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Winter Storms; Marijuana in Colorado; Dead Banker Captured

Aired January 02, 2014 - 14:00   ET

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

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you, my fabulous friend.

Hi, everyone. I'm Brooke Baldwin. Happy New Year. Thank you for being with my on this Thursday.

Here's the heads up. Get ready, bundle up, stay off the roads, stay in your homes if you can, because that's really the plea in a lot of cities today as the first major winter storm of the year is upon us. And forecasters say this nor'easter is no joke.

Look at these pictures. In the northeast, Boston is under a snow emergency. And just in, Logan Airport will stop all flights later tonight. To New York, we go. Salt trucks are out and about because blizzard-like conditions are also expected to disrupt travel there and bring dangerous wind-chills. And in the Midwest, a foot of snow has already fallen and temperatures are steadily dropping there as well. The first nor'easter of 2014 is hours away, and it is coming in with a bang.

CNN is on top of all of the storm with live team coverage here. You have Margaret Conley, she is in Boston, where the mayor says his team is ready. Sunlen Serfaty at Washington, D.C.'s Reagan Airport, monitoring hundreds of flight cancellations there. Ted Rowlands, very cold, already in the thick of things in Chicago.

And Margaret Conley, let's begin with you in south Boston. I say, I tip my hat to you. You have been out in it all day long. And let's get right to the news. The fact that we're hearing from Logan. Tonight, is it 8:30 p.m. Eastern, when they are cancelling flights?

MARGARET CONLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Brooke, the worst has yet to come. At Logan Airport, they're running right now. But at 8:30 tonight, they're going to stop flights all the way through until Friday right around noon. And that's because of the strong winds. That's the big concern here. There's strong winds and then the snow is really light, so it's creating blizzard-like conditions, and it's tough for visibility.

How much snow are we expecting? Well, right now we got our measuring stick here. We've got, oh, up to two inches. It's going to go up to a foot. We've still got that much more to come. Freezing temperatures minus 3 degrees. That is what we're expecting. But be cautious when you're out there on the roads and when you're on the planes. Those planes, they might be delayed, as they were saying.

We talked to the Department of Transportation. There's already been accidents on the roads. They're concerned about black ice. And we also talked to the -- we heard from the mayor of Boston, and here's more of what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR TOM MENINO, BOSTON: Take precautions and take public transportation and take care of one another. So our team is ready. We've been through this before. And I will get through this storm and public works is ready to do their work as long as the public cooperates with them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CONLEY: Now, Brooke, one more thing. Public schools in Boston, they've called Friday off. It's a snow day for all of those kids.

Brooke.

BALDWIN: Wicked cold, as my boss and friends say. Margaret, thank you very much.

Let's talk flights because the number of flight cancellations, because of the nor'easter, will probably rise as this storm is moving in. Sunlen Serfaty outside Reagan National - inside -- good for you, Sunlen -- inside Reagan National Airport for us.

And I know it's about to be really bad in D.C. Talk to me about traffic at Reagan so far.

SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Brooke, right now there aren't many major cancellations here at Reagan National, but we have seen people come and check this board behind me. And what they'll see is that red that we all dread seeing up on the screen saying that your flight is delayed. They are starting to see some delays here at Reagan National, but that's really nothing compared to what the whole nation is going through right now, because there's some major flight cancellations broadly speaking.

Let's look at the numbers. Flightaware reports that 1,600 flight cancellations across the nation. Most of those at Chicago's O'Hare's Airport, 3,400 delays. And we've also seen, Brooke, many of the airlines start to pre-emptively cancel their flights in anticipation of this storm. It's just getting worse. American Airlines already has 600 flight delays. US Airways, slightly over 100. And we spoke here at National Airport to Rob Yingling. He's in charge of the DCA and Dulles Airport outside of D.C., and he's talked about how they're getting ready for this major storm. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROB YINGLING, REAGAN/DULLES AIRPORT: It is a heavy travel time and the airlines are aware of that. They're also aware that this is a major storm headed to those cities. So they have likely made proactive reductions to the schedules, to those places and are letting customers liberally rebook their flights to those locations without penalty of change fees and things like that. (END VIDEO CLIP)

SERFATY: And he says it's not about the amount of snow that's worrying to airlines and airports, i's about those big wind gusts that really give them trouble. Here at DCA, they've brought in extra staff. They'll remain on through the night. Twenty people remain on to make sure that they're taking care of the runways and the planes as the weather here gets worse. Certainly, Brooke, this is going to be a hard 24 hours for travelers and for the airlines.

