in many models for many years."

Nearly half of those 559 Ford fires reported to the government safety agency as originating in the cruise control switch were in cars and trucks from model years not recalled. That includes the Expeditions owned by the Oyolas and that Orlando car dealer.

NABICHT: They've taken the step by recalling certain models of vehicles. I think the recall probably needs to be much broader than what it is.

GRIFFIN: Ford's response to that? "We have been asked why we have not expanded the recall. The last thing we want to do is make an important safety decision on incorrect or incomplete information." Ford did recall the Mercury Grand Marquis made in 1992 and 1993 but not the 1994 model year.

SANDRA GONZALEZ, HOUSE BURNED DOWN: We just drove by and everything was gone.

GRIFFIN: Sandra and Ramon Gonzalez of Mission, Texas, owned a nonrecalled 1994 Grand Marquis. It burned in their garage two years ago, taking their home with it.

RAMON GONZALEZ, HOUSE BURNED DOWN: Everything was destroyed. Everything. Everything. Completely.

GRIFFIN: In a lawsuit against Ford, three fire investigators hired by the Gonzalez' insurance company blamed the cruise control switch, the same switch recalled in the previous two model years.

Of the Gonzalez' fire, Ford told CNN there's no evidence that the fire actually originated in the Grand Marquis, let alone in the switch. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said its investigators couldn't find a safety defect trend in the '94 through '97 Grand Marquis model years. And there was no recall of those years.

So what does Ford say is the reason the switch catches fire? Again, Ford wouldn't agree to be interviewed for this report. But this is what the company told us in an e-mail.

"We have not determined at this time that there is a defect with the switch. But for reasons we still do not understand, the switch is failing. And we are trying to understand why."

Ford says it's cooperating with a federal investigation into the fires. As for the switch, Ford has stopped using it. And is now using a new switch as of the 2004 model year. In the meantime, the Oyolas who made that desperate 911 call when their nonrecalled SUV caught fire, are left to pick up their lives.

LAURA HERNANDEZ, HOUSE BURNED DOWN (through translator): Here, there is nothing to replace, nothing. I was left with nothing.

GRIFFIN: Firefighters found the family cat burned to death in this corner.

This is where Laura's daughter Rotsenmary dialed 911. As the Expedition was burning in the garage just a few feet away, she escaped with burns to her legs.

For Nestor Oyola, as a father, it's hard to talk about it. The night before the fire, he moved his wife's Expedition in the garage, hoping to keep it safe. He says he'll never forget it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: We'll have more on this coming up. Also coming up, racial profiling in medicine. Some people call it that, and why it may not be a bad thing at all.

Bit first, a little early tonight, Erica Hill in Atlanta tonight with some of the other headlines of the day.

ERICA HILL, CNN HEADLINE NEWS ANCHOR: I want to get right on them, so here we go.

We begin in Southern California tonight, rattled this afternoon by an earthquake, the third to hit the state this week. The magnitude 4.9 quake was centered 70 miles east of Los Angeles. The rumbling, though, was felt south of San Diego and east into the suburbs and north of L.A. There are no reports of injuries or damage. We do know of at least two dozen aftershocks, though, that have been reported.

Four gunmen had stormed the school for international children in Cambodia today. They held a teacher and more than two dozen toddlers hostage for six hours. Police say the attackers shot and killed a 2- year-old Canadian boy who wouldn't stop crying. The gunmen were looking for ransom money. Police did eventually arrest them.

Federal investigators have concluded medical researchers who tested AIDS drugs on foster children over the past two decades did so in violation of rules designed to protect vulnerable children. The research was funded by the government and conducted at prestigious institutions, including Columbia University Medical Center and New York Presbyterian Hospital.

In Philadelphia, Mississippi, Edgar Ray Killen was taken from the courthouse on a stretcher and hospitalized today for high blood pressure. His trial recessed until at least tomorrow. Killen's an 80-year-old former member of the Ku Klux Klan. He's on trial for the murder of three civil rights workers in 1964.

And a Goodyear blimp made a crash landing just north of Miami late today. The blimp hit powerlines as it went down in an industrial park not far from the airfield where it is based. Two people on board did get out safely. Bad weather may have played a role here.

Aaron, that is the latest from HEADLINE NEWS, at now almost 13 past the hour.

BROWN: Almost. Erica, we'll see you in a half hour, give or take.

Much more to come in the hour ahead, including tough questions at the end of another horrible day in Iraq.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): More than two years on, the tanks are still needed. Is the rest of the picture any better? Our answer tonight comes from the troops in Tal Afar.

Also tonight, a drug that helps the heart, but with a major side effect. It raises questions, questions about race.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Illness isn't color blind, and medicine shouldn't be either.

BROWN: Just the same, what to make of a new pill tested and targeted on the basis of skin color?

And later, a river boat gamble.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Woefully inadequate. Woefully inadequate.

BROWN: Patrolling the Mississippi with too many miles and not enough boats, and the country's lifeline at stake.

From Memphis to Minneapolis, and always New York, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Like almost everything else in our history, medicine in this country has a long and complicated relationship with race. Today, an FDA advisory committee broke new ground, and in doing so bumped up against a social taboo. Here's medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In this country, racial discrimination is considered unacceptable. Remember what happened when Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder voiced his opinion on race and athletics? JIMMY "THE GREEK" SNYDER: The black is a better athlete to begin with, because he's been bred to be that way.

COHEN: He was fired.

DR. SALLY SATEL, PSYCHIATRIST, OASIS CLINIC: I know you came in today to talk about the Prozac.

COHEN: But Dr. Sally Satel isn't scared. She does racial profiling on her patients, and she's proud of it.

SATEL: Illnesses isn't color blind, and medicine shouldn't be either.

COHEN: Dr. Satel, a psychiatrist, says she's found that how her patients physically respond to drugs has a lot to do with race. She says it's true for antidepressants, true for hepatitis drugs, true for other medicines. For example, studies have found that this cancer drug, IRESSA, works better on people whose ancestors came from Asia, and doctors say they've noticed that ACE inhibitors do a better job of lowering blood pressure if you're white.

And now, today, for the first time, an FDA panel of experts has recommended approval for a drug for one race. When this drug, called Bidil, for congestive heart failure, was tested mostly on whites, the results were disappointing. But in blacks, it cut the death rate by almost half. Cardiologist Elizabeth Ofili helped conduct the study for the drug company, NitroMed.

DR. ELIZABETH OFILI, MOREHOUSE SCHOOL OF MEDICINE: If we get this compound approved, as the community is anticipating, if that happens, you know, that is a huge benefit to patients in the community.

COHEN: So why would a medicine work differently in people of different races? Because historically, people have tended to marry within their own ethnic group, and so certain gene become more prominent.

Jews from Eastern Europe are more likely to get Tay-Sachs, a debilitating neurological disease. People whose ancestors came from Africa are more likely to get sickle cell anemia.

With congestive heart failure, studies show that people of African origin are more likely to have low levels of a chemical called nitric oxide. That leads to narrower blood vessels and restricted blood flow. This new drug helps raise levels of nitric oxide and widen the arteries.

