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Darren Wilson Resigned Yesterday from Ferguson PD: OSU Player Missing; Pope Francis Returns from Turkey; 13-Year-Old Held Captive in Hidden Compartment at Home; First Human Trial of Ebola Vaccine Produces Promising Results; Don Lemon's Roots

Aired November 30, 2014 - 17:00   ET

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

SUZANNE MALVAEUX, CNN HOST: Hi. You're in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Suzanne Malvaeux.

The mayor of Ferguson, Missouri, says that the city's now former police officer Darren Wilson has cut all ties to the city's police force. And he says Wilson did not receive a severance package when he resigned. While the new conference today, Mayor James Knowles sys his community is now ready to look ahead. He is launching a new effort to recruit minorities to the police department and protesters.

However, on the streets last night said that Darren Wilson's resignation comes far too late. As you know, Wilson who is white shot and killed 18-year-old Michael Brown who is black, the grand jury decided not to indict the officer. And a lot of protesters say that the police chief should joined Wilson and resigned or be fired. But today, he vowed to stay on the job.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHIEF THOMAS JACKSON, FERGUSON, MISSOURI POLICE: Well, my focus really has always been on the safety and security of the city of Ferguson and its citizens. And I report to the leadership of Ferguson. So, its them and the citizens that I have concern about their opinion.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you going resign, sir?

JACKSON: No.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: Our owned Ed Lavandera is in Ferguson at this hour. And he has been traveling through the areas that were hardest hit in last Monday's violent protest. And I want to you to give us the response to the reaction of what are you seeing today that the police officer has resigned. People are saying look they're trying to get their lives together. And we also heard from the mayor who said he is at least ready to move on.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Suzanne. You know what, the states around Fergusson, I think today has really been the kind of the idea of turning the page, turning the corner and moving on.

As we drive here along the Florissant avenue, in front of the police department here in Ferguson, as you look out the window and you start to see a lot of the boarded up windows, there have been that way for some time. And there have been groups of people coming in here and painting murals all over these hopeful messages and that sort of thing as we drive pass the police stations here. The barricades are still up but no sign of the National Guard just yet. Usually they come out at night if needed. And that is something that we haven't seen yet today.

But you know, the theme throughout the day in various places that we have been speaking with the mayor of the city and at a church service here today is, you know, people trying to turn that page, looking ahead to what is next. The mayor talked about creating the task force to bridge the gap between the police department and African-American community. And we come over here to the business stretch here, just on the north side of the police department. A lot of these business are boarded up. And you see these murals that have been left behind. And there is a great deal of focus and attention, Suzanne, as people, you know, start to focus more on these businesses getting their back up on their feet so they can get moving again and revitalize the economy that has been hurt in many ways for the last few months.

So that thing is really turning the page, looking ahead. That's what we have heard a lot about today, Suzanne.

MALVEAUX: And Ed, I think it's really quite amazing that you're giving us this tour, literally live tour as you drive through the neighborhood. I can't help but notice, there are not a lot of people who are out there today on the street. Is there a sense of quiet and calm that people are inside their homes in the holidays and really trying to assess where to go next?

LAVANDERA: Well, you know it's interesting. This was just on -- just north of the police department. You know, it's the temperature dropped kind of dramatically here in the last couple of hours. So you know, it is the end of that holiday weekend, people kind of wrapping up. But, you know, the other -- about a mile away from us is where that other stretch of road way that has -- that saw the most violent and most intense protest last Monday night. And a lot of those businesses just have it reopened on that stretch. Even during the daylight hours when people are free to move along and come and go on that stretch. But you know, it's quiet. But you know, Suzanne, for a lot of people, given what has happened here, quiet is a great thing.

MALVEAUX: Yes. Yes. Ed, thank you so much.

I mean, just literally taking us through the streets there of the neighborhood in Ferguson. Appreciate your coverage all weekend. Really outstanding job that you have done over the holiday weekend.

I am also joined by Michael Daly and Tara Setmayer. And for the holiday, Michael is a special correspondent for "the Daily Beast." Tara is a contributor to "Real News" on the Blaze TV.

