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DSK Accuser to Meet Prosecutors; "West Memphis 3" Enjoy Freedom; Battle for Tripoli Heats Up; From Street Boy to Opera Singer; Atlanta Cheating Scandal Fallout; Children Living in Poverty; Syrian President Speaks Out; Rebels Claim Big Gains in Tripoli; Schoolgirl Tracks Down Thief; Back to School Gadgets

Aired August 21, 2011 - 14:00   ET

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

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: You're in the CNN NEWSROOM and this is Sunday, August 21st. I'm Fredricka Whitfield.

The battle for Tripoli is heating up. Gunfire and explosions rocked the capital today and a fierce gun battle broke out near a hotel where many international reporters were staying. Rebels say they're making major gains in their effort to seize the city, and a Reuters report says thousands of rebels were seen advancing toward the city.

Moammar Gadhafi's government claim the rebels' offensive is failing, but a government official who asked not to be named concedes part of the capital and its suburbs are no longer in government hands.

Embattled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is giving an interview to state-run television this hour to talk about his country's future. Among other things, he is expected to discuss reforms and political and economic pressure from the west.

Al-Assad faces growing calls to end his brutal five-month crackdown on opposition protesters.

And the families of two American hikers sentenced to prison in Iran are holding out hope for leniency. Iran has handed down eight-year sentences for Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer. They were accused of spying.

In a statement, their family say, quote, "We appeal to authorities in Iran to show compassion and allow them to return home to our families without delay."

Prosecutors in the Dominique Strauss-Kahn case are asking the woman who accused him of sexual assault to meet with them tomorrow. What does this mean?

CNN's Susan Candiotti has been following this from the very beginning. So, Susan, what do you know?

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, we'll have to see how it plays out. Of course, there's been a lot of speculation about this case for weeks. The D.A.'s office wouldn't comment about whether it will drop charges. On Friday, prosecutors sent a letter to Nafissatou Diallo and her lawyers. She's the housekeeper accusing Dominique Strauss-Kahn of sexual assault. The letter offered what it said was a one-time opportunity to meet with prosecutors on Monday, tomorrow, on day ahead of DSK's next and possibly final court appearance. Ms. Diallo is expected to attend that meet.

Strauss-Kahn has pleaded not guilty, Fred.

WHITFIELD: OK, so in this letter, did it actually spell out or say that charges might be dropped?

CANDIOTTI: Actually, it did not. It said they would tell her what will happen in court on Tuesday.

Now, there are so many reasons - only - only so many reasons why they would want to meet with her ahead of the court appearance. Speculation that the case was going south, of course, ramped up back on July the 1st, when the D.A. asked the judge to release Strauss-Kahn from house arrest because of credibility issues with his accuser - Fred.

WHITFIELD: And so, what are those issues, Susan?

CANDIOTTI: Well, among them, the D.A. says Diallo admits to lying on her asylum papers, including claiming she was gang raped. Prosecutors say she also lied on tax forms. And, in this case, she lied to prosecutors about her whereabouts following the alleged attack.

As with any sexual assault cases, credibility of the accuser is key to the success of the case. And, of course, Fred, the D.A. is under a lot of pressure from - from all sides. Ms. Diallo repeatedly has said she wants to plead her case before a jury.

Prosecutors have also said there is evidence of a sexual encounter. But even the pastor of a large and a very influential New York church has called for the D.A. to prosecute the case. A local politician is holding a rally tomorrow in support of Diallo.

But, in the end, a D.A. needs to decide if prosecutors can convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt, and, if not, it's not a winnable case.

WHITFIELD: All right, Susan Candiotti thanks so much for that update on that case.

Meantime, another case a lot of people have been watching, particularly this past week, the West Memphis Three. Well, now, they're beginning their first full week of freedom.

The men were released from prison Friday after serving 18 years for the 1993 killings of three second graders in West Memphis, Arkansas. New evidence raised questions about their guilt, and, in a move to avoid retrial, they pled guilty and accepted a sentence of time already served while maintaining their innocence as well. And now, they are focused on their future.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JASON BALDWIN, RELEASED AFTER 18 YEARS IN PRISON: Right now, I'm just kind of floating on the hands of the people, you know, who love and care for me, you know, trying to help me get my feet up under me and everything. And I'm just trusting God, you know, to take care of me.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So where are you going to live? Any big plans that you have?

BALDWIN: Absolutely none right now. I do know in the near future - not like today or this week or anything like that - but, in the near future, I'm going to go back to school and everything.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Arkansas' attorney general and the prosecutor say they believe the men are guilty.

