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Sawyer Leaving; Uruguay Player Bites; 3-D Mammography; Teen's Alleged Murder Plot; Atlanta Toddler's Death; Living Illegally in the U.S.>

Aired June 25, 2014 - 09:30   ET

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

BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: But the "World News" cast is still an important flagship. You know, it still draws 6 million to 8 million viewers a night. Combined, NBC, ABC, CBS draw about 22 million, 23 million viewers every night. So in an era of fragmentation, in an era where we're all watching different things and we're reading the news online, the evening newscasts are still important. So to see Diane Sawyer step down, a trailblazing woman, one of the first women to host a nightly newscast stepping down is definitely a moment to reflect on how important these newscasts are.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Well, you know, that - I don't know, that makes me sad, you know, that there will be no woman at the helm of the nightly news and there's certainly -

STELTER: There will, once again, be three white guys at 6:30, yes.

COSTELLO: I mean was any woman at ABC - was any woman at ABC being considered to replace her?

STELTER: You know I think David Muir was being groomed for a while. There was a sense of a competition internally between David Muir and George Stephanopoulos. Of course, people at ABC poo-pooed that idea, said that wasn't true, but it certainly felt that way for a while. Recently, Stephanopoulos renewed at GMA and they made it pretty clear that David Muir was the only candidate left for Diane Sawyer's job. Then the question became how long until she would decide to step down. Maybe it's notable that just a few months ago she started winning in the all-important demo, 25 to 54 years olds. She started beating Brian Williams, who had been number one for years and years and years. So maybe she decided to go out somewhat on top.

COSTELLO: I don't know. I will miss you, Diane Sawyer. I'm sure she'll be doing stuff for the network though and -

STELTER: She will. She'll be doing specials. And they say she'll be on the network for several years of come.

COSTELLO: Good, because I - I kind of love Diane Sawyer. Thanks, Brian, we appreciate it.

Ugliness in the beautiful game. Soccer fans buzzing about this incident in the World Cup mesh between Uruguay and Italy. Uruguay striker Luis Suarez, well, he said his mouth ran into the shoulder of that player. But actually other people say he bit that guy. No penalty called during the game, but now Suarez could face a suspension as his team advances in the tournament. CNN's Lara Baldesarra is covering the cup in Brazil. Andy Scholes has the explosive media reaction to this incident.

But, Lara, I want to start with you. This isn't the first time Suarez has bitten someone.

LARA BALDESARRA, CNN SPORTS: No. This is -- Carol, this is ridiculous. At this point I'm starting to think that this guy has a serious problem. Biting people is just plain weird. And, no, like you said, it's not the first time that he's bit someone. He bit someone at -- when he was at Ajax, which is a team in the Dutch league, a number of years ago. From there he developed the nickname "the cannibal of Ajax." And then just a few years ago we saw him bite Branislav Ivanovic, who's a player on Chelsea in the English Premier League. And that was a good bite, that one. He actually grabbed Ivanovic's arm and bit it. So you could actually really see the entire action.

Now, this one in question not really the same thing. We don't really have that full, you know, teeth going into shoulder look as he bit Chiellini's back or his shoulder rather. So that's what FIFA is investigating now. They're taking all of the evidence in. They're going to look at this. They're going to evaluate and see exactly what happened and if there was enough evidence to prove that it is in fact a bite.

Now, if they do find him guilty of what this is called to FIFA is assault, that comes with a minimum two-game ban. And if that's the case, obviously it will impact Uruguay and their World Cup squad without their best player, Luis Suarez is. This ban could also carry a 24-month ban, that's two years, and FIFA has every ability to do that. And, theoretically, the ban can also apply to club competition, which would affect his team Liverpool. However, in practice, we've never seen any of those FIFA bans actually then move over to the club team as well. So it's not as big of a concern there. But surely this is a pretty large concern if Uruguay is without their star player for the rest of the World Cup.

COSTELLO: I know. It's problematic in so very many ways but it's caused, you know, quite the buzz online. And, Andy, you have some interesting things to share with us.

ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS: Carol, yes, this moment was made for the Internet. Something -

COSTELLO: It really was.

SCHOLES: Something like this on a national stage. And people came up with all kinds of creative names. Here's some of myself favorites. My -- this one's probably the best, this first one we have to show you. A nice dog cone around Luis Suarez. Italian players would like that. Hungry, hungry Suarez, that was one of my favorite games growing up. And we've got Suarez as a Trueblood vampire. But, Carol, I can confirm, this game was during the day, so we know he is actually not a vampire because they cannot be out in the sunlight.

