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Breaking News: CNN Has Just Obtained the Death Certificate of Andrew Brown Jr.; Family's Attorney Benjamin Crump Makes Announcement. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired April 26, 2021 - 13:00   ET

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

[13:00:00]

JOHN KING, CNN HOST: That's a lot in the days ahead as we wonder through these decisions. And thanks for your time today. Hope to see you back here this time tomorrow for "Inside Politics."

Don't go anywhere. Busy news day. Ana picks up our coverage right now. Have a good day.

ANA CABRERA, CNN HOST: Hello, I'm Ana Cabrera in New York. Breaking news, CNN has just obtained the death certificate of Andrew Brown, Jr. He's the black man shot and killed by sheriff's deputies in North Carolina. It says Brown died of a, quote, "Penetrating gun shot wound to the head and died within minutes of being shot."

The certificate calls Brown's death a homicide, saying Brown was shot by others. Now this comes as calls for the police body-cam footage grow louder. Attorneys for the Brown family spoke just moments ago at a press conference.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HARRY DANIELS, ATTORNEY FOR ANDREW BROWN, JR. FAMILY: I was told by the district attorney that the family would get to see the raw footage not the redacted version.

These county administrators are walking back their promises they have made. Show the tape. If you ain't got nothing to hide show the tape.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Let's go live right now to North Carolina and CNN's Natasha Chen joins us in Elizabeth City. Natasha, explain exactly how we got here and where things stand right now.

NATASHA CHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right Ana. You just mentioned the death certificate that obtained by our colleagues Brian Todd and Producer Devon Sayers, and just to repeat this very new information compared to the 911 audio that we've been listening to for the last few days.

Again, this death certificate saying that Andrew Brown, Jr. died by a penetrating gun shot wound to the dead -- to the head and died within minutes of being shot. This differs from the 911 audio that we've been hearing where an emergency responder was heard saying that he was found with a gun shot wound to the back.

All of this extremely concerning to the family and community that have been gathered outside this public safety building here. And at the same time I got a statement from the county attorney within the past hour saying that they need more time to redact the body-camera footage before they can show family members.

What they're saying is that the North Carolina state statute allows them to do so if it is to protect an active investigation. So, that's what they are saying they need to do. They would like to blur some faces, it's going to take some time. And then they can show the family that footage in private.

Now the family's attorneys have been out here with the community in the street. They tell us that that moment is coming shortly. That they expect to go in and view that video with the family, which could answer a lot of questions that have been on the minds of people really hurting from this incident last Wednesday.

So, if you count that's five full days since this happened and the family -- really no one has seen the body-camera footage that was -- you know -- obtained from the different body-cameras worn by the seven deputies on scene.

Again, the seven deputies are on administrative leave. There are two more deputies that have resigned at this point. A third deputy that has retired. So, everyone here is gathered outside the building waiting for that family attorneys to go in with the family to view the video, then to come back out and potentially tell the rest of us what they saw. Ana?

CABRERA: And Natasha, we are getting word that as you were speaking the family is going in to view this video right now. We, of course, will await word from them after they see this video. But understandably they are extremely concerned about they will see.

They expressed that there was an initial debate over who was going to be seeing the video. Which member of the family would represent them and be able to have access to that video viewing, only to be told an hour before they were supposed to see that they needed to do some redactions.

And that, in fact, because of those redactions there was going to be a delay in terms of when they'd be able to see the video. Can we talk more about the redactions that are expected? Do we know what they're planning to redact or why they would need to redact anything?

CHEN: Sure, so let me pull the whole statement that the county attorney sent us here. It -- this is from County Attorney R. Michael Cox. And what he's doing is he's saying -- he's citing North Carolina's state statute saying that the redaction may be done when necessary to protect and active internal investigation. And that the law allows them to do this and blur some faces on the video and that process takes time. And then the statement goes on to say that as soon as the redactions are complete we will allow the family to view the footage. That's perhaps what's happening now. We hope this occurs today, but the actual time will be driven by the completion of the redactions. We are also continuing to seek transparency within the law and continue our efforts to get a court order that would allow the video to be released to the public.

[13:05:00]

Because, again Ana, in North Carolina it requires a judge to grant the release of the video to the public. And that's why there's been discussion of many different entities filing court orders to try to get this video released. And one of those entities actually includes a coalition of news organizations, including CNN, and this coalition has filed to push for the release of that video today.