Motorcyclists are hitting the road to honor 9/11 victims. Today they rode to the World Trade Center and laid a wreath in memory of those who died there.

The ride supports a foundation that funds college scholarships for children of 9/11 first responders.

And his voice caught the world by surprise. But did this "Korea's Got Talent" contestant win the big prize? This is one rags to riches story that you don't want to miss.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: All right, back to Tripoli, Libya where rebel forces claim to be closing in.

Our Matthew Chance is in Tripoli. He's on the phone with us now. Matthew, bring us up to date.

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Thanks very much.

Well, yes, a very - a very difficult situation in Tripoli. Up until a few hours ago the government were trying to insist that they had the situation under control here, the Gadhafi loyalists. But that is clearly not the case because all around Tripoli right now, as I speak to you, there are fierce gun battles raging between government forces loyal to Colonel Gadhafi and rebels, some of whom are reported to have moved in from the western town of Zawiya, others said to have been part of an uprising inside Tripoli itself.

It's not clear to us the exact, you know, makeup of these rebel groups at the moment fighting in Tripoli. All I can say is that, you know, there are fierce gun battles taking place, there are machine guns being fired, very close proximity, explosions taking place, very close proximity to this hotel, in the center of - of Tripoli from where we're - we are reporting on this situation. It's a very, very bleak outlook indeed. According to government officials that we've spoken to in the course of the past several hours of fighting, since last night, that 376 people have been confirmed dead, another thousand have been injured in what has been, you know, by far the most intense fighting that we've seen in Tripoli since this Libya crisis began. And it does seem like the battle for the Libyan capital is well and truly underway.

WHITFIELD: And so, Matthew, has NATO played a part in this latest melee of gunfire?

CHANCE: Well, throughout the day NATO has been conducting air strikes against various military installations. The government has confirmed that to us, the Gadhafi loyalists. Spokespeople that we've been speaking to say that they've been striking at military outposts, trying to encourage Libyan soldiers to flee. In some extent, that's been effective.

But I can tell you that, you know, for the most part, in the very high density in terms of population areas inside Tripoli, it's going to be very difficult for NATO to support the rebels with their power in the kind of way that they've done in the past week or so, which has enabled the rebels to make those dramatic advances to the east of the site (ph). And, most dramatically perhaps, to the west cutting, off that road, taking that - that town of Zawiya, cutting off the road into Tripoli, essentially surrounding the rebels.

It's going to be much more difficult for NATO to carry out pinpoint air strikes in areas so built up as they are in Tripoli. And so the expectation is this will be a very bloody fight. The government officials we've spoken to say they have 65,000 well armed troops prepared to defend the city and they say that they're going to fight right until the end.

WHITFIELD: Matthew Chance in Tripoli. Thanks for that update.

And now there's a story out of South Korea about a young man with a great big opera voice. He was propelled to worldwide fame after he first appeared on "Korea's Got Talent."

Korea picked its winner last night, and it isn't the young opera singer. But his rags to riches story is so amazing that we thought you'd like to see it anyway. Here's Paula Hancocks.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): He may not have won "Korea's Got Talent" but Choi Sung-Bong has won the heart of a nation. His incredibility story from the streets to the stage has touched millions around the world.

CHOI SUNG-BONG, "KOREA'S GOT TALENT": (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

HANCOCKS: He says, "I never thought this could happen. I never thought I should have been born."

Choi is a long way from where he'd started. He was left in an orphanage at the age of three, ran away at the age of five after being bullied, and lived on the streets, fending for himself for the next 10 years.

(on camera): Up until 2006, Choi was living in a container box in this neighborhood, the Red Light District of the city of Daejeon. He was living without any electricity, without any heat, and without any water. The only income he had during that time was from selling drinks and gums in the local nightclubs.

(voice-over): Choi tells me, "There were a lot of criminal gangs in that area, and they didn't like me. I was beaten up a lot, and once they took me to a mountain, dug a hole, threw me in, and buried me." Choi says he tried to kill himself several times, as he felt his life was meaningless. The only thing that gave him comfort was music he heard in the nightclubs.

He says, "I felt calm when I listened to music. I would feel depressed and despair without it. Music was my only friend."

Choi searched the Internet for someone who could teach him. He found former opera singer and music teacher Park Jeung-So.

PARK JEUNG-SO, LUCE ENTERTAINMENT: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

HANCOCKS: Park tells me, "His situation was unbelievably harsh, but his passion for music, for wanting to learn to sing was very strong. I couldn't charge him for lessons when I knew what he'd been through."