COSTELLO: Good point, Andy, good point. SCHOLES: Hey, Carol, when we think of someone biting someone in a sporting event, what do we always think of? Mike Tyson biting Evander Holyfield. Evander Holyfield joined in on the discussion on Twitter last night. He tweeted, "I guess any part of the body is up for eating." That's it. I guess shoulders are now fair game. That's what Evander Holyfield had to tweet.

McDonald's -

COSTELLO: My mind didn't go that way, but I'm glad you saved me.

SCHOLES: Well - yes. Let's leave it at that. McDonald's and Uruguay also joined in and they were not, you know, helping Suarez's cause. In case you don't speak Spanish, Carol, this actually translates to, "hi, Luis Suarez. If you're still hungry, come take a bite out of a Big Mac."

COSTELLO: Oh.

SCHOLES: But we know Suarez was in the mood for Italian, don't we?

COSTELLO: I kind of enjoyed what Uruguay's coach said about all this. He said, hey, it's not a morality play, it's soccer. Man up.

SCHOLES: Right. Yes. And, you know, they were really making excuses. They just kind of danced around it. And Suarez, I think after the game, not so much, but he said, oh, things happen.

COSTELLO: Things happen. Andy Scholes, Lara Baldesarra, thanks so much. I'm sure we'll be talking about this much more today.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, a new tool in the fight against breast cancer and a new study that shows it may be better at detecting tumors. Can 3-D mammograms save lives? We're paging Dr. Sanjay Gupta after a break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: If you're confused about whether mammograms are effective, take heart. A new study shows an improved way to detect breast cancer. I'm talking about 3-D mammograms. 3-D mammograms uses multiple x-rays taken from different angles to create a three dimensional image. The study on these devices is published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. It shows that 3-D mammograms decrease those scary false positives by 15 percent, which means it can more accurately detect if you have a lump in your breast and if that lump is real. If you really need a biopsy, in other words. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is here to tell us more about these devices.

So, do you agree, are these devices better?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think the study is pretty compelling. What they did is they followed a half a million women. Half of them got the 3-D mammography plus the regular standard mammography and the other half just got the regular mammography. And what they found were some of the things that you said. You know, it's better at weeding out things that aren't cancer and better at finding things that are cancer. Still not perfect by any means, but it's better at it.

There are some downsides though and I think these are really downsides. It's a lot more expensive. It's about four times more expensive. I mean that adds up if you start talking about an annual screening. There's more radiation. And if you're getting this yearly, that could be a problem.

But I think the biggest question is, does it save lives? Are they finding cancers that are cancers that would be problematic? Not all cancers are necessarily problematic. They may not do anything in a woman's lifetime. Are they finding the right cancers? And that's going to be, I think, you know, you need - you need to follow these women longer to figure that out.

That's not as easy as it sounds. You really want to know, does it -- it looks great as far as actually seeing it as the imaging, but these women's lives, are they prolonged because of this type of technology? We're not sure of that yet.

COSTELLO: Right. And, of course, you say it's more expensive and you have to wonder if your insurance covers it -

GUPTA: Right.

COSTELLO: Or if you have to pay for it out-of-pocket and it's just -

GUPTA: Right.

COSTELLO: There seems to be so many road blocks into knowing what exactly you should do as a woman.

GUPTA: Yes. And I think, you know, with new technologies, I think as a general, more options are probably going to be better. Everyone has said that the standard mammography now just is a pretty blunt tool, not to throw away screening tests all together, but it's -- no screening test is perfect. These are getting better.

What I would say, there are certain women who just haven't had good results with mammography. Their breasts are too dense, they're told by the doctor, look, we just can't tell for sure. They may be the most likely to go to their doctors and say, what about this 3-D mammography? Am I a good candidate for that? Could that give better images? So I think for the time being, it will be a smaller group of women. Ultimately, are we going to have a big sea change possibly with screening?

COSTELLO: We'll see. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thanks so much.

GUPTA: You got it.

COSTELLO: I appreciate it.

GUPTA: Thank you. COSTELLO: Speaking of breast cancer, you might have heard former "Good

Morning America" co-anchor Joan Lunden's revelation. She joins Sanjay to talk about her diagnosis on "Sanjay Gupta M.D." this weekend. That's Saturday at 4:30 p.m. Eastern time and 7:30 in the morning right here on CNN. Thanks again, Sanjay.

Seventeen-year-old John LaDue came from a good home. He was a model student. He was never bullied and he wanted to kill as many people as possible. Fortunately, his plan was thwarted and LaDue was placed under arrest before any harm was done. Now, newly released police interviews with the teenager reveal a chilling look inside the mind of a young man intent on killing his own family and bombing his school. Miguel Marquez is here with more on this.

Good morning, Miguel.

MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning there, Carol.

