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Murder Suspect on the Run with Teen; Extreme Flood Risk for Missouri; The Oldest Cold Case Ever Solved; Oldest Cold Case Solved; Dr. Gupta's About-Face on Weed; Search Continues for Hannah Anderson; Flood Warnings in 12 States
Aired August 10, 2013 - 17:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Time now for news, everyone, and there is a lot of it. I'm Don Lemon, you're in the CNN NEWSROOM.
We'll going to begin in Idaho where a massive manhunt continues to intensify today. Federal and local authorities are looking for James DiMaggio who is suspected of killing Christina and Ethan Anderson in San Diego on Sunday and kidnapping 16-year-old Hannah Anderson. The search for the pair is now focused on the rugged mountain area in Central Idaho where the suspect's car was discovered on Friday.
CNN's Paul Vercammen has been following the latest developments on this story, he is in San Diego where the search began. Paul, just last hour investigators in Cascade, Idaho, held a news conference. What new information are we hearing?
PAUL VERCAMMEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Don, we've heard from those people at that news conference and from detectives here in San Diego, that the level, the level with which they are approaching this is just massive. One hundred and fifty agents, as you said, federal, so we're talking about FBI, the U.S. marshals, customs and others, detectives, all going into that vast wilderness. And they are fully armed. That's because there's been a suspicion all along that DiMaggio, the suspect, might be armed with homemade bombs. Let's listen to the level of concern that they have about him right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CAPTAIN LARRY NESBIT, SAN DIEGO SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT: At this point we believe he's extremely dangerous. We know that he's already killed two people. We know that he has a kidnap victim hostage with him and we are not taking any chances.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VERCAMMEN: And so these agents armed with automatic weapons. What they hope is he doesn't kill a third person. Obviously that would be Hannah Anderson, the 16-year-old, the 16-year-old who friends of her say that he professed that he had a crush on. She's out there right now. Her relatives also saying, I want to make this point, they say there's no way that Hannah would have left with DiMaggio willingly. And let's hear what agents had to say about that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) NESBIT: At this point, everything points to the fact that this is a kidnapping, that she left against her will. We have nothing that indicates that she went voluntarily.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VERCAMMEN: And yet another odd twist in this story, Don, apparently a friend of DiMaggio's said that today is the anniversary of DiMaggio's father's suicide and that friend had a concern that DiMaggio might try to do something drastic on the anniversary of that suicide -- Don.
LEMON: Let's hope not. Already so much heartache. Thank you, Paul Vercammen. We'll going to take a look at how the events surrounding the case unfolded this week. It began on Sunday when San Diego County firefighters responded to calls of DiMaggio's house engulfed in flames, they found the body of Hannah's mother inside and on Monday August 5th, California issues an amber alert for DiMaggio, Hannah and Ethan.
For the first time, California sends amber alerts to cell phones statewide. By Wednesday the teen is spotted with DiMaggio by a horseback rider in a remote and rugged area about 70 miles from Boise, Idaho. Friday, August 9th, Idaho State Police searching trailheads in the area find the blue Nissan Versa registered to DiMaggio near a remote trailhead in the river of no return wilderness area. Then this morning, confirmation from the San Diego Sheriff's Department. The second set of remains found in the burned-out house are those of eight-year-old Ethan Anderson.
Later this hour, you'll going to hear from one of Hannah Anderson's best friends and why she says the 16-year-old was scared to be alone with DiMaggio.
Other news now, dangerous floods may hit 12 states today. Right now three people are missing in Colorado where floods and mud slides hammered a small town.
Cars were swept away by rising waters in Manitou Springs, Colorado. At least one person was killed. Police found a man's body under a huge pile of debris on this highway. Right now Missouri, Arkansas, and Tennessee face extreme flood risks. Just days after floodwaters devoured areas in all three states. And in Nashville, dozens of families are in shelters, their homes swallowed up by floodwaters.
In Southern Missouri, floods have killed at least two people this week. Crowds rescued more than a dozen people in Hollister, Missouri, some had scrambled to rooftops of their flooded homes waiting for help.
Let's go to Zain Asher now, she's in Hollister for us today for the very latest. Zain, you spoke to a flood survivor with an amazing rescue story.