Park recommended an arts high school and helped him to pass the state examination. At the age of 16, Choi went to school for the very first time. The children's foundation ChildFund Korea helped him secure a government-subsidized flat and his life was transformed.

Social worker Yu Hyun Jeong is delighted he has found success, but she's also worried.

YU HYUN JEONG, SOCIAL WORKER: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

HANCOCKS: She says, "All this change happened very fast. I feel this overwhelming interest might be too much for someone who's been abandoned all his life."

But Choi says he's happy to have come this far and, more than anything, wants his singing to give hope to others who are suffering as he did.

Paula Hancocks, CNN, Daejeon, South Korea.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: And back in this country, no ordinary school year in Atlanta, as the fallout from an unprecedented cheating scandal mounts. Find out what's happening to the educators accused of inflating test scores and the students caught in the middle.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) WHITFIELD: Atlanta public school students are seeing plenty of new faces as they start the new year. A state investigation implicated nearly 200 teachers and principals in a massive cheating scandal, and those educators have been replaced in the classroom with interim staff.

CNN's Julie Peterson visited one school severely impacted by that scandal.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PETE SETTELMAYER, NEW PRINCIPAL, DOBBS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL: All right, ladies. Did you have breakfast?

JULIE PETERSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Principal Pete Settelmayer has his work cut out for him in his new job at Atlanta's Dobbs Elementary School, hired just 10 days before the start of classes.

SETTELMAYER: You're going to make Mr. Settelmayer cry in a moment.

Here, hold on to that. Let's tie these shoes.

PETERSON: At a school with more than 550 students, most of Settelmayer's responsibilities are obvious.

SETTELMAYER: Well, I know we have one child with severe chronic asthma.

PETERSON: Like motivating.

But there will be even greater challenges for Settelmayer, who is brought in as interim replacement for a principal implicated in Atlanta's test cheating scandal - cheating not by the students, but by their teachers and administrators. One hundred seventy-eight teachers and principals were accused of either changing students' answers to improve scores on standardized tests, or failing to stop the cheating from occurring.

At Settelmayer's school, the principal and four teachers were implicated and have been placed on administrative leave.

SETTELMAYER: I think my job, as well as any other school leader's job, is to create culture, a positive culture.

Give yourself a big pat on the back because that's amazing.

PETERSON: His message to teachers appears to be sinking in.

SETTELMAYER: We have a family and - and, you know, families change through marriage or through deaths or - and our family is clanging, but in a positive way.

RUBY CHAMPION, TEACHER, DOBBS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL: His positivity has really rubbed off on the rest of us here. So, when you have a great leader, it really guides us, and we're just following his lead, and we are supporting him 100 percent.

PETERSON: And there's one point he emphasizes when talking with teachers and staff.

SETTELMAYER: The one thing that I did not care about was the standardized test, the CRCT test. I said what I care about most is that we can bring a child in here with a certain set of knowledge, and that they exit in May with a greater sense and a greater understanding of the world they live in.

PETERSON (on camera): It sounds like you think people have really moved on - the staff, the families?

SETTELMAYER: Sure. Yes. And I would - probably would be naive to think that, you know, there isn't some skepticism out there or some, you know, what's it going to be like? And I try and be as proactive as possible.

Excellent job, Miss Champion's class. Have a fabulous Friday, OK?

CHILDREN: OK.

SETTELMAYER: You can either wallow in the past and - and think about all the things that could have happened, or you can think of the things that need to happen.

PETERSON (voice-over): Julie Peterson, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: Also focusing on the future, the city's new school superintendent, Erroll Davis. Earlier this weekend, I asked Davis about how he plans to move past the Atlanta public schools testing - test cheating scandal and if he is considering eliminating standardized testing.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ERROLL DAVIS, SUPERINTENDENT, ATLANTA PUBLIC SCHOOLS: I am, first, no great fan of high stakes, single-point testing. I believe that the children, as well as the teachers, should be judged on the body of their work, not just an instant snapshot of it.

But, also, you should understand that we don't have all the flexibility that we would like to have. Many of the tests are mandated by the state. Some are mandated by the federal government. And so, we will comply with the law, but how we evaluate teachers will be focused more on what value are they adding to the student and how do we measure that over time.

WHITFIELD: What do you suppose one of the greatest memories of your public school experience that you think might be missing now from public schools that you hope as a new superintendent to perhaps bring back to public school education?

