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Pope Francis in Brazil; Fruit Causing Illness?; Texas Teen Charged with Sexually Assaulting and Killing a Six-Year-Old

Aired July 25, 2013 - 15:00   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: There's no sound, no warning, just a terrifying image. As crews search the rubble of a deadly derailment, the question we're asking, how safe are America's trains?

I'm Brooke Baldwin. The news is now.

(voice-over): Police say a man targeted a random sex offender and killed him in cold blood. And apparently he wasn't done.

The pope's security team on high alert, as he kisses babies, shakes hands, and walks right out in the open.

Plus, a mysterious stomach bug spreading across America. Is fruit to blame?

And Lance Armstrong's lawyer tells the Postal Service to drop the lawsuit against his client. Why? Because they should have known he was doping. We're "On the Case."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: Thanks for staying with me. I'm Brooke Baldwin. Top of the hour.

I begin with a chilling quote. "I'm here to kill you," those are the words this white supremacist reportedly uttered before shooting and stabbing his victim to death. This is according to the Union County sheriff in South Carolina. His name is Jeremy Moody. He is accused of murdering someone, not because of the color of his skin, but for a crime in his past.

Moody told investigators that he and his wife, Christine, murdered this man because he is a registered sex offender. Charles Parker was convicted of eight sex crimes. Latest offense was in 2003. The Moodys allegedly murdered Parker's wife as well. Deputies discovered their bodies Monday in their home, and there's more.

The sheriff said another sex offender was on Moody's hit list.

Joining me now by phone is Union County Sheriff David Taylor.

Sheriff Taylor, thanks for calling in. I appreciate it. Let me just get straight to this. Moody, I know, has admitted to killing Charles Parker because he was a registered sex offender, but why? Why him exactly?

DAVID TAYLOR, UNION COUNTY, SOUTH CAROLINA, SHERIFF: Well, right now we don't know that information for sure. We have still been in contact with him and still talking to him. But other than what he has originally told us, that's all we know right now.

BALDWIN: Remind me, what did he originally tell you? Has he been cooperative?

TAYLOR: Yes, he has. He originally told us in his statement that Mr. Parker thought he was there to kill him for robbery, and he said: "I'm not here to rob you. I'm here to kill you because you're a child molester."

BALDWIN: And not only that, but did he share more with you in terms of plans to kill others?

TAYLOR: Well, we took him into custody Wednesday morning about 3:40 a.m. He told us that, if we had not arrested him and we'd waited until the next day, there would have been another victim.

BALDWIN: Can I ask the tone he took with you? Was it rather matter- of-fact admission?

TAYLOR: Yes, ma'am, pretty much.

BALDWIN: I understand that there are other sex offenders who have seen this story. They're calling you. They're afraid. What are they saying?

TAYLOR: Well, they have been afraid for -- and calling our office. Yesterday especially, we were busy answering calls from sex offenders who are on our sex offender registry in our county.

Today, to my knowledge, we have not received any calls. And I think, once the story broke and they heard that was the reason, they were worried about their safety. We just tried to tell them that the suspect is in custody. We think he was operating alone and they're secure and safe.

BALDWIN: Finally, sir, we're looking at pictures of Moody. He has some 30 tattoos, I understand. Tell me a little bit about -- we see "skinhead" around his neck, his chin. What groups? Is he affiliated with certain groups? Does have a criminal history?

TAYLOR: We're still trying to figure that out right now. I was on the phone with an agency just before I got on the phone with you. We're still trying to figure out that information.

BALDWIN: Sheriff David Taylor, thank you so much, calling us from Union County, South Carolina. Appreciate it.

We will story on that story. Also today, an American died in that train crash in Spain. We're working to get that individual's name, but we can tell you that the driver is being questioned. The death toll at this hour still stands at 80. But look at this because you will see the fatal curve here of the crash site. Just last next hour, a train safety expert I talked to told us it looks to him as though the train was going way too fast to make it around the curve safely.

Amazing that this camera was positioned caught in the matter that it was, caught this whole thing. Watch this. And there it went -- 8:41 last night, the train was nearing the end of a six-hour trip, 281 passengers, crew of about 30. You see it. It is an absolute catastrophe.

As we said, 80 people are dead, plus 178 injured, including at least five Americans.

There he is, Karl Penhaul. He is at the site of the crash.

Karl, where's the driver? Is he in custody or no?