ZAIN ASHER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely, Don, I spoke to a woman named Tracy Nelson, she described how she pretty much lost everything in her home and her home ended up floating all the way from here all the way to back there while her and her children were inside it. She also said how her children had to be evacuated on to the roof as they waited for rescue crews, and she ended up clinging by the way, to a basketball hoop as she waited for fire crews to arrive. Take a listen to what she had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRACY NELSON, FLOOD SURVIVOR: It was traumatizing, but I felt safer there than I did in the water, you know? I was in the water for a couple hours. You know?
ASHER: You were clinging to the basketball hoop for a couple of hours as well. What was that like?
NELSON: You know, I mean, it felt like forever. It was, you know, um, I was wondering are they going to be able to get to you?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ASHER: And, Don, right now it really is all about the cleanup, also all about rebuilding. Let me just show you some of the damage to some of the other homes here. This is what happens when you have water moving at 85 miles an hour, 15 feet high. You can actually see straight into this person's living room. I also want to show you another mobile home over here. This home, by the way, get this, used to be all the way over there. Pretty much a football field away.
The water was so strong that it was able to lift this home here up off the ground and send it flying all the way back here. Also this home actually used to sit the other way around. The water was also strong enough, forceful enough, to send it sort of spinning 180 degrees as well, so, yes, Don, it really is all about rebuilding right now. But people here are also trying to protect themselves from looters -- Don.
LEMON: Zain, thank you very much. It has been the summer of forceful weather here.
And here's another example, crews are making slow but steady progress trying to contain a fast-moving wildfire in Southern California. The silver fire has already scorched about 19,000 acres and has destroyed 26 homes in the San Jacinto Mountains. Officials say, it's now more than 45 percent contain and many of those evacuated from their homes have been allowed to return. Authorities still don't know what caused that fire.
His job on the line. A mayor facing nearly a dozen sexual harassment accusations decides he's had enough therapy, he's had enough of it, that's next. Also this hour, for detectives few things are as rewarding as cracking a cold case and putting a criminal behind bars but what if you get the wrong guy? Just eight minutes from now, we're going in-depth on one of the coldest cases ever solved. We'll break down the case, the victim and the suspect. You're going to want to watch this. So, stay tuned.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) LEMON: Taking on the response and the critics from my last "No talking points" segment. We really ignited a firestorm of discussion when I suggested there were things black people can do to fix some of the ails we face. Russell Simmons, a hip-hop mogul even had a few choice words for me and wrote me an open letter and today it's my turn. I wrote him back. See my response to him tonight at 6:00 p.m. Eastern at the top of the next hour. And you can also read my letter on CNN.com. That's also at 6:00. Also this as well, five suggestions for white people to improve as well.
San Diego Mayor Bob Filner is apparently done with his intensive therapy. The city attorney says, Filner checked out of a two-week behavior program a week early, but his staff says it's because he checked in one week early and that he will continue his therapy on an outpatient basis. It's not clear when Filner will return to work. Local reports say the locks of the mayor's office have been changed reportedly to ensure that nothing was removed or disturbed. Filner is facing sexual harassment claims by at least 11 women.
Most of the U.S. diplomatic posts that were closed due to an al-Qaeda threat will be back in business tomorrow. The State Department announced that 18 of the 19 embassies and consulates across the Mideast and North Africa will reopen on Sunday, the only exception the U.S. Embassy in Yemen will remain closed because of concerns about a possible attack. And the U.S. consulate in Lahore, Pakistan, which shutdown yesterday due to a separate threat will also remain closed.
A 49-year-old recently discovered something amazing about himself. His name, his parents, his background, none of it was true. Paul Fronczak grew up believing he was kidnapped as an infant in 1964 and returned to his parents as a two-year-old but he recently took a DNA test and found out everything he had been told was wrong. He didn't know who he was, now he's eager to learn the truth.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAUL FRONCZAK, SUBJECT AT 48-YEAR-OLD-COLD CASE: I've been struggling the fact that I want to know if the real Fronczak baby is still alive and what happened. I also want to found out who I am and why I was abandoned at a variety store in Newark, New Jersey, back in 1965.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: The FBI is back on the case opening files no one has looked at in decades and using new technology in an effort to learn who might have kidnapped the real Paul Fronczak.
