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The Lead with Jake Tapper

No Indictment In NYPD Choking Death

Aired December 03, 2014 - 16:30   ET

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

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JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. We'll continue with our National Lead. No indictment in the death of Eric Garner. A grand jury in NEW YORK CITY has decided not to charge a white New York City police officer in the death of an unarmed African-American man.

Cell phone video captured this incident. Garner died after saying repeatedly I can't breathe. Tensions are high in New York in the aftermath of the grand jury's decision this afternoon.

We've just learned that the NYPD has requested that all police officers be released from non-essential court appearances for the next couple of days, a New York City official telling that to CNN.

CNN's Joe Johns joins me now live from the District Attorney's Office in Staten Island. Joe, what is the NYPD doing to mobilize ahead of any potential protests to make sure that we don't see in any of New York's five boroughs what we saw in Ferguson last week?

JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, right now, really, Jake, I think the focus is on potential protests. When I got here to this location there was one guy in a store talking about the need to demonstrate over this issue and we didn't even have a decision from the grand jury at that stage.

What the police are telling CNN is that they will mobilize and move officers around as demonstrations develop and there are officers, of course, who are on desk jobs. Those officers have been told to be on standby in the event they are needed to handle any of the things that might go on here in New York City.

So the question is what is going to go on? I've reached out to a number of the civic leaders and such here in this area and haven't gotten a clear idea on what the plan is now, Jake, but that was when the decision came out.

TAPPER: Joe, tonight, of course, is the tree lighting in Rockefeller Center. How is that affecting at all the security plan? Is it throwing a wrench into it? Is it a target for protesters?

JOHNS: Well, that was a concern from the very start from this day about the fact that the tree lighting was going on at the same time we might get this decision in Staten Island. We are told that the New York Police Department will put extra officers on during the tree lighting in case there are demonstrations down there.

Of course, over at Rockefeller Center and I guess we're just going to have to wait and see. It doesn't look like a particularly angry situation on Staten Island right now at least from the people I've talked to.

Some of the store owners, for example, one store owner in particular telling me he's keeping his eyes open, but no plans to close at this stage because it appears that people are just going home from work so far.

TAPPER: All right, Joe Johns live for us on Staten Island, New York. Thank you so much.

This grand jury's decision in New York, of course, comes one week after a somewhat similar announcement in Ferguson, Missouri and we'll talk to the lawyer for Michael Brown's family about the growing outrage over this latest grand jury decision. That's coming up on THE LEAD.

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TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. We will continue with our breaking news out of New York City where a grand jury has announced it will not indict a police officer in the choke hold death of Eric Garner, the unarmed African-American man whose arrest was caught on cell phone video.

Here he is shown being put into that choke hold by a white police officer saying repeatedly, I can't breathe. I can't breathe before he died. Joining me now is Attorney Benjamin Crump who we've had on the show many times representing Michael Brown's family.

And in fact, that's why we had you scheduled, but now you are going to get involved with this case, the chief attorney for the Garner family is Jonathan Moore, but you will work with him.

BENJAMIN CRUMP, ATTORNEY FOR MICHAEL BROWN'S FAMILY: I am already working on them on the Gurley case and Jonathan is a great lawyer and been practicing for over 37 years and if anybody can educate people about how fair or unfair this system is it's Jonathan.

TAPPER: Let's talk about this. What's your reaction? Obviously, a lot of people are very upset and they see the video and they don't understand how it wouldn't even go to trial.

CRUMP: My reaction is I'm upset not just as an African-American, but as an attorney and an officer of the court because people keep looking to us any saying you see how unfair it is. It's getting more difficult to defend the system when they see things with their own eyes.

Where Mr. Garner is not being aggressive and not posing a threat to them and they say why does this not at least go to a trial by jury like the American constitution? Why are police officers always given special treatment and not held accountable especially in minority communities?

TAPPER: We just had a guest from the former NYPD police officer who said in his view, what he saw was a large guy resisting what the police were telling him to do. Who knows what he had in his pockets? The police were not trying to kill him. They were trying to subdue him. What's your response?

CRUMP: Jake, can you imagine if we didn't have this video what their story would be? A lot of people on that social media are saying it don't make a difference because they just don't care about us. They don't value our lives. The system is unfair.

I disagree with that. I reject that, Jake. I think the videos are not the problem. It's good when it's transparent. It's the system. When we see this here, it makes us say we've got to fix this system.

This whole system of having the local prosecutors sit in judgment whether to indict police officers or not when they use excessive force and kill people in our community, you can't have them with that symbiotic relationship thinking that it will be a different result if we keep doing the same thing over and over.

We have to fix this system. I think what we see is going to make people just outraged and not just lawyers and media, but the common man. This here says really? They don't get to go to trial?

TAPPER: In fact, there were a lot of similar complaints in Ferguson about the fact that maybe the district attorney had too close a working relationship with the police. Obviously, they need to have a close, working relationship to prosecute bad guys all of the time.

You're suggesting maybe there should be an independent investigation or an independent look when police are accused, the two senators from New York and Kristin Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer, I am being told, have this call for independent investigation into what happened by the Department of Justice. What else needs to happen, do you think, to fix the system?