Yes, this is a peek into a very, very dark mind of a 17-year-old. He said he had no specific targets in mind, but he did want to kill not only his family but older kids, saying of Adam Lanza from Sandy Hook who killed elementary students, he told investigators, "you really have to have some dignity."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN LADUE: I really want to get out of this place.

MARQUEZ (voice-over): In a chilling interview with investigators, 17- year-old John LaDue is heard revealing why he wanted kill himself, his family and as many victims as possible at his high school in Minnesota.

LADUE: I was not bullied at all. I don't even think I've ever been bullied in my life. I have good parents, I live in a good town. I think I'm just really mentally ill. And no one's noticed and I've been trying to hide it.

MARQUEZ: Yet it's those good parents and his older sister LaDue allegedly wanted to murder.

LADUE: They did nothing wrong. I just wanted as many victims as possible.

MARQUEZ: LaDue calmly detailing step by step plans to set off bombs inside the hallways of his school.

LADUE: Then my plans were to enter and throw Molotov cocktails and pipe bombs and destroy everyone. And then when the SWAT comes, I would destroy myself.

MARQUEZ: In the hours long interview, LaDue claims to be different from the rest of the mass school shooters, especially Adam Lanza, the 20-year-old who fatally shot 20 children and six adult staff at Sandy Hook Elementary. LAUDE: I didn't want to prove that I was a wuss, like all the other

recent shooters, like Adam Lanza who shot himself. I wanted to like get taken down by the SWAT just to show that I wasn't a wimp and not like willing to fight with equal force.

MARQUEZ: Prior to his arrest being made, the 17 year old posted videos to YouTube, testing bomb material. Explosives were found in a storage unit police say he was walking to when someone saw him acting suspiciously and called 911.

In this interview, LaDue claims his father had no idea what was going on.

LADUE: He thinks I'm just a good kid because I - because I lie pretty well and persuade him that I'm just ordinary.

MARQUEZ: He said he planned to shoot students with guns he stole from him.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And I don't think he wants to lie. I think he wants -- he knows he got himself in a strange place and he wants out.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MARQUEZ: Now, that 911 caller that alerted police to LaDue's activity says that it appeared that he was breaking into that storage facility. Police came over to check it out. When they went into the storage facility, it looked like somebody was living there. They started looking around more and everything unraveled from there. Amazing. Darn lucky that they caught him.

Carol.

COSTELLO: So lucky.

MARQUEZ: Shocking (Ph).

COSTELLO: Miguel Marquez, thanks so much.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

COSTELLO: All right, this news just coming into us out of Atlanta. Brutal new details just released by police in the case of a father who's accused of killing his 22-month-old boy by leaving him in a hot car for an entire day. Victor Blackwell joins us now the breaking news.

Good morning, Victor.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Carol, good morning.

A new arrest warrant has been issued for Justin Ross Harris. And the new detail this morning is that Harris apparently went back out to his SVU during his lunch break, went into the SUV, placed something inside the driver's side of the vehicle, closed the door, and went back into his work at the Home Depot support center just outside Atlanta. Now, initially the story from this father was that he drove to work with his son in the car, forgot to drop the child off at day care, worked a full day and only realized the child was in the car seven and a half hours later.

But this new information from Cobb County Police is that they have evidence that this father went out to the vehicle, opened the door, and the child was still in there, presumably as he roasted, temperatures outside got to about 88 degrees, and we know from experts that temperatures inside the car likely could have gone above 120 degrees. Of course, this 22-month-old boy died. The father has pleaded not guilty to child cruelty charges and felony murder.

Carol.

COSTELLO: Victor Blackwell, I know you'll continue to cover this story for us. Thanks so much.

BLACKWELL: Sure.

COSTELLO: The NEWSROOM is back in a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Imagine you're a successful journalist and you have a huge secret that you're hiding. What if you were in the United States illegally? Would you come forward, especially in this climate? Well, Jose Antonio Vargas (ph) is going to do just that. He's going to appear in a new CNN film "Documented."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSE ANTONIO VARGAS: I have become kind of a walking uncomfortable conversation. I get asked questions like, why don't you just make yourself legal? And I think it's really important that we actually go through an application process to become a citizen so that you understand where the problem lies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Gaby Pacheco can relate. She's an undocumented immigrant and an immigrant rights leader. She joins me now, along with Norman Adams, the co-founder of Texans for Sensible Immigration Policy.

Welcome to you both.

GABY PACHECO, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, BRIDGE PROJECT: Thank you.

NORMAN ADAMS, CO-FOUNDER, TEXANS FOR SENSIBLE IMMIGRATION POLICY: Good morning. Happy to be here.

COSTELLO: Oh, happy you're here too.

So, Gaby, tell our viewers why you're in the country illegally?