A 50-year-old murder mystery solved, but did investigators, did they get the right guy? Next, we're going in-depth in the CNN's special report "The coldest case ever solved" the crime, the victim, the suspect. Stay tuned for this, it's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: Before amber alerts, before missing children were splashed across the media or their faces posted on milk cartons, the case of Maria Ridulph captivated the nation, she was a seven-year-old girl living in Sycamore, Illinois, on the night of December 3rd, 1957, she went outside to play and was never seen again.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KATHY CHAPMAN, CHILDHOOD FRIEND OF MARIA RIDULPH: On December 3rd I went out to play a game called duck the cars with Maria, a man approaches us coming down the street and asks us if we'd like a piggyback ride. That's the last place I had seen either one of those two were on that corner.
UNIDENTIFIED MAN: The police were out with the spotlights and the megaphones.
CHAPMAN: The police all started showing up asking the same questions over and over and over. But I never did come across a picture of Johnny, and I think everybody was disappointed because everybody wanted that person to be found.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: State police and the FBI tracked down hundreds of leads but had no suspect, no motive and no idea where Maria and her kidnapper only known as Johnny may have gone. Then in 1958 her body was discovered in a field roughly 40 miles from where she vanished. Maria was burned and her case -- our buried, excuse me, and her case went cold. Fifty years later, these men received a tip that had been ignored by other investigators and the case was reopened.
Brion Hanley is a special agent with the Illinois State Police and Larry Kot is a criminal intelligence analyst supervisor also with the Illinois State Police and Mike Ciesynski, he is a homicide detective in Seattle, they all join us now.
Brion, I want to start with you. What was the tip and what made you take it seriously when so many other people did not?
AGENT BRION HANLEY, ILLINOIS STATE POLICE: It's really not that we took it -- we took it seriously, but I really can't comment on what other agencies did. When we get a case with the Illinois State Police, we take every case seriously, and we work that case until all the leads expire. And fortunately for us, the leads didn't expire until we got to Jack.
LEMON: Brion, again, I want to ask you this question, but first I want to play something for you and get your reaction. This is Kathy Chapman. She was eight when Maria was last seen in person. She was the last person to ever see her alive. She recalls a moment that you showed her Johnny's photo. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHAPMAN: We get a knock on our door. It was Brion Hanley. He had some photos he wanted me to view. He laid one down. And I knew immediately that was Johnny. You just don't forget a face. You just do not forget a face of somebody that has snatched somebody from the street corner. You don't forget what they look like. And I never have.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: So, Brion, I want you to get in to exactly what was the tip and how it came about and what ran through your mind when she correctly identified John.
HANLEY: Well, the tip came about that Kathy was with Maria, and when we went and spoke to Maria, the leads led us to Kathy, I'm sorry, and we showed her the photos. And without hesitation, she picked out Jack or Johnny, if you will, and like Kathy said, you just never forget a face that took her best friend.
LEMON: Larry, to you now. The original investigators seemed to have confused a lot of the details including the exact time of her disappearance. Did that make it more difficult for you when reopening the case and officially naming a suspect?
LARRY KOT, CRIMINAL INTELLIGENCE ANALYST SUPERVISOR: It didn't make it so much more difficult for me. It made it very difficult for the original investigators. They were working under the assumption that the abduction occurred right around 7:00. When in reality it occurred much earlier in the evening, probably closer to between 6:00, 6:15. And what that -- what happened after that is when they interviewed Jack initially, they looked at the timeline and said, well, he couldn't have done it. It happened later.
Well, when he became a suspect again years later, we reviewed it one more time. And lo and behold, oh, it happened earlier and the timeline worked. So, it created a lot of problems for the original investigators. But once we -- we had the luxury of having all the reports, so we were able to see pretty quickly that the abduction happened earlier, and it made the timeline work for Jack.
LEMON: Mike, I find it very interesting that you live more than 1,000 miles away. How is it that you became involved in this case when you live so far away?
