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5 School Districts in Hardest-Hit Florida Areas Closed; Black Residents in 2 Neighborhoods Say They're Being Left Out of Ft. Myers & Naples Relief Efforts; Uvalde School District Fires Former DPS Officer After CNN Report. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired October 06, 2022 - 14:30   ET

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

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[14:32:26]

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN HOST: In Florida, we're seeing small steps towards recovery. It's been more than a week since Hurricane Ian hit. Florida Power & Light says it has restored power to two million customers.

Public schools in Collier County reopened today. Attendance was light in there.

And for a second day, people have been allowed to return to Sanibel Island to see the damage.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: CNN's Randi Kaye is in Naples for us.

Randi, are most of the schools open and operational there?

RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Here in the Naples area, Alisyn and Victor, this is Collier County. They did open today. It was a light turnout. They're taking in students from Lee County right next door because that county was so hard-hit.

In fact, 22 percent of the district's teachers here in Collier County live in Lee County. They've lost homes and cars. That makes getting to their teaching jobs difficult.

And students here in Collier County are being offered free breakfast and lunch until the end of the month.

I mentioned Lee County. They're going to announce a plan for reopening schools on Friday. The superintendent says, as far as the damage assessment goes, 54 percent of schools suffered from some damage and some are beyond repair, which certainly isn't good news.

And in Charlotte County, where Punta Gorda is, they hope the students can return by October 24th. They're still figuring it out. It's taking time there.

Every, single school there, according to the superintendent, did receive damage. Some are still without power. There were roofs that blew off. There was a lot of flooding and water in the schools.

So it is going to take some time -- Victor, Alisyn?

BLACKWELL: Randi, tell us about the claims in some black neighborhoods that they say they're being treated differently, that they're getting slower support during the recovery period?

KAYE: Yes, Victor. Not only slower support in the recovery period but also problems before the storm.

We visited River Park, which is a historically black community in the Naples area. They said they didn't get any mandatory evacuations orders at all.

This is a coastal community. Not every home there has a seawall. In fact, the local NAACP says they have been fighting to get seawalls there.

But some of the residents say they evacuated the zoo about a mile away under a mandatory evacuation order but they did not evacuate this community.

Residents told us, the water chest-high. They walked from some of their homes to the 7-Eleven, on higher ground. They got picked up there by some first responders and dropped off at a mall about a mile away and left there. They were soaking wet. They weren't given blankets or anything.

[14:35:01]

They also told me that search and rescue has not been by to knock on doors and check on community members.

Here's a bit of our conversation with one of the women who experienced this.

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SHARDA WILLIAMS, NAPLES, FL, RESIDENT: I would think they would have brought some type of blankets that we just walked through water. Wind blowing like crazy. There's kids and stuff.

KAYE: Do you think the community was forgotten during the storm?

WILLIAMS: I do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAYE: We reached out to the Collier County Sheriff's Department. They directed us to the Naples police. They said that's who we should ask out questions to.

We were very specific with our questions, asking about why -- what the evacuation orders were, if any, that were given. Were they text messages? Why did they go door-to-door? And we also asked about the zoo and we asked why there was no search

and rescue, as well. We have not received a response from the Naples police regarding our questions -- Victor, Alisyn?

BLACKWELL: All right, Randi Kaye, thank you.

CAMEROTA: CNN has exclusive reporting on how an officer, who chose to stay outside during the school shooting in Uvalde, was hired to protect other schoolchildren in Uvalde. We have a major update for you next.

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[14:40:42]

CAMEROTA: Now, to a jaw-dropping CNN exclusive. A police officer under investigation for her slow response to the Robb Elementary School shooting was hired to protect other Uvalde school kids. But now there's a big update.

BLACKWELL: CNN's Shimon Prokupecz broke this story.

What's the latest?

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME & JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: The latest is the officer is now fired. The school district announcing they terminated her, removed her from the school.

Of course, parents were really, really upset when this news first came to them yesterday. We spoke to them before our story aired.

But they had hired this school police officer. She was a former state trooper with the Department of Public Safety, the DPS.

And she was under investigation for her failed response to the school shooting. Somehow, some way, the school hired her to be a police officer at the elementary school there.