So while discriminating in real estate, say, or in banking is unacceptable...

SATEL: Paying attention to race in medicine is done for the benefit of the patient.

COHEN: Elizabeth Cohen, CNN, Atlanta. (END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: African-Americans are more likely than other groups to develop congestive heart failure. That's just a fact. African- Americans are also more likely to die from the disease, both of which underscore the need for effective treatment and add another layer to the story. Bidil is familiar with many -- familiar to many heart specialists, including Dr. Jay Cohn, professor of medicine at the University of Minnesota Medical School. He helped organize the trials to tre -- to test, rather, the drug and we spoke with him earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Dr. Cohn, what's interesting about this story to me is not so much the medicine, though I think we have to deal with that, it's that there's, for reasons I think people have trouble articulating, they're, like, uncomfortable with the idea that there may be a drug or there may be some drugs that work better on one race of people than another race of people, and they're not even sure why they're uncomfortable with it. But they are.

DR. JAY N. COHN, UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA: Well, they are and they express it quite openly, Aaron. There are those people who are so sensitized to this societal misuse of racial designation in the past that any attempt to designate people by their race gives them discomfort, because they are afraid it will be used in some hierarchical fashion to claim that they are hierarchically inferior.

It's unfortunate, because in medicine we've used designation by race as a very important tool in improving our skill and precision and diagnosis and treatment, and yet there are many people who are very uncomfortable by this, and they're appropriately concerned that race is not a uniform entity. So, there is no -- just because we identify people or they self-identify as black, doesn't mean they're a homogeneous population.

BROWN: Do we know, by the way, precisely what it is in the African-American population that makes -- that seems to make this drug work better than it does on others?

COHN: Well, that's a fascinating and important question, and in this trial that we've done, we really didn't compare whites and blacks, so, we can't say for certain that the drug is ineffective in whites. In fact, I feel quite confident it will work in whites, perhaps to a lesser extent, because when we analyzed our prior data, we found a remarkably greater benefit in the black patients than the white patients.

And this fits in with a lot that we know about physiology, and that is that black people in previous studies have demonstrated a deficiency of nitric oxide, this critical gas which is released in the arteries and heart that protects them, and all the trials and studies that have been done, really small studies, show that black people on average respond less well to stimuli that release nitric oxide and this drug, this Bidil, is a nitric oxide donor and enhancer, so what it really does is provide nitric oxide to the body and if there are black people who are more deficient in nitric oxide, you can understand why it may have a preferential benefit in that population.

BROWN: That's just -- as a final question -- that's just one of the interesting things I find about medicine and science is that sometimes, in a whole range of different drugs, we don't know why they work in some people and why they don't work in other people. They just -- it's just the way it turns out.

COHN: Well, that's right and I believe this is a watershed moment in drug development, the events of today and the last few months. That is, we can no longer accept these large scale trials in heterogeneous populations that show a benefit and say, well that benefit applies to everyone. We approve the drug for everyone.

I think we're now entering an era where we have to recognize there are differences and we need to find the responsive population and we hope that pharmacogenetics and genomics will answer that question, and we're collecting DNA on these patients. We're trying to find a more precise marker. We know that self-designated race is not the ideal marker, but that's what we're working with right now. It's a place-holder for some marker that eventually we may find that we can use to be much more precise about how we administer drugs to patients.

BROWN: Well, we appreciate your work and appreciate your patiently working with me through my understanding of some of this. Thanks for your time tonight.

COHN: It's a pleasure, Aaron. Thank you.

BROWN: Thank you, sir.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Dr. Jay Cohn at the University of Minnesota medical school.

Next on the program, with growing doubts at home about the mission in Iraq, we'll hear from troops who have been there and back and there again. Tough questions in some pretty rough territory, as it turns out.

And, later, the men and women safeguarding a city that's easy to overlook in the war on terror, but a vital town just the same. We'll explain why. We take a break first around the world. This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Over 1,700 Americans have died now in combat in Iraq. Five Marines and one sailor died late yesterday. We're only halfway through June, but it's turning into a deadly month again for U.S. forces. May wasn't very good; 47 Americans have died so far in June.

There is some encouraging political news there. Shiites and Sunnis seem to have agreed on the 55 people who will draft a constitution.

The political news at home is getting a bit foggier, however. There are new calls on Capitol Hill for the administration to set a deadline to begin withdraw withdrawing troops. The White House says that's the wrong message to send to the insurgents. Instead, American and Iraqi troops are trying to root them out of strong holds. CNN's Jane Arraf, embedded still with the unit that's trying to crack down on the city of Tal Afar.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JANE ARRAF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: There's no sleep for anyone here tonight. There are 800 soldiers, more than 50 tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles gathering here to descend on Tal Afar.

Our thermal imaging camera captures the tanks rolling through the sand in this western desert. We're in Humvees between the heavy armor.

By the time dawn comes, we're on the edge of the city.

The tanks lumber down the narrow streets in this neighborhood controlled by insurgents. The attack helicopters hover overhead. We can't see them, but on the ground, gunmen are shooting at them with AK-47s.

For weeks, Iraqi tribal lead verse been asking the U.S. Army to bomb the neighborhoods where insurgents are living, not their neighborhoods, though. Iraqis usually use the Arabic word for insurgents. But here after months of mortar attacks and roadside bombs, they're calling them terrorists.

Some of the houses the Iraqi and American forces search have been deserted. We've set up our mobile satellite equipment near the armored vehicles to do a live report. Just as we go to air, shots from a sniper ring out.

The mobile command post is in the back of a Bradley. Squadron commander Lieutenant Colonel Christopher Hickey is absorbed in directing the battle. He learns a little later that a senior officer, Lieutenant Colonel Terrence Crowe, has been killed by gunfire as he's leading Iraqi forces.

No one has the luxury of grieving right now for the 1,680th U.S. military death in this war. They have a battle to fight.

I spend most of my time traveling across Iraq. There are parts of this country where schools have been rebuilt, where people have jobs and where things are getting safer. This isn't one of them.

(on camera): This has become a ghost of the city that it was. A lot of the shops are closed. Some mothers are afraid to send their children to school. Even the police are afraid to go out.

(voice-over): Two years after the end of major combat, the U.S. military has sent 4,000 troops to this area, west of Mosul. The insurgency has flourished here in the vacuum left after too few U.S. forces were pulled to other parts of the country, officials say.

Grim Troop lost two soldiers when a road side bomb hit the striker vehicle after the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment arrived a month ago. Now they go around in heavier tanks and Bradleys.

When you strip away all the reasons politicians give for going to war, what's left are the bonds between soldiers and marines that keep them fighting. Specialist Brian Loftin from Atlanta was wounded in the attack and fought to come back. He can't believe I'm asking him why.

BRIAN LOFTIN, U.S. ARMY: Because my guys are here, man. I can't be there and them be here. If they're taking this stuff every day, I'm going to too, ma'am. There it is.

ARRAF: That's the way it's been for two years.

But here in Tal Afar, there are things I haven't seen much of in places as troubled as this. Iraqis, like these men, increasingly taking the risk of helping to find the insurgents. Iraqi Army leaders paired with Americans.

