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911 Call Released in the Pre-Teen Stabbing; What Should Happen to Bowe Bergdahl; Russian Fighter Buzzes American Plane

Aired June 04, 2014 - 10:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thanks so much for joining me.

A lawyer for one of the 12-year-old suspects accused of stabbing a friend says the case should be moved to juvenile court so she can get the help she needs.

Right now those two young suspects are being charged as adults. Wisconsin police are also releasing the 911 call. Listen as the cyclist who found that bleeding 12-year-old victim calls for help.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I came upon a 12-year-old female she appears to have been stabbed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She appears to be what?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stabbed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stabbed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She said she's having troubling breathing, she said she was stabbed multiple times.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is she awake?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She's awake.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is she breathing?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes she's breathing she says she can take shallow breathe. She's alert.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

COSTELLO: The victim was stabbed 19 times. Police say the suspects were obsessed with a fictional online character called "Slenderman". If you don't know who "Slenderman" is, well we didn't either but plenty of young kids do. If you go online and you Google "Slenderman", you will find a whole lot of information. Watch. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's called "Slenderman." He's usually described as being tall and thin wearing a black suit, white shirt, neck tie and having a blank face.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Creepy, right? CNN's Kelly Wallace posted a column on the "Slenderman" stabbing and asked these questions. How can we be sure our children can truly separate reality from fantasy? What are the warning signs that children find confusing or children are confusing the two -- fantasy from reality I'm talking about. I'm sorry I blew your line there Kelly. Kelly joins from New York. Welcome.

KELLY WALLACE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's good to be with you.

COSTELLO: You know when you look online of this "Slenderman" character he doesn't look remotely real it's just hard to believe that two kids would buy into wanting to please this cartoon character online.

WALLACE: It is hard to believe, Carol. And you know we talk to a lot of people yesterday including one woman who does a lot of research into children's thinking and into children's ability to distinguish between reality and fantasy and she says really by the age of two and a half we can start figuring out what's real and what's not and as we get older and older we even know put what's real in that box and what's not real in the other box.

And she was saying she really doesn't believe that by age 12 there is any difference between a 12-year-old's ability to distinguish between reality and fantasy and an adult ability to do that so believing that there's a lot more going on that might have contributed to their thinking or to this whole crime that took place.

COSTELLO: Yes because the other -- the other thing in this story, these 12-year-old suspects were supposedly planning this killing for months, right? So it just didn't come on the spur of the moment. So are we overreacting to this story?

WALLACE: Well I think you know people I talked to say we would be overreacting if we accepted the premise that they lost themselves in fantasy and that is entirely what happened here. We need to know so much more of what's been going on with these girls were they showing any warnings signs of issues, depression, anxiety, hurting themselves, hurting other people.

You know, we had the criminologist Jack Levin on CNN yesterday and I thought it was really interesting. He said that sometimes you can have what he called a temporary sociopath. Right a child can do something at 12 or 13 that they would not do later in life at the age of 25 or so once you're fully socially developed and totally understanding the risk of any action you taking.

He was sort of looking at the relationship between the two. Is it possible again we're totally speculating is it possible that one of these girls was a little bit more troubled and brought the other in to this plan. That certainly could happen or the two of them together, you know, had a volatile terrible relationship and that's what led to a tragic turn. We just don't know. There are so many questions that we're having to learn more about what was going on with these girls before this happened.

COSTELLO: Right. Well on the other hand, I was talking to one of my friends with an 8-year-old son and she asked her son do you know who "Slenderman" is. And he said of course mommy I know who Slenderman is. And that really freaked her out because she monitors his activity online.

WALLACE: Yes I think -- I mean that's what raises questions here too. And people I talked to in the story also said you know parents need to keep talking with their kids. No you can't monitor everything your child is doing online and be with them 24/7 but yes you can have conversations. And in a way I applaud your friend for using this as a teachable moment to kind of have a conversation and understand what their kids might be watching, what they're playing with, who they're talking to.

I mean it's key for parents to be more involved. Again though they can't monitor everything. So they just have to try to have a conversation and be aware of any warning signs if the child seems to be having trouble with what they're engaging with or if they seem to be losing themselves and not embracing real things and spending so much time in fantasy. Maybe there are some other issues at work as well.

COSTELLO: Good advice. Kelly Wallace, thanks so much.

And again, check out the superb column Kelly posted on CNN.com. "The Slenderman Stabbing Case: When can Kids Understand Reality Versus Fantasy."

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, our first look at Bowe Bergdahl as he's handed over to American Special Forces. What should happen to the Army Sergeant now? Does he need a lawyer? We'll talk about that coming up.

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COSTELLO: More now on that extraordinary new video released on a Taliban Web site. A former captured Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl's release to U.S. Special Forces; 17 minutes long. It shows the transfer of Bergdahl to those American Special Forces following Bergdahl's five years of captivity.