Thanks for spending the thanksgiving weekend with us. Because obviously, a lot of news this week.

And I want to start off with you, Michael. Because a very provocative article that you wrote for "the Daily Beast." And it talked about the resignation that has been in the works for a while. It also had talked as well about the two coming together here when you think about what is going to happen next. Give us a sense of who is responsible when you think about the police and you think about police officer and you think about Michael Brown in that moment, the 90 seconds that were so crucial when they conflicted and they came together.

MICHAEL DALY, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT, THE DAILY BEAST: Well, I think we need to really to study those 90 seconds. Like no 90 seconds, we studied in a while. You know, you study 90 seconds in a plane crash, you look at the weather, the mechanics, everything that contribute to it. I don't think there has been enough detailed look at that we do know.

What you do know is that police officer Darren Wilson was not resourceful enough to diffuse the situation involving an 18-year-old young man. And that two things have bothered me when he went out the door. We was quoted saying that resigning from the police department is the hardest thing I have ever had to do. Well, you would hope shooting an unarmed 18-year-old kid in the head would be the hardest thing you ever had to do.

And the other thing is he said that he said well, they were also pressing my wife to resign. She is also a police officer. Well, she I think is completely blameless in this. So, if the police department, i.e., the guy who is running the police department is pushing her to resign, I don't know how he stays in his spot.

MALVEAUX: And Tara, one of the things that Michael talks about in that article as well is who is responsible, right? Who bears the burden of the person who is suppose to have cool heads prevail in that situation? When you have a standoff, a 90 seconds standoff and someone who ends dead, who is responsible?

TARA SETMAYER, CONTRIBUTOR, REAL NEWS: Well, it is interesting to me. Have you ever been a law enforcement officer?

DALY: No. I have not been.

SETMAYER: OK. So, it's very easy for you to be an armchair quarterback what Darren Wilson should or should not has done in those 90 seconds.

(CROSSTALK)

SETMAYER: You passed aspersions on him just now saying that, you know a shot the helpless 18-year-old kid in the head. That's not what happened. I listened to the tapes. I read the radio traffic. Darren Wilson was quite calm cool and collected during most of that. He was not out of control unlike the mythology that a lot of people are trying to put forward there.

You know, I come from a law enforcement family. My husband is a law enforcement officer. And, you know, he is looking at the situation and said he would have done almost exactly what Darren Wilson did at the same time given the circumstances. We have got to realize that Michael Brown did not put this did not happen in a vacuum. Michael Brown is partially responsible for what happened to him that say. His choices led up to that confrontation throughout this entire --

DALY: I completely agree.

SETMAYER: Thank God. But there are a lot of people that just seem to ignore the fact that Michael Brown chose to strong arm rob a store. He chose to assault the police officer the led to that confrontation.

I understand that there is a tension in the black community with police officers. And I think that is a valid conversation to have and why that is, is valid conversation to have. But they are conflating two different issues. Michael Brown is not the martyr that people are making him sound like. He did not just walk down the street and some rogue cop shot him in the head and it's not what happened at all. A few irresponsible of people to continue that myth.

MALVEAUX: Michael, you are responding?

DALY: Which is why I think we really need to study it. If you look at his friend's testimony. First of all he says --

SETMAYER: The one that lie Dorian Johnson who know a lie in many times? He was deemed not credible, but go ahead.

DALY: Well, I'm not sure that is completely true. But I do think is when he talks about Michael Brown in that store all of the sudden grabbing the stuff and his thought that was nuts. His friend though that was nuts. He said there's cameras here. I mean, it is obviously something was wrong with Michael Brown that day.

SETMAYER: Well, he was high.

DALY: And obviously something was wrong with him when he ran into the police officer Darren Wilson. And I think what we need to do which we haven't done is study every single instant of what happened and try to determine, first of all, not just who legally responsible and who should be indicted, but how can we prevent such things from happening again? That's for me, and I have a lot of friends who are police officers and I couldn't agree with you more.

