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Casey Anthony Murder Trial; No More Mr. Nice President; Body at Bottom of Pool for Days; The First Shuttle Crew
Aired July 03, 2011 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: The next hour of the CNN NEWSROOM starts right now.
I'm Don Lemon at the CNN World Headquarters in Atlanta. It's 7:00 on the East Coast, 4:00 out West. So let's get you caught up on the day's headlines.
And we're going to start with this, the Casey Anthony trial in Orlando could go to the jury at any time. Both the prosecution and defense presented closing arguments today attacking each other's case. But then it got personal and the judge threatened to throw both lawyers out of the courtroom. A live report just ahead here on CNN.
Iran says it plans to prosecute 26 current and former American officials for human rights violations. The Iranian lawmaker said today the officials will be tried in Iranian courts in absentia before they're referred to international tribunals. Now, the country didn't name names but Iranian TV said it may -- in May, that parliament planned sanctions on Americans including former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and commanders of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
An apology from Exxon/Mobil today after as much as 42,000 gallons of crude oil leaked into Montana's Yellowstone River. Exxon/Mobil is cleaning up the spill and the breached pipeline has been shutdown. It started leaking near the town of Laurel about 100 miles downstream from Yellowstone National Park. About 200 people were evacuated when the spill was discovered Friday. They're now back at home.
A new Wimbledon men's champion celebrates. In center court, today in London, we were just talking about this. Novak Djokovic, who just earned the world's number one ranking beat defending champ Rafael Nadal in today's men's final. Djokovic has just lost just one match all year.
Lady Liberty looking lovely right now on this eve before our nation's 235th birthday; you're looking at a live picture of the Statue of Liberty. Many of us are celebrating while enduring some serious heat. And you can see the haze around the Statue of Liberty right now. Still the parades, the air show, the pomp and circumstance are all ready in full swing this holiday weekend.
I want to check out the festivities from St. Louis along the Mississippi riverfront, a happy Independence Day to everyone.
Now let's get to the Casey Anthony trial. Jurors in that trial could get the case at any time now.
Today was closing arguments, but in the middle of the defense's presentation, a spat erupted between the prosecutor Jeff Ashton and the defense attorney Jose Baez. That brought the trial to a sudden stop and a screeching halt, really.
CNN's David Mattingly is covering the trial for us in Orlando. David, hello to you. Before we get into this dust-up between the attorneys, what's happening right now in the courtroom?
DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, right now the jury has gone out for the day, back to their hotels; back sequestered as they have been for over 30 days now with this trial. The judge says he wants them bright eyed and bushy tailed for tomorrow as they continue with the closing arguments.
Both sides weren't able to finish up today, because we had a couple of other things intruding on the timeline that they had set up today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOSE BAEZ, CASEY ANTHONY'S LAWYER: We're not talking about fantasy forensics anymore. We're talking about cold hard evidence; evidence that points to one person and one person only. And he can sit up here and lie all he want, and dance around the truth, but the truth is the truth, and he -- and depending on who's asking the questions. Whether it's this laughing guy right here or whether it's myself.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Objection.
JUDGE BELVIN PERRY, PRESIDING OVER CASEY ANTHONY TRIAL: Sustained. Approach the bench.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MATTINGLY: Well, Don that was the dust up that you were talking about, that cost us some time today. You saw the defense attorney, Jose Baez, in the middle of a very emotional point in his closing arguments before the jury. And he looks over and he see's prosecutor Jeff Ashton smiling off to the side. He got mad about that, called him laughing guy, right there in front of everyone.
So the judge had to talk with them privately. When everybody came back, he said, look, these are my rules. You know you can't do that. And if you do it again I'm kicking you out of the courtroom and you're done with this trial.
So very stern words from the judge to make sure he restores order. And keeps order at this very late hour -- Don.
LEMON: Ok usually, there are some antics outside of the courtroom. But today, there are antics inside. The judge is not standing for it.
Hey, any indication, David, when the jury's going to get this case?
MATTINGLY: Well, we know that the prosecution could have a couple of hours left, possibly, to finish up with their closing arguments. The way it works, the prosecution starts. The defense goes and then the prosecution finishes up again.
So we could be looking at a couple of hours more when they get started in the morning, and then the judge is going to be going through some very lengthy and detailed instructions to the jury telling them what they should consider, how they should consider it and what they need to do when determining what their decision is.
So it's anybody's guess right now, but we're looking at the jury getting this sometime tomorrow. How much time they will have left after all that to deliberate tomorrow is anybody's guess?
LEMON: David, get your rest in now. You're going to be a busy man. Thank you very much.