KARL PENHAUL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: He's being questioned. That much, we do know. He also, we understand, seemed very shocked after that crash and was found wandering along the tracks.

As I say, he spent most of the afternoon being questioned by authorities. But certainly, at this stage, nobody has come out and given any definitive statement on what he has told crash investigators, Brooke.

BALDWIN: What about -- we're hearing all these harrowing accounts right after the crash happened. Can you tell me about the effort, I imagine the frantic effort to try to get people out of these crushed and mangled cars?

PENHAUL: Certainly, the first effort was actually led by residents who live very close to the crash site. They said they heard what sounded to them like an explosion as the train crashed into the concrete pillar of a bridge and that they themselves at great personal risk ran down onto the tracks and began trying to help rescue survivors, dragging them through broken windows, pulling them out of wreckage, that even before the emergency services were on site.

And then, of course, at the same time, we saw some of those wagons had been split in two. We saw some of them had even caught fire, but as I say, residents determined to do their bit to try and rescue those who had managed to survive this deadly crash, but, of course, as we know, more than one-third of the passengers on board did die, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Karl Penhaul for us in Spain. Awful. Karl, thank you very much.

Just into us here at CNN, in the Aaron Hernandez case, prosecutors are now publicly revealing a more detailed motive here for the murder of Odin Lloyd back in June.

Susan Candiotti has been all over this. She's in Attleboro, Massachusetts.

Susan, what are you learning?

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Brooke.

Well, the prosecutor as you said for the first time saying that Aaron Hernandez allegedly killed Odin Lloyd just last month, and the body was dumped about a mile away from Hernandez's home, after Odin Lloyd, according to the prosecutor, allegedly got information linking Aaron Hernandez allegedly to an unsolved double murder drive-by shooting in Boston just last summer about a year ago.

Now, again, this is being reported as a possible motive, coming from a prosecutor, about what led to a double murder in Boston back in 2012. Remember, you have got two investigations going on here, one into the death of Odin Lloyd and a separate grand jury investigation in Boston looking into solving that double murder in Boston last July.

So this is an important new development that we're hearing from prosecutors in the case, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Yes. And we know Bill Belichick -- he was cut, we know. Hernandez was cut from the New England Patriots the second Hernandez was arrested.

Susan Candiotti for us in Attleboro.

CANDIOTTI: That's right.

Brooke, If I may...

BALDWIN: Can we go back to her?

CANDIOTTI: Hernandez has pleaded not guilty, not guilty to the first- degree murder charge in this case.

BALDWIN: Susan Candiotti, thank you very much for us in Massachusetts.

A mystery stomach bug is spreading. The CDC says nearly 300 people in 11 states have been infected. Health officials are investigating the intestinal outbreak. At least 18 people have been hospitalized so far in three states. The bug is caused by a parasite.

But the CDC has not been able to nail down the source, which is frustrating, I'm sure, for a lot of people wondering what the heck is this stuff.

Senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen here.

What are the symptoms of this thing?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: It's pretty unpleasant. It's watery diarrhea, vomiting, fever, all that.

BALDWIN: All the yucky stuff. COHEN: And the thing is it goes on for a while. Like, it can go on for weeks and weeks and weeks. So usually, when you see that, you think so you're sick for a day or two. But this actually goes on for a while.

BALDWIN: So, I don't want to get this. You don't want to get this. What do we do to avoid it?

CANDIOTTI: No. No.

That's the problem. They don't know what's causing it. Usually, with these kinds of things, you're like don't eat this brand of meat or don't eat that kind of spinach or whatever.

BALDWIN: Wash your fruit.

CANDIOTTI: Right, exactly.

But here they don't know what's causing it, so they can't tell you what not to eat. Now, it's cyclospora. That's the name of the parasite that's implicated here. It's usually produce, usually on produce in other outbreaks. That's what they're really kind of honing in on, but they don't know what produce it could be.

You can't stop eating produce. I just had a peach for lunch. I'm not not eating produce, but still it makes you kind of think.

BALDWIN: Fruits and veggies, scrub them all for now.

(CROSSTALK)

COHEN: Yes. And I'm not going to tell you that's a guarantee, because it's sticky. A researcher described it as sticky. So you might wash it, and it might still be there. Just being honest.

BALDWIN: OK. We appreciate the honesty. Elizabeth Cohen, thank you very much.

Coming up next, a startling admission by Anthony Weiner. This afternoon, he was asked point blank by a reporter, how many relationships he had that were sexual since his resignation from Congress. His answer? Well, I can tell you it was not one. We will hear exactly what he said.

