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CNN Connie Chung Tonight

Interview With Wife of Police Chief Charles Moose; Legendary Rapper Jam Master Jay Remembered

Aired October 31, 2002 - 20:00   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.


CONNIE CHUNG, HOST: Good evening. I'm Connie Chung.
Tonight: the Caribbean connection. What were John Muhammad and John Lee Malvo doing there?

ANNOUNCER: Did terror begin in paradise? Investigators are following the sniper trail all the way to blue waters of the Caribbean, John Malvo back to his youth in Jamaica. Plus, was there a John Muhammad Antigua connection? And we'll follow the money. Who funded the suspects?

Police Chief Charles Moose:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHARLES MOOSE, MONTGOMERY COUNTY POLICE CHIEF: We have not given in to the terror.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: For three weeks, we hung on his every word.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

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

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: Tonight, we'll meet Sandra Moose, the chief's wife, on how she endured one of the nation's biggest police investigations.

A pioneer of rap music, until a cold-blooded murder left him dead in his own recording studio.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, Run-DMC, it's like one of the Beatles just died.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: Another hip-hop artist is killed, striking another sour note for rap.

And Winona caught on tape at Saks, was she stealing or acting?

This is CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT. Live from the CNN Broadcast Center in New York: Connie Chung.

CHUNG: Good evening.

Tonight investigators here and in the Caribbean are piecing together the activities of John Muhammad and John Lee Malvo in the period leading up to the sniper attacks around Washington. Police in Louisiana say they are looking into possible links between Muhammad's rifle and a number of murders in that state.

In Alabama, police now say the rifle used in the Washington shootings actually was the weapon used in a fatal robbery there last month. And investigators now believe Muhammad and Malvo may have met in Antigua, where Malvo attended school and where officials are now trying to determine if Muhammad was involved in any recent unsolved crimes there.

And listen to this. Antiguan police also want to know whether there is any reason to suspect a link to Richard Reid, who tried to use a shoe bomb to blow a plane ultimately bound for Antigua.

CNN's David Mattingly has been tracking their movements and their money trail. And he joins us now from our sniper's desk in Washington -- David.

DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Connie, the face on this Antiguan passport is clearly that of sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad.

He was on the island in 2000 and 2001. But island officials tells us the passport was obtained fraudulently, that Muhammad used forged documents to claim that his mother had been born there. That tipped off Antiguan investigators to look into his possible involvement in a passport-forgery business, one in which bogus passports can not only get people into the United States, but they can fetch up to $1,000 apiece.

One Antiguan official calls Muhammad a habitual forger. And it's not the first time his activities have been called into question.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(voice-over): John Allen Muhammad was detained in April of last year in Miami, allegedly trying to bring two Jamaican women into the U.S. with false documents. The INS declined to prosecute. Also last year, he raised suspicions while staying at this Tacoma homeless shelter.

JAMES MITTON, LIGHTHOUSE MISSION: The one thing that I would say that I found most odd was that John Muhammad seemed to have the financial capability to travel at a moment's notice, even though he didn't have any visible means of income.

MATTINGLY: Getting to the bottom of such unexplained behavior could help investigators determine how the unemployed Muhammad may have been able to bankroll an alleged three-week killing spree that required traveling, at least four nights in D.C. area motels, a rifle, ammunition, and possibly electronic equipment.

Before the sniper killings, Alabama investigators say robbery was the motive behind Muhammad and Malvo's alleged shooting of two women outside a Montgomery liquor store. Though no money was actually taken, investigators continue to look for possible connections to other robberies.

DON CLARK, FORMER FBI INVESTIGATOR: You may find a series of different types of criminal activities where they could have gotten some money from, different types of convenient stores, or a robbery here or there, or maybe even a bank robbery or two, just to sustain themselves.

MATTINGLY: After the killing spree began, there were signs that whatever money Muhammad and Malvo may have had could have been running out. October 7, after the shooting of a Maryland middle school, Muhammad asks employees at this Baltimore sandwich shop if he could use their parking lot while resting in his car. Police later find him sleeping in his blue Caprice on a nearby street.

October 11: after the killing of a man at a Virginia gas station, court documents show Muhammad staying at a nearby inexpensive motel. He orders a pizza, but tips the delivery man a single penny.

October 22: Hours after the killing of a bus driver in Silver Spring, Maryland, Muhammad and Malvo are at a local YMCA, asking staff to waive a $3 fee.

And October 24: The two are arrested in the early morning, sleeping in their car at a Maryland rest stop.

CLARK: It doesn't look like any lavish lifestyle there or any great sums of money being furnished to them by some group. I haven't seen that. The investigators may know differently, but I haven't seen it at this point.

MATTINGLY: The only thing in their possession recovered by investigators and readily accounted for: the $250 Chevy Caprice, co- purchased with another man in New Jersey.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MATTINGLY: They would have also had to come up with approximately $3,000 for the items found in that car: a global positioning device, walkie-talkies, a Sony laptop computer, and, of course, a Bushmaster .223-caliber rifle -- Connie.

CHUNG: David Mattingly, in Washington, thank you.

Today, we also got a new glimpse into the past of John Lee Malvo. CNN has obtained this video of him in school in Jamaica in 1997. This is before Malvo's mother took him to Antigua, before he came to the United States. Malvo, seen here reciting poetry with his classmates, would have been around 12 years old at the time.

And, as we mentioned, police are looking at other murders that may be tied to the rifle used in the Washington shootings. One occurred last month in Louisiana.

And CNN investigative correspondent Art Harris is on the story -- Art, what have you learned?

ART HARRIS, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: Connie, CNN has learned that a murder in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, has been linked to the snipers' rifle in the Washington-Baltimore area slayings.

That murder of a beauty supply owner on September 23 was linked by ballistics at the Louisiana state crime lab. And they say the woman was hit by a bullet at closing time, her purse taken, possibly containing as much as $1,500. I talked to her husband, James Ballenger -- her name was Hong Ballenger, mother of three -- who has been trying to get police to look at this as possibly sniper-related for several weeks -- Connie.

CHUNG: Art, can you describe her injuries?

HARRIS: Just one shot to the head in the back of the head, believed to have been killed instantly outside the Beauty Depot -- it was a beauty supply store she ran -- and was killed on the spot. A witness told police that she saw a thin black man running from the scene with a white T-shirt over his shoulder.

CHUNG: And did police get any more information that would have caused them to fan out of state? Because I think one of the problems in Alabama was that police did not take that one fingerprint that was on a magazine and try and find out if it matched any other fingerprints in the rest of the country.

HARRIS: Well, Connie, it's a good question.

The detectives I'm talking to in Baton Rouge say they've been talking to detectives in Montgomery, Alabama, for some time now, trying to see what similarities there might be between their liquor store robbery/homicide and the murder of Mrs. Ballenger. And that may have lead to increased interest in recent days and the ballistics match between her murder and the bullets recovered from victims in the Washington/Baltimore area -- Connie.

CHUNG: And, Art, are there any other potential unsolved murders in Louisiana that authorities are concerned might be connected to this, again, the same weapon?

HARRIS: They are looking at one more in Baton Rouge, no details on that yet. And one of my sources has said that he expects departments around the country to be looking at their case files in an attempt to clear them, possibly link them to the snipers cross-country odyssey of death that may have taken other lives in other places. But we don't know that yet.

CHUNG: All right, CNN's Art Harris, thank you for your investigative reporting. Appreciate it.

A little later: a look at the most familiar figure from the sniper investigation: Montgomery Police Chief Charles Moose. We'll hear about sides of him we've never seen from the woman who knows him best, his wife. You won't want to miss it.

ANNOUNCER: Next: Another hip-hop legend is killed -- why rap music and violence has hit fever pitch.

CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHUNG: Back in the '80s, Jason Mizell was just a kid from Queens in New York City. But, as Jam Master Jay, his turntable scratching drove the music of the monstrously successful crossover rap group Run- DMC.

It's just about 24 hours now since he was killed by a single shot to the head in his recording studio, not far from where he grew up. Unlike some other rappers involved in violence, Run-DMC never pushed the culture of violence in songs or in image. He was 37, married, and had three children.

In Queens tonight, CNN's Michael Okwu.

Michael, what I want to know is, since you have been there at the scene of where the shooting occurred, there have to have been so many fans coming by. Are they gathering there?

MICHAEL OKWU, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Oh, they certainly have.

And they've been gathering here since the wee hours of this morning. They are disturbed, Connie. They are distraught. But, in many ways, they have been trying to pay tribute to this man. Many, as I said, came out last night, braving the cold and the rain, essentially trying to be as close to where this icon was last alive and also to set up some makeshift memorials. This is what a couple of them had to say earlier this afternoon.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think they were a trendsetter. They were the first rap group to go on "American Bandstand," the first one to appear on the cover of "Rolling Stone." So they broke barriers.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I believe that people should be more unified. I don't think jealousy and hate is going to make the situations any better. And I'm disappointed and disgusted.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

OKWU: Connie, it hits very hard because we're here in Jamaica, Queens, which is not very far from Hollis, Queens, where Jam Master Jay grew up. And he was certainly the pride and joy there -- Connie.