SETMAYER: Right. That is two folds now.

DALY: And you know, the last thing I think Darren Wilson wanted to do, he went from helping a two month old baby running into this guy. And you know, the last thing he ever wanted is was shooting this kid.

MALVEAUX: Absolutely. I just want us to go couple of things, too.

And first of all, Tara, just to be clear. I know you said he was guilty of bad behavior but you're not saying he deserved to die.

SETMAYER: No. He didn't deserve to die. But he made choices that put him in that -- that's right. He made choice that ultimately led to that if he hadn't been defiant when the police officer told him to get out of walking down the middle of the street. If he had not turned around and engaged in assault with a police officer which forensic evidence proved that part of Darren Wilson's testimony to be true and several black witnesses came forward and said there was a scuffle as well, and that Michael Brown was the aggressor, those things led to this.

I don't think that Darren Wilson woke up that day and decided he is going to go out and shoot a black boy. That is just not the case. And -- hut we have got stop saying boy. He was 6'5", 300 pounds.

MALVEAUX: All right. We're going to deal with this on the other side. We got to talk a quick break. (INAUDIBLE) take a breath. We are going to deal with it on the other side here. The nation divided as we can hear not only over the grand jury decision at Ferguson but how does the country reacted to this. So what was the appropriate response.

We are going to be back with Tara and Michael. They are going to sit by, stick with us and we are going to discuss this right after the break. Real quick.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MALVEAUX: Ferguson decisions sparked a wave of emotional reactions sweeping across the nation from rioting and looting to the peaceful protests as well, from anger and despair to compassion. And some people took to twitter and some people took to the streets.

An NFL player Benjamin Watson, he wrote a Ferguson essay that went viral. In just 611 words, Watson showed the range of conflicting emotion. He is angry. He is embarrassed, sad, sympathetic, hopeless and hopeful all at the same time. Watson read just part of his essay on CNN. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN WATSON, NEW ORLEANS SAINTS PLAYER: I'm introspective because sometimes I want to take our side without looking at the facts in situations like these. Sometimes I feel like it's us against them. Sometimes I'm just as prejudice as people I point fingers at and that's not right. How can I look at white skin and make assumptions but not want assumptions about me. That's not right. (END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: I want to talk more about why Ferguson set off so many powerful emotions and reactions.

Michael and Tara, first of all, Michael, do you think that people were responding to facts? Do you think it was more of a visceral emotional reaction that happened or a chain of pattern throughout the country when they look at young black men who have been killed by white police officers.

DALY: I think it was a generic response. We have got a white cop and a black young man and I don't think people were looking at who exactly did what, who exactly did what when, who was within their rights to do what, who provoked what, who could have stopped what? And I just think it was not a specific thing. I think if this kid was white, he would have gotten shot anyway.

MALVEAUX: Do you agree?

SETMAYER: No, I agree. I think that facts went out the window very quickly here. And there were race agitators and people who thrive off of creating this type of mythology that ran with this. And actually exploited Michael Brown's death to further a social justice agenda that is questionable at this point. And I think it was irresponsible of those people. I think the president of the United States and the attorney general fermented part of this mythology because they have themselves have a social justice agenda. They think that America is not fair. And they were -- they could have squashed this early on but they didn't. They allowed this to erupt.

MALVEAUX: But there were previous examples of black men who were unarmed, who were killed by white officers who did not -- who were not actually come to trial. I mean, that had happened in the past.

SETMAYER: But that's the exception.

DALY: I think we can't forget, though, I mean there was a guy who was an African-American man who was arrested in the case of mistaken identity and they ended up arrest -- changing him with destruction of property because he bled on their uniforms when they beat them.

And there are circumstances like that. And if you look at the numbers in terms of who get arrested, who gets stock from Ferguson, if you have Darren Wilson, in his testimony, talks about that area is anti- police, as hostile territory. I just think there is -- in the same way that weather can contribute to a plane crash, I think that there was an atmosphere that preceded these two people encountering each other on that street. And that is something I think they have to look at.