What's interesting is, in the statement that the school district issues, they say the reason they fired her is over comments we aired that she made at the end of the whole shooting. They went over and rescued some of the kids.

She talked about something. The school says they fired her was over the comments. They said they were deeply disturbed over these comments. There are not comments that they would find or anyone would find particularly useful.

And he said they're "deeply distressed by the information that was disclosed yesterday evening concerning one of our recently hired employees, Crimson Elizondo."

And they apologized to the parents for this.

Take a listen to what they are preferring to as the comments from the officer. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED POLICE OFFICER: My son's in daycare. He's not old enough.

UNIDENTIFIED POLICE OFFICER: I saw you --

UNIDENTIFIED POLICE OFFICER: Yes, I know. No, if my son had been in there, I would not have been outside. I promise you that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PROKUPECZ: Certainly, those are comments that the families found particularly disturbing, the fact she was saying that there. And then, she would be in a school. These parents would see her.

That's how the story came to us. A parent of one of the victims saw her at the school. They recognized her from body camera footage. Well, she's former DPS. How is she now working at the school?

The other thing that's troubling -- and we're just getting this, this is all new -- the Texas Department of Public Safety just released information, pursuant to public information request, that indicates that they notified the school that she was under investigation by the inspector general as early as August 1st, July 28th.

There's a letter that says that they know notified, pursuant to a ground check, from the school. The school has asked, OK, she a former DPS officer, we're about to hire here, we need a background check. The DPS sends them this information.

Now, we don't know why. Why did the school, in the end, hire her? We have no accounting from the school. They've refused to answer any of our questions. They've not told us anything about the hiring process, the vetting process.

Obviously, the pain here for the families continues. They're still getting piecemeal, not getting a full picture.

And still questions for the DPS and how officers responded.

She was one of the first officers on-scene at that school. The reason she was referred for information, was because she wasn't prepared. She didn't have her gear with her. She didn't have her tactical vest. She didn't have her long rifle.

And just her conduct throughout the shooting raised a lot of concerns for the DPS. So they referred her for the investigation. And she winds up working for the school. It's just incredible.

CAMEROTA: Shimon, I have to say that none of this would have come to light if not for your reporting. You have stayed there. You have been there for months. You've been asking the questions that the parents can't get answers to. Because we really didn't ever leave Uvalde. You have stayed there.

PROKUPECZ: Thank you. I think the credit goes to the parents also. They're really fighting.

But there's the district attorney there who is refusing to release any information. And right now, there's this battle.

But I think this is going to start shaking some things.

And all I can say is our reporting is going to continue. There will be more information that will come out. I think it would be best for officials there to start talking and start releasing the information.

It's going to come out. It's just -- they have to make the decision whether or not they do it or they are going to allow reporters to continue to dig.

We're going to get there. We're going to get that information out.

CAMEROTA: Yes. These poor parents who have been through enough.

Shimon, thank you so much.

[14:45:02]

BLACKWELL: A family of four in California is found dead days after video captured them being abducted at gunpoint. Investigators are desperate now to find out why.

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VERN WARNKE, SHERIFF, MERCED COUNTY, CA, POLICE DEPARTMENT: This is totally senseless. The whole family wiped out and we still don't know why.

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BLACKWELL: A tragic ending in California for a missing family of four. They were kidnapped this week in Merced. Authorities say their bodies were discovered last night at a rural orchard.

CAMEROTA: Surveillance video shows the family, a couple, their 8- month-old baby and the baby's uncle, being abducted Monday at gunpoint.

CNN's Natasha Chen is following this investigation.

Natasha, we understand there is a suspect in custody? But do police know a motive for this? And are they looking for anyone else?

[14:49:58]

NATASHA CHEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Alisyn, investigators are working on that potential motive by talking to this suspect, who yesterday was sedated for most of the day because police say that he tried to take his own life before law enforcement got involved. So, he was receiving medical. Now they are having conversations with

him. They won't reveal details of that, however.

I spoke with the public information officer from the sheriff's department who told me he is their sole suspect right now. But given the circumstances of what happened, the sheriff says there could be other people involved.