CHUNG: Michael, has there been any response or reaction statements from any of the industry leaders?

OKWU: Well, lots of the people who actually showed up last night were hip-hop greats such as Chuck D of Public Enemy, a rap band that was very big in the 1980s and the very early 1990s. And he said this was very much like a Beatle dying. And if that sounds like it's overstating it to some of the people not connected intimately to this music, it really isn't.

To those people in the hip-hop community and the rap community, this was very much like a Beatle passing away. This man was part of a pioneering band, pioneering act, Run-DMC, essentially the first to start scratching music, essentially sampling sounds from disparate artists and genres and blending it, fusing it with hip-hop in order to create a whole new genre of music.

As a matter of fact, Russell Simmons, who is something of an icon within the community and a brother of one of the founding members of Run-DMC, came out earlier today and he read a statement, essentially saying, for nearly 20 years, Run-DMC has been the closest thing to gospel artists that the contemporary music community has had. They talked about God and their higher selves, the importance of staying away from drugs, and generally inspirational and uplifting subject matter.

A very dark day here, because so many people, Connie, cannot imagine why this particular group would have been touched in such a violent way -- Connie.

CHUNG: Thank you, Michael Okwu, in Queens, New York.

Run-DMC's original publicist was Bill Adler, who also became the group's biographer with the book "Tougher Than Leather: The Rise of Run-DMC." And we also have Michael Eric Dyson, University of Pennsylvania professor of Afro-American studies and author of "Holler If You Hear Me: Searching for Tupac Shakur." He joins us from Tucson, Arizona.

Thank you, gentlemen, both for being with us.

Bill, let's start with you.

How many years did you know him?

BILL ADLER, AUTHOR, "TOUGHER THAN LEATHER": Well, I knew him from 1984 to the present.

CHUNG: This had to have been a shock.

ADLER: It's a terrible hock. This is a textbook case of senseless violence. There's no explaining this. If they arrest and solve this murder, it's still not going to make any sense to me.

CHUNG: Was Jam Master ever involved in any kind of violence or talked violence or had a gun?

ADLER: No, not that I know of. And, also, their public image, Run-DMC's public image is almost as the angels. I don't want to make them saints, but their most important work predates the whole rising gangsta rap.

CHUNG: What kind of guy was he?

ADLER: He was very amiable personally. And he was essentially happy. And he was a very hard-working musician. That's who he was. When he wasn't performing, he would be in the studio producing.

CHUNG: Michael, there has been a long list of these types of murders. What is going on with this industry?

MICHAEL ERIC DYSON, PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA: Well, I think, on the one hand, we have to acknowledge that there has been a glamorization and glorification of violence within certain pockets of hip-hop.

But, as Bill has eloquently stated, not only did they predate it. They were the antithesis of the very expression of violence within hip-hop. They embraced black culture. They celebrated commercial culture. They fused the races. They organized a very spiritual place within hip-hop, where all peoples could come together.

On the other hand, it is a hazard to be a young black man in American society, from the ages of 18 to 35. Mr. Mizell was 37. So the hazards of ghetto living, the hazards of African-American life make it real.

CHUNG: But you don't really believe that this was one of those cases, the hazards of being a young black male?

DYSON: Well, he's in his old neighborhood. We don't know the circumstances. I don't know what happened. This is certainly not a East Coast vs. West Coast thing. I don't think it has anything particularly to do with the violence within hip-hop. I don't even know the circumstances.

But I am suggesting that, in this culture, young black men die at an extraordinarily high rate. And when they are famous, like Mr. Mizell, we of course lament the tragedy of that. But there are so many other black men who are dying and perishing every day from this kind of senseless, aimless violence that Bill Adler has so eloquently spoken about.

CHUNG: I'm sure the investigators will try and find out what the motive was and why it was seemingly an execution-style murder.

Michael, I wanted to ask you, also. You talked about the glamorization of violence in this industry. But has it changed since the deaths of Tupac Shakur and others?

DYSON: Well, absolutely. I think that people have become much more wary of trying to engage in rhetorical battles, where they visit scorn on their opponents, what they call the dis rap. It used to be that it was contained within the lyrical format of rap music, where you would dis somebody else, talk about their particular skills and so on. But then it began to spill over into real life, so to speak.

But I think, again, that so much of hip-hop has taken an unfair beating on this. Here I am in Tucson, Arizona, where a Gulf War veteran walked Monday into the University of Arizona and killed three professors. Another Gulf War veteran was part of the D.C. snipers.

I think there's a much more powerful correlation between those Gulf War veterans who are out of control who have been trained to snipe. And they killed more people in the last three weeks than have been killed in hip-hop in the last 10 years.

(CROSSTALK)

CHUNG: I just want to take a moment to remember Jam Master, so let me switch over to Bill for a minute.

What is his legacy?

ADLER: His legacy, I think of him sort of as the -- he was to Run-DMC what Charlie Watts has been to the Rolling Stones. He was a superb timekeeper and a pace-setter and a goad on stage.

And then, also, unlike the Rolling Stones -- I'll leave that alone now -- I'll just, in the studio, he was a tremendous producer. And what he did and what Run-DMC has done is, they brought authentic hip-hop to the stage and to the world through their records and through their performances and whatnot.

CHUNG: All right, gentlemen, I thank you so much. Professor Dyson and Bill Adler, thank you for being with us.

When we come back: the latest in the shoplifting trial of Winona Ryder.

Stay with us.

Still ahead: Charles Moose, the face of the sniper investigation -- what life is like now outside of the national spotlight. Connie goes one-on-one with his wife, Sandra -- when CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHUNG: If you think of the Winona Ryder trial as a guilty pleasure, trust me, you are not alone.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE LATE SHOW WITH DAVID LETTERMAN")

DAVID LETTERMAN, HOST: So Winona Ryder is researching for a movie role. And, yes, I believe the name of the movie was "Saks, Lies and Videotape."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHUNG: Oh, that wasn't great. Of course, for Ryder, it's very, very serious. If she is convicted of stealing more than $5,000 worth of clothing from Saks in Beverly Hills, she could face up to three years in prison.

Covering the trial in Los Angeles for "Celebrity Justice" is Pat LaLama.

Hello, Pat.

And here: Jeffrey Toobin, our legal correspondent -- our legal analyst, I should say .

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Basically full-time on the Ryder story.

CHUNG: You got it.

TOOBIN: That's me.

CHUNG: Pat, what happened this morning in court?

PAT LALAMA, "CELEBRITY JUSTICE": Well, essentially, today's proceedings amounted to the following: Mark Geragos trying to punch great big fat holes in the Saks security person'S testimony.

As you'll recall, she had some pretty damning things to talk about yesterday with what she saw, eyewitness to Winona allegedly having a cut finger, wrapping items in tissue paper, pulling out a pair of scissors, trying to pull sensors, cut sensors off of items.

So today, Mark Geragos basically tried to show that this particular witness, Colleen Rainey, is setting up for the prosecution, that she's embellishing, that she's changing testimony, that she's adding things, all in the effort to set up Winona Ryder.

CHUNG: And how has Winona been, if you will, acting in the courtroom?

LALAMA: Well, I have to tell you, I watch her very closely every day. That's my job. And the first time that they showed the surveillance tape, I have to tell you, this is a defendant who was so fixated on the surveillance tape, watching every frame of it, watching the witness for the prosecution.

And the only time I would ever see her divert her attention was to make a comment to Mark Geragos. And I noticed that the first couple of days, she made many comments to him, particularly when the surveillance tape looked incriminating. She was constantly tugging him or made comments to him. There was one point when I thought, isn't he going to ask her to be quiet so he can pay attention to the testimony?

And she wasn't writing anything. She wasn't taking any notes, but she was diligent and paying close, close attention. Yesterday, she changed her strategy. She was writing all day and making faces and jaw-dropping when there would be testimony about much of the -- quote -- "stolen merchandise." You would see her look in disbelief like, "Oh, they can't possibly be saying that about me."

And today, she looked shocked and dismayed at some of the testimony. So the question is: Is it acting? Is it not? Who knows. Only the jury has to decide whether that is important.

CHUNG: Pat, you're a hoot. Let me go to Jeffrey.

There are two strategies. One is that she was practicing for a role, right?

TOOBIN: Practicing, yes. As David Letterman said, the story she was practicing for was "The Winona Ryder story." so that's kind of a problem for her. Anyway, yes, that's one story.

