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CNN Live Saturday
Families Speak Out Over 9/11 Report
Aired July 26, 2003 - 18:43 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOPHIA CHOI, CNN ANCHOR: The families of September 11 victims are looking for something in hundreds of pages of government documents -- answers. Answers to why clues were overlooked or discounted that could have alerted intelligence officials about the attacks. CNN's Michael Okwu says details from the comprehensive inquiry are creating more anger than closure.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MICHAEL OKWU, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Beverly Eckert says that on 9/11, she felt completely helpless. Her husband, Sean Rooney (ph), was trapped on the 105th floor of the south tower. He called Eckert, who was watching on television, looking for a way out.
BEVERLY ECKERT, 9/11 WIDOW: At some point, you know, the windows were getting hot and smoke was coming in, you know, and then he knew.
OKWU: Two years later, Eckert is still looking for answers. Why did the man she met and fell in love with in high school 36 years ago died? And could the government have prevented it?
After reviewing a 9/11 congressional report, she and other victims' families are angry, and even more convinced that the CIA and FBI failed to heed warnings and al Qaeda was about to strike.
ECKERT: The smoking gun was people plotting this, getting funding, taking flying lessons, doing dry runs. It was all there.
OKWU: Eckert and others are incensed that the Justice Department failed, in their view, to adequately fund intelligence agencies. That the CIA did not communicate with the FBI. And that the FBI, under the leadership of Louis Freeh, failed to decipher critical information available to it.
ECKERT: I think his next job should be guard at ground zero, at the entrance to the -- excuse me -- to the place where the unidentified remains are going to be interred.
OKWU: William Doyle lost his oldest son, 25-year-old Joseph, a trader for Cantor Fitzgerald.
WILLIAM DOYLE, LOST SON ON 9/11: Nothing.
OKWU: Doyle says all these empty pages are about the role of Saudi Arabia. The White House, which took seven months to screen the document for sensitive material, deleted the information he says because the government wants to keep Saudi Arabia's support for the terrorists' secret.
DOYLE: There are so many oil dealings and what have you, and I don't honestly -- I honestly believe that they did not want that to come out in the wash.
OKWU: After reading the report, Doyle says that the INS is to blame too, that the hijackers never should have been allowed to stay in the country. He temper, his anger reflecting by a shrine for his son.
Two years after the fact, the report doesn't seem to offer closure. Instead, a new opening in a very raw wound.
Michael Okwu, CNN, New York.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired July 26, 2003 - 18:43 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOPHIA CHOI, CNN ANCHOR: The families of September 11 victims are looking for something in hundreds of pages of government documents -- answers. Answers to why clues were overlooked or discounted that could have alerted intelligence officials about the attacks. CNN's Michael Okwu says details from the comprehensive inquiry are creating more anger than closure.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MICHAEL OKWU, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Beverly Eckert says that on 9/11, she felt completely helpless. Her husband, Sean Rooney (ph), was trapped on the 105th floor of the south tower. He called Eckert, who was watching on television, looking for a way out.
BEVERLY ECKERT, 9/11 WIDOW: At some point, you know, the windows were getting hot and smoke was coming in, you know, and then he knew.
OKWU: Two years later, Eckert is still looking for answers. Why did the man she met and fell in love with in high school 36 years ago died? And could the government have prevented it?
After reviewing a 9/11 congressional report, she and other victims' families are angry, and even more convinced that the CIA and FBI failed to heed warnings and al Qaeda was about to strike.
ECKERT: The smoking gun was people plotting this, getting funding, taking flying lessons, doing dry runs. It was all there.
OKWU: Eckert and others are incensed that the Justice Department failed, in their view, to adequately fund intelligence agencies. That the CIA did not communicate with the FBI. And that the FBI, under the leadership of Louis Freeh, failed to decipher critical information available to it.
ECKERT: I think his next job should be guard at ground zero, at the entrance to the -- excuse me -- to the place where the unidentified remains are going to be interred.
OKWU: William Doyle lost his oldest son, 25-year-old Joseph, a trader for Cantor Fitzgerald.
WILLIAM DOYLE, LOST SON ON 9/11: Nothing.
OKWU: Doyle says all these empty pages are about the role of Saudi Arabia. The White House, which took seven months to screen the document for sensitive material, deleted the information he says because the government wants to keep Saudi Arabia's support for the terrorists' secret.
DOYLE: There are so many oil dealings and what have you, and I don't honestly -- I honestly believe that they did not want that to come out in the wash.
OKWU: After reading the report, Doyle says that the INS is to blame too, that the hijackers never should have been allowed to stay in the country. He temper, his anger reflecting by a shrine for his son.
Two years after the fact, the report doesn't seem to offer closure. Instead, a new opening in a very raw wound.
Michael Okwu, CNN, New York.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