DET. MIKE CIESYNSKI, SEATTLE POLICE: Well, I'm a Seattle police, homicide cold case detective and I came into my office, there was a little post-it note from my sergeant asking me to contact the Illinois state police reference a 1957 cold case. I happened to be originally from Chicago. And I knew where Sycamore was. So, I just contacted. I believe I spoke to Brion Hanley and he gave me the gist of what we're looking at, and they asked me if I would go and try to locate Jack, Jack Daniel McCullough and John Tessier and that's when I started to do it.
LEMON: So, Mike, you know, I have to ask you, because many people probably watch, you know, the TV shows "The Cold Case" show one called cold case, and they think it's exactly like that. My question is how many people are really looking at these old cold cases and how much is like the show, if like that at all?
CIESYNSKI: Well, I don't have the music when I walk into my office or the beautiful, you know, partners. But, look, I'm actually the only cold case detective now for the Seattle Police Department. A lot of that is just for budget reasons throughout all police departments in the entire country. I know New York City at one point had 54 cold case detectives and now they have seven. It's not because we're turning out and solving them, it's just for budget cuts. So, I have a full plate all the time, you might say. And a lot of my job now with other agencies is assisting other agencies with their work like this case.
LEMON: Yes. Obviously we can't bring the little girl back but it's good at least that you guys have solved this case and you must be very proud of that. Brion, Mike, Larry. Thank you, guys, I appreciate you coming in on a Saturday, OK?
HANLEY: Thank you very much.
KOT: Thank you.
CIESYNSKI: Thank you.
LEMON: Coming up --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JACK MCCULLOUGH, ABDUCTED AND MURDERED MARIA RIDULPH: I see her standing there with her big, big eyes and cute little dress on her and she had her little patent shoes, and she was just adorable.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: We are going inside the mind of an accused killer. What was his connection to Maria? And his motive? His jailhouse interview with us right after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: In the summer of 2011, 54 years after the kidnapping and murder of Maria Ridulph, investigators tracked down John Tessier in his Seattle home. He was 71-years-old, married and living under the name Jack McCullough. He willingly went with police to answer questions about Maria's disappearance but never went home. He was charged with her killing and extradited back to Sycamore, Illinois, to stand trial.
Seattle homicide detective Mike Ciesynski is back with us. He interrogated the man -- who interrogated Tessier. Also joining now is criminologist Casey Jordan.
So, Mike, you know, John denied his role in Maria's murder, but you have said, after his interrogation that you had no doubt that John was the guy who had eluded police for decades. Why is that?
CIESYNSKI: Well, during the investigation, or during my interview of Jack, which lasted a couple hours, he was making some very telling signs during the interview. At one point when I showed him the montage that was shown to the little girl who was with Maria, he was looking at each picture saying that he didn't know one person in there and he -- one over his picture which was clearly him and it was almost comical -- he just, you know, threw it to the side and said I don't know who that person is.
Also he would stand up in the room and he would put the chair between himself and me, kind of on the blocking system. Caught him in a couple different lies. He also told me that he never went by the name Johnny until I showed him the back of the photograph that he gave to his girlfriend at the time signed, you know, love, Johnny, and he kind of dismissed that also.
LEMON: But, you know, John or Jack as you call him, claims that he only met Maria once but vividly remembered her and then we spoke with him in Illinois. Here's what he had to say about her --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MCCULLOUGH: My memory of her is so vivid. I see her standing there with her big, big eyes and cute little dress on her and she had her little patent shoes. And she was just adorable with just big, big brown eyes. The word isn't lovely didn't describe. She was precious. And even as I remember her picture now, the audience could have seen her, they'd all just say one word, ahh. Of course, all kids are precious, but this is one that would make you say, ahh.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: So, Casey, what do you think about what he's saying here?
CASEY JORDAN, CRIMINOLOGIST: Well, he's gushing about a little girl in a way that for lack of a better phrase or more scientific word is just explain creepy. Why would he remember this? His stepsister says that he was molesting her as a child. He was convicted in 1981 of inappropriate contact with a minor, so there is a certain, you know, if you take all of these confluences, the variables, these issues of would he as an 18-year-old be someone who could potentially be a pedophile who would snatch up a little girl, there's a lot of things that if you put them together and if you build them especially with the timeline that the detectives have figured out, it's extremely possible. Possibly even likely. Obviously he's convicted that this man is responsible for that little girl's disappearance and death.