DAVIS: Well, like every person of my generation, of course, we were always smarter and more disciplined. But I think the aspect of classroom discipline is a little bit different today. The challenges are a little bit different.

We are a microcosm of society and we have a lot of societies, challenges, which didn't exist when I was a child in our classroom. Our teachers hopefully all are trained to deal with it -

WHITFIELD: So things outside of the classroom -

DAVIS: Absolutely.

WHITFIELD: -- that you're talking about, challenges that need to be addressed.

DAVIS: Yes, absolutely. The issues of - of poverty and hunger. We have a significant number of students that we feed not only one, but two meals a day, because you really can't learn when you're hungry.

WHITFIELD: Quickly, how does that get addressed then outside of the classroom?

DAVIS: Well -

WHITFIELD: If you're talking about poverty and families are strapped, it's difficult. They don't have any other options.

DAVIS: Yes. So, again -

WHITFIELD: How do we, as a country, help address that?

DAVIS: Well, you know, I'm not a centralized policymaker in - in Washington. But, again, we have to get this economy going, and depending upon what side of the political spectrum you're on, you can either talk about stimulus - stimuluses to get it going, or you can talk about balancing budgets to get it going, and probably the truth lies somewhere between the two of those.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: The Atlanta Public School System has launched an academic recovery program that offers students impacted by the scandal more instruction.

The recession's most vulnerable victims are children and, after the break, I'll introduce you to two parents who sometimes go hungry in order to feed their own kids.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: In these tough economic times, doctors, dentist and other health care workers are pitching in to help millions of Americans who can't afford health care. In Charlotte, North Carolina, thousands of people showed up at a free dental clinic this weekend. Hundreds of dentists, oral surgeons and hygienists volunteered their time.

And in Chicago hundreds of people lined up as early as Thursday for a free health clinic. Medical care, vision screenings and dental procedures were available. The volunteers usually help the needy in remote areas overseas.

And in the midst of the recession, one in five children now live below the poverty line. Athena Jones talked to a married couple in Washington. They have four kids and have both been out of work for now over two years.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KEANA WALLACE, MOTHER: Now, this is the wedding dress.

ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: OK.

(voice-over): The ripple effects of the recession can be felt here, at the Washington home of Nathan and Keana Wallace.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I like (INAUDIBLE).

JONES: Both have been out of work for more than two years, and their unemployment benefits have run out.

The Wallaces live in public housing and don't have to pay rent, but they have struggled to pay their utilities bills and recently had their power cut off.

WALLACE: We did candles. We just - you know, some days during that six-week period, it was either the kids eat or we eat. We just had to make sacrifices.

JONES: Both of the Wallace's cars have been repossessed and they'll have to come up with $120 a month for Metro passes for their four children once school starts. They once brought in $5,000 a month and say they're determined to get back on track.

WALLACE: I get up with my boxing gloves on every day for - for them.

JONES: According to a study by the NEEKC Foundation, a national charity, one in five children lived below the poverty line in 2009.

The Wallace Family receives food stamps each month, but they run out after about three weeks. Nathan mows lawns and does other odd jobs, and Keana sells snow cones, hot dogs and candy to get by.

JONES (on camera): Do you just go out outside right here, or do you travel up...?

WALLACE: I go up the street, and do it on a corner. And then, with the candies, I do it all on the Metro. I do it at the subway stations. I do it up and down the street. I - I do what it takes to make sure we can survive another day.

JONES (voice-over): She brings in as much as $145 on a really good day, but that doesn't happen often.

Thirteen point nine million people were unemployed in July, and nearly half of them are like the Wallaces, people who have been out of work for 27 weeks or more. Advocates for children and families don't want to see the focus on budget cuts hurt programs for the poor.

LAURA SPEER, ANNIE E. CASEY FOUNDATION: We can't forget about children as we make decisions in the fiscal crisis. We can't cut these programs thinking eventually we might put money back into them because childhood is a very short time.

JONES: Keana's 14-year-old daughter, Danielle, believes things will turn around for her family, and she has a lot of plans for her own future.

DANIELLE BEDNEY, 14 YEARS OLD: First, I want to go to college for designer school. Then, after I graduate from design school, I want to send my pictures in to be a model. After I be a model for five years, I want to open my own store called Danny 101 (ph), a clothing store. Then, after I open my own store -

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: And Athena Jones join me now from Washington.

Incredible numbers. What else did this study find?