MALVEAUX: Yes. And people have -- people in the neighborhood have described it as really the perfect storm that you have unemployment, that you have discrimination, that there is a hustle relations between the police and the black community that all that contributed to it.

I want you to see this is something that a singer Farrell Williams said on the Ferguson issue. He told in Ebony Magazine. He says quote "the boy was walking in the middle of the street when the police reportedly told him to get the "f" on the sidewalk." He is talking about Michael Brown. "If you don't listen to that after just having pushed a store owner, you're asking for trouble but you're not asking to be killed. Some of these youth feel hunted and preyed upon and that's why the office needs to be punished."

I mean, that seems like he is making a distinction between what happened before and what he believes people genuinely feel in the neighborhood in the community. SETMAYER: Right. So I acknowledged that before. So that there is a

-- that is a legitimate real tension that I think we can have that conversation as to why or how -- why that is? And I think that is separate from what happened that day.

Clearly, Michael Brown was disrespectful of authority. And he had no problem assaulting a police officer. People are forgetting part two of this. Assaulting a police officer is a felony. And if it ends, he was in the commission of a possible arrest and was assaulted, that officer (INAUDIBLE) law has the right to use deadly force in that situation. He had been hit, punched in the face. He was reaching for his gun. DNA was on the gun.

So I mean, that is not in dispute what happened there. So as unfortunate as it is, Michael Brown was shot that day because of his own actions.

MALVEAUX: OK. Well, that -- I mean, a lot of that is actually -- it actually is in dispute. But I don't want to re-litigate this.

Michael, you say in your article, you talk about the fact that the police officer if he was somebody who knew the community would have been able to tell --

DALY: May have been able to tell.

MALVEAUX: That Michael Brown was not necessarily somebody who was out to get him or a troublemaker or that there was something that he could have done?

DALY: I think that first of all, I think that it's probably started out with a nasty exchange, the encounter. That kind of set the tone. And if you -- and then when the cop backed up, you know, they sought two police officers have to leave in that store -- one went right by him, another one went by him. And so, they told themselves that the guy in the store didn't call the police. When they left the store, the guy said I'm going to call the cops. They told themselves that he did call a police. So when they had this third encounter, I'm not sure that they thought it was necessary relayed to that robbery. I think they probably thought it was an extension of that nasty exchange and that was the tone of it. And the other question that it has, if he didn't respect authority, why not?

MALVEAUX: All right.

SETMAYER: That's the larger question. I think that's --

DALY: As far as the previous guys. And I have got to say we all owe his parents a great debt by the way they handled this and ask people to be peaceful. And they said we have to move on and make that death mean something.

MALVEAUX: And obviously people in the community want to do that. They are calling for that as well as people around the country.

We have got leave it here. We're going to talk about it and I know we are going to continue talk about it, debate about. But you know, I think people agree that you have got to find some sort of positive way to move forward. We got to leave it there. Thank you so much. Really appreciate it.

(CROSSTALK)

MALVEAUX: A 13-year-old boy missing now for four years found behind a hidden wall in his father's suburban Atlanta home. Police are now revealing new details about the strange case. That's up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MALVEAUX: The U.S. led coalition ramped up attacks overnight on what has become the capital of the militant Islamic group, ISIS. Thirty air strikes were reported in Syria. Extremists have made a city now the headquarters of their so-called Islamic state, training fighters and storing weapons there. But previous airstrike has centered on Kobani. That is near the Turkish border.

Meanwhile in Turkey, Pope Francis wrapped up a weekend visit where the pontiff condemned the quote "bar baric violence by ISIS." The Pope mentioned those words saying taking away the peace of a people committing every act of violence especially when directed against the weakest and defenseless is a profoundly grave sin against God since it means showing contempt for the image of God which is in man.

Joining us is CNN's John Allen who is in Rome and he is on the phone to talk more about the Pope's visit to Turkey.