LEMON: Mike, do you agree with her assessment?
CIESYNSKI: Oh, definitely. At one point during the interview he was telling me -- well, he told me a couple times that he'd seen her numerous times, one time she was trying to cross the street, and he would tell her, go back, little girl, he was, you know, protecting her. Another time he said, he was on the stoop with four of his friends. Now, I figured these four 18-year-old young men and they're seeing this seven-year-old walking down the street, Jack said, she was just so gorgeous, we were just all amazed at how beautiful this 40- pound, seven-year-old girl was. Can you imagine being on the stoop with your buddies and seeing some little girl and commenting about how beautiful and gorgeous this little girl was? Classic pedophile.
JORDAN: Very disturbing. LEMON: Yes, and you spent a lot of time with him, Mike, a lot of time looking in to John, interrogating him. What else did you find out about him and his past?
CIESYNSKI: Well, we also found out that he actually was a policeman in a suburb of Seattle or Tacoma.
LEMON: Wow.
CIESYNSKI: And -- but he didn't last there too long because he was charged with a sexual assault of a young 14-year-old girl. She was a runaway at the time and he took her under his wing so to speak and brought her home and then sexually assaulted her. He was fired. But the charges were dropped down to I think a gross misdemeanor at the time for another sexual act, though.
LEMON: Mike and Casey, stick around.
CIESYNSKI: And also we found out he was a photographer.
LEMON: OK. All right. Hey, guys, stick around, because coming up we'll going to talk about the conclusion of the oldest cold case ever solved. We'll show you what happened to John Tessier and what he's doing now.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: Last year, John Tessier was extradited back to his hometown of Sycamore, Illinois, he was found guilty of kidnapping and murdering Maria Ridulph back in 1957 and sentenced to life in prison. And it became the oldest cold case ever solved. But even after all this time, it may not be over.
I want to bring back the Seattle homicide detective that dealt with it, Mike Ciesynski, and criminologist, Casey Jordan. We've been speaking to both of them. And our legal expert, Holly Hughes.
Thank you, guys, for joining us.
John's attorney has filed for an appeal based on what he calls thin evidence. To start, back in 1957, the FBI ruled John out as a suspect because he had an alibi, but the judge didn't allow the alibi or the original FBI files to be presented in court.
Holly, to you first.
What do we know about his alibi, and why wouldn't it be allowed in court?
HOLLY HUGHES, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY & FORMER PROSECUTOR: Well, the short answer is it would have been straight-up hearsay because the alibi he gave to his parents was that -- you know, they alibied him and said he was somewhere else, he was 40 miles away. But they are deceased, so there's nobody to validate that hearsay statement. And additionally, Don, the mother, on her deathbed, told one of John's sisters, Johnny did it. Basically saying, I lied. So, she recanted that alibi. And the reason that that testimony would have been allowed in is as an exception to the hearsay rule called a dying declaration. So the judge made the right evidentiary ruling. And I don't really see grounds for appeal based on that argument.
LEMON: OK. Interesting.
You know, Casey, John was arrested because his photo was picked out of a line-up from a woman --
CASEY JORDAN, CRIMINOLOGIST: Right.
LEMON: -- who had only seen the kidnapper for a matter of minutes more than five decades ago. Is that reliable?
JORDAN: You know, there's a lot of criticism of eyewitness testimony and recall. There's a lot of research on selective blindness. But I have to tell you that when it comes to children, more than adults, because they don't have as much clutter in their brains, if you will, it tends to be even more reliable. You might remember Samantha Runnion (ph) was snatched off the street in front of her home in front of a 5-year-old playmate who gave a description to the police, but they were able to make such a perfect sketch based on this 5-year- old's description of the man that grabbed -- and everybody was, like, are you sure? Are you sure? You were only 5 years old.