JONES: Well, the study found that 2.4 million children fell into poverty between 2000 and 2009, so that's essentially erasing all of the gains that have been - that had been made in reducing child poverty rates since the early 1990s.

And, one more important statistic from this study, 42 percent of children in America live in low-income families. And so that's 31 million kids who live in families that make less than twice the federal poverty line, which is only about $44,000 for a family of four.

So there are a lot of people struggling out there, whether or not they fall below or just above the poverty line, Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: And so, Athena, the family that you profiled, you talked about how the family is going to need a Metro card in order for the kids to get to school. Getting very close to starting school. Are they any closer to getting some assistance, getting the kind of help they need so that the kids are ready?

JONES: It absolutely is getting close. Several of the children start next week, another one starts the following week.

They - they have - they hold out hope. They believe it's going to work out for them, whether it's through these odd jobs, being able to - to sell a few things on the street. This - this week, maybe next week, they believe it's going to work out. And so they - they said it's going to be fine.

WHITFIELD: Oh, we hope so.

All right, Athena Jones in Washington. Thanks so much. JONES: Thanks.

WHITFIELD: A look at other top stores right now.

Syria's embattled president is giving an interview to state-run TV this hour to talk about his country's future. Among other things, Bashar al-Assad is expected to discuss reforms and political and economic pressure from the west.

Al-Assad faces growing calls to end his brutal five-month crackdown on opposition protesters.

And gunfire and explosions rocked Tripoli today, as fighting between Libyan rebels and Moammar Gadhafi's forces intensified. A fierce gun battle broke out near a hotel where many international correspondents are staying. Thousands of rebels are reportedly closing in. Libyan official deny rebels are making any gains and say thousands are ready to defend Tripoli against any invasion.

Speculation is growing today that the sexual assault charges against former IMF Chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn may be dropped. The woman making those charges has been asked to a meeting with the prosecutors in New York. No comment from the DA's office.

And she is being called a pint-sized Nancy Drew. The 12-year-old Jessica Maples solved a burglary case that police couldn't after his late great-grandmother's house was robbed, she tracked down the thief and stolen goods.

Jeff Dohe with CNN affiliate WSB explains exactly what happened.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFF DORE, WSB: Before she turned this into real crime fighting, it started out as a kid summer program here at the Fulton County District Attorney's office.

(voice-over): Junior district attorneys learn to argue cases in the real state supreme court. They meet former prosecutor Nancy Grace, and the key to this story, learn about investigating crimes.

Among the junior district attorneys was Jessica Maple, just after the forensics class, someone burglarized the home of Jessica's late great- grandmother in Fitzgerald, Georgia.

Jessica investigated and found where the burglars broke in. The police had missed it. Then she and her mom investigated and local pawnshop and found her great-grandmother's property.

JESSICA MAPLE, 12-YEAR-OLD CRIME FIGHTER: We called the police station and the investigator, he came and he was like, my gosh, how did you find this stuff here? I was coming here. And I was like, I did your job again.

DORE: They also learned the pawnshop owners had copies of the I.D.s of the guys who sold the stuff. Then, believe it or not, she and her mom drove to the guy's house and confronted him.

(on camera): He confessed to you that he did it?

MAPLE: He confessed.

DORE (voice-over): At last word, police still haven't made an arrest?

(on camera): The police still haven't arrested him?

MAPLE: No. I don't know what's taking them so long.

DORE (voice-over): Paul Howard started the Junior DA program 13 years ago, and this is a first.

PAUL HOWARD, FULTON COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY: We're hoping that she will take that lesson through life, the things she has learned as a junior DA.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: OK, so the young crime fighter, Jessica Maple, is here with me right now in the studio and so is Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard. All right, good to see you all.

What an incredible story. This is very bold. You have to be produce of her because she was in the junior DA program. So she learned a lot from your program.

HOWARD: We are so proud. That's what our program is all about, exposure, taking what they learn, and put it into good use, and man, she really did that.

WHITFIELD: You really did. So when did this happen? Of course, we saw the piece, but tell me about the instincts that kicked in. Somebody got in there, but police said, no, there was no sign of forced entry. So what did you learn from that program that made you think otherwise?

MAPLE: I learned to look like twice, and go over what the police looked at. When I did that, they were wrong, obviously. I went by the garage, and I could tell that somebody went in, because there was broken glass and fingerprints all over the place. I don't see how they missed that.

WHITFIELD: What is the explanation? Between they ever say anything about, you know what they overlooked? Is it an issue of being so familiar with the property and perhaps they weren't?

MAPLE: Yes, I think so.