PACHECO: Well, I came to the United States with my family when I was eight years old. And when you're a child, you really don't know what is happening with your status, you're just happy going to school, enjoying your friends and family. And then when you hit 18, you come to this very ugly reality, which is, you don't have documents and there's nothing you can do. There's nothing on the books or the laws that would allow you to essentially get regularized and get a green card and eventually citizenship.

COSTELLO: And you believe that people like you, that kids like you, should eventually get citizenship, right? You believe in the Dream Act?

PACHECO: I believe in the Dream Act. I believe in America. And I believe that people like myself who are not right in with the law, right, we're not here legally, we don't have documents, we're unauthorized, we should be given a chance, an opportunity to come right with the law and we should be able to fix our immigration system, which has allowed for 11 million people to be here undocumented. We're not just talking about journalists. We're talking about doctors and nurses and people that are working in the fields, people who are neighbors, people who we live with on an everyday basis.

COSTELLO: There are those who believe the Dream Act and the possibility that that could be true for all undocumented immigrants in this country is really the thing that's causing this influx of illegal immigrants pouring over our borders right now. What would you say to those people?

PACHECO: Well, I think we can hide the sun with one finger. And I think that that could probably be maybe one-tenth of what is the problem and what it's actually allowing for families to send their children to the United States. But the reality is that there are policies and there are things that have happened in those countries way before DOCA (ph) got implemented that is really pushing and pulling those kids to go through all those different borders, go through the desert, and come to look for a better life in the United States.

And it's the same thing that Cubans, during the Peter Pan influx that drove Cuban immigrant children to the United States. And it's the same thing that we have seen during the potato famine with Irish families. And so it's the violence that is happening in central America, it's the policies that the United States has implemented in those countries that now has bankrupt some of these families and has created really bad situations for those children and their families.

COSTELLO: Yet, Norman, all of these children are causing enormous hardships, especially in states like Texas and in Arizona. One lawmaker suggested we just put these children on a bus and send them right back where they came from. Is that the answer?

ADAMS: Well, as far as the latest influx, which is obviously someone in central South America is behind that, we have - we have -- we've given the wrong impression. They believe and they've been told they can come here and unrestricted and we will welcome them with open arms. As much as I would like to do that from a humanitarian standpoint, we cannot do that. We have to send a firm message back to those countries and we have to educate those folks that you can't just walk in here.

The problem we have -- we continue to face this. The longer we kick the can down the road on sensible or practical immigration reform, whatever you want to call it, the longer we kick that can down the road, the longer folks like Gaby have a dilemma that you can't solve and the longer there's no system for people to come in here legally. We have no system because our immigration laws are broken and we have to completely overhaul the system.

But as far as the young folks that have been dumped at the border, we're going to have to make a firm stand. Certainly we have to take care of them while they're here, but we have to send them home. We have no choice. That's not - that's not part of immigration reform.

COSTELLO: How do you we do that, though? You know, they have to appear at a hearing, right?

ADAMS: Right.

COSTELLO: Some of the kids have to go to special counselling beforehand to see if they're going to go back to abusive situations and things like that.

ADAMS: Right.

COSTELLO: Is it just a matter of time? Are the laws -- should the laws be changed? Should they be stronger when it comes to these kids and sending them back?

ADAMS: Well, I think that the law is clear as it is, right. They've come in illegally and there's no - there's no solution, no quick solution. It's going to take years to get these children replaced in a humanitarian basis. But we will do that. America is not going to drive a bus across a border and kick these children out. And that's - and we can't do that.

But the big picture is for folks like Gaby. She - her -- the only way you -- how many people do you hear say, I don't mind you being hear, Gaby, I just want you to get legal. Well, Gaby's only solution under our current laws is to return to her home country where she has no family or income, sit here for 10 years and then get in a line that is five to eight years long. That's no solution. So Gaby, like the 11 million or 12 million others, would rather stay here and live in the shadows.

And we have got to fix that. We have got to have immigration reform that has a method of legalization. We don't have to have any short cuts to citizenship. We don't even have to have a guaranteed path. Frankly, I think we have to give them eventual ability for citizenship or we create a second class citizen.

These are great folks. She -- Gaby has proved this. We don't want these folks to go home. We need to I.D. them and tax them and let them live freely in this country, go and travel as they may, and not be worried about being deported every day of the week.

COSTELLO: All right, Norman Adams, Gaby Pacheco, thank you both for your insight. I appreciate it.

PACHECO: Thank you for having us.

COSTELLO: Thanks for being here.

"Documented," the story of a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, Jose Antonio Vargas, airs Sunday night at 9:00 p.m. on CNN.

The next hour of NEWSROOM after a break.

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