And when they caught the culprit, he looked exactly like the sketch. Think about that. Think about Elizabeth Smart was -- her captor was described perfectly by her 9-year-old sister. I buy it. I actually think Kathy has a very good memory, which you kind of called this snapping of a photo memory because it was such a traumatic event for her to realize that her friend was taken from her in front of her. So, I think that's definitely reliable.
LEMON: The prosecution also relied on testimony of three informants. Each of them said that Tessier told them how he killed Maria, but they each had a different story and none of them was the actual case -- cause, excuse me, of death.
Mike, I don't know, jailhouse informants, are they reliable?
CIESYNSKI: For the most part, they usually are. I've used them many, many times, and especially when you have multiple informants from, you know, jailhouse snitches, if you would. But they all had something to add to this case, which they would have never known because they were being incarcerated unless Jack told them. And one of the most things I found very interesting was the one that said that Jack told them that he stabbed the girl. And during my research of Jack and people I interviewed, I found out Jack had a fascination with knives and that he always had even up to the point.
LEMON: Can I ask you a question? I always find it fascinating that people go to jail and claim innocence, right, sometimes, and then they confess to other people about other crimes they've done or about particular crimes. Why do they do that, Mike? I don't understand that. CIESYNSKI: The county jail is what we call actually the hard time. Once you get to the penitentiary, that's not as hard because you have a job, you have, you know, your television, your books, and you have a normal life. When you're in county jail, it's very, very boring. You know, you get your three meals a day. It's very transient. And you -- and obviously, it's a captive audience. And in Jack's case, Jack was worried that he was going to be getting -- he knew he was going to be locked up and going to the joint, so he wanted to actually ask some of these guys if they would protect him once he did go to prison, so he befriended them and started telling them what happened. Which is, -- that happens quite a bit.
LEMON: Since you're talking-- and I'll start with you -- I'll ask each of you based on what you know, do you think Tessier is guilty or not guilty.
First, Mike?
CIESYNSKI: No doubt, he is guilty of this crime.
LEMON: Casey?
JORDAN: I do believe he's guilty. I think the timeline does work because I don't think children would be playing December 3rd after 7:00 in the evening. It's pitch dark out, so I think the new timeline, starting her disappearance at 6:00, makes complete sense, yes.
LEMON: Holly Hughes, I know you have an opinion about this. Do you think he's guilty?
HUGHES: I do think he's guilty, Don. And one of the strongest reasons I think he's guilty is a pattern of behavior. Anybody who's worked in this system for any length of time will tell you, once a pedophile, pretty much always a pedophile, unless they go and get serious heavy duty treatment. And we see throughout John/Jack's life a repeat offender where he's constantly, consistently either being charged or pleading guilty to improper contact with minors or going to trial for sexually assaulting his own sister, I believe it was, so I think he did it.
CIESYNSKI: Correct.
LEMON: Holly, Casey, Mike, thank you. Interesting discussion there. Appreciate it.
JORDAN: Great to be here.
CIESYNSKI: Thank you.
HUGHES: Thanks.
LEMON: We want to give credit where credit is due. Members of CNN's digital team, Ann O'Neil and Brandon Ansel (ph), did an incredible job on this story. Thank you, guys. You can check out their work by logging on to CNN.com/coldcase. Again, great job to them. Go check it out. It is a fascinating in- depth story. CNN.com/coldcase.
Within 30 seconds, the south Florida skyline is forever changed. An implosion reduced a historic power plant to a pile of rubble.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: A south Florida landmark for more than half a century, now a memory. The Miami-area Cutler Power Plant was imploded this morning, took less than 30 seconds -- Can we hear it? -- to bring down the 150-foot-tall smokestack and two power-generating boilers. The plant had been out of service for four years. It was the company's second demolition in two months. Wow, look at that thing.
I want to talk about Martha Ryan. Has made life better for more than 80,000 new moms helping them break the cycle of poverty, homelessness and addiction. That makes her our "CNN Hero" of the week.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Years ago, my daughter and I were homeless. My main priority was to get high. Then I got pregnant again, and I was like, what am I doing, I need to change.
MARTHA RYAN, CNN HERO: I have never met a woman who wanted to hurt her unborn baby. But I've met a lot of women that did not want to do the right thing. The common denominator is poverty. And poverty is an accident of birth.