And tonight at 10:00 p.m., make sure you join us for a CNN NEWSROOM special report in the Casey Anthony trial. A panel of guests who have been following the case from start to finish will break down the closing arguments from both sides, including that uncomfortable moment when the judge threatened to throw both lead attorneys out of the courtroom.
Our Jane Velez-Mitchell from "ISSUES" on HLN among our guests tonight at 10:00 p.m. Eastern; she knows everything about this case.
Ok. So when does criticism of the President go too far? Apparently when four-letter words are used -- that's straight ahead. Plus, why President Obama's tone when it comes to the GOP has gone from courteous to confrontational.
Also -- ouch. A land dispute gets personal. That is a city mayor throwing punches at the police chief.
And if you want the information on the stories that we're covering or you want to give us some information about stories you'd like to see covered reach out to us in social media. You can reach us on Twitter, Facebook on CNN.com/don and on Four Square.com; and behind the scenes of some of the biggest stories in recent history at this network and others.
You can check out my book "Transparent" available anywhere books are sold.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MICHELE BACHMANN (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: In 2012, Barack Obama will be a one-term president.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Well, Michele Bachmann on the road and on a roll in Iowa. The Minnesota congresswoman has seen a surge in her Iowa support in recent weeks as she pursues the Republican presidential nomination. Her newest applause lines against President Barack Obama include a jab about the tough economic conditions and an offer to help the President find a job after she defeats him in 2012.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: They need to do their jobs. Now is the time to go ahead and make the tough choices. That's why they're called leaders.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Tough talk from President Obama, going after Republicans in Congress over the looming deadline to raise the federal debt ceiling.
Errol Louis is here, he's a CNN contributor and the political anchor for New York One. Hello, Errol.
ERROL LOUIS, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Good to be here.
LEMON: What's the strategy behind the President's change in tone now?
LOUIS: Well, the President has to do what his republican counterparts are doing, he's got to gin up the base. He's got to go through not a tough primary season but he's to get the faithful out there. He's got to get them signing checks and making contributions, getting organized for what is going to be a very, very tough re-election bid.
And there's no better way to do that than to talk about the guys with the corporate jets, and the guys who took the bailouts and all of these folks that the Democratic base has always been a little bit angry about.
LEMON: Yes. And he's getting it from both sides he's getting it from Republicans and Democrats. Democrats are saying, stick with it. You heard the former President Bill Clinton saying the same thing. And the Republicans, of course, he's getting it from them as well, always the opposition.
LOUIS: Oh absolutely. I mean look, the Republicans are going to say this is class warfare, this is class warfare. The numbers are on the President's side.
LEMON: Yes.
LOUIS: You know, the corporate CEOs have done extraordinarily well. The industries that were bailed out, those guys are doing extraordinarily well. And if he wants to make the case that they need to give a little bit more back. And if he needs to make the case of letting the Bush tax cuts expire would actually take $4 trillion off the deficit over the next 10 years, he's got every reason to do so.
LEMON: Ok Errol so we -- you heard the President's tone and others. This tone even carried over in the media when Mark Halperin used a four-letter word to describe the President's behavior at this news conference and it got him suspended for his analysis job at MSNBC. I want you to take a look. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And the precedent has been set.
MARK HALPERIN, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes I thought he's going.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That was good.
HALPERIN: I thought he was kind of a (EXPLETIVE DELETED) yesterday.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh my God.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: All right. There's a lot to say about this. But would that remark, really had been ok, had it been bleeped?
LOUIS: No. Not at all. In fact I hope -- you know, look, I'm friendly with Mark Halperin. I have a lot of respect for him. I think he does a good job. He had a similar gaffe four years ago.
I hope he realizes when his person -- the personal side of this is over for him that he did a real disservice to everybody else in this business. Because a lot of people out there are very suspicious that folks are harboring secret agendas and have contemptuous views of public officials that they're supposed to be analyzing. And he -- he just kind of ripped the cover off that and showed skeptics and cynics that that could be what's going on with a lot of the people --
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: But it really didn't helped to -- I saw it happening live. And he was egged on a bit. And I'm not sure if he knew. Because they were saying we could delay it, we could beep it. So I'm not exactly sure if he knew.
LOUIS: Right.
LEMON: But here is the thing that -- you have to say about Mark Halperin. He made a mistake.
LOUIS: Yes.
LEMON: This is the way you do it correctly. He apologized quickly and he said, "I made a mistake. No ifs, ands or buts about it I was wrong." And then, he moved on. We don't hear much about it. That's how you do it.
LOUIS: That is how you do it.