CHUNG: The other one is, she thought her assistant was going to pay the $5,000 later.

TOOBIN: Right.

CHUNG: Either of these strategies good?

TOOBIN: Either one is good.

My favorite, of course, is the practicing for a movie role.

CHUNG: I know.

TOOBIN: And the interesting question to me will be, will she bring in anyone from the movie business who will say, "Yes, this is the role..."

CHUNG: I told you she would.

(CROSSTALK)

TOOBIN: Let's ask Pat.

Is anyone going to come in and really say what movie she was practicing for?

LALAMA: So far, there is no indication whatsoever that that's going to happen. But, listen, I want to tell you something else that was important that happened today.

And, Jeffrey, I'd love your legal expertise on this.

While at the same time that the defense is trying to say, "Hey, all these people are setting her up and getting together and embellishing and fabricating," at the same time, he accused this Saks witness of being essentially star-struck, by saying things like: "Didn't you look through her file-o-facts? And didn't you see Bono's number? And didn't you see Keanu Reeves' number and you shrieked, 'I love him?' And aren't you trying sell the Winona Ryder story?"

And I just thought, whoa, I guess as a lawyer, you could answer to whether you can throw all that out if there's relevance, if there's a foundation. And she was very calm and said, "No, no, no."

(LAUGHTER)

TOOBIN: I am just so jealous that it's you in the courtroom and not me. But what happens when celebrities go...

LALAMA: Eat your heart out.

TOOBIN: Yes, I am.

But when celebrities go on trial, the issue always is, from the defense perspective is, they're getting special treatment, that they are being singled out, they get too much attention, and that it's too much negative attention. You're picking on them because you want to bathe in their reflective glory.

CHUNG: Sure, I think so.

TOOBIN: So the question is whether it works. I wish I were seeing the testimony itself. It's hard to imagine it works, that you can convince a jury that the prosecution is making this whole story up because she's a celebrity. But we shall see.

CHUNG: Do you think she'll take the stand? She won't, right?

TOOBIN: It would be insane, I think, to take the stand, especially if it's true there may be prior incidents, if not arrests, discomfort with store surveillance in the past. Cross-examined about that, she'd be toast.

CHUNG: OK.

Pat LaLama and Jeffrey Toobin, thank you.

And when we come back: the woman behind the man.

ANNOUNCER: Still ahead: On camera, the chief in the sniper case wore his emotions on his sleeve.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

C. MOOSE: That has not changed today. That has not changed from yesterday or the day before. I've tried to say that every time. Sorry you missed it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: But what is the high-profile cop like when the cameras are gone? Mrs. Charles Moose tells her story.

CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT continues in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHUNG: Through the drama and suspense and anguish of the sniper hunt, there was one face of the investigation: Montgomery County Police Chief Charles Moose. Maybe it was just that we saw so much of him, but he seemed different somehow from the usual podium police officers in high-profile cases.

In a bit, you're going to meet the one person who knows him better than anyone, his wife.

But first: a reminder of just why so many found him so fascinating.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(voice-over): For nearly a month, we hung on his every word, waiting for news, hope, a lead, three to four news conferences a day, frequent television interviews. But it was this moment when we knew Charles Moose was not your ordinary cop.

C. MOOSE: Someone is so mean-spirited that they shot a child. Now, all of our victims have been innocent, have been defenseless. But now we're stepping over the line.

CHUNG: The facade fell. For him, it was personal, not surprising for the father of two who would pay out of his own pocket for neighborhood children's bicycles that had been stolen, who organized a gift drive for needy children. These are the two sides of Charles Moose; soft-hearted, but tough.

C. MOOSE: We can't ever make any community totally crime-free, but I think you can do a lot better job there.

CHUNG: Beneath that steady, calm voice, a slight Southern drawl. His roots are in the small North Carolina town of Lexington, where football was his passion. In 1975, Moose graduated from the University of North Carolina with a degree in history, on his way to becoming a lawyer, not a cop.

But he decided to take the test for the Portland, Oregon, Police Bureau to get some background. He thought he'd only be there a few years, but he stayed for 18. Moose went from patrolman to chief, earned a Ph.D., taught college-level courses. And after he became police chief, he and his second wife, Sandy, moved into one of the worst neighborhoods in Portland to show that this chief intended to make the entire city safe.

C. MOOSE: There's a lot of hope for the neighborhood. But I certainly recognize there are a lot of people working to make this area better. And I'm just -- we're just two more people.

CHUNG: The crime rate did go down. And, in an almost eerie parallel to today's headlines, his department successfully solved the 1999 serial murder case of three prostitutes.

But controversy followed him. There were charges that he had used excessive police force to break up a demonstration outside of his home. And there were allegations that he made racial slurs against whites he thought discriminated against him. C. MOOSE: I'm sad that those responses occurred. I'm ashamed of my behavior in those situations. I'm clearly embarrassed that I have to relive these situations again.

CHUNG: In the spring of 1999, after a six-month national search, Montgomery County, Maryland, tapped Chief Moose to be police chief. They knew he was an innovator.

C. MOOSE: People that choose to not work to meet the goals and the mission of the Montgomery County Police Department are going to have to deal with me.

CHUNG: Who knew the country, even the world, would get to know him well, watch him consumed with a deadly chase, killers on a cross- country shooting spree? Moose was the man in charge of catching them. He was emotional at times.

When a child was targeted:

C. MOOSE: Stepping over the line, shooting a kid. I guess it's getting to be really, really personal now.

CHUNG: Angry, at times, when people were critical of the investigation.

C. MOOSE: I have not received any message that the citizens of Montgomery County want Channel 9 or "The Washington Post" or any other media outlet to solve this case. If they do, then let me know. We will go and do other police work and we will turn this case over to the media and you can solve it.

CHUNG: And determined when communications with the sniper seemed to break down.

C. MOOSE: We still ask you to call or write us if you are reluctant to contact us. Be assured that we remain ready to talk directly with you. Our word is our bond.

CHUNG: But, in the end, he nabbed two suspects.

C. MOOSE: We're going to let a lot of the members of the task force, the people you see here, we're going to let them go home, hug their children, hug their spouses, and just think about the fact that we continue to live in the greatest nation.

CHUNG: And everyone, along with the man at the center of it all, was able to breathe again.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CHUNG: And possibly no one was breathing easier than Sandy Moose, the wife of Montgomery County Police Chief Charles Moose.

Sandy, thank you for being with us.

SANDY MOOSE, WIFE OF CHARLES C. MOOSE: Thank you for having me. CHUNG: So, how long have you known your husband?

S. MOOSE: About 20 years.

CHUNG: Long marriage, long relationship.

S. MOOSE: Longtime friends, yes. We've been married 13 years.

CHUNG: So you know him very well.

S. MOOSE: Yes, very well.

CHUNG: I'm going to just utter a few words here. And you tell me yes or no, do they describe your husband?

S. MOOSE: OK.

CHUNG: Shy?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: A guy who wears his emotion on his sleeve?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: Volatile?

S. MOOSE: No.

CHUNG: Sensitive?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: A man's man?

(LAUGHTER)

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: Proud to be an African-American?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: Did I say man of principle already?

S. MOOSE: No.

CHUNG: But he is?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: Correct?

S. MOOSE: Yes. It's a double yes.

CHUNG: I had not said it. OK, got it. Wishy-washy?

S. MOOSE: No.

CHUNG: Opinionated, then?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: The best thing about him?

S. MOOSE: His kindness.

CHUNG: Oh.

The worst thing about him?

S. MOOSE: Man.

CHUNG: Tough one?

S. MOOSE: He's stubborn.

CHUNG: Oh, all right. All right.

S. MOOSE: Tough one.

CHUNG: Yes. OK.

Now, your husband was the public face in a case in which there was no identity for the sniper. He was not known. But your husband was on television day after day after day. You said that you would call him several times during the day, because you knew he was under stress. And when you would call him, would tell him how he did at a particular news conference?

S. MOOSE: Definitely.

CHUNG: For instance, were you praiseworthy and brutal?

S. MOOSE: Most definitely. That's the nature of our relationship. So, just as he doesn't mince his words, neither do I.

CHUNG: Sandy, you just heard your husband in our story take on the media, attack the media. What did you think?

S. MOOSE: I was like, "Oh, my God." You know, I don't like leaks either. And I thought, "Whoa."

CHUNG: Did you think he should have hauled off and...

S. MOOSE: Well, the problem, definitely, once it's all been revealed, the problem was -- I guess it's just the opportunity to let him do his work wasn't there, like, is this guy just an out-of-control idiot or is he trying to do something here?

CHUNG: You mean your husband? S. MOOSE: My husband, yes, the out-of-control idiot, my husband, yes.