Plus, the first polls released hours ago and how the scandal has impacted voters in New York.

Also, look at this. I cannot get over these pope pictures out of Rio. The pope keeping his word, one with the people, kissing babies, shaking hands. And you know that has to make his security folks very nervous, scrambling to keep him safe. We will take you live to Brazil.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: We're learning a lot more today about the Anthony Weiner sexting scandal, and some of it comes from the man himself, Anthony Weiner.

Want you to watch what he was asked in a news conference today after he was finishing. There he was volunteering, soup kitchen in Brooklyn. Watch. You're going to hear the question and then his answer. Roll it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUESTION: How many conversations did you have with women after you resigned that were sexual in nature?

ANTHONY WEINER (D), NEW YORK MAYORAL CANDIDATE: I don't believe I had any more than three.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: He doesn't believe he had any more than three. So this news today comes at the same time we now have new poll numbers. So this is a poll that was conducted yesterday after the whole scandal broke. Take a look at the numbers with me.

You can see him at number two there. Again, these are the Democrats running for mayor in New York City, but he's nine points behind the leader there, Christine Quinn. That is a complete reversal from some June polling when Weiner was leading in those polls.

You can see the differences there on the right side, June, vs. now, clearly a drop.

Chief political analyst Gloria Borger is in Washington.

Gloria, we are -- I know. I know. I see you shaking your head.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Any time you have to answer a question that starts with how many women did you have inappropriate exchanges with, it is not a good day for your candidacy. Let's put it that way.

BALDWIN: It's not a good day. You know you have -- all these reporters were following him, following him into soup kitchens right outside of Brooklyn, 47 days from the primary. The opinion has clearly dropped. There are more polls, you can see. As he continues to talk here and there, is he digging himself out of any holes? You're hearing all this.

BORGER: Well, look, he's certainly in a deep hole. If you would have asked me the first day, I would have said, this is somebody who's going to leave this race.

But, clearly, he decided not to. His wife, Huma Abedin, decided to rally around him. And now I think he's in it until the primary. And you see his poll numbers dropping precipitously. I'm not saying he couldn't at some moment, if she and he both decide together that he ought to get out of the race, he would, but I think she's the only one who can tell him to do that, by the way. I don't think anybody else has any credibility with him. Nobody big has endorsed him. She's the only one who could do that. But I think that he severely diminished his chances of becoming the next mayor of New York City, should we say, at the very least.

BALDWIN: Listen, there are many a scandal in politics, and we have seen politicians blaze through, and we love a good comeback story. But here we have him doubling down on a scandal. Can you think of another politician who has pulled through?

BORGER: No, look, politicians come back from scandals. Voters love the political redemption story, but they like to believe you have actually redeemed yourself and that they haven't been lied to. They're willing to give you a second chance, but not a second chance at a second chance.

If you look at Bill Clinton, of course, we all know came back from the Lewinsky scandal. Mark Sanford ran again for Congress and won and, although there was distance between his affair, his extramarital affair, and when he did run for Congress again and succeeded.

This, however, is kind of in the heat of the moment, and he does have the support of his wife, but New Yorkers are looking at this in real time, and, again, he's got to make this race about his opponents.

BALDWIN: About the issues.

BORGER: And about the issues and about New York. And now this race is all about himself, and you just heard the question. How many inappropriate exchanges did you have with women? That does not help a campaign.

BALDWIN: But then still -- there are all these polls. We're all looking at polls, and there's another one showing New York Democrats, whether they want him in or out, and that's pretty close when you look at that, 47 vs. 43. But trust is key, isn't it?

BORGER: Sure. Look, trust is key. Judgment is key. He was asked a question about whether the voters should trust you. He did not answer. He did not answer that question.

Voters have to decide that for themselves. The interesting larger question is here is, do people have so little trust in their elected officials that they really don't care, right? I am not so cynical as to believe that they don't care. I believe that they do care. I believe they don't want to believe they have been toyed with or fooled with or lied to. I believe that voters still want to cast their vote for the person they believe is most able, qualified to do the job, and that's not what Anthony Weiner is talking about right now.

BALDWIN: We will see...

BORGER: That's his problem.

BALDWIN: ... when they go to the polls. Gloria Borger, thank you.