BALDWIN: We'll be watching all those major airports and airlines and the status there. Sunlen, thank you very much for us in Washington.

And, you know, weather, the big story of the day. Want to take you north now to New York City. The city's new mayor, Bill de Blasio, facing his first big test, salt trucks are on standby waiting for six, maybe eight inches of snow there. Alexandra Field is live for us in Manhattan.

And, you know, I've been watching you all day. I have yet to see snowflakes falling. Has it begun? I hear, you know, Long Island is really supposed to get it.

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right, we had a little bit of a dusting overnight, early this morning. It has stopped now. A long pause before the real storm finally hits us. And we're forecasting, you know, those six to eight inches here in New York City. But it won't start until a little later this evening.

Still, that said, we're talking about a city with 8 million people. Eight inches of snow can wreak a lot of havoc. So, the planning is certainly underway well in advance of those flakes actually beginning to fall.

It started around 7:00 this morning here at the Department of Sanitation. We're starting to see that salt pile dwindling as almost 400 salt spreaders come through here to fill up and hit the roads. And 1,600 plows have been attached to city garbage trucks. They'll be out there as well.

Again, this is a big test for New York City's new mayor, Bill de Blasio, who does have some good backup here, though. The commissioner for the Department of Sanitation, the Officer of Emergency Management, and the fire department, those commissioners have all stayed in place. So you've got a tremendous amount of institutional knowledge here. They'll be in place to help the city weather this storm that again is going to really hit us later today. It's going to be even worse out on Long Island. Out there they're preparing for blizzard-like conditions. So certainly people who can stay inside probably want to do that, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Do so. Do so. Alexandra Field for us in New York, thank you.

And now to the real cold, to Chicago, where tonight the lows are supposed to drop below zero. And that is where we have CNN's Ted Rowlands just west of there in Naperville. And, Ted, my friend, how cold is Naperville cold right now?

TED ROWLANDS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's not as bad as it's going to be. The temperature is dropping, though. It's an ominous sign. Within the last hour, it's dropped about six degrees and it's going to get really bad in the next few hours. As you mentioned, it gets probably down below zero. Much of the Midwest will be down below zero in the next few hours.

It's still snowing here. It's been snowing for two and a half days now and snow removal -- you talk about the preparations in the east. Well they -- folks here in Chicago have been knee-deep in this battle for the last two and a half days. It's coming down. They're trying to get it off the roads. It's been an ongoing thing. We're starting to see the snow taper off. So the folks clearing the roads will get a rest. But the real brutal, brutal part of it is coming for us. The wind, Chicago, oh, below zero. It's horrifying to think about the next 24 hours.

BALDWIN: Ah, just stay warm and get back in that satellite truck as soon as you can. Ted Rowlands, thank you very much.

ROWLANDS: I will.

BALDWIN: So, let's bring it back to the CNN Weather Center, where we are tracking this storm's movement. Meteorologist Alexandra Steele is watching the latest advisories and warnings.

And so where is this storm right now?

ALEXANDRA STEELE, AMS METEOROLOGIST: All right, Brooke, let's get to it. Here's where it is. This is the radar picture. Of course, the white delineating the snow. Boston has had some flurries, but New York City, the snow gets to you at about 4:00 this afternoon. Washington, D.C., it's a rain-snow mix now. Within an hour, it will all change over to snow.

But, you know, Brooke, it's not just a snow storm. This is going to have some incredible winds and some incredible cold temperatures. Kind of like Chicago normally does but this nor'easter will affect obviously and southern New England specifically. So, hour by hour, kind of a bull's eye timeframe of when this will be the worst. 8:00 tonight till 8:00 tomorrow morning. Tomorrow morning, 18 below in Albany, New York, 14 below in Boston. It will feel like 12 below in Providence. Saturday morning you can see, still.