(LAUGHTER)

S. MOOSE: Basically, because you're just looking at it and you're going, "Oh, my God."

CHUNG: So, what did you think? When he came home or when you called him after that, what did you say to him?

S. MOOSE: Well, he just said, "There's more to it." And that's all he said.

CHUNG: Was smoke still coming out of his ears?

S. MOOSE: Yes. And he's like, "Man, this is going to cost me."

CHUNG: What do you mean?

S. MOOSE: I mean, because he just couldn't tell the plan, he pretty much expected the reaction he got, which was just: "This is going to cost me. I'm going to become hated by the media."

CHUNG: You mean because he took the media on.

S. MOOSE: Yes. Yes.

CHUNG: I see.

S. MOOSE: And that's pretty much what happened at first.

CHUNG: All right.

When we come back, there's a question I want to ask you. And that is that, you were out there. The sniper knew where your husband was. He could conceivably have known where you were and your son was also. And I'm wondering if any of you had any protection.

But don't tell me yet. We're going to pick that up when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

C. MOOSE: Received a communication. It is in the form of a postscript: "Your children are not safe anywhere at any time."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHUNG: One of the most gripping statements from the man the nation saw as the lead of the sniper investigation, Charles Moose.

Throughout the three-week sniper ordeal, Sandy Moose was the one behind the man, Chief Charles Moose. Sandy, let's continue.

Here he was at the center of this investigation. In fact, the sniper had written a couple of messages to him. And it was pretty clear that the sniper wanted to taunt law enforcement and try and control law enforcement.

My question is, was your husband being protected when he went from home to work? And were you being protected? Or did you have to just go out and get our own gas and sort of roll the dice?

S. MOOSE: Basically, I took care of myself. Charles was busy.

CHUNG: Really?

S. MOOSE: Yes. But I think if I would have asked for any kind of protection, it certainly would have been there.

CHUNG: How about your husband? Did he have any protection?

S. MOOSE: He felt it was adequate.

CHUNG: OK, all right.

There were many things that occurred that your husband did that I think were out there, not the sort of predictable. And another one is that he lambasted former police officials.

He said: "They are ranting and raving on all the various stations. What I'm seeing is an absolute ego problem. They are no longer anybody, but they do have the media in America and that all of a sudden makes them somebody again. We have got retired police chiefs out there looking for other jobs, taking advantage of the situation to get their face on television. How sad. How insulting."

So, did he come home that day or many days complaining about these people?

S. MOOSE: Actually, he has this ability to know that that's out there, but just kind of turn it off. And, really, I was glued to all the pundits and the talking heads and analysts. And so I knew a lot more about what they were saying than he -- he now knows.

CHUNG: You mean so he actually sheltered himself from it?

S. MOOSE: He did. He did.

And, you know, Connie, there was one particular person that said something that really bothered me. After he came out for a press conference, she called him hostile. And he was doing his job. And the word hostile, I just wanted to dial up right then and say, "Do you know what you're doing when you are calling this man hostile?"

That's one of those -- we have whole areas of discrimination law tailored to the word hostile. And for someone to label this black man as an angry or hostile person, that's a hard jacket to get off. CHUNG: Do you think that some of the criticism was racially based?

S. MOOSE: Well, I don't know that it was racially based. It might have been ignorance-based. I hate to think that people haven't studied history. But those words are charged words and they're very damaging.

CHUNG: Well, I think there has been some thought that, certainly, if he was a white police chief, that people would not be so willing and feel so free to criticize the head of an investigation that was unprecedented.

I'm going to show you a clip of a person that we interviewed. His name is Joseph McNamara. He was a former police chief -- the same kind of person your husband was talking about -- of Kansas City, Missouri, and San Jose, California.

Let's roll this clip and I want you to see it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSEPH MCNAMARA, FORMER POLICE CHIEF: I was a policeman for 35 years and a chief of two of the largest cities in the country for more than 18 years. And I have gone through the stress that the chief has. I know what it is.

But, nevertheless, what he is doing is wrong in blasting the news media. And I'm not privy to any inside information. I don't want to be. But I know that it doesn't do anyone any good to have careless talk that might stimulate the sniper to do more damage or attack the media.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHUNG: What would you like to say to that man?

S. MOOSE: I would say that he has been in the profession long enough to know that he shouldn't be talking out of school. He doesn't have the facts. What the hell is he talking about, you know?

CHUNG: Exactly. There were many people who did just that. This man in particular wrote an op-ed piece in the paper.

S. MOOSE: I saw it.

CHUNG: You did?

S. MOOSE: Yes. It was more of the same. I do know this chief. I know his thinking, his philosophy, his position on the legalization of drugs, and various things about him. And so does my husband.

CHUNG: You mean McNamara?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: And what are you saying?

S. MOOSE: Well, what I'm saying is, he's welcome to his thoughts, but to second-guess a police chief when they are in the middle of something, that -- and he's incorrect. He says, "I've handled things like this." I beg to differ. There has been nothing of this magnitude in this country for a very long time.

CHUNG: Was your husband bringing the stress home? I would find it impossible not to. And if he was bringing it home, how did it evidence itself with you?

S. MOOSE: Charles is -- he is really able to handle a lot of stress. And he was just really highly charged. He barely needed sleep.

His main thing that I could see that worried me, as his spouse, was that I felt that he was somehow going to consider his whole career a failure if he didn't solve the case. And I had to talk with him about the fact that some things you don't get done in your lifetime. And why would he be the exception?

There have been great police chiefs that have had cases, serial murders, that they haven't solved in their career. And they've gone to their grave without it being solved. I am very thankful this has come this far.

CHUNG: And after the suspects were arrested, was he up there all night?

S. MOOSE: No, no. He is not that kind of leader. He's like, "They go do their job and they'll call me."

CHUNG: So when did they call him?

S. MOOSE: They called at about 1:30 to say they were going to go do their job.

CHUNG: 1:30 a.m.

S. MOOSE: Yes, right.

And then we waited until about 2:00. And then it's like, "Well, let's get some sleep." And they called at 3:00 saying they had done their job. And so he left for work saying, "Be thinking about what you want to do tonight," you know?

(LAUGHTER)

S. MOOSE: And that was the first time he said that in 22 days. So, it was a good day.

CHUNG: So, obviously, these two men are still suspects. They have not been...

S. MOOSE: Absolutely. CHUNG: Gone through a court or anything. But is it your feeling that your husband really feels that he has done his job and he can sleep easily now?

S. MOOSE: Well, I think that he feels that some of the work is done. I think he's been clear that there's more to do. And I think that he will feel that his job is completely done when they have been adjudicated.

CHUNG: Is he vindicated as well, your husband?

S. MOOSE: Certainly, I think his skills are no longer in doubt by a good group of people in their profession. And I'm glad about that.

CHUNG: And he climbed a long road up, didn't he, in terms of -- I remember you telling me that there was a lot of discrimination along the way.

S. MOOSE: Oh, sure. Oh, yes.

CHUNG: From?

S. MOOSE: Oh, from early on. And he's basically picked his battles. And it hasn't been easy for him to stick with it and just kind of take those smacks and get back up.

CHUNG: Well, I'm sure you're not easy on him. You're a lawyer, right?

S. MOOSE: That's right.

(LAUGHTER)

CHUNG: Sandy Moose, thank you for being with us.

S. MOOSE: Thank you.

CHUNG: Appreciate it.

S. MOOSE: Thank you very much.

CHUNG: All right. Say hello to your husband for us.

S. MOOSE: Will do, yes.

CHUNG: And say thank you on behalf of all of us, because Washington was my hometown.

S. MOOSE: I know.

CHUNG: So with much appreciation. I went to school in Montgomery County, too.

S. MOOSE: Blair High School -- I did my homework.

CHUNG: You got it. Good for you. You're a good investigative lawyer.

(LAUGHTER)

CHUNG: Sandy Moose, thank you.

When we come back: Would you vote for a guy behind bars?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHUNG: A quick word about the elections next week: Here's how badly some people want to be in Congress. James Traficant is running for his old seat in Ohio, the seat from which he was expelled, even though he's serving an eight-year prison sentence for bribery and racketeering he committed the last time in prison. How do you run for Congress in that position?

Like this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, AD)

JAMES TRAFICANT, FORMER U.S. CONGRESSMAN: They say I can't win a congressional race. Let me tell you something. You want to send a message to Washington? You want to straighten this mess out? I want your vote. I believe I can do a better job than half of those people down in Washington.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHUNG: The ad was shot the day before he went to prison. Of course, now he has to vote by absentee ballot.

Tomorrow: more on the Baton Rouge sniper connection. Plus, we'll meet the teacher who gave birth in the middle of her class.

And coming up next on "LARRY KING LIVE": She made us laugh, even though she was crying on the inside: Carol Burnett.

Thank you for joining us. And for all of us at CNN, good night.