In two years, I've seen hundreds of houses raided. Some things are always the same: the frightened the women and children, the men defiant or resigned as they're blindfolded and handcuffed. We almost never hear whether these men are kept or questioned and released.

Some other military units take away every military aged male for questioning. This one is more discriminating. It's the second time this regiment has been deployed in Iraq. They're less nervous than soldiers here for the first time. They seem to know a bit more of the language and a bit more about behavior here. Enough for Captain Ryan Howell to diffuse the tension at a house they burst into.

HOWELL: When we knocked on the door -- that's good. Laughter is good.

ARRAF: The captain has reached across the cultural divide. A small victory. But two years into a complicated war, the kind that will help win or lose the people of this city.

Jane Arraf, CNN, Tal Afar, Iraq.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Still to come tonight, the hard work of security at home. Some place with a lot of ground. And as it turns out a lot of water to cover. Security watch on the Mississippi tonight.

And later, the kids who happened to be the future of the past. We'll sample the work of young historians. That's in our future, because here and now, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: When a Spanish explorer named Hernando Desoto discovered the Mississippi River almost 500 years ago near where Memphis, Tennessee is today, he was looking for gold. And in many ways, the mighty Mississippi has been a gold mine ever since, a broad highway for ships and boats delivering goods up and down the country.

Some say Old Man River is a big target without enough protection, which has them singing the blues in Memphis. On the "Security Watch" tonight, CNN's Jeanne Meserve.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEANNE MESERVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The music of Memphis is the music of the Mississippi, brought here in the era of river boats and cotton, celebrated in the blues clubs of Beal Street.

Memphis mayor Willy Harrington knows his river city's charms and risks. He worries that a terrorist strike here would impact much of the country.

MAYOR WILLIE HERENTON, MEMPHIS: Well, I mean, it was just wreak havoc. It would wreak havoc to our entire distribution system.

MESERVE: Mississippi barges haul tons of grains, minerals, chemicals, some of them highly toxic. They deliver coal to a power plant and petroleum to a refinery which pipes fuel to a fleet of FedEx planes. With FedEx headquartered here and two interstates and five railroads using the city's bridges, Memphis calls itself America's Distribution Center.

DONALD MCCRORY, PORT OF MEMPHIS: If we were to shut down the port and the waterway here in Memphis, it would impact, easily 50 percent of the United States, I would say, in terms of delivery of a variety of commodities.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm looking for that red one off of that point.

MESERVE: It is the job of the Coast Guard to keep the river safe.

CMDR. DAVID STALFORT, US COAST GUARD: We just take a look around the banks, look around the bridges, and if we see anything suspicious, report back to our OP center.

MESERVE: The station in Memphis is responsible for 1,200 miles of river in five states. Much of the river bank is remote and undeveloped, but there are nine ports and plenty of critical infrastructure. To patrol all this, Coast Guard Memphis has three small boats.

Do you have enough?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have enough to patrol the areas we patrol. Of course, how much is enough?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Woefully inadequate. Woefully inadequate.

MESERVE: The mayor says the Coast Guard needs more of almost everything.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Patrol boats, manpower and technology.

MESERVE: The city and county do assist and industries along the river keep an eye out for people who are where they shouldn't be.

Funded but not yet installed, a port-wide system of surveillance cameras and sensors to detect any accidental or intentional chemical release. More could be done, but should it?

MCCRORY: Someone has to pay the bill, and it gets back to how much risk are you willing to accept and how much security can you afford. That's a question for the American people.

MESERVE: The mayor of Memphis has an answer.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't think we can ever close our eyes to possibilities and I don't think we can invest too much.

MESERVE: Inland ports like Memphis haven't gotten the attention or funding coastal ports have, though a terrorist strike here could reverberate far beyond the river's banks. It's all about geography. For Memphis, it always has been.

For CNN's America bureau, Jeanne Meserve, Memphis, Tennessee.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: And on the program tonight, kids making history by making history. We'll introduce you to the Ken and Rick Burns of the high school set.

Also coming up, how close Michael Jackson came to a conviction. Notes from jury to judge tell a story and we'll tell you. It's what we do. This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: In a moment, making history by making movies, but first, at about a quarter to the hour, almost exactly quarter to the hour, time for some of the other headlines of the day. Here's Erica Hill again in Atlanta.

HILL: By my clock in Atlanta, you hit it right on the nose, Aaron. Excellent work.

BROWN: Thank you.

HILL: Michael Jackson, it turns out, came very close to going to prison instead of back to Neverland. This, according to documents released today. Just three hours before the final verdict, jurors sent a message to the judge saying they couldn't agree on two counts of providing alcohol to a minor. Those charges would have carried a sentence of up to six months in jail. The judge also said today he plans to review and release almost all the sealed documents in the case. The battle over the confirmation of John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations moved on to a new round today. Bolton met with Democratic senator Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, one of those trying to block the confirmation. But Senator Dodd says he still needs more documents the White House refuses to turn over. The Republicans say they'll try to force a vote on Monday.

BJ's Wholesale Club has settled with Federal Trade Commission over charges lax security led to $13 million in counterfeit credit and debit card purchases. BJ's will adopt a new security program. It will be monitored by an outside expert for the next 20 years.

For the first time since World War II, the U.S. Army has awarded a Silver Star to a female soldier. Sergeant Leigh Ann Hester earned the silver star in Iraq while serving in military police unit which provides security for a convey that came under fire. Twenty-seven insurgents were killed in that firefight. It was caught on tape by an insurgent. The Silver Star is Army's the third highest combat award.

Another high honor for another woman in the military. The Air Force has named Captain Nicole Malachowski the first woman to be named one of the famed Thunderbirds Aerobatics Squadron. She'll fly an F-16 in the number three right wing position in the diamond formation for the precision jet demonstration team. Not bad.

And, some deals for Deep Throat. Mark Felt, the 91-year-old former FBI man who recently revealed his role in helping "The Washington Post" cover the Watergate scandal has sold the book and movie rights to his life. Actor Tom Hanks' company is producing the film.

And, Aaron, that's the latest. Back on over to you.

BROWN: Thank you.

You can imagine the father of a teenage daughter likes to hear about all these firsts that women are doing these days.

HILL: Absolutely. I love to hear about it.

BROWN: I bet you do. Thank you very much.

National History Day, celebrating its own birthday, 25 years old now; 2000 students from around the country -- this is really cool -- today, sixth grade to 12th, came to compete at the University of Maryland near Washington. Most had been working on their projects all year. Many mix history with new technology to make student documentaries and a few of these students may make history one day.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CATHY GORN, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY: National History Day is a wonderful history program for kids in sixth to 12th grades. They choose a topic in history go out and do extensive research.

Back when the documentary category first started, we called it media presentations. Now, kids are using iMovie to construct all these complicated documentaries.

KRISTI DAVIS, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNER: We used iMovie 4 and when we came here and we watched other documentaries, they used so many different programs.

DUSTIN MCEVOY, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNER: I used Pinnacle Studios 9.4.3-plus.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Dustin Mcevoy.