The Elizabeth City, city manager told me that they are filing today a formal letter with the sheriff's office to allow them three business days to respond before they go the court as well. Ana?

CABRERA: OK Natasha, stand by. We understand Attorney Benjamin Crump, who's representing the family is speaking. Let's listen.

BENJAMIN CRUMP, BROWN FAMILY LAWYER: -- of Andrew Brown, Jr. Attorney Daniels is going to give an announcement and an update so you all can govern yourselves accordingly.

DANIELS: Thank you guys. I've been in communication with County Attorney Mike Cox and he e-mailed me and let me know that the viewing should be around 1:30. So, that's about 30 minutes from here. So, just hang tight. So, about 1:30 the family should be able to view this video and we'll come out and reconvene after that. So 1:30-ish.

I say -ish, so OK.

CRUMP: And we'll give you all a few minutes to assemble after we come out. But, be ready, we -- probably five, 10 minutes after we come out, we're going to make the statement. Anything else from anybody?

OK, thank you all. See you all then.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK, thank you all.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK, guys.

CABRERA: OK, that announcement was only to tell us that the family would now be seeing the video at 1:30 this afternoon. That's in 25 minutes or so from now. And, of course, we will be monitoring this story and any developments as we continue here throughout the hour, so stay tuned for that.

But we have much more to cover. We are continuing to follow new developments in the fight against the coronavirus.

Johnson & Johnson's vaccine back in action now after that pause over incidents of very rare blood clots, but will Americans feel comfortable getting it? Let's check in with CNN's Polo Sandoval. He's at the Javits Center in New York City, one of the mass vaccination sites in New York City.

So Polo, the Javits Center was authorized to administer the J&J vaccine. Have they resumed that since the recommended pause was lifted?

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well remember too Ana over the weekend it was the (ph) New York State health officials that essentially lifted that pause after that recommendation was issued by the CDC and by the FDA. That recommendation applying to all New York State run vaccination centers. And that includes, as you mentioned, the Javits Center that you see behind me. It's actually quite busy.

Health officials in the state of New York saying that that would be offered immediately, talking about the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. This is actually where I got my Johnson & Johnson vaccine about three weeks ago. And so, there certainly is this expectation that there will be interest given the fact that it is a one-dose vaccine.

But, health officials are certainly up against some vaccine hesitation. And as you look at some of these numbers, especially some polling that was released by ABC and the "Washington Post" this morning, now showing that only about a fifth of Americans would consider it safe.

And so because of that there is certainly this expectation that there will be more people coming to these locations interested in getting that Pfizer, interested in getting that Moderna vaccine even if it takes those two doses because of those concerns about that extremely rare risk of a blood clotting.

But, what we are seeing from New York State health authorities here is hoping to assure the public, even telling folks here in New York that the Clinical Advisory Task Force here in the state of New York has also looked at this vaccine and like the Federal Government has deemed it to be safe and effective. So, that is why you will -- you can expect it to be offered in -- at multiple locations.

But here's the thing though, just because some states or some locations might be offering it doesn't necessarily mean that they have it right now. It's going to take some time to ramp up those supplies, to get some of those millions of Johnson & Johnson vaccines to locations like these.

So, it's very possible that folks may actually head to those locations and might be told that they don't have that Johnson & Johnson vaccine available quite yet. But at the end of the day Federal Government now green-lighting it after that 11 day pause. Ana?

CABRERA: OK, Polo Sandoval, keep us posted. Thank you, sir. In other sign of something's returning to normal, fully vaccinated American tourists may be able to travel to Europe this summer.

CNN's Pete Muntean is following this from D.C. Pete, I understand the fast pace of vaccinations here in the U.S. was a big part of this decision by the E.U.

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well Ana, and also the E.U. is saying that our vaccines are good enough. Pfizer, Moderna, J&J all approved here by emergency use authorization, also approved in the European Union and its 27 member nations.

You know, this is so big because non-essential travel to the E.U. has essentially been banned for more than a year and now the head of the E.U. is saying that fully vaccinated Americans can travel there starting this summer. Still some details to iron out though.

We do not know the actual timeline of this. Not many specifics there yet. Also, don't know many specifics about how a vaccine passport will be used in order to prove your vaccination. Also, we are hearing from airlines that they cannot wait for this.