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





Legendary Rapper Jam Master Jay Remembered>


Aired October 31, 2002 - 20:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CONNIE CHUNG, HOST: Good evening. I'm Connie Chung.
Tonight: the Caribbean connection. What were John Muhammad and John Lee Malvo doing there?

ANNOUNCER: Did terror begin in paradise? Investigators are following the sniper trail all the way to blue waters of the Caribbean, John Malvo back to his youth in Jamaica. Plus, was there a John Muhammad Antigua connection? And we'll follow the money. Who funded the suspects?

Police Chief Charles Moose:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHARLES MOOSE, MONTGOMERY COUNTY POLICE CHIEF: We have not given in to the terror.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: For three weeks, we hung on his every word.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

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

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: Tonight, we'll meet Sandra Moose, the chief's wife, on how she endured one of the nation's biggest police investigations.

A pioneer of rap music, until a cold-blooded murder left him dead in his own recording studio.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, Run-DMC, it's like one of the Beatles just died.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: Another hip-hop artist is killed, striking another sour note for rap.

And Winona caught on tape at Saks, was she stealing or acting?

This is CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT. Live from the CNN Broadcast Center in New York: Connie Chung.

CHUNG: Good evening.

Tonight investigators here and in the Caribbean are piecing together the activities of John Muhammad and John Lee Malvo in the period leading up to the sniper attacks around Washington. Police in Louisiana say they are looking into possible links between Muhammad's rifle and a number of murders in that state.

In Alabama, police now say the rifle used in the Washington shootings actually was the weapon used in a fatal robbery there last month. And investigators now believe Muhammad and Malvo may have met in Antigua, where Malvo attended school and where officials are now trying to determine if Muhammad was involved in any recent unsolved crimes there.

And listen to this. Antiguan police also want to know whether there is any reason to suspect a link to Richard Reid, who tried to use a shoe bomb to blow a plane ultimately bound for Antigua.

CNN's David Mattingly has been tracking their movements and their money trail. And he joins us now from our sniper's desk in Washington -- David.

DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Connie, the face on this Antiguan passport is clearly that of sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad.

He was on the island in 2000 and 2001. But island officials tells us the passport was obtained fraudulently, that Muhammad used forged documents to claim that his mother had been born there. That tipped off Antiguan investigators to look into his possible involvement in a passport-forgery business, one in which bogus passports can not only get people into the United States, but they can fetch up to $1,000 apiece.

One Antiguan official calls Muhammad a habitual forger. And it's not the first time his activities have been called into question.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(voice-over): John Allen Muhammad was detained in April of last year in Miami, allegedly trying to bring two Jamaican women into the U.S. with false documents. The INS declined to prosecute. Also last year, he raised suspicions while staying at this Tacoma homeless shelter.

JAMES MITTON, LIGHTHOUSE MISSION: The one thing that I would say that I found most odd was that John Muhammad seemed to have the financial capability to travel at a moment's notice, even though he didn't have any visible means of income.

MATTINGLY: Getting to the bottom of such unexplained behavior could help investigators determine how the unemployed Muhammad may have been able to bankroll an alleged three-week killing spree that required traveling, at least four nights in D.C. area motels, a rifle, ammunition, and possibly electronic equipment.

Before the sniper killings, Alabama investigators say robbery was the motive behind Muhammad and Malvo's alleged shooting of two women outside a Montgomery liquor store. Though no money was actually taken, investigators continue to look for possible connections to other robberies.

DON CLARK, FORMER FBI INVESTIGATOR: You may find a series of different types of criminal activities where they could have gotten some money from, different types of convenient stores, or a robbery here or there, or maybe even a bank robbery or two, just to sustain themselves.

MATTINGLY: After the killing spree began, there were signs that whatever money Muhammad and Malvo may have had could have been running out. October 7, after the shooting of a Maryland middle school, Muhammad asks employees at this Baltimore sandwich shop if he could use their parking lot while resting in his car. Police later find him sleeping in his blue Caprice on a nearby street.

October 11: after the killing of a man at a Virginia gas station, court documents show Muhammad staying at a nearby inexpensive motel. He orders a pizza, but tips the delivery man a single penny.

October 22: Hours after the killing of a bus driver in Silver Spring, Maryland, Muhammad and Malvo are at a local YMCA, asking staff to waive a $3 fee.

And October 24: The two are arrested in the early morning, sleeping in their car at a Maryland rest stop.

CLARK: It doesn't look like any lavish lifestyle there or any great sums of money being furnished to them by some group. I haven't seen that. The investigators may know differently, but I haven't seen it at this point.

MATTINGLY: The only thing in their possession recovered by investigators and readily accounted for: the $250 Chevy Caprice, co- purchased with another man in New Jersey.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MATTINGLY: They would have also had to come up with approximately $3,000 for the items found in that car: a global positioning device, walkie-talkies, a Sony laptop computer, and, of course, a Bushmaster .223-caliber rifle -- Connie.

CHUNG: David Mattingly, in Washington, thank you.

Today, we also got a new glimpse into the past of John Lee Malvo. CNN has obtained this video of him in school in Jamaica in 1997. This is before Malvo's mother took him to Antigua, before he came to the United States. Malvo, seen here reciting poetry with his classmates, would have been around 12 years old at the time.

And, as we mentioned, police are looking at other murders that may be tied to the rifle used in the Washington shootings. One occurred last month in Louisiana.

And CNN investigative correspondent Art Harris is on the story -- Art, what have you learned?

ART HARRIS, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: Connie, CNN has learned that a murder in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, has been linked to the snipers' rifle in the Washington-Baltimore area slayings.

That murder of a beauty supply owner on September 23 was linked by ballistics at the Louisiana state crime lab. And they say the woman was hit by a bullet at closing time, her purse taken, possibly containing as much as $1,500. I talked to her husband, James Ballenger -- her name was Hong Ballenger, mother of three -- who has been trying to get police to look at this as possibly sniper-related for several weeks -- Connie.

CHUNG: Art, can you describe her injuries?

HARRIS: Just one shot to the head in the back of the head, believed to have been killed instantly outside the Beauty Depot -- it was a beauty supply store she ran -- and was killed on the spot. A witness told police that she saw a thin black man running from the scene with a white T-shirt over his shoulder.

CHUNG: And did police get any more information that would have caused them to fan out of state? Because I think one of the problems in Alabama was that police did not take that one fingerprint that was on a magazine and try and find out if it matched any other fingerprints in the rest of the country.

HARRIS: Well, Connie, it's a good question.

The detectives I'm talking to in Baton Rouge say they've been talking to detectives in Montgomery, Alabama, for some time now, trying to see what similarities there might be between their liquor store robbery/homicide and the murder of Mrs. Ballenger. And that may have lead to increased interest in recent days and the ballistics match between her murder and the bullets recovered from victims in the Washington/Baltimore area -- Connie.

CHUNG: And, Art, are there any other potential unsolved murders in Louisiana that authorities are concerned might be connected to this, again, the same weapon?

HARRIS: They are looking at one more in Baton Rouge, no details on that yet. And one of my sources has said that he expects departments around the country to be looking at their case files in an attempt to clear them, possibly link them to the snipers cross-country odyssey of death that may have taken other lives in other places. But we don't know that yet.

CHUNG: All right, CNN's Art Harris, thank you for your investigative reporting. Appreciate it.

A little later: a look at the most familiar figure from the sniper investigation: Montgomery Police Chief Charles Moose. We'll hear about sides of him we've never seen from the woman who knows him best, his wife. You won't want to miss it.

ANNOUNCER: Next: Another hip-hop legend is killed -- why rap music and violence has hit fever pitch.

CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHUNG: Back in the '80s, Jason Mizell was just a kid from Queens in New York City. But, as Jam Master Jay, his turntable scratching drove the music of the monstrously successful crossover rap group Run- DMC.

It's just about 24 hours now since he was killed by a single shot to the head in his recording studio, not far from where he grew up. Unlike some other rappers involved in violence, Run-DMC never pushed the culture of violence in songs or in image. He was 37, married, and had three children.

In Queens tonight, CNN's Michael Okwu.

Michael, what I want to know is, since you have been there at the scene of where the shooting occurred, there have to have been so many fans coming by. Are they gathering there?

MICHAEL OKWU, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Oh, they certainly have.

And they've been gathering here since the wee hours of this morning. They are disturbed, Connie. They are distraught. But, in many ways, they have been trying to pay tribute to this man. Many, as I said, came out last night, braving the cold and the rain, essentially trying to be as close to where this icon was last alive and also to set up some makeshift memorials. This is what a couple of them had to say earlier this afternoon.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think they were a trendsetter. They were the first rap group to go on "American Bandstand," the first one to appear on the cover of "Rolling Stone." So they broke barriers.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I believe that people should be more unified. I don't think jealousy and hate is going to make the situations any better. And I'm disappointed and disgusted.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

OKWU: Connie, it hits very hard because we're here in Jamaica, Queens, which is not very far from Hollis, Queens, where Jam Master Jay grew up. And he was certainly the pride and joy there -- Connie.