WHITFIELD: Then you took it a step further.

MAPLE: Yes.

WHITFIELD: You thought about the economic times, and what happens, something else you learned at the DA's program about really knowing about the environment, kind of the state of affairs, and that helps you in the investigation?

MAPLE: Yes.

WHITFIELD: So what happened?

MAPLE: So I thought to myself, since this is a bad economy, with the furniture, instead of keeping it. They may want to sell it, so they go to a pawnshop. Down the street there was a pawnshop.

I saw all of my grandmother's furniture inside. I got the manager, and the manager said, is this your stuff? I said, yes. Who were the people that brought it in? And he said yes, there were two people who brought the stuff in.

WHITFIELD: And they gave you that information, names, addresses.

MAPLE: And I.Ds.

WHITFIELD: And then you took it further. You didn't call authorities. You said I'm going to investigate myself.

MAPLE: Yes, so one day me and my mom, we were driving around, randomly around the town, and we happened to pass by one of the streets where one of the suspects lived. So then I saw a man standing outside with his mom by his mom -- well, the man said hi.

Then my mother and I, we stopped the car and said, could you come here, please? We asked him his name. This was the exact same guy on the I.D. then we started asking him questions like, do you know that house on Cypress Street?

He kept saying random things like, yes, yes, and we asked, did you break in? He said, no. We asked him more questions, like how old are you? He said, 17, and then he finally admitted that he did it.

WHITFIELD: Paul, aren't you surprised that she said, you know what, I'm going to take it into my hands, but at the same time, you probably don't encourage all the young folks to do this, because anything could happen. But in this case, he was very forthright and a conversation that gave real solid results.

HOWARD: Well, we certainly don't encourage people to confront defendants at their own locations, but one of the things that we talk about quite often is participation between citizens and our police department.

Not surprisingly, in most burglaries, they are solved when citizens are assisting the police by turning in information, just as Jessica did in this instance. It's an amazing thing, because she's only 12 years old.

WHITFIELD: That is amazing. So wait a minute, all the stuff, is it back at your great-grandmother's house?

MAPLE: Yes.

WHITFIELD: Yes, it is. Even though there has not been an arrest, still no arrest of the person that you are certain is the suspect?

MAPLE: Yes.

WHITFIELD: Kind of discouraging?

MAPLE: Well, it was very disappointing because this is illegal. If somebody breaks the law, they need to be arrested or whatever charges are against them.

WHITFIELD: Where do you suppose this will go then?

HOWARD: Well, when they finally do decide to make the arrest, it appears to be the arrest case will be quite simple. All they have to do is tune into CNN and they could wrap it up.

WHITFIELD: So something tells me, Paul, now your program has got another feather in its cap for really teaching some, you know, very valuable lessons. How might this impact perhaps next year's programs?

HOWARD: Usually there are about 25 young people like Jessica who what we are expecting is we'll get a lot more applications. We plan to try to take as many new people as possible, because obviously this program has great impact.

WHITFIELD: Excellent, Paul Howard, thank you so much, Fulton County DA and Jessica Maple, hero of the week/hour/month/summer. Job well done. Excellent. Good to see both of you. Appreciate that.

HOWARD: All right, good to see you.

WHITFIELD: All right, thank you. Of course, you want your information quickly, right? So which states have the fastest internet? Here is a top ten list, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, New York, District Of Columbia. The top five when we come right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: All right, we're looking for which state has the fastest internet speed. Here are the top five from Maryland, Delaware, fourth, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and number one, Rhode Island.

So as summer winds down and the kids head back to school, school shopping has never been so high tech. Our gaming and gadgets expert Marc Saltzman joins us now with the newest back to school gadget. Let's hope that thunderstorm doesn't interfere with our signal.

So let's begin with Apple's new Mac Book Air?

MARC SALTZMAN, SYNDICATED TECHNOLOGY WRITER: That's right. So last week, we looked at a few new tablets, but definitely a laptop is probably the most important tool still in 2011 for students.

So the new Mac Book Air absolutely gorgeous, you know, the Mac has that style down, super thin and lightweight. It uses flash memory so it boots up faster opposed to a hard drive and lasts longer on the battery.

What's new is a backlit keyboard, so you can type in dimmer environments and see what you're typing, like what they have on the Mac Book Pro.

It's got the new thunderbolt port, which for new peripherals, faster speeds, as well as it's prebuilt with the new Mac OS Lion, so that has a bunch of bells and whistles. That's the new platform with support for lots of multi-touch gestures on the track pad.