CRUMP: You have to have an attorney more and I talked right after the decision came, right before and then right after and what he told me, he couldn't believe it. The prosecutor had granted immunity to all the officers on there except the one who put the choke hold on.

TAPPER: Isn't that normal, though, to get them to testify?

CRUMP: No. It's problematic because when you look at the video, the coroner who said it was homicide said it was a combination of things. It was a combination of the choke hold and the pressure on the back and stuff.

So you don't go give immunity because then you look down the road and you say he's going to use that as his defense in the criminal case that it wasn't just me, but I'm the only one on the hook.

TAPPER: Let me put you on hold -- no. Never mind. In terms of where we go from here, you are working with Jonathan Moore on a different case and you will work with him on this case, as well. Is the family going to bring a civil suit against the state of New York?

CRUMP: That's up to Attorney Moore and I'm working on the Gurley case where a man was killed on the stairway. That officer had been indicted and then with this track record of Ferguson and Ohio and New York, I don't know what scenario we can present where an officer will be held accountable for killing a minority or person of color. We haven't seen it.

TAPPER: I want to break in right now, if I can. Apparently President Obama is discussing this issue right now. Let's take a listen.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: -- and I'm not interested in talk. I'm interested in action, and I am absolutely committed as president of the United States to making sure that we have a country in which everybody believes in the core principle that we are equal under the law.

So I just got off the phone with Attorney General Eric Holder and he will have more specific information about the case in New York, but I want everybody to know here as well as everybody who may be viewing my remarks here today.

We are not going to let up until we see a strengthening of the trust and a strengthening of accountability that exists between our communities and law enforcement and I say that as someone who believes that law enforcement has an incredibly difficult job that every man and woman in uniform are putting their lives at risk to protect us.

That they have the right to come home just like we do from our jobs, that there's real crime out there that they've got to tackle day in and day out, but they're only going to be able to do their job effectively if everyone has confidence in the system.

And right now unfortunately we are seeing too many instances where people do not have confidence that folks are being treated fairly. And in some cases, those may be misperceptions, but in some cases that's a reality.

And it is incumbent upon all of us as Americans regardless of race, region, faith that we recognize this is an American problem and not just a black problem or a brown problem or a native American problem.

This is an American problem when anybody in this country is not being treated equally under the law that's a problem and it's my job as president to help solve it.

Now, when I visited the nation in Montana, I was a candidate for this office, and I made it a point to meet with tribal leaders on the campaign trail as often as I could because I wanted to make sure our country did better.

TAPPER: All right, so that's President Obama speaking at the White House Tribal Nations Conference and he was interrupting his remarks to the crow nation to talk a bit about what happened with Eric Garner.

Mr. Crump, I have to -- I sit here, and I wonder what you think when you hear the first African-American president referring to what happened in New York and what happened in Ferguson.

I've heard a lot of African-Americans criticize President Obama for being too tepid on these issues. What do you think?

CRUMP: Well, I think what he said initially in these comments we just can't talk the talk, we have to act where I think more action, there's less people criticized and when you see the attorney general get involved in Ferguson, but get involved in New York.

When you see these unbelievable things happen not only on video, but in the court system. Jake, as a lawyer, we have to understand the American justice system is built on the principle of trial by jury, the fourth and 14th Amendment, due process.

Everybody gets equal justice. We know there's no guarantee once you get a trial that you will get the justice that you seek, but you have a chance at justice. The police officers aren't even being indicted.

And so the Garner family, the Brown family, they don't even get a chance at justice and that's what is frustrating to keeping us in Ferguson and that's what you're about to see in New York and people are frustrated and it's not equal in our community.

TAPPER: To play devil's advocate, the grand jury process is not only for police, the grand jury process happens for everyone and these are individuals and these are citizens. I'm playing devil's advocate, Mr. Crump. They can go against what the prosecutor is saying. What's your response to that and again, I'm playing devil's advocate.

CRUMP: Two things, Mr. Tapper. Number one, we see people getting indicted in our community with no evidence at all, no video, and it's an innuendo, it's a hunch and someone said they fill a description and they're indicted and a lot of times they're convicted.

That's number one. Number two, the grand jury proceeding is so unfair because you can indict a help sandwich if you want it. The grand jury will do whatever the prosecutor wants them to do if they present the evidence in such a way that they don't get -- if they don't want an indictment.

And if they present it in such a way they want an indictment they will get it. The process is broken. The game is fixed before we ever began so we can't have the local prosecutors who got this relationship with the police that they should.

TAPPER: So any time a policeman or policewoman is accused of something it should go to a separate, independent prosecutor, you think?

CRUMP: If it's going to be fair and impartial because think, if I work with you every day, you work with Wolf Blitzer every day, Wolf committed a crime and you were in charge of it. People will say they work every day together.

TAPPER: He can do anything he wanted. He'd walk.

CRUMP: Well, I just think you get what I'm saying.

TAPPER: Yes.

CRUMP: You can't have people who have this relationship, and it's an inherent conflict of interest and these and the officers are star witnesses in many cases. In 20, 30 cases, he's your man. He's building up your credibility.