MCEVOY: Well, I won first place, senior individual documentary.

In the 1880s, London was a society of the haves and have-nots.

For my project on the White Chapel murders of 1888 and how it was used as a political tool to instigate social and political reform.

In 1988, 100 years after the killings of White Chapel, the murder cases were officially closed. The identity of the Ripper remains unknown.

ALEXANDRA COX, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNER: I won first place for my junior individual documentary on George F. Kennan.

The key to post-war Communist containment.

I researched major communicators in the Cold War and came across George F. Kennan and thought his communication was so influential, that it would be perfect for a documentary.

Kennan realized the Soviet system was a combination of political oppression and governmental economics, which he felt would eventually self-destruct.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Kids can compete as individuals and kids can compete in groups of two to five so we give them an opportunity for cooperative learning.

PATRICK PUGLIESE, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNER: We did a documentary called "Please Adjust the Color." It was about stereotypes on television of African-Americans, and how the civil rights movement kind of helped to change the idea what the African- American culture was.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: By communicating with images as well as sound, television was able to effect its audience in a much more powerful way than radio ever could.

BRANDON KELLER, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNER: Art comes in many forms. This is the, well, most educational art. You can just do so much more with it than you can with a book. You just have so much more freedom, so many doors are open for you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Good for them. We'll probably all be working for them some day.

Check morning papers, update you on our lead story as well after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Okey-doke. Time to check morning papers from around the country and around the world. But before we do, we've gotten so many e-mails already with questions about our lead story, having to do with Fords, some Fords, those made -- some Fords made before the year 2004, do some of them suddenly burst into flame. We have set up an area on our Web site where you can check your Ford model against the ones that have this part. Go to cnn.com, and it will list the cars you ought to be concerned about, whether they've been recalled or haven't been recalled. And you can make some decisions about how you want to deal with it. You may have to pay for it yourself, because right now Ford isn't paying for all of it.

OK. On to morning papers. Iraq is all over the morning papers, and the message -- this is the most Iraq I've seen in a long time in morning papers, honestly. What was that again? One? Wow!

"International Herald Tribune," "American discontent, increasing polls find. "The Christian Science Monitor." Pretty much the same: "As Iraq efforts drags on, doubt mounts at home." Yeah, I would say so.

"Chattanooga Times Free Press." "Senator Frist defends Schiavo remarks." The senator said, well, I didn't make a diagnosis that she was OK. Well, he kind of sort of did, sort of.

Forget that one.

"The Boston Herald." I'm running out of time. It happens sometimes. I know when you do this at home, it happens to you. "Hub goes to pot." This is "The Boston Herald." "We are the highest city in the United States." There's a poll done on cities where the most marijuana is smoked. Boston ranked number one. And I think San Francisco ranked number two. Oregon was up there.

The weather in Chicago tomorrow -- if you're wondering, and I was -- "glinty." We'll wrap it up with something cool in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This week in history, the first African- American, Thurgood Marshall, nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court.

And a slow speed chase on June 17th, 1994, L.A. police followed O.J. Simpson in a white Ford Bronco driven by his friend and former teammate Al Cowlings.

And in Montana, an 81-day standoff between the FBI and the anti- government Freemen group came to a peaceful end. That is "This Week in History."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Isn't that weird that the Bronco chase and the Michael Jackson car thing this week -- same week.

One bonus paper before we go, because we've got a little extra time. "New York Daily News," "Enemy in the ranks: Charge sergeant murdered two officers." I believe this is the first case of alleged fragging in the war in Iraq. It was the case in Kuwait, just before.

Tomorrow on the program, we'll take a look at the movement in Congress to get some sort of exit strategy out of the administration, in some cases bring the troops home. I'll do that and much more tomorrow. We hope you'll join us, 10:00 Eastern time. "LOU DOBBS TONIGHT" next for most of you. We'll see you tomorrow. Until then, good night for all of us.

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


Aired June 16, 2005 - 22:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
AARON BROWN, HOST "NEWSNIGHT": Good evening again.
We begin tonight with a CNN exclusive. Imagine this: Your car is turned off, parked, and suddenly, with no one around, it bursts into flames. That's exactly what's happened to some Ford vehicles built before the year 2000.

Just yesterday, one family filed a wrongful death suit over a fire that family members say started in a 1996 F-150 pickup truck in the garage attached to their Iowa home. That fire killed 74-year-old Darletta Mohlis, and injured her 67-year-old husband. Investigators for Ford and the National Transportation Safety Administration spent hours earlier this week poking through the rubble of the house. The agency has no comment on its findings, but Ford specifically denies the fire was caused by the truck.

Ford, however, does admit it has a problem with some vehicles catching fire when parked and when turned off. The company has already recalled more than a million cars, trucks and SUVs, and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says it is investigating nearly 4 million more vehicles for the same problem.

We begin tonight with CNN investigative correspondent, Drew Griffin, who has uncovered new information on just how many more Ford vehicles may be at risk.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Fire rescue. What is your emergency.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Please, my house is exploded. Something in my car -- my house is on fire.

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A frantic call to 911 at 5:00 in the morning.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, my gosh.

GRIFFIN: A mother in a panic. Her 15-year-old daughter's bedroom wall is in flames.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My house is fire! Please!

GRIFFIN: She makes several more calls to 911 before fire trucks arrive. Within minutes, the fire burned down the Kissimmee, Florida house of Nestor Oyola and his wife Laura leaving their daughter Rotsenmary scarred.

ROTSENMARY OYOLA, HOUSE BURNED DOWN: It's difficult. But you know, we have to accept it.

GRIFFIN: So what went wrong? What could have possibly caused this much destruction

NESTOR OYOLA, FATHER (through translator): I bought the car on Monday and Wednesday it burned everything.

GRIFFIN: The insurance investigation showed the 2001 Ford Expedition Nestor just bought his wife caught fire while it was parked and turned off in the garage. Ken and Michelle Whelpley of Winterhaven, Florida had a similar experience.

KEN WHELPLEY, TRUCK CAUGHT FIRE: How do you park a vehicle, go to bed, sleep all night, and then in the morning, it's on fire?

GRIFFIN: It sounds unusual, but CNN has learned fires like this have occurred all across the country. A neighbor took this picture of the Whelpley's truck.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Flames were shooting all the way up to the top of the garage. I couldn't believe it. I mean, just could not believe it.

GRIFFIN: In Orlando, a used car dealer surveillance camera caught this car bursting into flames. It had been parked overnight.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just come in the morning like a regular day and I see a car all burnt up. I'm like, what the -- it was a shock. I didn't know what to do. I lost all the money.

GRIFFIN: And with many of the cars and trucks sitting in garages, houses are being burned down, too.

WHELPLEY: What if we'd have died in this mess?

GRIFFIN: Four investigations by the National Traffic Highway Safety Administration have compiled 559 reports of Ford fires. And those investigations are focusing on one part under the hood.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sometimes when we're digging through this, we find the remains that failed.

GRIFFIN: Harvey Michel (ph) is a fire investigator and says he's seen about 30 of these Ford cases in just the last year.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Tire damage is more severe on top.