WHITFIELD: OK, and these other bells and whistles, you can dispute whether the kid, the student, really needs them. but they're going to appreciate it nonetheless. HTC-Evo 3D, a Smartphone for movies?

SALTZMAN: Yes, so I mean, Smartphones are kind of like a digital Swiss army knife, they do everything from GPS navigation to movies, games, music and a lot more even reading e-books. This is the HTC-Evo 3D. It's $199 on a two-year Sprint plan.

What I like about it is aside from the fact that it's got a gorgeous 4.3-inch touch screen. It actually shows 3D movies, 3D photos and 3D games without you having to wear glasses.

You're not going to be able to see the effect at home, because you need two eyes to see it. Think of this web camera that I'm talking to as one eye, but definitely it's amazing to look at. Plus, if I show on the back here, it's got a dual lens camera so it can take 3D pictures and shoot 3D video as well.

WHITFIELD: OK, another distraction from studying. Then there's the Click-Free C6 Easy Imaging because there's also the Microsoft Life-Cam Studio, so take it away with those two items?

SALTZMAN: Sure. The last two products, one of them backs up your important files onto this little, tiny hard drive. All you do is you plug it in, and the click-free technology does the rest. It finds all your files, your programs and even backs up your operating system in case you need it. So that's a great little gadget because you don't have to know what to back up. It does it for you.

And then finally the Life Cam Studio from Microsoft is there's HD web camera so college kids can chat with mom and dad and friends back at home for free, with HD video and high definition. It has a great microphone and a few other cool things. So that's the new one from Microsoft.

WHITFIELD: Mom and dad will appreciate that and they get to keep an eye on their hard-working student to see if they're studying or if they're watching that 3D little Smartphone.

SALTZMAN: You got it.

WHITFIELD: All right, Marc Saltzman, thanks so much. Glad we got through the thundershower there on your screen. All right.

SALTZMAN: Yes. WHITFIELD: Good to see you.

SALTZMAN: Thanks, Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right, for more high tech ideas and reviews, just go to cnn.com/tech, and look for the gaming and gadget tab.

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WHITFIELD: A dramatic light show over New York City. We're getting a new picture today. One of our I-Reporters took this picture of lightning striking the George Washington Bridge on Friday.

Isn't that amazing? Zachary Taylor says he ran to his rooftop as the storm rolled in from New Jersey and he says he got goose bumps when he took that picture.

Forecasters are keeping a close watch on Tropical Storm Irene in the south eastern U.S. We should also be on alert in the week ahead. Jacqui Jeras is here now.

JACQUI JERAS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Here we go.

WHITFIELD: A very active Atlantic hurricane season?

JERAS: Yes, the big bulk of the hurricane season is really from mid- August through mid-October, and that's what we call our Cape Verde season when those tropical waves roll off the coast of Africa and those are the ones that developed into major hurricanes oftentimes.

Now we've got our first one. This is Irene. It's a tropical storm that developed yesterday. Maximum winds now around 50 miles per hour. This storm is showing signs of intensifying, and everything out ahead of the storm is very good environment for it to continue to do so.

Now it is already moving through the U.S. Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico already starting to get some of the shower and thundershowers activity. Here you can see the radar is bringing in some of the first outer bands of that system beginning to move in.

The rainfall amounts are going to be real heavy here, too, for Puerto Rico probably 4 to 7 inches with isolated amounts up to 10 inches. Tropical storm force winds are going to be arriving anytime especially gusting into some of these thunderstorms and then it's going to continue to push westwards and head over towards Espaniola, that's the Dominican Republic.

That's Haiti, where the flood situation we expect to be much worse because of their terrain. In fact, they could see upwards of 6 to 10 inches maybe even as much as 20 inches, so that will be the big concern there for those folks.

All right, let's talk about some of the other concerns that we're talking about, watches and warnings are in place across the Caribbean Islands. The bright pink here, that's where we have hurricanes warnings, tropical storm warning out ahead of it, and tropical storm watches already for parts of the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos.

Let's talk about the forecast track and where we're expecting this system to go. It's going to continue on a west-north westerly turn. It's expected to be the first hurricane of the season. Now the intensity of the storm is going to rely very heavily on how much it interacts with land as it moves through here.

The more time it spends over land, the weaker the storm will be. If it does take an outerly track then it's more likely this will be a stronger storm.

All right, the big question everybody wants to know is what's going to be happening here into the U.S.? It's still too early to tell. We don't want you to focus yet on South Florida because the margin of error is still too great.