And John, first of all, you know, put this in context here. Because this visit by Pope Francis comes at a time of quite turmoil inside of that country. You have got ISIS that camped out on the borders. More than a million Islamic refugees who are now flooding to this country. And they are now worries that the country's leaders are going to move away from maintaining Turkey as a secular state. Did he come here because all of that is happening all at once?

JOHN ALLEN, CNN SENIOR VATICAN ANALYST (via phone): Well, Suzanne, the official reason for the Pope's trip to Turkey actually had nothing to do with any of that. The fact is that today was the feast of St. Andrew. St. Andrew was patron saint of the patriarch of Constantinople and the patriarch of the Constantinople for (INAUDIBLE) considered the first among equal in the orthodox world. So extensively, the Pope was here to promote closer ties between Catholics and orthodox Christians.

However, there is no doubt this for unfolded under the shadow of the broader geo-political situation across the Middle East. And as a matter of fact, the Pope came in part to deliver a very sharp challenge to moderate Muslim leaders. It is not just in Turkey but across the entire region to try to press harder on the issue of religious freedom and the protection of minorities in a particular way that the protection of Christians across the Middle East are on the plane on the way back to Rome tonight from Istanbul.

The Pope revealed that in his private conversation with President Recep Erdogan of Turkey on Friday, he basically laid down a challenge. He said that Muslim -- moderate Muslim leaders and not just clerics, but also politicians and academics and other leaders of the Muslim world, ought to issue what he called a global condemnation that at least sweeping condemnation or violence committed in the name of Islam.

And so, I think it is quite clear that the Pope had is, the Pope had the persecution of Christians across the Middle East and the broader sort of struggle for the soul that we see unfolding in the Islamic world on his mind during his trip to Turkey which was his third to a majority Muslim nation.

MALVEAUX: OK, John.

ALLEN: Which I think in and of itself is also an indication of how concerned he is with this issue.

MALVEAUX: Thank you, John. Appreciate it very much.

New information emerging today about a Georgia couple accused of keeping a young boy captive in their home for four years. Police found the boy yesterday after he texted that he was hidden in a secret space above the garage.

Steven Gehlbach (ph) of Atlanta affiliate WSB has the disturbing details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEVEN GEHLBACH, WSB REPORTER (voice-over): 37-year-old Gregory Jean and 42-year-old Samantha Davis are charged with false imprisonment and child cruelty for keeping a 13-year-old son, Gregory Junior, captive in a hidden compartment inside their Clayton County home.

Late Saturday, Gregory Junior reunited with his mother after four years with lots of hugs and many tears. In court, we learned Davis is also accused of hitting the boy with a stick on his legs and backside. She shook her head and looked confused as the judge read those allegations. Jean spoke up in court when the judge brought up a previous arrest from 2006.

GREGORY JEAN, FATHER: I have never been in jail in my life before.

GEHLBACH: The father told the judge his from Haiti, but is a U.S. citizen who has been living and working in Clayton County for six years. He said the previous case was dismissed because of mistaken identity.

JEAN: That was not me. They had the wrong person.

GEHLBACH: But Davis has been convicted before of child cruelty and still on probation from a case in Henry country and therefore not even eligible for bond. Gregory Jr. is OK and now reconnecting with family. He was able to text his mother in Florida using a cell phone app. Police discovered him in a small attic space above the garage. The access was hidden behind towels and a piece of plywood in the back of the closet.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MALVEAUX: That is so sad. The next court date for the father and stepmother is set for December 9th.

The race is on now to find a cure for Ebola. Now, early tests are promising. So how close are we to a vaccine? The director of the national institute of allergy and infectious diseases joins us next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MALVEAUX: It's still early in the testing phase but the first human trial of an experimental Ebola vaccine now has produced what scientists are calling promising results. All 20 adults who received the vaccine in a trial overseen by the national institute of health developed anti-Ebola anti-bodies and no one suffered serious side effects.

We want to talk about the progress in developing the Ebola vaccine with Dr. Anthony Fauci. He is the director of the national institute of Allergy and infectious diseases.

Dr. Fauci, good to see you. Happy holidays and thanksgiving here.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: Thank you.