GRIFFIN: We asked him to look at the Whelpleys burned, 2000 Ford F-150 pickup. Within 30 minutes, he finds what he says is the cause.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Here's the part. That is typical of the failure of the switch. GRIFFIN: It's the cruise, or speed control deactivation switch. This is what several fire investigators hired by major insurance companies and auto engineers consulted by CNN say is causing the cars and trucks to ignite.

How? The pressure switch disconnects the cruise control when the driver steps firmly on the brake. That switch is attached to the brake master cylinder on one end and wired to the cruise control on the other.

Ford designed the switch to be powered, or hot at all times even when the vehicle is off and the key is out of the ignition. What separates the electrical components from the brake fluid inside the switch is a thin film barrier. Investigators say the film can crack allowing droplets of brake fluid to come in contact with the hot electrical components, sometimes, say investigators causing a fire.

And those fires can happen whether the vehicle is moving or even parked with the engine off. Firefighters in Deltona, Florida, say you can see it happen in this video. A firefighter was changing a fuse when he noticed the switch in his 1995 F-250 begin to smoke. A co- worker grabbed a video camera.

CHRIS NABICHT, DELTONA CHIEF FIRE MARSHAL: Had we allowed it to continue it would have burst into flames and it would have consumed the vehicle.

GRIFFIN: Chris Nabicht is chief fire marshal for the city of Deltona. He says he's seen at least a half a dozen similar Ford fires.

NABICHT: The concern for people's lives and how fast this can occur, whether you're in the vehicle or not in the vehicle, is kind of scary.

GRIFFIN: Houston attorney Mike Jolly agrees. He represents clients whose vehicles have caught fire while parked.

MIKE JOLLY, ATTORNEY: There's no reason to wire the switch hot because you don't need to turn off the cruise control when the car is stopped and turned off and parked in your garage.

GRIFFIN: Five different auto engineers tell CNN the design is unique to Ford. And Ford has responded to the fires by issuing two separate recalls. The first in 1999 recalled nearly 300,000 Crown Victorias, Mercury Grand Marquis and Lincoln Town Cars.

Then, just this past January, Ford issued a second, larger recall 792,000 vehicles, including 2001 F-Series Super Crews, and 2000 Expeditions, Navigators and top selling F-150 pickups.

(on camera): Beyond those recalls, the federal government is investigating an additional 3.7 million Ford vehicles for the same problem. Now CNN has obtained this Ford document, which the company handed over to federal investigators. It shows a total of 16 million Ford cars and trucks have been built with what the company acknowledges is the same or similar switch.

(voice-over): The list includes recalled and nonrecalled Expeditions, Explorers, F-Series pickups, Crown Victorias, Town Cars and Grand Marquis, some as early as 1992 and as recent at 2003. Also included are thousands of Tauruses, Econoline vans, Rangers and Windstars.

Ford declined our requests for an on camera interview. But in a statement to CNN, Ford says its records show the risk of fire differs for make, model and year. They say, quote, "it's important to understand that all speed control systems are not identical in Ford vehicles. In those populations with an increasing fire report rate, we stopped using the switch through the recall process. The switch has performed well in many models for many years."

Nearly half of those 559 Ford fires reported to the government safety agency as originating in the cruise control switch were in cars and trucks from model years not recalled. That includes the Expeditions owned by the Oyolas and that Orlando car dealer.

NABICHT: They've taken the step by recalling certain models of vehicles. I think the recall probably needs to be much broader than what it is.

GRIFFIN: Ford's response to that? "We have been asked why we have not expanded the recall. The last thing we want to do is make an important safety decision on incorrect or incomplete information." Ford did recall the Mercury Grand Marquis made in 1992 and 1993 but not the 1994 model year.

SANDRA GONZALEZ, HOUSE BURNED DOWN: We just drove by and everything was gone.

GRIFFIN: Sandra and Ramon Gonzalez of Mission, Texas, owned a nonrecalled 1994 Grand Marquis. It burned in their garage two years ago, taking their home with it.

RAMON GONZALEZ, HOUSE BURNED DOWN: Everything was destroyed. Everything. Everything. Completely.

GRIFFIN: In a lawsuit against Ford, three fire investigators hired by the Gonzalez' insurance company blamed the cruise control switch, the same switch recalled in the previous two model years.

Of the Gonzalez' fire, Ford told CNN there's no evidence that the fire actually originated in the Grand Marquis, let alone in the switch. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said its investigators couldn't find a safety defect trend in the '94 through '97 Grand Marquis model years. And there was no recall of those years.

So what does Ford say is the reason the switch catches fire? Again, Ford wouldn't agree to be interviewed for this report. But this is what the company told us in an e-mail.

"We have not determined at this time that there is a defect with the switch. But for reasons we still do not understand, the switch is failing. And we are trying to understand why."

Ford says it's cooperating with a federal investigation into the fires. As for the switch, Ford has stopped using it. And is now using a new switch as of the 2004 model year. In the meantime, the Oyolas who made that desperate 911 call when their nonrecalled SUV caught fire, are left to pick up their lives.

LAURA HERNANDEZ, HOUSE BURNED DOWN (through translator): Here, there is nothing to replace, nothing. I was left with nothing.

GRIFFIN: Firefighters found the family cat burned to death in this corner.

This is where Laura's daughter Rotsenmary dialed 911. As the Expedition was burning in the garage just a few feet away, she escaped with burns to her legs.

For Nestor Oyola, as a father, it's hard to talk about it. The night before the fire, he moved his wife's Expedition in the garage, hoping to keep it safe. He says he'll never forget it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: We'll have more on this coming up. Also coming up, racial profiling in medicine. Some people call it that, and why it may not be a bad thing at all.

Bit first, a little early tonight, Erica Hill in Atlanta tonight with some of the other headlines of the day.

ERICA HILL, CNN HEADLINE NEWS ANCHOR: I want to get right on them, so here we go.

We begin in Southern California tonight, rattled this afternoon by an earthquake, the third to hit the state this week. The magnitude 4.9 quake was centered 70 miles east of Los Angeles. The rumbling, though, was felt south of San Diego and east into the suburbs and north of L.A. There are no reports of injuries or damage. We do know of at least two dozen aftershocks, though, that have been reported.

Four gunmen had stormed the school for international children in Cambodia today. They held a teacher and more than two dozen toddlers hostage for six hours. Police say the attackers shot and killed a 2- year-old Canadian boy who wouldn't stop crying. The gunmen were looking for ransom money. Police did eventually arrest them.

Federal investigators have concluded medical researchers who tested AIDS drugs on foster children over the past two decades did so in violation of rules designed to protect vulnerable children. The research was funded by the government and conducted at prestigious institutions, including Columbia University Medical Center and New York Presbyterian Hospital.

In Philadelphia, Mississippi, Edgar Ray Killen was taken from the courthouse on a stretcher and hospitalized today for high blood pressure. His trial recessed until at least tomorrow. Killen's an 80-year-old former member of the Ku Klux Klan. He's on trial for the murder of three civil rights workers in 1964.

