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Terrorist Video Shows American Pleading; Turmoil in Egypt

Aired December 26, 2013 - 15:00   ET

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

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: And all right, I want to get back to this brazen move by the terrorists, this video drop on Christmas Day that shows an American captive pleading for his life. Al Qaeda is holding Warren Weinstein. They grabbed him two years ago in Pakistan.

And now they're apparently using Warren Weinstein, age 72 now, by the way, to try to gain some sort of leverage. Take a listen to this. They apparently put Weinstein up to pressure to his own family to lobby the U.S. government to negotiate his release, lest he die in captivity. It is pretty horrifying. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WARREN WEINSTEIN, AL QAEDA CAPTIVE: I understand this is not easy, and I know that doing so will take its toll on each of you. But in the final analysis, unless you continue to try to get President Obama and his administration to actively pursue my release, we may never see each other again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Well, clearly under duress, that is American Warren Weinstein, two-plus years a captive of al Qaeda now.

Now, Mike Baker is with us now from Boise, Idaho, and he's former CIA.

Mike, over the years, we have seen a lot of videos unfortunately like this clearly coerced. Having looked at Warren Weinstein, is there anything here that stands out to you and your highly trained eyes?

MIKE BAKER, FORMER CIA COVERT OPERATIONS OFFICER: Well, no.

There are a couple of points, but unfortunately none of them necessarily a surprise. A., it is very good news there is a proof of life video. And obviously the first thing you do when you get something like this is you work hard to authenticate it and also then start to gather whether you can determined exactly the time the video was made, if there is any evidence of location, any indications at all that you can pull forensically off something like this.

The other part of this is the release of it. And what he is saying unfortunately is not a surprise, meaning that al Qaeda, which picked him up and took him hostage, as you mentioned, over two years ago back in August of 2011, this is what they do. They target important dates. They target anniversaries. They look for the publicity. And they know they release something like that at Christmas then it will get more attention than it normally would.

And the other part of it is what he is saying, he is feeling abandoned. He says he feels like he has been completely forgotten. Well, of course, he is an elderly person who works as a development specialist, for good lord, trying to help the Pakistani people under contract with USAID. He has health issues and he is saying exactly what al Qaeda wants him to say. They're telling him what to say in this video.

And frankly after two-plus years of being held hostage he is going to do whatever it takes to try to get at least a message out. So he is going to be very compliant. This is not what he signed up for when he went out to Lahore all those years ago.

PHILLIPS: Well, let's play a little bit more of this video, and then I want to get your take.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WEINSTEIN: In order to alleviate my pain and suffering and to help me to reestablish my health, I have asked my captors if they will allow my family to visit me. They have agreed to do so, but they have done so on the basis that you will make an agreement, an arrangement with them that will provide a quid pro quo with respect to their people who are being held as prisoner.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: So, Mike, we know the United States does not negotiate with terrorists and hostage takers. So if that's a signal from al Qaeda, is it clear to you what they're proposing?

BAKER: Well, they're not proposing anything. They know we're not going to go for that. They know they're not going to have his family come and visit him. What are they going to do? Put them up inside the Motel 6 outside of wherever they hold him in the safe house?

(CROSSTALK)

BAKER: You know what? This is psychological torture being performed by al Qaeda, frankly. And they're doing this because they're trying -- they're looking for publicity. They're trying to make you know, this case about how relevant they are.

And, you know, unfortunately, you know, Mr. Weinstein is in a position where of course he has to do this. He is going to say what they tell him to say. He is going to believe half the time what they're telling him. They're telling him, look, you have been forgotten, you have been abandoned. The truth of the matter is, he has not been forgotten.

The government is doing whatever they possible can. Unfortunately, because we're all used to watching big feature films, we think that rescue operations are very simple things. And this situation is a nightmare in terms of an operational effort to try to rescue an individual who is being held likely up in Eastern Pakistan, up along the Waziristan area.

Our level of intelligence on this, our ability to collect information on where this individual is little to none.

PHILLIPS: With your experience, obviously, he is being coerced. But it sounds like he is speaking in his own words. Would al Qaeda have told him, OK, here are the points we want you to make, so just figure out how to say it or that is it?

BAKER: Well, it depends on how clever the group that is holding him is, and how good their English is, how experienced they are with this sort of thing.