It still could be a gulf storm, could be an Atlantic storm so you'll have to stay tuned in the week ahead. Also some thunderstorms in the northeast. We'll talk more about that coming up next in the NEWSROOM.

WHITFIELD: OK, we'll do that. Thanks so much, Jacqui.

All right, graphic pictures on cigarette packs. Big tobacco says the pictures are unconstitutional. Our legal guys weigh in.

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WHITFIELD: Starting next month, tobacco companies have been ordered to place graphic warning photographs on cigarette packages, but the tobacco industry is opposed to the new labeling, filing suit against the FDA to stop it.

Yesterday, I talked to our legal guys Avery Friedman and Richard Herman about the case, and I asked them if big tobacco has any chance in stopping the FDA.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RICHARD HERMAN, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I think they do, Fred. Look, this is what's going to be on cigarette packages, these pictures that you're showing right now. So this probably goes too far. Whether it's going to avoid people from smoking, I don't think so.

There was an '81 study that said smokers, you know, completely ignore warnings on cigarettes, but look at these visuals here. I mean, this is pretty devastating. This is a lawful business, cigarettes.

If it wasn't lawful, OK, but it is lawful. Five of the six big tobacco companies are saying the government has gone too far. It's impingent on our rights and they've got to stop it.

WHITFIELD: They're going as far, Avery, as saying this is unconstitutional.

AVERY FRIEDMAN, LAW PROFESSOR: Yes, it's a constitutionally tantalizing case, Fredricka, but the problem is the tobacco industry originally challenged the question of smoking may be hazardous to your health, and they lost.

Now they're challenging smoking will kill you, and they think, well, there's a big difference. No, there isn't. I mean, the constitutional basis, which I think is an intriguing one, I think it's a fascinating case.

This is big tobacco being backed up with some very good lawyers. At the end of the day, I think they're going to lose.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD: And you can catch our legal guys every Saturday, noon Eastern.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: All eyes will be on Wall Street this week for a repeat of last week's roller coaster ride? And there are several factors that could have an impact. CNN's Alison Kosik starts off our financial look ahead.

ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Fredricka. We thought it might be a quiet week for Wall Street, but then Europe started sneezing again. The U.S. market caught another case of the chills.

Thursday's 419-point drop on the Dow sent the blue chips back below 11,000 mark, and cause investors to run to the safety of gold, which hit new record highs and treasury bonds who's yield touched an all time low.

In the end, the Dow posted a roughly 450-point loss for the week, a decline of 4 percent. The Dow is now down almost 11 percent so far for the month. Felicia --

FELICIA TAYLOR, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Thanks, Alison. Hewlett- Packard is waving the white flag in the tablet war. The company is pulling its touch pad tablet and Web OS mobile operating system.

You can say goodbye to those commercials too. The move is part of a drastic restructuring plan announced this week. HP, which is the world's biggest computer maker also says it will spin off its PC business and it will pay $10 billion to buy a British software developer.

CEO Leo Apotheker says the company has to focus on services instead of hardware before the entire business runs out of steam, Poppy --

POPPY HARLOW, CNNMONEY.COM: Thanks so much, Felicia, well, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke heads to Jackson Hole, Wyoming this week for an annual conference of central bankers.

At last year's conference, Bernanke hinted as a new round the fed stimulus and that sparked a nine-month rally for the stock market. The big question is, of course, will he do it again this year?

Also coming up, the Commerce Department will release its second estimate of second quarter GDP. Last month's estimate showed very slow growth in the quarter, just 1.3 percent. You can bet the market will look closely for any change in the pace of U.S. growth. We'll follow it all week on CNN Money. Back to you.

WHITFIELD: And a quick look at the top stories.

Moammar Gadhafi is vowing to hold on to Libya, even if it takes, quote, "the last blood drops from every man and woman," unquote. Gunfire and explosions rocked Tripoli today and a fierce gun battle broke out near a hotel where many international reporters are staying. Thousands of rebels are reportedly closing in on the capital. Libya officials deny rebels are making any gains and say thousands of people are ready to defend Tripoli against any invasion.

And speculation is growing today that the sexual assault charges against former IMS chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn maybe dropped. The woman making those charges has been asked to meet with prosecutors tomorrow in New York. No comment from the DA's office.

I'll be back in one hour. We'll take you to Washington, D.C. where you will hear from a musical pioneer, who is still packing the house with a sound known as go-go. Stay with CNN. "YOUR MONEY" starts right now.