So the winds are a huge factor and also the temperatures. How much snow will we see? Eight to 14 in Boston, eight to 12 in Providence, six to eight in Springfield, Mass, central Mass, eight to 12 in Hartford, New York gets six to eight, Albany, New York, eight to 12.

But here's the timeline on it. All right, from this morning to tonight, by Thursday night you can see where the snow is i all the big cities, also in New Jersey, in Pennsylvania, in New York and in Long Island. By tomorrow morning as well, it's still there, but you see the backside to the snow. So again, overnight tonight till tomorrow morning, then it all moves out by noon. But then these incredibly cold winds come in. And that's the timeframe, too. We're going to have such incredibly cold temperatures. Boston early Saturday morning, air temperature, three below, will feel like 15 below. New York City air temperature at about eight degree, will feel like eight below.

So here's the accumulations farther south. Four to seven in Philadelphia. two to four in Washington, D.C. So Washington, too, will see some snow. Again, changing over within the next hour. But the biggest bite here, the wind gusts. Why we have blizzard warnings here. Not only for the snow, but when you see the consistency of the snow, the water content is really low, so it's very light and fluffy. Factor in these 50-mile-per-hour gusts and visibilities becomes the key. Visibility less than a quarter of a mile. So, the Cape and Long Island, that's where the worst of it will be. Blizzard warnings end tomorrow about 1:00.

BALDWIN: First nor'easter of the year. Didn't waste any time, did it?

STEELE: That's right.

BALDWIN: Alexandra, thank you.

STEELE: A robust year, perhaps, snow wise.

BALDWIN: No. We'll talk a little later this hour here. Keep us posted on what's happening weather wise. Obviously, the big story.

But coming up, a banker wanted by the feds writes a suicide note and is legally declared dead. Turns out this guy's alive.

Plus, a celebrity chef breaks her silence after secrets about her marriage and drug use were revealed to the world.

And as Mary Jane goes mainstream, what happens if you smoke pot in Colorado but take a random drug test weeks later? Say you're not high but it's still in your system. Are you in trouble? Hmm, stay right here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Celebrity chef Nigella Lawson breaking her silence after details about her personal life played out in court. Lawson's assistants recently acquitted of using company credit cards for personal expenses. But the trial put a spotlight on Lawson's life at home, including her troubled marriage and drug use.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You went through a lot and the focus turned sharply on you at times. This was a criminal lawsuit against them, but at times did you feel like you were on trial?

NIGELLA LAWSON, CELEBRITY CHEF: Well, I did, but it's, you know, it's one of the nicety of the English legal system, that you're not allowed any counsel if you're a witness. But, you know, maybe it will change. Maybe that's good. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What were those moments like on the witness stand for you?

LAWSON: You know, I can't really remember exactly because you're so focused on answering the questions to the best of your ability that actually you don't have an almost awareness of yourself. Maybe that's a good thing, to have not only your private life, but distortions of your private life put on display is mortifying. But, you know, there are - there are people going through an awful lot worse. And to dwell on it -- dwell on any of it would be self-pity. And I'm -- I don't like to do that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Lawson goes on to say she's disappointed with the verdict and ate a lot of chocolate during the ordeal.

So far, marijuana milestone is without chaos in Colorado. Day two here, people are calmly lining up, buying their marijuana, leaving with a smile. Security fears, though, linked to the U.S. debut of legal recreational marijuana sales so far unfounded. It is commerce meets cannabis. Let me bring in our correspondent in that Denver, Casey Wian, who has been all day at this grow facility here, and our senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin, to whom I have several hypothetical questions for you.

But, Casey, first to you. This is day two of legalization. How's it going?

CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's going really well, Brooke. All of this marijuana you see in front of me is destined for Evergreen Apothecary. This will be ready for the shelves there in about 60 days.