Oftentimes, they will write out a script, literally write out a script and rehearse it with the hostage and then say, this is what you're going to say, under threat of death, essentially, if you don't follow the script. If they're not as well-experienced, then, yes, they will say this is what we expect you to say and you will say it.

They will reshoot this video as many times as it takes until they have what they believe is exactly the message they want to get across. And also they're doing the same thing. We're looking for evidence of information that may be helpful operationally, in terms of where he is, what time this was shot.

They're doing the same thing. They're going to send out a video that they feel in their mind is as sterile as possible.

PHILLIPS: Mike, appreciate you joining us.

BAKER: Sure. Thank you.

PHILLIPS: Coming up, what do UPS, Target and McDonald's all have in common? Well, they may need some major crisis management for some recent brand damage. Our expert has some suggestions.

And an anonymous donation yields a huge reward to one lucky couple. How the Salvation Army is turning the discovery into a contest.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Well, the market closes in just about 45 minutes, and we will see if we set another record high. The Dow set a record at the opening bell and right now we're up 118 points. That continues a record, year, by the way. The Dow and S&P are up more than 20 percent, while the Nasdaq is up 30 percent, good news for all of our 401(k)s. Yay.

Well, for UPS and Target, Christmas is the Super Bowl. So when hackers stole the credit card info of 40 million Target shoppers just days out from Christmas, you can get bet it was in a bit of a crisis mode at Target headquarters. Then there is this, UPS, Amazon's best friend, failing to deliver millions of Santa's packages in time for Christmas.

So UPS is blaming is blaming unprecedented online sales and bad weather. Whatever the case, people are not happy.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I waited around for hours and hours for it to show up and it never did.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're still blaming it on the ice storm, which was two-and-a-half weeks ago. It's terribly disappointing because we ordered these things on December 1.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We got to the front of the line after waiting for about an hour, and they said it hasn't been processed yet. And...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They left me a note. And thank God they're open, so, I could go to my parents and give my mom her gift.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Joining me now, Peter Shankman, branding and social media consultant.

So, Peter, UPS and Target, OK, huge blows to suffer around Christmastime, when people are already tense, right? So short-term, long-term, how do you think these P.R. disasters will impact their branding, are or they just so big that they're immune?

PETER SHANKMAN, BRANDING AND SOCIAL MEDIA CONSULTANT: It's been a bad few weeks. I will definitely give it that.

Target I think will recover, because Target is one of the giants. They will both recover. Look, let's face it. They're huge brands. They're not going to just disappear overnight from one mistake. Target will be OK because they're a huge store and they will take steps to increase security. People are not going to stop shopping at Target simply because of a one-time breach.

There unfortunately will be more breaches over time, not just Target, but other stores as people start relying more on credit card data and more on Internet. UPS has a really great chance here. UPS has a great chance to make things right with their customers, not only the customers waiting to receive the gifts, but the corporations who use them a regular basis.

They can do something in terms of a discount or an apology or something like that to make it better. I have seen several companies that have taken advantage of this, including Fab.com, for instance. Anyone who ordered a gift to be delivered on Christmas Day and didn't get it, Fab.com is refunding them entirely and letting them keep the gift.

There is a really great chance to make up for some of this bad stuff here from all the companies.

PHILLIPS: I think it's got to be more than an apology.

(CROSSTALK) SHANKMAN: There definitely has to be more than an apology. There has to be a discount, and there has to be a promise that it's going to be fixed. There has to be a promise that it's going to be fixed.

PHILLIPS: OK, let's talk about this other P.R. crisis we have been following. And that is McDonald's.

SHANKMAN: This is an amazing story.

PHILLIPS: Oh, my gosh. It is the McResources Web site. I couldn't believe it. It's meant for their employees. And then they publish this dietary advice, folks, if you don't know about it, that actually saying don't eat fast food.

Now the site has been pulled. What is the fallout of this and what were their thinking?

SHANKMAN: Yes. This is a question of a McEditor maybe is something they needed.

(CROSSTALK)

SHANKMAN: Perhaps McCorporate Allegiance?

It started out a couple of weeks ago when they first issued the Web site about -- the site is designed to help their internal employees, and it was definitely written by a third party. This was definitely outsourced, outsourced I would bet outsourced two or three levels down, probably to outside America.