[13:10:00]

Delta Airlines says it's monitoring the situation. United Airlines is already adding routes to some places, Greece, Croatia, Iceland, places that already have relaxed their restrictions on vaccinated travelers and it seems like there will be more to come. Ana?

CABRERA: OK, Pete, thank you so much for that. A U.S. official just confirming to CNN the U.S. will begin chartering millions of doses of AstraZenaca's vaccine to other countries soon.

And joining us now is CNN Medical Analyst Dr. Celine Gounder. She's an infectious disease specialist and epidemiologist. Doctor, lots to talk about. First your reaction to the AstraZenaca news.

DR. CELINE GOUNDER, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: I am really relieved to hear that Ana. I have family -- half of my family is back in India right now and we have been watching the news very anxiously to see how the cases are spiking, deaths are spiraling out of control.

And so, this is not going to -- you can't vaccinate yourself out of a surge like this, but this is certainly going to be an important tool amongst many to addressing the crisis on the ground there.

CABRERA: Millions of Americans are getting their first vaccine shot but skipping their second one. Can you remind our viewers how much protection they get after receiving the first dose and why it is so important to get that second dose?

GOUNDER: Yes, and I think even some of experts have misinterpreted these numbers. So after your first dose of Moderna and Pfizer you have 80 percent vaccine effectiveness, but it's really important to understand that 80 percent is just for those couple weeks between doses. We don't actually know how long that protection is. And that protection was in the face of the original strains of the virus.

We know that the new variants are more infectious, more deadly and you need higher levels of antibody to protect against those. And so, you really need that second dose of vaccine to have protection against the new variants. CABRERA: The J&J vaccine is back on the market, as Polo reported, but

even before the pause was lifted a "Washington Post" ABC news poll found that people were less confident in this vaccine compared to Pfizer and Moderna. How do you build trust after what's happened this month?

GOUNDER: I think the process the CDC and the FDA took to review those side effects was really essential, because so much of trust in vaccines is really about trust in our health system and our government institutions that when the tell us something is safe and effective it is true. And so, I think that process was really important.

Now, some people are still nervous about the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. To be clear, there were very, very rare side effects with that. Your risk of getting blood clots with COVID are many fold higher. And so, if you're worried about blood clots, there's no question any vaccine is going to be the right path here.

CABRERA: OK, that's important news obviously. We are seeing cases start to dip a little. Right now we're averaging 58,000 new COVID infections a day over the last seven days and that is down about 14 percent since last week. But we seem to be getting conflicting messages about where we are in this pandemic.

First, listen to President Biden's Chief Medical Adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, CHIEF MEDIAL ADVISER TO PRESIDENT BIDEN: Something we need to pay attention to is that we're having still bout 60,000 new infections per day. That's a precarious level and we don't want that to go up.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: But then you have the former FDA Commissioner saying this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SCOTT GOTTLIEB, FORMER FDA COMMISSIONER: Right now the declines that we're seeing we can take to the bank. I think we can feel more assured because they're being driven by vaccinations and greater levels of population-wide immunity, not just from vaccination, but also from prior infection.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: So Dr. Gounder who do you agree with?

GOUNDER: There's truth in what they're both saying. We have been teetering on this knife's edge of 50,000 to 60,000 new cases every day for several months now. And that is a very high level and there is a very real risk that we could have a situation like we're seeing play out in Michigan, where because you have the new U.K. variant, the B117 variant, has become dominant there and really throughout the U.S., we have seen a big surge in cases among younger people who may not have had a chance to be vaccinated yet.

So, those 30, 40 and 50-year-olds are driving many of those new cases, hospitalizations and deaths. And so while the elderly have been really well covered by a vaccine and we're maybe not seeing the surge in cases in hospitalizations in that group, the rest of us still very much remain at real risk..

CABRERA: OK, we're not out of the woods yet is what I'm hearing you say. Dr. Celine Gounder, it's always great to have you with us. Thanks for your expertise and your ongoing hard work fighting this pandemic.

We are on top of any developments out of Elizabeth City, North Carolina, after the deadly police shooting of a black man. The calls for the release of that body-cam footage growing louder by the hour. And his death certificate just coming out saying he died from a wound to the head. Stay with us as we continue to follow that.