Pregnancy is a wonderful window of opportunity. A mother can turn her life around.
My name is Martha Ryan, and I help expecting mothers, many who are homeless, break the cycle of poverty for good.
You know you can't just be saved. You have to do the work yourself.
I learned very early on that prenatal care alone is not enough.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We need a place to stay as soon as possible.
RYAN: We'll help you with housing as well.
These women needed help with complex issues, and now we serve the entire family.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you so much.
RYAN: You're so welcome.
Given opportunities, nothing stops them.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Getting over my addiction wasn't the hardest part. I love you.
Getting my kids stable, finding my confidence.
Smaller circles.
I work here now. I am so happy to be able to relay the things I've learned to moms. This program gave me the tools and I found my self worth.
RYAN: We are investing in people.
Believe in yourself and take one day at a time.
Their ability to change their lives, now that is inspiring.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LEMON: Just ahead here on CNN, could there be a helpful high? Our Dr. Sanjay Gupta tells us why he is now in favor of medical marijuana.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: I have a couple of sports headlines for you this Saturday afternoon. It's PGA championship weekend and so far it's all been about this guy, Jason Dufner. He tore up the course Friday, shooting a 63, which ties the all-time record score for a round at a major. Dufner led at the turn today, but has since given up the lead to Jim Furyk. Tiger Woods -- you probably don't want to ask. This is one tournament Woods is going to wish he could start all over. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: Fifth in the order, third baseman, number 13, Alex Rodriguez. Number 13.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: That's about 50 percent cheers, 50 percent jeers. Alex Rodriguez, A-Rod, back in Yankee stadium Friday for the first time in the 2013 season. It was also his first time in pinstripes since Major League Baseball handed him a long suspension on charges he used illegal drugs. Now -- performance-enhancing drugs, I should say. If any Yankees fans were on the fence about how they felt about Alex Rodriguez, he didn't do much to earn their love, going 0 for 4 at the plate. A-rod was not in the Yankees line-up for today's game.
Sit tight everyone. Pay attention to this. A new CNN documentary airing this weekend may make you rethink what you thought you knew about pot. Our chief medical correspondent is, of course, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, and he changed his mind after he spent almost a year investigating the impact of marijuana on the body.
Sanjay is here to discuss.
Sanjay, this is not the first time you and I have had this conversation. We'll talk about that. But I want to dive into more about something that you thought was bad, a bad drug for such a long time, that actually, surprisingly, you say works well as a medicine. So how so? Why did you change your mind?
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, let me preface by saying, you know, for a long time we've known there's been some medicinal qualities to marijuana. For a thousand years or so, it was used as a medicine up until 1943. It was actually on the list doctors use to prescribe medicines. For the last 70 years, it has not been.
For me, Don, one of the things that happened, if you look at the literature regarding medical marijuana, some 20,000 studies will pop up and you find the vast majority of them are designed to look at harm. Less than 10 percent, around 6 percent, to actually look at benefit. I realize now that painted a distorted picture and it distorted my own views on medical marijuana. I was pretty critical of it.
It took sort of getting out of the country, literally looking at other countries, looking in small labs that don't get nearly enough attention, and paying attention to legitimate patients with legitimate problems for whom not only did marijuana work, it was the only thing that worked. I too easily dismissed them as high visibility malingerers who were just looking to get high. And I think once you start doing all this and really spending time investigating this, it -- in my case, changed my views.
LEMON: OK. Let's watch a little bit of, Sanjay, and then we'll talk more. I want people to see it.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHAZ MOORE, USES MEDICAL MARIJUANA: But always have (inaudible).
GUPTA: Meet 19-year-old Chaz Moore. He uses many different strains of marijuana, many of them high in CBD to treat his rare disorder of the diagram.
MOORE: My abs would, like, lock up.
GUPTA: That's why he's talking this way. Almost speaking in hiccups. Like he can't catch his breath. It's called myoclonis diaphragmagmatic flutter.
(on camera): This fluttering is annoying but becomes painful --
MOORE: Yeah.