And a Goodyear blimp made a crash landing just north of Miami late today. The blimp hit powerlines as it went down in an industrial park not far from the airfield where it is based. Two people on board did get out safely. Bad weather may have played a role here.

Aaron, that is the latest from HEADLINE NEWS, at now almost 13 past the hour.

BROWN: Almost. Erica, we'll see you in a half hour, give or take.

Much more to come in the hour ahead, including tough questions at the end of another horrible day in Iraq.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN (voice-over): More than two years on, the tanks are still needed. Is the rest of the picture any better? Our answer tonight comes from the troops in Tal Afar.

Also tonight, a drug that helps the heart, but with a major side effect. It raises questions, questions about race.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Illness isn't color blind, and medicine shouldn't be either.

BROWN: Just the same, what to make of a new pill tested and targeted on the basis of skin color?

And later, a river boat gamble.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Woefully inadequate. Woefully inadequate.

BROWN: Patrolling the Mississippi with too many miles and not enough boats, and the country's lifeline at stake.

From Memphis to Minneapolis, and always New York, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Like almost everything else in our history, medicine in this country has a long and complicated relationship with race. Today, an FDA advisory committee broke new ground, and in doing so bumped up against a social taboo. Here's medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In this country, racial discrimination is considered unacceptable. Remember what happened when Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder voiced his opinion on race and athletics? JIMMY "THE GREEK" SNYDER: The black is a better athlete to begin with, because he's been bred to be that way.

COHEN: He was fired.

DR. SALLY SATEL, PSYCHIATRIST, OASIS CLINIC: I know you came in today to talk about the Prozac.

COHEN: But Dr. Sally Satel isn't scared. She does racial profiling on her patients, and she's proud of it.

SATEL: Illnesses isn't color blind, and medicine shouldn't be either.

COHEN: Dr. Satel, a psychiatrist, says she's found that how her patients physically respond to drugs has a lot to do with race. She says it's true for antidepressants, true for hepatitis drugs, true for other medicines. For example, studies have found that this cancer drug, IRESSA, works better on people whose ancestors came from Asia, and doctors say they've noticed that ACE inhibitors do a better job of lowering blood pressure if you're white.

And now, today, for the first time, an FDA panel of experts has recommended approval for a drug for one race. When this drug, called Bidil, for congestive heart failure, was tested mostly on whites, the results were disappointing. But in blacks, it cut the death rate by almost half. Cardiologist Elizabeth Ofili helped conduct the study for the drug company, NitroMed.

DR. ELIZABETH OFILI, MOREHOUSE SCHOOL OF MEDICINE: If we get this compound approved, as the community is anticipating, if that happens, you know, that is a huge benefit to patients in the community.

COHEN: So why would a medicine work differently in people of different races? Because historically, people have tended to marry within their own ethnic group, and so certain gene become more prominent.

Jews from Eastern Europe are more likely to get Tay-Sachs, a debilitating neurological disease. People whose ancestors came from Africa are more likely to get sickle cell anemia.

With congestive heart failure, studies show that people of African origin are more likely to have low levels of a chemical called nitric oxide. That leads to narrower blood vessels and restricted blood flow. This new drug helps raise levels of nitric oxide and widen the arteries.

So while discriminating in real estate, say, or in banking is unacceptable...

SATEL: Paying attention to race in medicine is done for the benefit of the patient.

COHEN: Elizabeth Cohen, CNN, Atlanta. (END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: African-Americans are more likely than other groups to develop congestive heart failure. That's just a fact. African- Americans are also more likely to die from the disease, both of which underscore the need for effective treatment and add another layer to the story. Bidil is familiar with many -- familiar to many heart specialists, including Dr. Jay Cohn, professor of medicine at the University of Minnesota Medical School. He helped organize the trials to tre -- to test, rather, the drug and we spoke with him earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Dr. Cohn, what's interesting about this story to me is not so much the medicine, though I think we have to deal with that, it's that there's, for reasons I think people have trouble articulating, they're, like, uncomfortable with the idea that there may be a drug or there may be some drugs that work better on one race of people than another race of people, and they're not even sure why they're uncomfortable with it. But they are.

DR. JAY N. COHN, UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA: Well, they are and they express it quite openly, Aaron. There are those people who are so sensitized to this societal misuse of racial designation in the past that any attempt to designate people by their race gives them discomfort, because they are afraid it will be used in some hierarchical fashion to claim that they are hierarchically inferior.

It's unfortunate, because in medicine we've used designation by race as a very important tool in improving our skill and precision and diagnosis and treatment, and yet there are many people who are very uncomfortable by this, and they're appropriately concerned that race is not a uniform entity. So, there is no -- just because we identify people or they self-identify as black, doesn't mean they're a homogeneous population.

BROWN: Do we know, by the way, precisely what it is in the African-American population that makes -- that seems to make this drug work better than it does on others?

COHN: Well, that's a fascinating and important question, and in this trial that we've done, we really didn't compare whites and blacks, so, we can't say for certain that the drug is ineffective in whites. In fact, I feel quite confident it will work in whites, perhaps to a lesser extent, because when we analyzed our prior data, we found a remarkably greater benefit in the black patients than the white patients.

And this fits in with a lot that we know about physiology, and that is that black people in previous studies have demonstrated a deficiency of nitric oxide, this critical gas which is released in the arteries and heart that protects them, and all the trials and studies that have been done, really small studies, show that black people on average respond less well to stimuli that release nitric oxide and this drug, this Bidil, is a nitric oxide donor and enhancer, so what it really does is provide nitric oxide to the body and if there are black people who are more deficient in nitric oxide, you can understand why it may have a preferential benefit in that population.

BROWN: That's just -- as a final question -- that's just one of the interesting things I find about medicine and science is that sometimes, in a whole range of different drugs, we don't know why they work in some people and why they don't work in other people. They just -- it's just the way it turns out.

COHN: Well, that's right and I believe this is a watershed moment in drug development, the events of today and the last few months. That is, we can no longer accept these large scale trials in heterogeneous populations that show a benefit and say, well that benefit applies to everyone. We approve the drug for everyone.

I think we're now entering an era where we have to recognize there are differences and we need to find the responsive population and we hope that pharmacogenetics and genomics will answer that question, and we're collecting DNA on these patients. We're trying to find a more precise marker. We know that self-designated race is not the ideal marker, but that's what we're working with right now. It's a place-holder for some marker that eventually we may find that we can use to be much more precise about how we administer drugs to patients.

BROWN: Well, we appreciate your work and appreciate your patiently working with me through my understanding of some of this. Thanks for your time tonight.

COHN: It's a pleasure, Aaron. Thank you.

BROWN: Thank you, sir.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Dr. Jay Cohn at the University of Minnesota medical school.

Next on the program, with growing doubts at home about the mission in Iraq, we'll hear from troops who have been there and back and there again. Tough questions in some pretty rough territory, as it turns out.