BORGER: Sure. BALDWIN: Catholics say he is the holiest man in the world, and that is what makes scenes like this one just so incredibly unusual, the pope in the middle of the mobs of people today. Security for the pontiff on high alert with even more events planned for his trip to Brazil. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Want to go straight to Brazil now and just show you some of these live pictures. And just take a listen, Rio de Janeiro.

"Thank you, Father." The pope is in Rio de Janeiro right there, as we have been watching these pictures. The crowds have grown and grown. My goodness, the scenes, as we have been watching the pope the last couple of days, before he blesses all these possibly up to a million people, music there in Rio.

We saw the pope in one of the poorest and most dangerous neighborhoods earlier today, Pope Francis. He shrugged off security concerns. He waded into crowds, kissing babies. He walked the streets of the Varginha favela once run by drug lords reportedly. Large swathes of the area still in ruins. Pope Francis walked the favela's narrow streets, reportedly repaved just in time for this.

And the joy, the joy on the little children's faces. Look at this little boy, thrilled to be meeting the pope, giving him a hug, shaking hands.

Shasta Darlington is live in Rio for us.

Shasta, let me just begin with where you are, the music, the scene, the crowds. Set it up for me.

SHASTA DARLINGTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's amazing, Brooke.

The pope hasn't even arrived here on Copacabana Beach, but I'm standing in front of the stage where he will lead hundreds of thousands, maybe even a million people, many of them young pilgrims, from around the world. He's going to lead them in prayer tonight, and you can hear other Catholic rock groups and pop groups from all over the world just getting all the groups warmed up.

They just brought the cross up onto the stage that's kind of the symbol of World Youth Day. It travels from each city that hosts the event. It was in Madrid two years ago. Now it's here in Rio de Janeiro.

But let me get actually Miguel to swing around here. You can see the crowds already lining the beach, holding the flags of their different countries. It's been a pretty cold, rainy, miserable day, but you just wouldn't know it to look at the faces here. These people are just thrilled and, of course, waiting for the moment and it won't be very far from now, when Pope Francis arrives here on the beach in Copacabana, Brooke.

BALDWIN: And the faces, Shasta, of all the people that he has greeted. I was glued to the live router this morning seeing the faces as he walks through the favelas, the shantytowns, the poorest of the poor, incredibly dangerous. Why go there? And I can only imagine the security nightmare for his people.

DARLINGTON: Absolutely, Brooke, but you have to remember this is a man who said from the day he was elected that he was going to make serving the poor the cornerstone of his papacy.

He's a Franciscan, and he has said that he will walk among the poor. He will remind everyone that that's what Jesus Christ did and that's what he's here to do. So he has to go to the favelas, and even though they have stepped up security, there were hundreds of police, he's not going to let them keep him from the people, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Shasta Darlington in the middle of the party for the pope at Copacabana in Rio.

Shasta, thank you very much.

Coming up next here, we're going to learn a little bit more about this tragic case, the shocking twists and turns, a 6-year-old girl murdered. Her parents still dealing with the tragedy, they then were targeted with another crime. And when police go to arrest the suspect, they were ambushed -- the whole story next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Near the bottom of the hour, I'm Brooke Baldwin.

And I want to give you -- it's really just this chilling story out of Dallas, Texas, a 17-year-old accused of sexually assaulting and killing a 6-year-old girl. Now he's in critical condition after getting into this shoot-out with police trying to arrest him.

And neighbors told our affiliate in Dallas WFAA they saw the accused teen at this little girl's vigil, and they say he was wearing a T- shirt with one word across his chest, "Wanted."

Sara Ganim has the back story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

911 OPERATOR: Saginaw 911, what is your emergency?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have got a dead body on the corner. I think it's a little girl. It's in a bag -- plastic bag. Somebody dropped it off.

SARA GANIM, CNN CONTRIBUTOR (voice-over): With a killer on the loose for 23 days, the Fort Worth suburb of Saginaw, Texas, was on edge.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I would see her a lot just walking around, trying to like find somebody to play with.

GANIM: Six-year-old Alanna Gallagher, a redhead with a pixie haircut, found July 1, the same day she went missing, bound and lifeless, with plastic bags over her head. She suffocated.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I haven't opened it all the way up, but I can see the legs and everything. There's a belt around it and tape.

GANIM: Her father did what many parents do in desperately tragic situations. He asked for help.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We urge anyone with information about her to contact the police.

GANIM: And help came. Tips poured in, but the family was also targeted. Alanna had a mom and two dads all living in the same house.