GUPTA: -- pretty quickly I imagine.
MOORE: Yeah. Like after 15, 20 minutes is where I can start to really feel it.
GUPTA: He is about to show me how the marijuana works. He's been convulsing now for seven minutes.
(on camera): How quickly do you expect this to work?
MOORE: Within, like, the first five minutes.
And I'm done. That's it.
GUPTA (voice-over): It was actually less than a minute.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GUPTA: That is Chaz Moore, Don. He had been seen by lots of different doctors, was 19 years old. Has been on dozens of medications. Was even in intensive care unit for this for sometime.
So you saw how well that could possibly work for him when dozens of other medications, potentially toxic medications, could not. And that's not just one person. There are hundreds of people like this. There is real science to sort of make this point.
LEMON: All right, is marijuana harmful or helpful? CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta cuts through the smoke on America's green rush and journeys around the world to uncover the highs and lows of "Weed," tomorrow night, 8:00 eastern.
Next, major flooding across a big portion of the United States. People in 12 states are in danger of high water right now. I'll show you a wide area of the south that's already been hit and is back in the threat zone again.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: A massive manhunt continues to intensify in Idaho. Federal and local search teams are looking for James DiMaggio, who is suspected of killing two people in San Diego Sunday and kidnapping 16- year-old Hannah Anderson. The search for the pair is now focused on a rugged mountain area in central Idaho where the suspect's car was discovered Friday. Police still consider DiMaggio a threat.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CAPT. LARRY NESBIT, SAN DIEGO SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT: At this point, we believe he's extremely dangerous. We know that he has killed two people. We know he has a kidnap victim, hostage with him, and we are not taking any chances.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: This morning, the San Diego Sheriff's Department confirmed that the second set of remains found in the burned-out house are those of Hannah Anderson's 8-year-old brother, Ethan.
Earlier today, a friend of Hannah Anderson talked to CNN and described the missing teen's relationship with James DiMaggio.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MARISSA CHAVEZ, HANNAH ANDERSON'S FRIEND: We both felt a little uncomfortable. But he was driving home and he just said he had a crush on her. We both kind of just really didn't look at each other, and want to make a big deal about it. He said, don't think I'm weird or creepy Uncle Jim. I just want you to know that if you were my age, I'd date you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Marisa Chavez said her friend was unnerved by the comments and afterwards didn't want to be alone with him. She believes Hannah would never have gone willingly with DiMaggio.
Right now, 12 states have flood watches or warnings. Three people are missing in Colorado where floods and mudslides hammered a small town.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(RUSHING WATER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Cars were swept away by rising waters in Manitou Springs, Colorado. At least one person was killed. Police found a man's body under a huge pile of debris on this highway. And right now, Missouri, Arkansas, and Tennessee face extreme flood risks just days after flood waters devoured homes in all three states.
I want to go now to meteorologist, Jennifer Delgado, for your weather update -- Jennifer?
JENNIFER DELGADO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, Don, we are still talking about flash flooding as well as the heavy rainfall that's been causing that. Over the last couple days, we've been following this, and we know some locations across parts of Missouri as well as Arkansas have picked up 15 inches of rainfall.
But of course, more recently, we are following what's happening in Manitou, Colorado, where flash flooding happened. We do know it was deadly. This is after just 1.5 inch of rainfall. Don, you're probably thinking that doesn't sound like that much, Jennifer. And the reality is when you have that much rain coming down, you add in the mountainous region, and then talk about an area still trying to recover from a wildfire from last year, you have a burn-scar area. That means we don't have any vegetation out there to actually soak up the rainfall. And as we go through the next 24 hours, we're still looking at the likelihood of more of these storms popping up so the threat is certainly not out of the woods yet.
Now, as we go through the next 24 to 48 hours, we expect another one to three to two to four inches of rainfall to come down through parts of the mid-Atlantic. And then on the other coast, the west coast, we continue to follow the Silver Fire in Banning. As we go through Sunday as well as into Monday, we are looking at wind gusts up to about 25 miles per hour. Certainly, we'd like to see those winds not as strong as that -- Don? LEMON: All right, Jennifer. Thank you very much. Really appreciate that.