[13:15:00]

Plus, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy changes his story on Former President Trump's insurrection response. Here's the problem, his first response was all on tape.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: OK, so there's what happening in North Carolina involving the shooting death of Andrew Brown, Jr. But right now there's a Virginia man fighting for his life after being shot 10 times by a sheriff's deputy in that state. It happened just an hour after that same deputy gave him a ride home.

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Attorney's for Isaiah Brown say a communication failure led to this shooting. The deputy who gave Brown a ride home then returned in response to a 911 call placed by Brown. Lawyers say the deputy apparently mistook a phone for a gun. Here's part of the deputy's body-cam video in this case. Again, this is the Virginia case. And just a word of caution, this is disturbing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Drop the gun.

He's got a gun to his head.

Drop the gun now. Stop walking towards me. Stop walking towards me. Stop. Stop.

(GUN SHOTS)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Obviously hard to see what was happening. So let's turn to Brynn Gingras to fill in some of the blanks for us. What are officials saying Brynn? BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes Ana, and hard to hear as we are going to show you with the 911 call that was also released. Right now though authorities say that this is under investigation by a special prosecutor there in the state of Virginia.

And that deputy who fired the shots, well he is on administrative leave. But again, a 911 call was released in addition to that body- camera footage and it gives a little bit more insight into what happened before the shots were fired.

I'm going to go through it a little bit with you before we get to it. Essentially we hear the dispatcher communicating with 32-year-old Isaiah Brown and it's a domestic disturbance call.

You can hear Brown fighting with is brother and actually asks his brother for his gun. His brother refuses and then says to the dispatcher, I'm going to kill my brother. And the dispatcher basically says, don't kill your brother. You don't want to kill you brother.

And then asks multiple times to Brown if he is armed. Which Brown says he is not multiple times. And the audio continues where you hear Brown go out into the street and then you can actually hear the sirens blaring of the deputy arriving there on the scene. The 911 dispatcher is telling Brown, put your hands up multiples times and that's where this audio picks up that we want to let you listen to.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Isaiah are you holding your hands up?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Show me your hands.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Put your hands up.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Show me your hands now. Show me your hands. Drop the gun. Drop the gun now, stop walking towards me, stop walking towards me. Stop. Stop.

(GUN SHOTS)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Show your hands. Show me your hands. Drop the gun. Drop the gun.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

GINGRAS: And again, just as disturbing to hear. But what we've learned is that Brown was not holding a gun, as he said he wasn't to the dispatcher. Instead he was holding a cordless house phone that the deputy mistook for a gun according to authorities.

Of course, the family of Brown, their attorney says how could there have been this breakdown between the dispatcher and that arriving deputy? How do they make the steps that the make? And they want all the answers to that.

One more quick thing to point, Ana, the sheriff's department said that Brown is -- has non-life threatening injuries. Well, the family disputes that too. Saying right now he is fighting for his life with eight bullets still in him according to the family. Ana?

CABRERA: Wow, that is tough to hear, that video and see it. It's do disturbing. Thank you Brynn Gingras.

If you needed more proof that this is Trump's Republican Party, three months after House Minority Leader blamed the former president for the deadly riot at the Capitol. McCarthy now says Trump didn't provoke the mob.

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(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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CABRERA: Breaking news right now, Attorney General Merrick Garland is about to speak. What we do know now is he's expected to announce an investigation into practices of Louisville and that police department.

Evan Perez joins us now. What are you learning Evan?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right Ana, the Justice Department has been now since Merrick Garland took office has decided that they're going to do more of these investigations of police departments.

And now we have this announcement from the Attorney General that the Louisville police department where Breonna Taylor was killed last year is now going to be the subject of one of these pattern an practice investigations.

And that they're doing -- what they're going to do is they're going to go into that community, they're going to try to figure out what is wrong in the practices of that -- of that police department.

One of the things that emerged from the killing of Breonna Taylor was that the police there executed this warrant. It appears that there was very little done to make sure that she was there -- that -- I'm sorry, that who they were going after and she was killed in the -- in the process.

If you remember, there were charges that were brought against one of the police officers who was involved in planning the raid in which Breonna Taylor was killed, but none of the officers who were involved actually was charged with her death. It was simply because of -- because of endangerment of some of the neighbors that one detective was charged in that case.

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