And, later, the men and women safeguarding a city that's easy to overlook in the war on terror, but a vital town just the same. We'll explain why. We take a break first around the world. This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Over 1,700 Americans have died now in combat in Iraq. Five Marines and one sailor died late yesterday. We're only halfway through June, but it's turning into a deadly month again for U.S. forces. May wasn't very good; 47 Americans have died so far in June.

There is some encouraging political news there. Shiites and Sunnis seem to have agreed on the 55 people who will draft a constitution.

The political news at home is getting a bit foggier, however. There are new calls on Capitol Hill for the administration to set a deadline to begin withdraw withdrawing troops. The White House says that's the wrong message to send to the insurgents. Instead, American and Iraqi troops are trying to root them out of strong holds. CNN's Jane Arraf, embedded still with the unit that's trying to crack down on the city of Tal Afar.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JANE ARRAF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: There's no sleep for anyone here tonight. There are 800 soldiers, more than 50 tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles gathering here to descend on Tal Afar.

Our thermal imaging camera captures the tanks rolling through the sand in this western desert. We're in Humvees between the heavy armor.

By the time dawn comes, we're on the edge of the city.

The tanks lumber down the narrow streets in this neighborhood controlled by insurgents. The attack helicopters hover overhead. We can't see them, but on the ground, gunmen are shooting at them with AK-47s.

For weeks, Iraqi tribal lead verse been asking the U.S. Army to bomb the neighborhoods where insurgents are living, not their neighborhoods, though. Iraqis usually use the Arabic word for insurgents. But here after months of mortar attacks and roadside bombs, they're calling them terrorists.

Some of the houses the Iraqi and American forces search have been deserted. We've set up our mobile satellite equipment near the armored vehicles to do a live report. Just as we go to air, shots from a sniper ring out.

The mobile command post is in the back of a Bradley. Squadron commander Lieutenant Colonel Christopher Hickey is absorbed in directing the battle. He learns a little later that a senior officer, Lieutenant Colonel Terrence Crowe, has been killed by gunfire as he's leading Iraqi forces.

No one has the luxury of grieving right now for the 1,680th U.S. military death in this war. They have a battle to fight.

I spend most of my time traveling across Iraq. There are parts of this country where schools have been rebuilt, where people have jobs and where things are getting safer. This isn't one of them.

(on camera): This has become a ghost of the city that it was. A lot of the shops are closed. Some mothers are afraid to send their children to school. Even the police are afraid to go out.

(voice-over): Two years after the end of major combat, the U.S. military has sent 4,000 troops to this area, west of Mosul. The insurgency has flourished here in the vacuum left after too few U.S. forces were pulled to other parts of the country, officials say.

Grim Troop lost two soldiers when a road side bomb hit the striker vehicle after the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment arrived a month ago. Now they go around in heavier tanks and Bradleys.

When you strip away all the reasons politicians give for going to war, what's left are the bonds between soldiers and marines that keep them fighting. Specialist Brian Loftin from Atlanta was wounded in the attack and fought to come back. He can't believe I'm asking him why.

BRIAN LOFTIN, U.S. ARMY: Because my guys are here, man. I can't be there and them be here. If they're taking this stuff every day, I'm going to too, ma'am. There it is.

ARRAF: That's the way it's been for two years.

But here in Tal Afar, there are things I haven't seen much of in places as troubled as this. Iraqis, like these men, increasingly taking the risk of helping to find the insurgents. Iraqi Army leaders paired with Americans.

In two years, I've seen hundreds of houses raided. Some things are always the same: the frightened the women and children, the men defiant or resigned as they're blindfolded and handcuffed. We almost never hear whether these men are kept or questioned and released.

Some other military units take away every military aged male for questioning. This one is more discriminating. It's the second time this regiment has been deployed in Iraq. They're less nervous than soldiers here for the first time. They seem to know a bit more of the language and a bit more about behavior here. Enough for Captain Ryan Howell to diffuse the tension at a house they burst into.

HOWELL: When we knocked on the door -- that's good. Laughter is good.

ARRAF: The captain has reached across the cultural divide. A small victory. But two years into a complicated war, the kind that will help win or lose the people of this city.

Jane Arraf, CNN, Tal Afar, Iraq.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Still to come tonight, the hard work of security at home. Some place with a lot of ground. And as it turns out a lot of water to cover. Security watch on the Mississippi tonight.

And later, the kids who happened to be the future of the past. We'll sample the work of young historians. That's in our future, because here and now, this is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: When a Spanish explorer named Hernando Desoto discovered the Mississippi River almost 500 years ago near where Memphis, Tennessee is today, he was looking for gold. And in many ways, the mighty Mississippi has been a gold mine ever since, a broad highway for ships and boats delivering goods up and down the country.

Some say Old Man River is a big target without enough protection, which has them singing the blues in Memphis. On the "Security Watch" tonight, CNN's Jeanne Meserve.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEANNE MESERVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The music of Memphis is the music of the Mississippi, brought here in the era of river boats and cotton, celebrated in the blues clubs of Beal Street.

Memphis mayor Willy Harrington knows his river city's charms and risks. He worries that a terrorist strike here would impact much of the country.

MAYOR WILLIE HERENTON, MEMPHIS: Well, I mean, it was just wreak havoc. It would wreak havoc to our entire distribution system.

MESERVE: Mississippi barges haul tons of grains, minerals, chemicals, some of them highly toxic. They deliver coal to a power plant and petroleum to a refinery which pipes fuel to a fleet of FedEx planes. With FedEx headquartered here and two interstates and five railroads using the city's bridges, Memphis calls itself America's Distribution Center.

DONALD MCCRORY, PORT OF MEMPHIS: If we were to shut down the port and the waterway here in Memphis, it would impact, easily 50 percent of the United States, I would say, in terms of delivery of a variety of commodities.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm looking for that red one off of that point.

MESERVE: It is the job of the Coast Guard to keep the river safe.

CMDR. DAVID STALFORT, US COAST GUARD: We just take a look around the banks, look around the bridges, and if we see anything suspicious, report back to our OP center.

MESERVE: The station in Memphis is responsible for 1,200 miles of river in five states. Much of the river bank is remote and undeveloped, but there are nine ports and plenty of critical infrastructure. To patrol all this, Coast Guard Memphis has three small boats.

Do you have enough?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have enough to patrol the areas we patrol. Of course, how much is enough?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Woefully inadequate. Woefully inadequate.

MESERVE: The mayor says the Coast Guard needs more of almost everything.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Patrol boats, manpower and technology.

MESERVE: The city and county do assist and industries along the river keep an eye out for people who are where they shouldn't be.

Funded but not yet installed, a port-wide system of surveillance cameras and sensors to detect any accidental or intentional chemical release. More could be done, but should it?

MCCRORY: Someone has to pay the bill, and it gets back to how much risk are you willing to accept and how much security can you afford. That's a question for the American people.

MESERVE: The mayor of Memphis has an answer.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't think we can ever close our eyes to possibilities and I don't think we can invest too much.

MESERVE: Inland ports like Memphis haven't gotten the attention or funding coastal ports have, though a terrorist strike here could reverberate far beyond the river's banks. It's all about geography. For Memphis, it always has been.