And it basically said make sure you tip your pool cleaner and your outsourced au pair. I'm looking, like, I slung fries in high school. I'm pretty sure I could not afford an au pair.

(CROSSTALK)

PHILLIPS: I don't even think I knew what that was when I was working at McDonald's.

(CROSSTALK)

SHANKMAN: Christmas came, we forgot about that story, and then this morning it broke again when they said, oh, yes, and, by the way, here's what you should eat to stay healthy. One of the things you shouldn't eat, McDonald's.

Instead, and even worse, they showed a Subway -- they showed a Subway sandwich, said, eat this, it's healthier. This has just been an amazing screw-up for McDonald's. This tells you that if you had one person internally edited this, no one saw this. Had one person saw this, they would have said, hey, wait a second, this isn't working. This guarantees me no one saw this from the time it was produced to the time it went live. They definitely need some better editing and protocols in place. But they're not going to do this any time again soon. I guarantee it.

PHILLIPS: It will be interesting to just follow it and see if there is an impact.

(CROSSTALK)

SHANKMAN: An au pair, oh, my God.

PHILLIPS: Hey, people still love the Big Mac, though. Come on, now. Peter Shankman, Appreciate it. Thanks a lot.

SHANKMAN: My pleasure.

(WEATHER UPDATE)

PHILLIPS: Coming up here in the NEWSROOM, Egypt naming a new terrorist organization, one that most recently enjoyed some backing by the U.S.

Plus:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is the world coming to?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: New federal charges in a violent game that appears to be gripping U.S. cities. We are "On the Case" next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Egypt's military-backed interim government has made a stunning declaration, branding the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization.

They blame the group for a suicide car bombing at a police station that killed 16 people. Of course, the Brotherhood is the Islamist movement that propelled Mohammed Morsi to the presidency just 18 years ago. But since he was toppled in July, a divide between the two sides has deepened, and all this in just a month out of a referendum on a new constitution.

And in South Sudan, African leaders are in a crisis -- or in the middle of crisis talks right now, actually, desperate to stop a civil war from breaking out in the world's newest nation.

The revolt, which began last week, has now spread rapidly, with half the country now engaged in violence. The U.N. pledging thousands of extra troops to try and help ease that heavy fighting between government forces and the rebels.

Joining me once again from New York -- or New York, rather, CNN's Fred Pleitgen.

Fred, the president of Kenya and the prime minister of Ethiopia just arrived in South Sudan. Is there any resolution in sight, just the fact that they are holding these meetings?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, there really is not any resolution in sight so far.

They concluded that meeting earlier today, Kyra, and what they said was that the meeting was very constructive, but it did not yield any results just yet.

It seems as though the time is not ripe just yet for the opposition and the government to actually sit together and come to a truce. But this is something that many leaders in the international community, including the U.S., say has to happen immediately.

The big problem is right there, right now, is that right now this is a feud between the president and the former vice president, both leaders of very influential tribes in that country that are going at it. And many people believe the longer all of this goes on, the more likely this will descend into all-out ethnic war.

The U.N. says that point has not been reached. But with every day, it seems as though that country is being pushed further to the brink. As you said, the fighting there is spreading. It's not just around the capital anymore. It's in the center of the country and also in the north of the country, where the rebels apparently have taken some of the oil field, and oil accounts for almost the entire revenue of that country of South Sudan.

This is a very dire situation, a difficult situation, and one that the U.S. and the U.N. are trying to sort out, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, let's talk about the people there.

The U.N. Security Council adding thousands of troops to its peacekeeping force, trying to protect those civilians. How bad is the situation now and how many people have been displaced? Can you even put a number on it?

PLEITGEN: Yes, it is awful.

From what the U.N. is saying, the situation is absolutely dire for the people there. They say that the number of displaced is now reaching close to about 100,000. Some of those people are leaving the country. Many of those people however are trying to get into U.N. camps. And right now the U.N. camps are not very well guarded.

That is why the U.N. is moving in thousands of additional peacekeeping forces. We noted that yesterday, where they said they would up the force by about 6,000. And, interestingly, you know the kind of language the U.N. usually uses, it's pretty soft language normally.

Today, the U.N. representative for South Sudan came forward and said the peacekeepers on the ground are authorized to use force if any civilians are in danger. That's how dire they think the situation is for the civilians. There's reports of summary executions. There have been reports of mass graves, not verified just yet.