MALVEAUX: This is some a little bit of good news. Yes, for the first time this trial shows that there are some promising results. So, what is this next step in developing a successful vaccination?

FAUCI: Well, the first step that you just mentioned, Suzanne, is the determining if it's safe and it is. There were no serious adverse events and whether it produces the response that you would predict would be protected. So that's the good news of the first face.

But the proof of the pudding is going to be whether it actually works. And that is the next step. So sometime of the next couple of months likely in mid-January, we are going to do a much larger trial and many, many more people in West Africa to determine if these promising early results actually spell out to be a vaccine that works. And we will know that until we tested in the setting when there is ongoing Ebola affection going on. And the only place that that is happening is in West Africa. So that is where the next stage is going to be.

MALVEAUX: And Dr. Fauci, this question comes up all the time when you talk about trial vaccinations. Whether this will contain, the vaccine contain Ebola, the Ebola virus, and whether or not somebody could get Ebola from the vaccine.

FAUCI: Not at all, Suzanne. That's impossible, in fact. Because what we're injecting is not the Ebola virus into the people. We are injecting a very small component of a protein that is part of the Ebola virus that in of itself cannot infect but can induce in your body an immune response that hopefully will protect you against Ebola if and when you get exposed to it.

MALVEAUX: So, what is the biggest hurdle here that you have to across before you can actually disseminate something like this and give it to the general public?

FAUCI: The biggest hurdle is does it work and is it safe when you give it to a large number of people? The fact is what looks like its promising now, we have been there before. And sometimes it doesn't spell out in to an effective vaccine. So the big question, the bottom line of this all will be determined by the much larger trial to determine if it actually works.

MALVEAUX: And if you have as vaccine that is created and it is successful, what is the process, what is the protocol in deciding who is going to get this and who gets this first and who doesn't get it?

FAUCI: Well, what happens is that if indeed it shows to be effective, it would be distributed certainly to all the health care workers, the people who handled the bodies, the people who are at risks. Then all of the people in that area. And in fact when you have an outbreak in a city, for example like Free Town (ph) in Sierra Leone or Monrovia in Liberia, that those are the kinds of people you would want to essentially vaccinate as many people as you possibly could. So this could be widespread if in fact it works. That is the big if.

MALVEAUX: All right, Dr. Fauci. It is at least a start and a hope and it is good news for that. Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

FAUCI: You're quite welcome.

MALVEAUX: Coming up, one CNN anchor finds out why he should not quit his day job. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you would cut them a long time ago, they would fire you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MALVEAUX: All right. That's the warning there. Taking a trip around the world with our own Don Lemon as he goes on a search to find his roots. That's up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MALVEAUX: Thanksgiving for many of us, a long weekend spent with family and friends. So we wanted to showcase one of our own anchor's journey to find out more about his family and his family tree. Don Lemon knew nothing about the people who came before him so he set off to find his roots. It's a journey that begins in the hometown of Port Allen, Louisiana.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR, NEWSROOM: So one of the favorite questions I like to ask my guests is who do you think you are? So now I'm getting to answer that question.

Growing up in Port Allen, here it is. I grew up in the country and I loved it. This little Brown curly haired kid with big teeth and big ears and who grew into his look.

What am I doing? Are you rolling?

I left Louisiana in my 20s and never really looked back. Now I'm going home to find my roots to learn more about my family tree, the people who are so much a part of who I am today.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Come on over here.

LEMON: I don't want to see you all. I just want to eat.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Come on, come on come on.

LEMON: Hey, mother.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi!

LEMON: I think I still owe them something.

I spent so many years chasing a dream and chasing a career and missing birthday parties and anniversaries and graduations and babies being born and all those things. And because of this, I have had to reconnect more with my family and talk with my family and what's better than that?

May father, Wilmon, died when I was nine. So I was raised by my mom, Katherine, who worked and by her mom, my grandmother, Mary Henrietta.