CHUNG: Michael, has there been any response or reaction statements from any of the industry leaders?

OKWU: Well, lots of the people who actually showed up last night were hip-hop greats such as Chuck D of Public Enemy, a rap band that was very big in the 1980s and the very early 1990s. And he said this was very much like a Beatle dying. And if that sounds like it's overstating it to some of the people not connected intimately to this music, it really isn't.

To those people in the hip-hop community and the rap community, this was very much like a Beatle passing away. This man was part of a pioneering band, pioneering act, Run-DMC, essentially the first to start scratching music, essentially sampling sounds from disparate artists and genres and blending it, fusing it with hip-hop in order to create a whole new genre of music.

As a matter of fact, Russell Simmons, who is something of an icon within the community and a brother of one of the founding members of Run-DMC, came out earlier today and he read a statement, essentially saying, for nearly 20 years, Run-DMC has been the closest thing to gospel artists that the contemporary music community has had. They talked about God and their higher selves, the importance of staying away from drugs, and generally inspirational and uplifting subject matter.

A very dark day here, because so many people, Connie, cannot imagine why this particular group would have been touched in such a violent way -- Connie.

CHUNG: Thank you, Michael Okwu, in Queens, New York.

Run-DMC's original publicist was Bill Adler, who also became the group's biographer with the book "Tougher Than Leather: The Rise of Run-DMC." And we also have Michael Eric Dyson, University of Pennsylvania professor of Afro-American studies and author of "Holler If You Hear Me: Searching for Tupac Shakur." He joins us from Tucson, Arizona.

Thank you, gentlemen, both for being with us.

Bill, let's start with you.

How many years did you know him?

BILL ADLER, AUTHOR, "TOUGHER THAN LEATHER": Well, I knew him from 1984 to the present.

CHUNG: This had to have been a shock.

ADLER: It's a terrible hock. This is a textbook case of senseless violence. There's no explaining this. If they arrest and solve this murder, it's still not going to make any sense to me.

CHUNG: Was Jam Master ever involved in any kind of violence or talked violence or had a gun?

ADLER: No, not that I know of. And, also, their public image, Run-DMC's public image is almost as the angels. I don't want to make them saints, but their most important work predates the whole rising gangsta rap.

CHUNG: What kind of guy was he?

ADLER: He was very amiable personally. And he was essentially happy. And he was a very hard-working musician. That's who he was. When he wasn't performing, he would be in the studio producing.

CHUNG: Michael, there has been a long list of these types of murders. What is going on with this industry?

MICHAEL ERIC DYSON, PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA: Well, I think, on the one hand, we have to acknowledge that there has been a glamorization and glorification of violence within certain pockets of hip-hop.

But, as Bill has eloquently stated, not only did they predate it. They were the antithesis of the very expression of violence within hip-hop. They embraced black culture. They celebrated commercial culture. They fused the races. They organized a very spiritual place within hip-hop, where all peoples could come together.

On the other hand, it is a hazard to be a young black man in American society, from the ages of 18 to 35. Mr. Mizell was 37. So the hazards of ghetto living, the hazards of African-American life make it real.

CHUNG: But you don't really believe that this was one of those cases, the hazards of being a young black male?

DYSON: Well, he's in his old neighborhood. We don't know the circumstances. I don't know what happened. This is certainly not a East Coast vs. West Coast thing. I don't think it has anything particularly to do with the violence within hip-hop. I don't even know the circumstances.

But I am suggesting that, in this culture, young black men die at an extraordinarily high rate. And when they are famous, like Mr. Mizell, we of course lament the tragedy of that. But there are so many other black men who are dying and perishing every day from this kind of senseless, aimless violence that Bill Adler has so eloquently spoken about.

CHUNG: I'm sure the investigators will try and find out what the motive was and why it was seemingly an execution-style murder.

Michael, I wanted to ask you, also. You talked about the glamorization of violence in this industry. But has it changed since the deaths of Tupac Shakur and others?

DYSON: Well, absolutely. I think that people have become much more wary of trying to engage in rhetorical battles, where they visit scorn on their opponents, what they call the dis rap. It used to be that it was contained within the lyrical format of rap music, where you would dis somebody else, talk about their particular skills and so on. But then it began to spill over into real life, so to speak.

But I think, again, that so much of hip-hop has taken an unfair beating on this. Here I am in Tucson, Arizona, where a Gulf War veteran walked Monday into the University of Arizona and killed three professors. Another Gulf War veteran was part of the D.C. snipers.

I think there's a much more powerful correlation between those Gulf War veterans who are out of control who have been trained to snipe. And they killed more people in the last three weeks than have been killed in hip-hop in the last 10 years.

(CROSSTALK)

CHUNG: I just want to take a moment to remember Jam Master, so let me switch over to Bill for a minute.

What is his legacy?

ADLER: His legacy, I think of him sort of as the -- he was to Run-DMC what Charlie Watts has been to the Rolling Stones. He was a superb timekeeper and a pace-setter and a goad on stage.

And then, also, unlike the Rolling Stones -- I'll leave that alone now -- I'll just, in the studio, he was a tremendous producer. And what he did and what Run-DMC has done is, they brought authentic hip-hop to the stage and to the world through their records and through their performances and whatnot.

CHUNG: All right, gentlemen, I thank you so much. Professor Dyson and Bill Adler, thank you for being with us.

When we come back: the latest in the shoplifting trial of Winona Ryder.

Stay with us.

Still ahead: Charles Moose, the face of the sniper investigation -- what life is like now outside of the national spotlight. Connie goes one-on-one with his wife, Sandra -- when CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHUNG: If you think of the Winona Ryder trial as a guilty pleasure, trust me, you are not alone.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE LATE SHOW WITH DAVID LETTERMAN")

DAVID LETTERMAN, HOST: So Winona Ryder is researching for a movie role. And, yes, I believe the name of the movie was "Saks, Lies and Videotape."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHUNG: Oh, that wasn't great. Of course, for Ryder, it's very, very serious. If she is convicted of stealing more than $5,000 worth of clothing from Saks in Beverly Hills, she could face up to three years in prison.

Covering the trial in Los Angeles for "Celebrity Justice" is Pat LaLama.

Hello, Pat.

And here: Jeffrey Toobin, our legal correspondent -- our legal analyst, I should say .

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Basically full-time on the Ryder story.

CHUNG: You got it.

TOOBIN: That's me.

CHUNG: Pat, what happened this morning in court?

PAT LALAMA, "CELEBRITY JUSTICE": Well, essentially, today's proceedings amounted to the following: Mark Geragos trying to punch great big fat holes in the Saks security person'S testimony.

As you'll recall, she had some pretty damning things to talk about yesterday with what she saw, eyewitness to Winona allegedly having a cut finger, wrapping items in tissue paper, pulling out a pair of scissors, trying to pull sensors, cut sensors off of items.

So today, Mark Geragos basically tried to show that this particular witness, Colleen Rainey, is setting up for the prosecution, that she's embellishing, that she's changing testimony, that she's adding things, all in the effort to set up Winona Ryder.

CHUNG: And how has Winona been, if you will, acting in the courtroom?

LALAMA: Well, I have to tell you, I watch her very closely every day. That's my job. And the first time that they showed the surveillance tape, I have to tell you, this is a defendant who was so fixated on the surveillance tape, watching every frame of it, watching the witness for the prosecution.

And the only time I would ever see her divert her attention was to make a comment to Mark Geragos. And I noticed that the first couple of days, she made many comments to him, particularly when the surveillance tape looked incriminating. She was constantly tugging him or made comments to him. There was one point when I thought, isn't he going to ask her to be quiet so he can pay attention to the testimony?

And she wasn't writing anything. She wasn't taking any notes, but she was diligent and paying close, close attention. Yesterday, she changed her strategy. She was writing all day and making faces and jaw-dropping when there would be testimony about much of the -- quote -- "stolen merchandise." You would see her look in disbelief like, "Oh, they can't possibly be saying that about me."

And today, she looked shocked and dismayed at some of the testimony. So the question is: Is it acting? Is it not? Who knows. Only the jury has to decide whether that is important.

CHUNG: Pat, you're a hoot. Let me go to Jeffrey.

There are two strategies. One is that she was practicing for a role, right?

TOOBIN: Practicing, yes. As David Letterman said, the story she was practicing for was "The Winona Ryder story." so that's kind of a problem for her. Anyway, yes, that's one story.

CHUNG: The other one is, she thought her assistant was going to pay the $5,000 later.