However, it does seem as though there are massive human rights abuses going on. We have some intel from on the ground from the town of Bor that has seen heavy fighting in the past couple of days, and the people there tell us that the town is absolutely ransacked, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, we will keep following it with you. Fred, thanks so much.

And up next, a dangerous game that involves knocking out random strangers just for fun and then putting the video on the Web. Well, the courts are involved. We have got update for you on this one case.

And imagine posting a complaint online about a shopping experience, only to be fined thousands of dollars by the retailer. We have one family's story and how they're fighting back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: So a Texas man has been arrested and charged in connection with that so-called knockout game.

Let's take a quick look at the attack that happened. This is what usually goes down. It's a sucker punch to a complete stranger and they take off.

Poppy Harlow is with us now from New York.

Poppy, tell us what we're talking about here. What is the update? We have been following this obviously for a while.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Sure. And our viewers have heard a lot about it. It's very disturbing. The video you just showed is part of one alleged knockout game, not the incident -- we're talking about it.

But it gives people an idea of what's happening. Well, federal officials have arrested a 27-year-old from Katy, Texas, and charged him with a federal hate crime. We have a picture we can show you. His name is Conrad Alvin Barrett. They say that in late November, he approached a 79-year-old African-American man, hit him so hard in the jaw, that he fell to the ground.

And then allegedly Barrett laughed as he said "knockout," got in his car and fled. This is all according to the criminal complaint that was just unsealed. The law enforcement officials are saying the victim, a 79-year-old man, suffered two jaw fractures, was hospitalized for several days, had to get metal plates inserted.

So you can see how serious this is. Again, this is being charged as a federal hate crime showing the severity of it. In the complaint, I won't even read you some of the language, but federal officials say they saw other videos on the cell phone of Barrett that used the N- word, had some very racial, very racist things that were said. So that is why this crime is being charged as a hate crime.

One of our affiliates in Houston had a chance to talk to a family member, somebody named Joseph Lewis, who is the nephew of the alleged victim. I want you to listen to what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: His face was swollen on this side. He say had three plates in there. He is sucking out of a straw. What is the world coming to?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: And I also want to read you, Kyra, something from the complaint. This comes from the federal complaint.

It says: In another video, Barrett is driving around." It goes on to say, and he states he is trying to work up the "courage" to play "the knockout game."

So what is Barrett saying about this? I had a chance to speak for a long time on the phone this morning with his attorney, because Barrett is in jail right now. His attorney said that his client, Barrett, has been charged -- has been, rather, diagnosed with bipolar disorder. He said that his client is on medication. He also said that at this point he cannot say whether or not his client did or was involved at all in this attack.

But he said this. He said: "Mental health issues definitely played a part in anything that occurred." He also went on to say he, his client, is very sorry for this person -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Yes, a federal hate crimes charge, I mean, this is serious.

HARLOW: Right.

PHILLIPS: So what kind of sentence could he face?

HARLOW: So we're still waiting for an indictment.

He has not been indicted yet. But if he is and if he is convicted, Barrett could face a statutory maximum sentence of 10 years in prison, a $250,000 fine. He had that initial court appearance this morning. Tomorrow, at 2:00 p.m. Central, there will be a public hearing. The lawyer told me we will get a lot more information at that public hearing.

I want to read you what the FBI chief in Houston had to say. He said: "It is unimaginable in this day and age that one could be drawn to violently attack another based on the color of their skin." He went on to say, "We remind all citizens that we are protected by law from such racially motivated attacks and encourage everyone to report such crimes to the FBI."

And, Kyra, I will just say, a little earlier, I said alleged victim. Well, we know that this man was attacked, allegedly by Barrett. But we know that he had to go to the hospital and that he had to have metal plates inserted in his jaw. So certainly he is a victim of an attack -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Oh, yes.

HARLOW: Yes. PHILLIPS: We also know this is not an isolated case, that we have seen cases like this across the country.

HARLOW: Right.

PHILLIPS: And the Justice Department clearly sending a message that...

HARLOW: Yes.

PHILLIPS: ... you are going to not be able to get by with this.

HARLOW: Yes.

PHILLIPS: Poppy, thanks.

HARLOW: Sure.