Unfortunately, he -- again, almost a carbon copy on Sirius Radio four years ago, he said back then that he was sorry, he was apologetic, and it would never happen again. Here we are four years later, it happened again.
Also, look. I've got to say, he's been in television a lot longer than I have. He's been -- he was at ABC before he had his current job. And I think we all know what can and cannot happen when somebody's supposed to push a button back stage.
LEMON: Yes.
LOUIS: So --
LEMON: I agree.
LOUIS: You know, the fact that they kind of set him up is not really --
LEMON: I understand. But I have to say I think nobody's perfects. And it doesn't matter, whatever political party or who he reports for, I just think that he apologized --
(CROSSTALK)
LOUIS: He's still great analyst --
LEMON: Yes and I think he apologized and he moved on.
LOUIS: Absolutely.
LEMON: And that's the way to do it.
Listen, we reported on Michele Bachmann's remarks just a moment ago about finding the President a job after he loses in 2012. And you see her strategy at work here. It's almost as if the primaries have started already. Right?
LOUIS: Oh absolutely. In fact, what we have right now is what I would call the pre-primary, where -- what you've got are a group of candidates, who are clustering to try and claim the centrist wing or the center of the Republican Party. That's what Romney is doing, that's what Huntsman is trying to do, that's what Pawlenty wants to do.
And then, you've got those like Michele Bachmann, who were doing a sort of little mini Tea Party primary trying to get the hearts and minds of the social conservatives and the Tea Party wing.
And that's who Herman Cain wants to attract, and that's who Ron Paul is trying to talk to.
LEMON: Yes.
LOUIS: And that's -- if he gets into it, what Rick Perry is going to be going after and certainly Rick Santorum. So Michele Bachmann is the leader I think among those who were trying to win the pre-primary for the hearts and minds of the Tea Party.
LEMON: All right, Errol Louis and thank you it was great seeing you last week and thanks for having me on your show and turning the tables asking me a quite --
(CROSSTALK)
LOUIS: Enjoyed it -- I enjoyed it a whole lot.
LEMON: All right, thank you.
A woman drowns in a public swimming pool and is not found for, get this, for days. Next, a warning a little boy says he gave to life guards that could have saved a life and the fallout that has resulted.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MATTHEY KEELER (PH), U.S. ARMY: Hello. My name is Specialist Matthew Keeler. I'm with the 109th Mobile Public Affairs Detachment based at the Joint Base Balad, Iraq. I would like to say happy Fourth of July to Jessica Good and her family in Nahant, Massachusetts. I miss you, dear and I'll see you soon.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: People were swimming in there with a body in there. That's what I find that's pretty weird. I mean there's a dead body in there and there's children and people were still swimming inside the pool.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: More fallout from the bizarre story out of the Boston area. A dead woman was in a public pool for days before she was discovered. Now the little boy who says he saw her go down is traumatized. His loved ones say, well, he pleaded for help, but he was ignored.
Alana Gomez (ph), from our affiliate WBZ has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAVERNE HUNT, GRANDSON SAW BODY IN THE POOL: He's going to have some problems. You know what I'm saying? He's crying all the time.
ALANA GOMEZ, REPORTER, WBZ: Laverne Hunt (ph) says her 9-year-old grandson is devastated over the death of 36-year-old Maria Joseph.
HUNT: My grandson said he went down to the slide, Maria came down behind him. And he was stuck a little bit but he got out. And he went to the life guard and told them that someone is drowning, and they didn't do nothing.
GOMEZ: Autopsy results have showed Joseph drowned in the Veterans Memorial public pool. Investigators are trying to figure how her body went unnoticed at the bottom for days.
The DA's investigation revealed the water here was so murky you couldn't see a police (ph) diver 3.5 feet below the surface. Joseph's body was submerged under 12 feet of water.
Laverne says her grandson knew Joseph well since they were neighbors. The boy wishes he could have done more. He now has trouble sleeping and is seeing a counselor.
HUNT: Why should I -- my grandson have to suffer because of someone else's negligence. That's not right. He went and did what he was supposed to do.
GOMEZ: The entire pool staff is on leave and so are two city inspectors who checked the pool Monday and Tuesday. But Joseph's friends are blaming the life guards who allegedly heard that someone went under.
VERONICA REIS, FRIEND OF VICTIM: She probably would have been with us right now if they were doing their job.
GOMEZ: A makeshift memorial at the pool is decorated with heartfelt messages for the mother that will be missed.
HUNT: It's hard. I talked to her Sunday. (INAUDIBLE) You know that ditty -- here today, gone tomorrow. That's true.