TOOBIN: Right.

CHUNG: Either of these strategies good?

TOOBIN: Either one is good.

My favorite, of course, is the practicing for a movie role.

CHUNG: I know.

TOOBIN: And the interesting question to me will be, will she bring in anyone from the movie business who will say, "Yes, this is the role..."

CHUNG: I told you she would.

(CROSSTALK)

TOOBIN: Let's ask Pat.

Is anyone going to come in and really say what movie she was practicing for?

LALAMA: So far, there is no indication whatsoever that that's going to happen. But, listen, I want to tell you something else that was important that happened today.

And, Jeffrey, I'd love your legal expertise on this.

While at the same time that the defense is trying to say, "Hey, all these people are setting her up and getting together and embellishing and fabricating," at the same time, he accused this Saks witness of being essentially star-struck, by saying things like: "Didn't you look through her file-o-facts? And didn't you see Bono's number? And didn't you see Keanu Reeves' number and you shrieked, 'I love him?' And aren't you trying sell the Winona Ryder story?"

And I just thought, whoa, I guess as a lawyer, you could answer to whether you can throw all that out if there's relevance, if there's a foundation. And she was very calm and said, "No, no, no."

(LAUGHTER)

TOOBIN: I am just so jealous that it's you in the courtroom and not me. But what happens when celebrities go...

LALAMA: Eat your heart out.

TOOBIN: Yes, I am.

But when celebrities go on trial, the issue always is, from the defense perspective is, they're getting special treatment, that they are being singled out, they get too much attention, and that it's too much negative attention. You're picking on them because you want to bathe in their reflective glory.

CHUNG: Sure, I think so.

TOOBIN: So the question is whether it works. I wish I were seeing the testimony itself. It's hard to imagine it works, that you can convince a jury that the prosecution is making this whole story up because she's a celebrity. But we shall see.

CHUNG: Do you think she'll take the stand? She won't, right?

TOOBIN: It would be insane, I think, to take the stand, especially if it's true there may be prior incidents, if not arrests, discomfort with store surveillance in the past. Cross-examined about that, she'd be toast.

CHUNG: OK.

Pat LaLama and Jeffrey Toobin, thank you.

And when we come back: the woman behind the man.

ANNOUNCER: Still ahead: On camera, the chief in the sniper case wore his emotions on his sleeve.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

C. MOOSE: That has not changed today. That has not changed from yesterday or the day before. I've tried to say that every time. Sorry you missed it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: But what is the high-profile cop like when the cameras are gone? Mrs. Charles Moose tells her story.

CONNIE CHUNG TONIGHT continues in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHUNG: Through the drama and suspense and anguish of the sniper hunt, there was one face of the investigation: Montgomery County Police Chief Charles Moose. Maybe it was just that we saw so much of him, but he seemed different somehow from the usual podium police officers in high-profile cases.

In a bit, you're going to meet the one person who knows him better than anyone, his wife.

But first: a reminder of just why so many found him so fascinating.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(voice-over): For nearly a month, we hung on his every word, waiting for news, hope, a lead, three to four news conferences a day, frequent television interviews. But it was this moment when we knew Charles Moose was not your ordinary cop.

C. MOOSE: Someone is so mean-spirited that they shot a child. Now, all of our victims have been innocent, have been defenseless. But now we're stepping over the line.

CHUNG: The facade fell. For him, it was personal, not surprising for the father of two who would pay out of his own pocket for neighborhood children's bicycles that had been stolen, who organized a gift drive for needy children. These are the two sides of Charles Moose; soft-hearted, but tough.

C. MOOSE: We can't ever make any community totally crime-free, but I think you can do a lot better job there.

CHUNG: Beneath that steady, calm voice, a slight Southern drawl. His roots are in the small North Carolina town of Lexington, where football was his passion. In 1975, Moose graduated from the University of North Carolina with a degree in history, on his way to becoming a lawyer, not a cop.

But he decided to take the test for the Portland, Oregon, Police Bureau to get some background. He thought he'd only be there a few years, but he stayed for 18. Moose went from patrolman to chief, earned a Ph.D., taught college-level courses. And after he became police chief, he and his second wife, Sandy, moved into one of the worst neighborhoods in Portland to show that this chief intended to make the entire city safe.

C. MOOSE: There's a lot of hope for the neighborhood. But I certainly recognize there are a lot of people working to make this area better. And I'm just -- we're just two more people.

CHUNG: The crime rate did go down. And, in an almost eerie parallel to today's headlines, his department successfully solved the 1999 serial murder case of three prostitutes.

But controversy followed him. There were charges that he had used excessive police force to break up a demonstration outside of his home. And there were allegations that he made racial slurs against whites he thought discriminated against him. C. MOOSE: I'm sad that those responses occurred. I'm ashamed of my behavior in those situations. I'm clearly embarrassed that I have to relive these situations again.

CHUNG: In the spring of 1999, after a six-month national search, Montgomery County, Maryland, tapped Chief Moose to be police chief. They knew he was an innovator.

C. MOOSE: People that choose to not work to meet the goals and the mission of the Montgomery County Police Department are going to have to deal with me.

CHUNG: Who knew the country, even the world, would get to know him well, watch him consumed with a deadly chase, killers on a cross- country shooting spree? Moose was the man in charge of catching them. He was emotional at times.

When a child was targeted:

C. MOOSE: Stepping over the line, shooting a kid. I guess it's getting to be really, really personal now.

CHUNG: Angry, at times, when people were critical of the investigation.

C. MOOSE: I have not received any message that the citizens of Montgomery County want Channel 9 or "The Washington Post" or any other media outlet to solve this case. If they do, then let me know. We will go and do other police work and we will turn this case over to the media and you can solve it.

CHUNG: And determined when communications with the sniper seemed to break down.

C. MOOSE: We still ask you to call or write us if you are reluctant to contact us. Be assured that we remain ready to talk directly with you. Our word is our bond.

CHUNG: But, in the end, he nabbed two suspects.

C. MOOSE: We're going to let a lot of the members of the task force, the people you see here, we're going to let them go home, hug their children, hug their spouses, and just think about the fact that we continue to live in the greatest nation.

CHUNG: And everyone, along with the man at the center of it all, was able to breathe again.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CHUNG: And possibly no one was breathing easier than Sandy Moose, the wife of Montgomery County Police Chief Charles Moose.

Sandy, thank you for being with us.

SANDY MOOSE, WIFE OF CHARLES C. MOOSE: Thank you for having me. CHUNG: So, how long have you known your husband?

S. MOOSE: About 20 years.

CHUNG: Long marriage, long relationship.

S. MOOSE: Longtime friends, yes. We've been married 13 years.

CHUNG: So you know him very well.

S. MOOSE: Yes, very well.

CHUNG: I'm going to just utter a few words here. And you tell me yes or no, do they describe your husband?

S. MOOSE: OK.

CHUNG: Shy?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: A guy who wears his emotion on his sleeve?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: Volatile?

S. MOOSE: No.

CHUNG: Sensitive?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: A man's man?

(LAUGHTER)

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: Proud to be an African-American?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: Did I say man of principle already?

S. MOOSE: No.

CHUNG: But he is?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: Correct?

S. MOOSE: Yes. It's a double yes.

CHUNG: I had not said it. OK, got it. Wishy-washy?

S. MOOSE: No.

CHUNG: Opinionated, then?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: The best thing about him?

S. MOOSE: His kindness.

CHUNG: Oh.

The worst thing about him?

S. MOOSE: Man.

CHUNG: Tough one?

S. MOOSE: He's stubborn.

CHUNG: Oh, all right. All right.

S. MOOSE: Tough one.

CHUNG: Yes. OK.

Now, your husband was the public face in a case in which there was no identity for the sniper. He was not known. But your husband was on television day after day after day. You said that you would call him several times during the day, because you knew he was under stress. And when you would call him, would tell him how he did at a particular news conference?

S. MOOSE: Definitely.

CHUNG: For instance, were you praiseworthy and brutal?

S. MOOSE: Most definitely. That's the nature of our relationship. So, just as he doesn't mince his words, neither do I.

CHUNG: Sandy, you just heard your husband in our story take on the media, attack the media. What did you think?

S. MOOSE: I was like, "Oh, my God." You know, I don't like leaks either. And I thought, "Whoa."

CHUNG: Did you think he should have hauled off and...

S. MOOSE: Well, the problem, definitely, once it's all been revealed, the problem was -- I guess it's just the opportunity to let him do his work wasn't there, like, is this guy just an out-of-control idiot or is he trying to do something here?

CHUNG: You mean your husband? S. MOOSE: My husband, yes, the out-of-control idiot, my husband, yes.

(LAUGHTER)

S. MOOSE: Basically, because you're just looking at it and you're going, "Oh, my God."

CHUNG: So, what did you think? When he came home or when you called him after that, what did you say to him?