Now, this is the store we spent all of New Year's Day at. And it was really a very, very busy place. They took numbers from 800 customers. They were only able to service 400 of those customers, not because they ran out of marijuana, but because they ran out of time. According to the city of Denver, they had to shut down at 7:00 last night.

So what does that mean? Four hundred people that didn't get pot yesterday are outside that store today. Plus, all the others who were going to come today anyways. Here's what one of those customers and the store's owner had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it's just for the novelty of it. You know, we don't have to, you know, buy it from the black market or something. Just to be able to go into the store and buy it, you know, even though it's a little bit more expensive, I think it's still worth it to do it legally.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, everyone's excited. It's -- what an incredible time for not only for cannabis in Colorado but it's just exciting. We've got the system down a little bit more and we changed how the line works inside a little bit. So I think we'll be able to accommodate more if we have that many people that show up today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WIAN: And those people who are showing up, more than willing to pay a very steep price for legal recreational marijuana. It's going for $50 an eighth of an ounce, and that's plus tax, 25 percent state and city taxes.

Brooke, I've got to show you one more thing if you've got a moment.

BALDWIN: OK. I've got a moment for you. Go for it.

WIAN: It may be a cliche, but we're here at this grow operation, and look what I found. Can you imagine this? A giant bag of Kit-Kat, Milky Way, Snickers, every kind of chocolate you can imagine. (INAUDIBLE) what they say is true, this stuff does give you the -

BALDWIN: Already broken into and halfway gone.

WIAN: No, this was this way before I got here. I want to specify that. So, I just thought it was kind of appropriate to --

BALDWIN: Oh, I'm not implicating you. I'm not implicating you in this. But, you know, whoever's growing this stuff.

WIAN: OK, thank you.

BALDWIN: I mean did you ever think when you were in journalism school you would be surrounded by marijuana in a live shot, Casey? Thank you, by the way.

WIAN: I did not.

BALDWIN: Jeff Toobin, to you.

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Can I ask a question, Brooke?

BALDWIN: Yes. Go for it.

TOOBIN: Is every -- is every Fig Newton in the state of Colorado now gone? Because -- anyway, I just -- I'm sorry, go ahead.

BALDWIN: Toobin, legal comp - legal complications here with this new - with this new law.

TOOBIN: Yes. Yes.

BALDWIN: Let me throw a hypothetical at you. Let's say, you know, one is to drive in Denver. Say you smoked pot three weeks ago. You get pulled over for speeding. You get drug tested. You know, something is found in your system. Can you get in trouble with the law?

TOOBIN: You can.

BALDWIN: You can? TOOBIN: This is obviously a big issue. You know, this is going to have to play itself out in the courts, but one of the arguments against legalizing marijuana has always been, what about the pot equivalent of drunk driving? And there are prohibitions against driving while high. The problem, as you point out in your question, is marijuana stays in the system a lot longer than alcohol does. And, frankly, I think the courts in Colorado and in Washington state, when it becomes legal there shortly, are going to just have to sort out what it means to be driving under the influence when it comes to pot. Clearly you can be arrested, but there also has to be some rule of fairness. And I think the courts are just going to have to try to -- and the state legislature are going to have to figure it out.

BALDWIN: Then it won't just be Colorado, because let's say you smoke it legally in Colorado, you have a flight back home to New York, to Georgia, to California, and the same question, you're pulled over, you're tested. I mean this is -- this is something -- is this something every single state is going to have to deal with?

TOOBIN: Absolutely. And, frankly, these states, I suspect, at least based on what I've seen, are not going to be terribly sympathetic to the argument, well, it was legal in Colorado. You know, you -- if you are tested in New York or New Hampshire or Florida, you are going to have to abide by law there and --

BALDWIN: Even though you smoked it legally in Denver, in Boulder, a couple weeks ago?

TOOBIN: Exactly. Exactly. And that - and, you know, people will have to consider that risk when they smoke pot even legally in Colorado.

BALDWIN: OK, that's a note to all those people.

Jeffrey Toobin, thank you, and thanks to the photo journalists getting these pictures of marijuana in Denver.

Let's move on.