For CNN's America bureau, Jeanne Meserve, Memphis, Tennessee.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: And on the program tonight, kids making history by making history. We'll introduce you to the Ken and Rick Burns of the high school set.

Also coming up, how close Michael Jackson came to a conviction. Notes from jury to judge tell a story and we'll tell you. It's what we do. This is NEWSNIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: In a moment, making history by making movies, but first, at about a quarter to the hour, almost exactly quarter to the hour, time for some of the other headlines of the day. Here's Erica Hill again in Atlanta.

HILL: By my clock in Atlanta, you hit it right on the nose, Aaron. Excellent work.

BROWN: Thank you.

HILL: Michael Jackson, it turns out, came very close to going to prison instead of back to Neverland. This, according to documents released today. Just three hours before the final verdict, jurors sent a message to the judge saying they couldn't agree on two counts of providing alcohol to a minor. Those charges would have carried a sentence of up to six months in jail. The judge also said today he plans to review and release almost all the sealed documents in the case. The battle over the confirmation of John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations moved on to a new round today. Bolton met with Democratic senator Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, one of those trying to block the confirmation. But Senator Dodd says he still needs more documents the White House refuses to turn over. The Republicans say they'll try to force a vote on Monday.

BJ's Wholesale Club has settled with Federal Trade Commission over charges lax security led to $13 million in counterfeit credit and debit card purchases. BJ's will adopt a new security program. It will be monitored by an outside expert for the next 20 years.

For the first time since World War II, the U.S. Army has awarded a Silver Star to a female soldier. Sergeant Leigh Ann Hester earned the silver star in Iraq while serving in military police unit which provides security for a convey that came under fire. Twenty-seven insurgents were killed in that firefight. It was caught on tape by an insurgent. The Silver Star is Army's the third highest combat award.

Another high honor for another woman in the military. The Air Force has named Captain Nicole Malachowski the first woman to be named one of the famed Thunderbirds Aerobatics Squadron. She'll fly an F-16 in the number three right wing position in the diamond formation for the precision jet demonstration team. Not bad.

And, some deals for Deep Throat. Mark Felt, the 91-year-old former FBI man who recently revealed his role in helping "The Washington Post" cover the Watergate scandal has sold the book and movie rights to his life. Actor Tom Hanks' company is producing the film.

And, Aaron, that's the latest. Back on over to you.

BROWN: Thank you.

You can imagine the father of a teenage daughter likes to hear about all these firsts that women are doing these days.

HILL: Absolutely. I love to hear about it.

BROWN: I bet you do. Thank you very much.

National History Day, celebrating its own birthday, 25 years old now; 2000 students from around the country -- this is really cool -- today, sixth grade to 12th, came to compete at the University of Maryland near Washington. Most had been working on their projects all year. Many mix history with new technology to make student documentaries and a few of these students may make history one day.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CATHY GORN, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY: National History Day is a wonderful history program for kids in sixth to 12th grades. They choose a topic in history go out and do extensive research.

Back when the documentary category first started, we called it media presentations. Now, kids are using iMovie to construct all these complicated documentaries.

KRISTI DAVIS, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNER: We used iMovie 4 and when we came here and we watched other documentaries, they used so many different programs.

DUSTIN MCEVOY, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNER: I used Pinnacle Studios 9.4.3-plus.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Dustin Mcevoy.

MCEVOY: Well, I won first place, senior individual documentary.

In the 1880s, London was a society of the haves and have-nots.

For my project on the White Chapel murders of 1888 and how it was used as a political tool to instigate social and political reform.

In 1988, 100 years after the killings of White Chapel, the murder cases were officially closed. The identity of the Ripper remains unknown.

ALEXANDRA COX, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNER: I won first place for my junior individual documentary on George F. Kennan.

The key to post-war Communist containment.

I researched major communicators in the Cold War and came across George F. Kennan and thought his communication was so influential, that it would be perfect for a documentary.

Kennan realized the Soviet system was a combination of political oppression and governmental economics, which he felt would eventually self-destruct.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Kids can compete as individuals and kids can compete in groups of two to five so we give them an opportunity for cooperative learning.

PATRICK PUGLIESE, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNER: We did a documentary called "Please Adjust the Color." It was about stereotypes on television of African-Americans, and how the civil rights movement kind of helped to change the idea what the African- American culture was.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: By communicating with images as well as sound, television was able to effect its audience in a much more powerful way than radio ever could.

BRANDON KELLER, NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNER: Art comes in many forms. This is the, well, most educational art. You can just do so much more with it than you can with a book. You just have so much more freedom, so many doors are open for you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Good for them. We'll probably all be working for them some day.

Check morning papers, update you on our lead story as well after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Okey-doke. Time to check morning papers from around the country and around the world. But before we do, we've gotten so many e-mails already with questions about our lead story, having to do with Fords, some Fords, those made -- some Fords made before the year 2004, do some of them suddenly burst into flame. We have set up an area on our Web site where you can check your Ford model against the ones that have this part. Go to cnn.com, and it will list the cars you ought to be concerned about, whether they've been recalled or haven't been recalled. And you can make some decisions about how you want to deal with it. You may have to pay for it yourself, because right now Ford isn't paying for all of it.

OK. On to morning papers. Iraq is all over the morning papers, and the message -- this is the most Iraq I've seen in a long time in morning papers, honestly. What was that again? One? Wow!

"International Herald Tribune," "American discontent, increasing polls find. "The Christian Science Monitor." Pretty much the same: "As Iraq efforts drags on, doubt mounts at home." Yeah, I would say so.

"Chattanooga Times Free Press." "Senator Frist defends Schiavo remarks." The senator said, well, I didn't make a diagnosis that she was OK. Well, he kind of sort of did, sort of.

Forget that one.

"The Boston Herald." I'm running out of time. It happens sometimes. I know when you do this at home, it happens to you. "Hub goes to pot." This is "The Boston Herald." "We are the highest city in the United States." There's a poll done on cities where the most marijuana is smoked. Boston ranked number one. And I think San Francisco ranked number two. Oregon was up there.

The weather in Chicago tomorrow -- if you're wondering, and I was -- "glinty." We'll wrap it up with something cool in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This week in history, the first African- American, Thurgood Marshall, nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court.

And a slow speed chase on June 17th, 1994, L.A. police followed O.J. Simpson in a white Ford Bronco driven by his friend and former teammate Al Cowlings.

And in Montana, an 81-day standoff between the FBI and the anti- government Freemen group came to a peaceful end. That is "This Week in History."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: Isn't that weird that the Bronco chase and the Michael Jackson car thing this week -- same week.

One bonus paper before we go, because we've got a little extra time. "New York Daily News," "Enemy in the ranks: Charge sergeant murdered two officers." I believe this is the first case of alleged fragging in the war in Iraq. It was the case in Kuwait, just before.

Tomorrow on the program, we'll take a look at the movement in Congress to get some sort of exit strategy out of the administration, in some cases bring the troops home. I'll do that and much more tomorrow. We hope you'll join us, 10:00 Eastern time. "LOU DOBBS TONIGHT" next for most of you. We'll see you tomorrow. Until then, good night for all of us.

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