And then you have a situation to sit in judgment of whether or not to indict him or not. And if you indict him, that kills his credibility, so if you indict him, you lose these 20 or 30 cases, and if you don't indict him, people will say, were you worried about all the other cases?

It's an inherent conflict of interest and it's not fair for the citizens of the United States. We have to be fair to everybody, because that's what the American justice system is built on.

TAPPER: All right, Benjamin Crump, it's always a pleasure to talk to you. Thank you so much for your time. We'll be right back.

Coming up, New York police are mobilizing. They're getting ready for potential protests there this evening, to make sure that everything is safe and secure. We'll have new details on that. And we're expecting remarks from the mayor of New York City, coming up.

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TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. And our breaking news coverage on the decision by a grand jury to not indict, pardon me, a police officer in the death of Eric Garner of Staten Island, New York.

We were just looking at a podium and waiting for the mayor of New York City, Bill De Blasio, to come and speak about the grand jury decision, about the steps that the city of New York is taking to make sure that protests are orderly and safe for all of the citizens of New York City.

This decision today comes on a day when we could see some huge crowds in New York City for the tree lighting at Rockefeller Center. Police want to make sure, of course, that if protesters come out in full force, especially for the tree lighting, that they will have some protection and make sure there is order there.

CNN's Deborah Feyerick is live in New York City with more on that. Deborah, what are police doing to prepare for people to protest peacefully and make their voices heard and exercise their first amendment and also for people who want to come see the tree lighting in Rockefeller Center?

DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is one of the things they were concerned about. But the NYPD has made very clear they are not going to allow what happened in Ferguson to happen in New York City. They have taken proactive steps.

The day shift police officers will be extended into the evening, specifically around the area of Rockefeller Center. They want to make sure they have enough police to both protect the crowds, who are turning out, but also to protect the tree lighting itself, make sure that there are no interruptions whatsoever.

They will be stationing a lot of police officers in areas that they do believe there will be protests, for example, Times Square. That's where Eric Garner's family was supposed to be. In fact, now we're hearing that they will not be making a 5:00 appearance.

There'll be heavy police presence at Union Square on 14th Street and at Staten Island on the Brooklyn Bridge because sometimes when there are protests, they do cross the Brooklyn Bridge symbolically.

But the NYPD is used to this kind of thing. They just had a Thanksgiving Day parade. They do this on New Year's Eve. So crowd control is one of their specialties. But the NYPD is making it very, very clear that what was seen happening in Ferguson is absolutely not going to be happening in New York City.

They will allow the protesters to protest peacefully, respectfully, civilly, but they will not let anything get out of control, out of line. They want the demonstrators to be table to voice their anger, but they want to make sure that it doesn't spill out into action -- Jake.

TAPPER: All right, Deborah Feyerick in New York, thank you so much. I want to bring back CNN legal analyst, Sunny Hostin right now. Sunny, I wanted to ask you because you have an interesting perspective.

You obviously disagree with the grand jury decision in the Eric Garner case, but you also are a former prosecutor. You heard Benjamin Crump, the attorney for Michael Brown's family earlier on my show.

Saying that he thought that when it comes to grand juries and investigations into whether police committed any crimes, it should not be the local prosecutor. You've had an inside view as a prosecutor. Do you agree?

SUNNY HOSTIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I do agree. And you're right, I was a prosecutor and when I was a prosecutor, I was very, very close to my investigators. I was very close to all of the officers that worked together, in fact, that I work with.

In fact, I was assigned to a particular district and I got to know the officers of the sixth district extremely well. I used to go to the Christmas party with them. You know, went with ride-alongs with them.

And I think it's very difficult when you have established that kind of relationship and you trust the officer to then be asked to present a case against that officer in front of the grand jury.

So, you know, there's no question in my mind that there are changes that need to be made, when you're talking about this process, Jake. And I think we're seeing it over and over and over again now. There's a problem with the pattern, the practice, and the process. And initially, I used to think, you know, well, body cameras are the answer. But I think it's pretty clear that on video, what we saw was excessive force.

I think we saw an overreaction by the police department. I think that was very, very clear that probable cause exists. And so I think you're going to need a special prosecutor when there are officer- related shootings and deaths, just no question about it.

You can't ask police departments to self-report, and quite frankly, you shouldn't have prosecutors that have these kinds of relationships with officers to present cases against them. It just doesn't work.

TAPPER: And Sunny, quickly, if you could, just a quick question, police departments have internal affairs divisions.

HOSTIN: That's right. They do. And they should, right? I mean, you shouldn't have officers investigating other officers. I, quite frankly, think that was a significant problem with the Ferguson investigation.

Because we know that the Ferguson chief of police was very involved with leaking the surveillance video, very involved on a day-to-day basis with that initial part of the investigation.

So internal affairs officers are generally removed from the general population of police officers and they are situated that way for a reason. It's just too difficult for police to police themselves. You can't expect clarity there.

TAPPER: All right. Sunny Hostin, thank you very much. That's it for THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. Now I'll turn you over to Wolf Blitzer. He is in "THE SITUATION ROOM."