My mom is my best friend now. My grandmother was my best friend and she was my buddy. I can't wait to find out more about her because I think she's the lynch pen. You know, I think about her all the time. I even have dreams about her like we are in a communications like she is still alive and then I wake up. And she's not there anymore. And I remember that she's not there. She made me who I am. She is the one who instilled pride in me.

I don't know much about who came before my grandmother. She did tell me her mom, Katherine Jackson, died in childbirth. She didn't know much about her dad except his name, Harry Revault and that he was white. I have always wished I asked my grandmother more about them. So my mom and I asked Michelle (INAUDIBLE) from ancestry.com to dig through the record books and see what she could find.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why don't we start by you telling me about your grandmother or your mother?

KATHERINE, MOTHER: She was a very nice, very good mother.

LEMON: She was very outspoken.

KATHERINE: Very outspoken.

LEMON: All I ever knew is that her mother died in childbirth.

KATHERINE: And her dad was Harry Revault.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And she just didn't talk about it?

KATHERINE: She just didn't talk about it that much. Because my daddy didn't like it at all.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because Harry is white?

KATHERINE: And because of the way he was with her. You know, like a secret of out of your child did because you're white and she's black.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is him in 1910. He is married and (INAUDIBLE) is his wife. So what this looks like is part of the reason why he wanted to keep Mary Henrietta quiet is because he was married. And him and Odele never had any children.

KATHERINE: Really?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They never had children. Who got the house?

KATHERINE: He did.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He bought it and gave it to her? So this is someone that he's -- he cares for and is trying to provide for in his own way because you didn't know that he had done that, right?

KATHERINE: No. No one. I never knew that. My mom said she saved the money to buy it.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm sure she had her ways, right?

KATHERINE: She has her ways.

LEMON: That's a family thing. Ways.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is an interesting page, too. Harry Revault is right here.

LEMON: He was an overseer of a plantation.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

LEMON: So my great grandfather was a plantation owner or plantation overseer.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He works at a plantation. And the main plantation in West Baton Rouge or in the (INAUDIBLE) area is Sinclair and it's likely this is where Harry and Katherine Jackson met. And it's also likely that the plantation is where your mother was born and where Katherine died.

LEMON: I had grown up in the shadow of Sinclair plantation but had never been there and certainly never imagined that I had a personal connection to it. But if that's where my great grandfather worked, great grandmother died and great grandmother was born, I want to see it for myself.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Right now we are walking along what is known as manager's row.

LEMON: So who lived on this row?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Harry. Harry like lived his life in one of these houses and walked up and down these streets to and from work every day. This is a turn of the century map of Sinclair. Right here is the management. And then here is this Negro quarters. So the layout in the past 100 years has not changed at all. And it kind of gives you an idea of where Katherine might have lived and where Harry might have lived.

I have another document. This is his obituary in the state times advocate, third of March, 1941. You want to read it?

LEMON: It was a funeral of Harry Revault, 54, was held Sunday afternoon at 3:00. Mr. Revault who had been in ill health for several months killed himself by placing a 12-gauge pump gun to his head and pulling the trigger. The coroner jury brought in a verdict of suicide.

KATHERINE: I wonder why, why he shot himself in the head.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. It's gruesome.

LEMON: It is pretty gruesome. Imagine how much pain you have to be in to do that.

I never knew him yet finding out my great grandfather killed himself is disquieting. It hangs heavy. I can't ignore it. But it is part of my story just like this sugar cane plantation where my great grandmother worked for wages doing the same kind of work that her grandparents did as slaves. I wonder what it was like in the (INAUDIBLE) fields under the summer son.

Kirby Grant (ph) has been harvesting cane here since he was a small boy. He knows what it was like.

If you worked on a plantation you would be there what? Sun up to sun down?

KIRBY GRANT (ph), RESIDENT: Sun up to sun down.

LEMON: This was self-worth?

GRANT (ph): It was.

LEMON: Show me how you did it.

GRANT (ph): I used to cut the top, throw it over. If you were cutting cane a long time ago they would fire you.

LEMON: Because I'm cutting it too high?