This all went down on Saturday in eastern Afghanistan. The only translated message on the tape was for Bergdahl not to come back to Afghanistan or in essence he would die.

In the video Bergdahl does look pale. He does look sick. So let's talk about this joining me now is Greg Rinckey a military lawyer and Matthew Farwell, Farwell rather a writer for "Rolling Stone" and a former Afghanistan veteran. Good morning to both of you.

GREG RINCKEY, MILITARY LAWYER: Good morning.

COSTELLO: Good morning.

MATTHEW FARWELL, WRITER, ROLLING STONE: Good morning.

COSTELLO: Matthew, good morning thank you so much for being here. Matthew I want to start with you. As you look at this video and writing about Bowe Bergdahl with your own experiences in Afghanistan, what goes through your mind?

FARWELL: I mean relief frankly. I've been following this case since it happened. And I'm grateful that we're getting him back and that Bob and Jenny Bergdahl will be able to see their son soon.

COSTELLO: Sergeant Bergdahl has been somewhat demonized. How do you view him, Matthew?

FARWELL: You know, I am a -- I'm a bit bewildered by him. I really don't know but I'm not willing to rush to judgment on him as so many people seem to be so willing to do. And I find it a bit curious that many of the soldiers from his former unit that are coming on networks such as CNN and Fox are being arranged by Republican strategists and that this has all been so politicized when it's really a tragedy for everyone and it's a human drama that we all need to take a step back and just give time for the facts to come out, give the family some respect, because they have gone through five years of sheer hell and so has Bowe.

COSTELLO: And Greg, I want to ask you this question as a military lawyer. If you were to represent the family, what would you be looking at in particular in this video?

RINCKEY: Well, I think what we're looking at here is we're looking at an American soldier that's being released. I mean at this point I think we don't jump to any judgments as to how he was captured or how he potentially walked off the base. I think at this point we need to focus on the mental well-being and the health of this soldier and getting him back to American society. And then we deal with the questions that are later going to come.

As a defense attorney, I mean obviously Sergeant Bergdahl really needs to be careful with what he says and I think he should be represented before any questioning.

COSTELLO: Do you suppose in the end he will be charged with anything?

GREG RINCKEY, MILITARY LAWYER: In my opinion I don't believe he's going to be charged at court-martial. I think there could be other options for the army. An investigation could potentially separate him administratively or potentially separate him medically whether it be for a medical reason or a mental health reason.

Even assuming that Sergeant Bergdahl did walk off of the firebase, we don't know the reason. We don't know the intent. We don't know if he was suffering from a mental health issue at the time. So I don't see this turning into a court-martial. But I think there's the potential that there could be an administrative or medical separation for this soldier.

COSTELLO: And, Greg, in the article in "Rolling Stone", you guys pointed out that the unit that Bergdahl served in wasn't exactly the best run unit. Can you talk more about that?

RINCKEY: Are you asking me that question?

COSTELLO: I'm sorry -- Matthew. I'm asking Matthew.

MATTHEW FARWELL, "ROLLING STONE": Yes, I mean if you go back and look at the footage that Sean Smith from "The Guardian" shot with Bowe's unit just before to his disappearance, I looked at that as a former infantry man who'd served in that area and I saw undisciplined cowboys frankly. And I showed it to other friends that were also in the infantry and also had high standards of professionalism and they saw the same thing.

COSTELLO: When you say undisciplined cowboys, what do you mean?

FARWELL: They run around in baseball caps. Not wearing helmets, which is standard kit. Kind of jumping around and not acting like a professional American soldier. They didn't seem to be very well-led. And they didn't seem to be executing their duties very well.

COSTELLO: So as a military attorney, Greg, would that enter into the equation once you're helping this young man and family hypothetically?

RINCKEY: Yes, absolutely. The chain of command is going to come into the spotlight here as well. There was an investigation that was done five years ago so some of these questions probably have already been answered and it's something that obviously is going to be looked at closer. As a defense attorney or military defense attorney, looking at the chain of command and how the unit was run is absolutely going to be on the table.

FARWELL: It should be noted too that his platoon leader was relieved of command just a month prior to that incident. So I mean that points to a problem in the unit, you know, right there.

COSTELLO: Interesting. So if you have a soldier on base, for example -- and I'll pose this question to you Greg -- if you have a soldier like this who is troubled and clearly he was. He was doubting why he was in Afghanistan -- that was clear, right? so if you don't have good leadership, how do you find the help that you need?

RINCKEY: Well, that's clearly the problem. A good leader, a good military leader or good officer should recognize if there are issues with one of their troops and either have them evaluated by a mental health provider or med-evac'd out. And that's really going to be the question here.

If there were all of these warning signs around this soldier, why wasn't it dealt with? There's a lot of questions that are not answered at this point.

COSTELLO: And Matthew, I want to leave you with the last word because I think there's been so many derogatory things said about Sergeant Bergdahl when all the facts aren't in yet. Describe to me as you see him as a person and how we should be thinking about him.