S. MOOSE: Well, he just said, "There's more to it." And that's all he said.

CHUNG: Was smoke still coming out of his ears?

S. MOOSE: Yes. And he's like, "Man, this is going to cost me."

CHUNG: What do you mean?

S. MOOSE: I mean, because he just couldn't tell the plan, he pretty much expected the reaction he got, which was just: "This is going to cost me. I'm going to become hated by the media."

CHUNG: You mean because he took the media on.

S. MOOSE: Yes. Yes.

CHUNG: I see.

S. MOOSE: And that's pretty much what happened at first.

CHUNG: All right.

When we come back, there's a question I want to ask you. And that is that, you were out there. The sniper knew where your husband was. He could conceivably have known where you were and your son was also. And I'm wondering if any of you had any protection.

But don't tell me yet. We're going to pick that up when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

C. MOOSE: Received a communication. It is in the form of a postscript: "Your children are not safe anywhere at any time."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHUNG: One of the most gripping statements from the man the nation saw as the lead of the sniper investigation, Charles Moose.

Throughout the three-week sniper ordeal, Sandy Moose was the one behind the man, Chief Charles Moose. Sandy, let's continue.

Here he was at the center of this investigation. In fact, the sniper had written a couple of messages to him. And it was pretty clear that the sniper wanted to taunt law enforcement and try and control law enforcement.

My question is, was your husband being protected when he went from home to work? And were you being protected? Or did you have to just go out and get our own gas and sort of roll the dice?

S. MOOSE: Basically, I took care of myself. Charles was busy.

CHUNG: Really?

S. MOOSE: Yes. But I think if I would have asked for any kind of protection, it certainly would have been there.

CHUNG: How about your husband? Did he have any protection?

S. MOOSE: He felt it was adequate.

CHUNG: OK, all right.

There were many things that occurred that your husband did that I think were out there, not the sort of predictable. And another one is that he lambasted former police officials.

He said: "They are ranting and raving on all the various stations. What I'm seeing is an absolute ego problem. They are no longer anybody, but they do have the media in America and that all of a sudden makes them somebody again. We have got retired police chiefs out there looking for other jobs, taking advantage of the situation to get their face on television. How sad. How insulting."

So, did he come home that day or many days complaining about these people?

S. MOOSE: Actually, he has this ability to know that that's out there, but just kind of turn it off. And, really, I was glued to all the pundits and the talking heads and analysts. And so I knew a lot more about what they were saying than he -- he now knows.

CHUNG: You mean so he actually sheltered himself from it?

S. MOOSE: He did. He did.

And, you know, Connie, there was one particular person that said something that really bothered me. After he came out for a press conference, she called him hostile. And he was doing his job. And the word hostile, I just wanted to dial up right then and say, "Do you know what you're doing when you are calling this man hostile?"

That's one of those -- we have whole areas of discrimination law tailored to the word hostile. And for someone to label this black man as an angry or hostile person, that's a hard jacket to get off. CHUNG: Do you think that some of the criticism was racially based?

S. MOOSE: Well, I don't know that it was racially based. It might have been ignorance-based. I hate to think that people haven't studied history. But those words are charged words and they're very damaging.

CHUNG: Well, I think there has been some thought that, certainly, if he was a white police chief, that people would not be so willing and feel so free to criticize the head of an investigation that was unprecedented.

I'm going to show you a clip of a person that we interviewed. His name is Joseph McNamara. He was a former police chief -- the same kind of person your husband was talking about -- of Kansas City, Missouri, and San Jose, California.

Let's roll this clip and I want you to see it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSEPH MCNAMARA, FORMER POLICE CHIEF: I was a policeman for 35 years and a chief of two of the largest cities in the country for more than 18 years. And I have gone through the stress that the chief has. I know what it is.

But, nevertheless, what he is doing is wrong in blasting the news media. And I'm not privy to any inside information. I don't want to be. But I know that it doesn't do anyone any good to have careless talk that might stimulate the sniper to do more damage or attack the media.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHUNG: What would you like to say to that man?

S. MOOSE: I would say that he has been in the profession long enough to know that he shouldn't be talking out of school. He doesn't have the facts. What the hell is he talking about, you know?

CHUNG: Exactly. There were many people who did just that. This man in particular wrote an op-ed piece in the paper.

S. MOOSE: I saw it.

CHUNG: You did?

S. MOOSE: Yes. It was more of the same. I do know this chief. I know his thinking, his philosophy, his position on the legalization of drugs, and various things about him. And so does my husband.

CHUNG: You mean McNamara?

S. MOOSE: Yes.

CHUNG: And what are you saying?

S. MOOSE: Well, what I'm saying is, he's welcome to his thoughts, but to second-guess a police chief when they are in the middle of something, that -- and he's incorrect. He says, "I've handled things like this." I beg to differ. There has been nothing of this magnitude in this country for a very long time.

CHUNG: Was your husband bringing the stress home? I would find it impossible not to. And if he was bringing it home, how did it evidence itself with you?

S. MOOSE: Charles is -- he is really able to handle a lot of stress. And he was just really highly charged. He barely needed sleep.

His main thing that I could see that worried me, as his spouse, was that I felt that he was somehow going to consider his whole career a failure if he didn't solve the case. And I had to talk with him about the fact that some things you don't get done in your lifetime. And why would he be the exception?

There have been great police chiefs that have had cases, serial murders, that they haven't solved in their career. And they've gone to their grave without it being solved. I am very thankful this has come this far.

CHUNG: And after the suspects were arrested, was he up there all night?

S. MOOSE: No, no. He is not that kind of leader. He's like, "They go do their job and they'll call me."

CHUNG: So when did they call him?

S. MOOSE: They called at about 1:30 to say they were going to go do their job.

CHUNG: 1:30 a.m.

S. MOOSE: Yes, right.

And then we waited until about 2:00. And then it's like, "Well, let's get some sleep." And they called at 3:00 saying they had done their job. And so he left for work saying, "Be thinking about what you want to do tonight," you know?

(LAUGHTER)

S. MOOSE: And that was the first time he said that in 22 days. So, it was a good day.

CHUNG: So, obviously, these two men are still suspects. They have not been...

S. MOOSE: Absolutely. CHUNG: Gone through a court or anything. But is it your feeling that your husband really feels that he has done his job and he can sleep easily now?

S. MOOSE: Well, I think that he feels that some of the work is done. I think he's been clear that there's more to do. And I think that he will feel that his job is completely done when they have been adjudicated.

CHUNG: Is he vindicated as well, your husband?

S. MOOSE: Certainly, I think his skills are no longer in doubt by a good group of people in their profession. And I'm glad about that.

CHUNG: And he climbed a long road up, didn't he, in terms of -- I remember you telling me that there was a lot of discrimination along the way.

S. MOOSE: Oh, sure. Oh, yes.

CHUNG: From?

S. MOOSE: Oh, from early on. And he's basically picked his battles. And it hasn't been easy for him to stick with it and just kind of take those smacks and get back up.

CHUNG: Well, I'm sure you're not easy on him. You're a lawyer, right?

S. MOOSE: That's right.

(LAUGHTER)

CHUNG: Sandy Moose, thank you for being with us.

S. MOOSE: Thank you.

CHUNG: Appreciate it.

S. MOOSE: Thank you very much.

CHUNG: All right. Say hello to your husband for us.

S. MOOSE: Will do, yes.

CHUNG: And say thank you on behalf of all of us, because Washington was my hometown.

S. MOOSE: I know.

CHUNG: So with much appreciation. I went to school in Montgomery County, too.

S. MOOSE: Blair High School -- I did my homework.

CHUNG: You got it. Good for you. You're a good investigative lawyer.

(LAUGHTER)

CHUNG: Sandy Moose, thank you.

When we come back: Would you vote for a guy behind bars?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHUNG: A quick word about the elections next week: Here's how badly some people want to be in Congress. James Traficant is running for his old seat in Ohio, the seat from which he was expelled, even though he's serving an eight-year prison sentence for bribery and racketeering he committed the last time in prison. How do you run for Congress in that position?

Like this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, AD)

JAMES TRAFICANT, FORMER U.S. CONGRESSMAN: They say I can't win a congressional race. Let me tell you something. You want to send a message to Washington? You want to straighten this mess out? I want your vote. I believe I can do a better job than half of those people down in Washington.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHUNG: The ad was shot the day before he went to prison. Of course, now he has to vote by absentee ballot.

Tomorrow: more on the Baton Rouge sniper connection. Plus, we'll meet the teacher who gave birth in the middle of her class.

And coming up next on "LARRY KING LIVE": She made us laugh, even though she was crying on the inside: Carol Burnett.

Thank you for joining us. And for all of us at CNN, good night.

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