GRANT (ph): Yes. You got to cut it all the way to the ground.

LEMON: it is got to be here?

GRANT (ph): Yes. This is the way -- mostly, you see glorious (ph).

LEMON: That's where most of the sugar is.

GRANT (ph): You would see skinny people in those days. They used to work so hard.

LEMON: I wonder if the slaves, among my ancestors, had to work even harder finding out about them is like fighting through a brick wall but Michelle won't rest. Coming up, see what she has found that leads me half way across the world in search of my roots.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For the next part of your story, we are coming here to the West Baton Rouge museum. This cabin was built by slaves, so we're in a building that's very contemporary to the time of when your ancestors lived here as well. And we want to talk about Moses Jackson. So here's a pedigree.

LEMON: All right.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So this is your grandmother, and this is your great- great-grandmother, Catherine, and her father, James. So Moses and Catherine are your third great-grandparents.

Katherine, were maiden name was Woods. Now, we don't know who her father was, but there's a candidate. His name was Clemence Woods. This is an 1880 census. This says he was born in Louisiana and his father was born Africa. Clemence was born in 1812. Based on Clemence's age and, you know, what his father's age could have been, anywhere from about 1767 to 1792 is when he could have been born in Africa.

LEMON: He's without a name and age, or face, but he's my connection to Africa. I wonder about his passage to America, his journey, his struggle.

My answers lie 5,000 miles away at Cape Coast Castle in Ghana, one of the hubs of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. It's hard to believe a place so beautiful and so full of life had such a dark past. A historian (INAUDIBLE) was about to show me just how dark.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This was constructed in around 1792. It was designed for 1,000 people.

KATHERINE: In here?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. LEMON: Can you imagine being this dark?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stayed here for about three months on average, work in this darkness, yes.

LEMON: It felt like a descent into hell. I felt like this must what it is like to enter hell. I can't believe that people walked down that path, and then walked through here and then spent months in here if you survived.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This was a dungeon for the trouble mid-case (ph). Those were inside the rebellions and is (INAUDIBLE).

LEMON: But it was dark in here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was dark in here. Right. They were held here in chains. You see the hole on the wall? The holes on the wall. Were held in chains. The floor now -- removed much of the coverings on the floor. Feces, blood, decomposed bodies, clothes, food, vomit, sweat and tears (INAUDIBLE).

LEMON: I kept looking for places to escape and there was no escape. The only escape was either you had to survive, become a slave, or you escaped through death.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are about a enter a religious site.

LEMON: Before leaving the dungeons, we lit a candle in memory of the slaves who passed through these harrowing halls.

We're survivors.

Yes. Survivor spirit.

Door of no return.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Door of no return. Through this door, they left behind the known for the unknown.

LEMON: Then you walked through the door of no return.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now, we have the door of return. In 1988, two bodies of ex-slaves were resumed in America and Jamaica. They were brought back through this door to reverse the trend of no return.

LEMON: I was thinking there, and I just can't hold it in anymore. I wake up every day, my life is like a dream. Every day, I feel like I'm dreaming. I have such a wonderful life. I am so blessed and so fortunate. I want all those people who think that they can't survive and all these people who say, I can't do this, I can't do that, I want to show people that that isn't true. You can do whatever you want.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So on behalf of the government and people of this country, it's my pleasure to welcome you back.

LEMON: Who do I think I am? I know that I'm a survivor and I came from a group of people who are survivors.

Did you enjoy the trip?

KATHERINE: I loved it. I'm so glad I came. And it's so beautiful here.

LEMON: It is. Glad you came. Thanks.

KATHERINE: I'm happy you got me into it.

LEMON: I love you, mom.

KATHERINE: I love you, too.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MALVEAUX: A beautiful story.

Breaking news in the search for the missing Ohio state university football player. His body has been found. Sad news, but now questions, too, remaining for the police. His friends and family. We have those details up ahead.

Plus Ray Rice, the controversial football player won his case against the NFL, but will any team take a chance on him?

Also the president's daughters come under attack from one Republican. It's all coming up after the break.

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