FARWELL: You know -- well, I don't know him. I know his family quite well. I admire his family. I have spent quite a bit of time with them. They came to my brother's funeral. My brother was a helicopter pilot and was buried in Idaho when his Blackhawk crashed. From his family I see an educated, well read, thoughtful young man who was put into a situation that I don't think he expected. And I think he reacted poorly to the situation he was in. I think he'll regret that for quite a long time. I don't think we should rush to damn him immediately.

COSTELLO: Matthew Farwell --

FARWELL: Or at all.

COSTELLO: Matthew Farwell, Greg Rinckey, thanks so much for your insight. I appreciate it.

FARWELL: Thank you, ma'am.

COSTELLO: Still to come in the NEWSROOM, scary moments in the skies over Russia. Like a scene out of a movie, a Russian fighter jet comes dangerously close to a U.S. reconnaissance plane. So why are we just learning details now? We'll talk about that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: I know it sounds cliche but it was like a scene straight out of a movie. A Russian fighter jet dangerously buzzing past an American reconnaissance plane in late April off of Russia's eastern coast -- the jets passed within 100 feet of one another. Now a U.S. official says the American crew's lives were in jeopardy.

Chief national security correspondent, Jim Sciutto joins us now to tell us more. Good morning.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Carol -- this was an extremely serious incident. A U.S. official telling me it is it's the most dangerous close pass as they call it in decades between U.S. and Russian warplanes. This took place off the eastern coast of Russia. It's a routine surveillance flight by a U.S. surveillance plane. It's called a KC135U. You see a mock-up of it there.

These happen all the time. And oftentimes you will have Russian jets that will fly nearby but never like this -- never this close. So close that they told us that the pilots considered their lives in danger and they immediately aborted the mission. Also so close that when that jet as you're seeing there passed in front of the American jet, it left the American jet in the turbulence. It's called the jet wash of that Russian fighter jet, which is a very dangerous situation. These pilots had to make a quick call. We understand that they filmed this incident. That film has not been released. No intention at this point of the military of releasing that film. But this is very dangerous and also at a very tense time between the U.S. and Russia at the height of the crisis over Ukraine.

COSTELLO: So this happened in late April. Why are we finding out about this now?

SCIUTTO: Well, we're told that the U.S. military wanted to deal with this privately with their Russian counterparts and that's what's happened. The chairman of the joint chiefs Martin Dempsey communicated his concerns directly to the Russian chief of defense and I'm told that since then there have been no close passes like this.

But I will remind you though, Carol, you probably remember this, about ten days before this on April 14th, another Russian jet buzzed a U.S. destroyer in the Black Sea --

COSTELLO: Yes.

SCIUTTO: -- this is off the Crimean coast. It buzzed it a number of times flying back and forth coming within 1000 yards of the ship. So the concern is that was a pattern that the Russians are trying to send the U.S. a message here.

Now, I am told because I asked OK, have you seen a significant uptick in these kinds of close passes since the start of the Ukraine crisis? And they say in terms of numbers, statistics, no, though over the last two years of going back before the Ukraine crisis, they have seen an increase in these kinds of things.

So you're seeing the Russian military testing the American military. It's not just in the Black Sea, it's not just off the coast of Russia. It's also happening in Europe and close to Alaska as well. So it's -- you know this is a real problem and something that U.S. officials I talked to are extremely concerned about.

COSTELLO: Jim Sciutto reporting live. I'll be right back.

SCIUTTO: Thank you.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Checking our top stories at 58 minutes past, Hall of Fame quarterback, Dan Marino is now scrambling following reports he was one of 15 former players bringing a new concussion lawsuit against the NFL. Well, Marino is now withdrawing from the suit saying he didn't realize his name would be attached to it. Marino said that within the last year he authorized a claim to be filed in case he needed future medical coverage for possible effects of head trauma.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh my gosh.

(END VIDEO CLIP) COSTELLO: Intense -- right. This is -- check out this video from a backyard in Nebraska where it looks like a flurry of golf balls hitting the ground. But of course, that's hail and the hail is much bigger than golf balls. More like baseball sized hail. Car buyers looking for a deal though will be lining up at this Omaha area dealership. Hail damaged 4,300 vehicles. Huge dents, shattered windshields, flooded interiors. That severe weather is moving east today.

The scandal at the Veterans Affairs is widening. VA officials say they've uncovered treatment delays and secret waiting lists at ten more facilities in Kansas, Missouri, Illinois and Indiana. CNN was first to report on delays in the VA system including at that Phoenix hospital.

In the meantime, "The Wall Street Journal" is reporting the White House is eyeing Cleveland clinic CEO Toby Cosgrove to become the next VA secretary. He's a decorated Vietnam War veteran and has been heading the Cleveland clinic health system for the last 10 years.

Thanks for joining me today. I'm Carol Costello.

"@THIS HOUR WITH BERMAN AND MICHAELA" starts now.