While they cannot say for a fact that the person in custody is the person you're seeing from this surveillance image on screen, they believe that is him. That's what she said.

We can tell from the details of what the sheriff's office was learning that this was really angering the sheriff.

Here is how emotional he got yesterday with the press after the bodies were found.

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WARNKE: The circumstances around this, when we are able to release everything, should anger the hell out of you on how things went down. I told the other crew that was here earlier, there's a special place in hell for this guy. I'm hoping he is there for a long time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHEN: The sheriff was emotional enough that he even said he hopes this person gets the death penalty. Keep in mind, there's a moratorium on that in the state of California.

But still, he talked about how this is incredibly emotional because this involves the killing of an 8-month-old baby.

And from that surveillance video that we saw, we can see that person carrying a firearm and leading these people out the back door of their trucking business, the two men hands tied, zip tied behind their backs.

Of course one of the victim's ATM cards was used in a bank transaction. Given the suspect's history, the sheriff says it's possible money may play a part in the motive here -- Alisyn and Victor?

BLACKWELL: Natasha Chen, thank you.

CAMEROTA: Closing arguments just wrapping up in the Alex Jones trial. A judge has already ruled the right-wing conspiracy theorist is libel for peddling lies about the Sandy Hook school massacre.

BLACKWELL: Now jurors have to decide the damages.

CNN's Jean Casarez is with us now.

So tell us what was heard today in the closing arguments. JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You're so right, damages. And that's

really what the plaintiffs' attorney focused in on in this rebuttal close, the damages, the monetary amounts that they have to award for defamation/slander, per se, and also emotional distress.

The plaintiffs' attorney, Josh Koskoff, really went into the fact that the defense closing argument was trying to be all about politics.

You heard over and over again, he told the jury this is not a case about politics. But he's trying to divide you. He's trying to hook you. Because you have to be unanimous in your damages.

The plaintiffs' attorney went on to try to bring the jury together by what the plaintiffs say are the facts. Take a listen.

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JOSH KOSKOFF, PLAINTIFF'S ATTORNEY: Alex Jones is a liar. You get that, right? This idea that he is even a conspiracy theorist is a lie.

When it comes to the truth, Alex Jones is nothing but an arsonist. He sets fire to the truth and he spreads that roaring fire immediately from his place in Austin, up to Connecticut, to Washington.

NORM PATTIS, ATTORNEY FOR ALEX JONES: Are these the word of a man who, for the sake of a dollar, targeted these families? Or are they the words of a man who's lost trust in our basic institutions?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: Basic institutions - obviously, bringing that political argument into the courtroom right there in the closings.

The closings have just ended, as you just heard. Short break. The jury will be charged. And then they will deliberate.

I'll tell you, there are so many charts and graphs, because the amount of viewership to his Web site and his program and the amount of money that he made exponentially into the millions whenever he would bring up Sandy Hook.

So the jury has to look at all of this to determine damages.

CAMEROTA: It's so vile, all that he said.

CASAREZ: And the family listened to the closing arguments. They were in the courtroom. The camera showed them. They were sitting there very intently focused.

CAMEROTA: Jean Casarez, thank you very much for that report.

[14:54:26]

An Ebola outbreak in Uganda is prompting the CDC to take new steps at several airports in the U.S. We'll explain and give you the details.

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CAMEROTA: An Ebola outbreak in Uganda has U.S. officials rerouting passengers who have traveled to the country.

BLACKWELL: Starting at midnight, they'll be sent to five airports for enhanced screening.

CNN's Jacqueline Howard joins us for more now.

Jacqueline, just want to be clear, there are no cases of Ebola in the U.S. right now, are they?

JACQUELINE HOWARD, CNN HEALTH REPORTER: That's right. There are no suspected, probable or confirmed cases here in the U.S., but U.S. Officials do want to take an abundance of caution.

And that's why passengers who have been in Uganda 21 days prior to their arrival in the U.S. are being sent to Newark, New Jersey, New York City, Washington, D.C., Chicago and Atlanta for that enhanced screening.

[14:59:59]

And the reason why, the species of Ebola virus that's causing the outbreak in Uganda is the Sudan species. This is one we don't have a vaccine. We don't have an approved treatment.