GOMEZ: Dealing with the pain of her death by keeping her memory alive.
In Fall River, Alana Gomez, WBZ News.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEMON: The final space shuttle launch is just days away. Next a journey all the way back to the first shuttle launch and the astronauts who made history.
And take that.
You might see this fairly often, but here it is the city mayor taking on a police chief when politics get personal. Straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five, four, three, two, one.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have liftoff.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Space shuttle "Atlantis" will launch for the final time on Friday. NASA is pulling the plug on the shuttle program after 135 missions. As we near the end of an era, our John Zarrella did some time traveling for us in a cnn exclusive.
He sat down with the two astronauts who were there when it all began and they actually manned the very first shuttle mission in 1981. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Did it perform any differently than you thought it would? I mean had you guys, was it --
JOHN YOUNG, FIRST SHUTTLE COMMANDER: Well, it worked. It worked like we did in the simulators. It was great.
ZARRELLA: The story was that your heart rate, when you guys -- everybody said -- that every article I read talked about how, John, your heart rate was like, hardly went up at all. But Bob's went up to about 130, on a --
BOB CRIPPEN, FIRST SHUTTLE PILOT: I was excited. (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The crew is now moving across --
CRIPPEN: We were just going through the countdown like John and I had done many times before and it was only when we got inside of a minute, I looked at John and said, "I think we're really going to do it." That's when my heart rate went up as we talked about a while ago. But we're focused on don't let me screw up; that was our main concern.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: America's first space shuttle.
CRIPPEN: The first stage, you know, 8.5 minutes, while you're under thrust goes by so fast, and on my first flight, my eyes were like saucers. So that seemed like about 15 seconds.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Columbia, you're negative (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Should anything go wrong, the shuttle is now too high for the astronauts to use their ejection seats.
ZARRELLA: Were you confident that you guys were going to get back ok?
YOUNG: Well, we had ejection seats. If things went really south, we could jump out. And we had parachutes.
CRIPPEN: I felt you know, there were risks associated with it, but I wouldn't have gone to fly it if I didn't think I'd be able to get back down.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Zero G is something else. That is something that all of you should have an opportunity to experience. It is really fun. You know, you can do that in your living room without breaking your legs, you sure would.
ZARRELL: You guys were pretty packed with the testing everything out. Was that --
YOUNG: Yes. We're testing, testing stuff out and making sure that the payload door worked right. Checking to make sure the radiators deployed and stuff like that to make sure we'd operate ok on orbit.
We were throwing switches. CRIPPEN: We were doing lots of stuff. We didn't really have time to concentrate too much on -- hey, I finally did it.
YOUNG: Everything worked. That was the amazing part.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Columbia, Houston, you guys did so good we're going to let you stay up there for a couple of days. You're go for an orbit.
ZARRELLA: Did that amaze you that everything worked so smoothly?
YOUNG: Yes. Especially on re-entry when we didn't get burned up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What a way to come to California.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Two, one -- touchdown.
ZARRELLA: you didn't even wait for the doctor? Right? The story is you stayed on, but you jumped off?
YOUNG: Oh, yes. We don't need no doctor to walk around.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And zero and liftoff.
Space shuttle Atlantis.
ZARRELLA: You think it's time to move on?
CRIPPEN: Time to do something different, but the shuttles should still be flying.
YOUNG: Yes, I think we ought to keep the shuttle flying. That's important.
(CROSSTALK)
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEMON: You can catch John Zarrella's special "BEYOND ATLANTIS: THE NEXT FRONTIER" in just about 30 minutes from now at 8:00 Eastern right here on CNN. And Friday, CNN has live coverage of the final shuttle launch, "Atlantis" lifts off at 11:26 a.m. Eastern. Our coverage begins about 90 minutes before that at 10:00 Eastern right here on CNN.
Want to go now to the Philippines where a political argument got physical, very physical, in front of TV cameras. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
(END VIDEO CLIP) LEMON: That furious woman is the mayor. The target of her anger is a court sheriff. She lashed out after he reportedly ignored her order to postpone the demolition of a shanty town until she arrived. The mayor apologized for the incident and is now under investigation.
The Casey Anthony trial almost in the hands of the jury; tonight at 10:00 Eastern, make sure you join us for a CNN Newsroom special report. A panel of guests who have been following the case from start to near finish will break down the closing arguments from both sides today, including that uncomfortable moment when the judge threatened to throw the lead attorneys out of the courtroom. That's tonight at 10:00 p.m. Eastern.
I'm Don Lemon at CNN headquarters in Atlanta. I'll see you back here then. Thanks for watching.
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