Coming up next, Rob Ford - oh, I'm just not going to make up a Segway there. Rob Ford, Toronto's crack smoking mayor, back in the news again today. What he did this morning that could keep his name in the headlines for years to come.

And a small-town Georgia banker faked his own death, went into hiding after cheating his customers out of millions of dollars. Now he is in jail. How one tiny mistake destroyed his plan of a life on the lam.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Now to some of the biggest stories in a flash. We call it "Rapid Fire." Roll it.

It is official, crack smoking Mayor Rob Ford wants to keep his job for another four years. Ford believes Toronto voters can overlook his admissions of smoking and drinking too much while mayor. He filed official paperwork today seeking re-election. And according to "The Toronto Star," Ford said today he is the best mayor the city of Toronto has ever seen and he wants to be judged on his fiscal record. The election is in October.

A car bombing in Lebanon has killed at least four people. A source tells CNN the bomb went off near a building used by the terrorist group Hezbollah. State-run media also says the explosion in southern Beirut wounded 65 people. Tensions in the country have gone up since Hezbollah began to support the Syrian government in that country's civil war. This is the second car bombing in Beirut in less than one week.

BALDWIN: And to Wall Street we go. Opening again today, kicking off 2014, the first day of trading. And as we look and see how the Dow is looking -- we don't have it? Down 145. You can just imagine those numbers, down 145 - there you go, down 145 right now. You know it had been up rallying the last two weeks, we're told by traders -- you know, beginning of the year, not too abnormal to see some of those numbers pull back like this.

And now to the FBI manhunt for a dead man. It has just ended and the man is arrive, as you can see here from what's called his perp walk after a court hearing today. Our affiliate, WJXT reports Aubrey Price has spent the last 18 months doing migrant work after allegedly bilking millions of dollars from more than a hundred people. You see, back in 2012, he just up and disappeared leaving a 22-page suicide note. It was so convincing that the "Sarasota Herald Tribune" reported last year a judge declared Price dead and regulators collected $1 million from his life insurance policy. So what led to this major nab? A minor traffic stop. Deputies pulled Price over because the tint on his car windows was too dark. More now from CNN's Ana Cabrera.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANA CABRERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hiding in plain sight, Aubrey Lee Price, a man wanted by the FBI for wire fraud, vanished more than a year ago in an apparent suicide. Nearly a year after he was presumed dead, the fugitive was apprehended by police in a traffic stop on New Year's Eve.

TRACY MORRIS, FRIEND OF FRAUD VICTIM: I cannot believe he had the nerve to hide out so close to home, number one.

CABRERA: Price is alleged to have embezzled $21 million from more than 100 investors between 2010 and 2012. Prosecutors say instead of investing money held at Montgomery Bank and Trust where he worked, he created a dummy company in New York to funnel the funds through fraudulent wire transfers and phony investments. Before going on the run, Price wrote a 22-page confession letter to his family saying he planned to kill himself off the coast of Florida by jumping off a ferry boat. The letter was the beginning of an elaborate plan to stage his own suicide. These photos show Price dressed in shorts and a t- shirt arriving at the Key West airport, carrying a suitcase. This is the day of his disappearance of that year.

JOHN CHAPMAN, ATTORNEY FOR INVESTORS: He's got a bag and a (INAUDIBLE) he's toting behind him. Might be packed with investor money for all I know.

CABRERA: Surveillance video from that day shows him at the ferry terminal in Key West, where he led investigators and his family to believe he took his own life. But without evidence of a body, the FBI continued to look for him. That search ended on Tuesday thanks to a Glynn (ph) County, Georgia, sheriff, who stopped Price's vehicle for having darkly tinted windows. The bold fugitive will now be brought to justice. He faces up to 30 years in prison.

Ana Cabrera, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: Ana, thank you.

Coming up, the northeastern U.S. getting slammed with snow, freezing conditions. Ideally, you do not have to be out in this. But if you are traveling, we have some advice on how you can stay safe as you're on the roads.

And a memorial for the Colorado teenager killed by her classmate at a shooting at their high school recently. That girl's father gave an emotional speech, and we have to play for you these words you may think are surprising. A surprising message for his daughter's killer. Stay here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)