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Erin Burnett Outfront
U.S. Warship Moves Closer To North Korea; Judd Adviser: Democrats Sabotaged Senate Run; Second Texas Prosecutor Gunned Down
Aired April 01, 2013 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ERIN BURNETT, CNN ANCHOR: OUTFRONT next, the U.S. Navy closes in on North Korea. America responds to Kim Jong-Un's latest threats with a warship.
Plus why did Ashley Judd decide not to run for the U.S. Senate? Was she a victim of a Democratic Party hit job?
And just two months after a deputy district attorney in Texas was gunned down, his boss and his wife also murdered. Prosecutors say they are living in fear. Let's go OUTFRONT.
Good evening, everyone. I'm Erin Burnett. OUTFRONT tonight, American warship closing in. The U.S. Navy tonight is moving one destroyer and one sea based radar platform closer to the North Korean Peninsula tonight after U.S. stealth fighter jets were deployed to South Korea yesterday.
The destroyer, the USS John S. McCain is prepared to shoot down a missile from North Korea. Let's get to our Kyung Lah. She is in Seoul tonight. Kyung, what can you tell us about the warship?
KYUNG LAH, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, we can tell you is that this is a warship that generally is ported in Japan, it ports in Japan. It's part of the Navy's seventh fleet. And what the Defense Department officials confirming to CNN is that it will now move closer to South Korea. Why?
It is to monitor any sort of military moves in North Korea, specifically any potential missile moves, any missile launches. That's specifically what they're concerned about. We understand from that Defense Department official that this may be the first of other naval moves.
Some important context here, though. This is not the first time that the seventh fleet moved a warship into these waters. In 2010, the USS George Washington was actually moved over here during a similar time. Tensions were a little higher. The U.S. and South Korea was also engaging an ongoing drill.
So that's important context here. Not the very first time, but certainly a signal to North Korea that the U.S. Navy, that the U.S. military is watching what is happening on the ground. The Pentagon spokesman today, Erin, we should also mention that he feels we need to separate this, that this is part of ongoing ship moves in this area. BURNETT: Right. I know they're trying to make that point. We're being careful, but we're not overreacting. What about on the North Korean side today, Kyung? The government released a new video of troops and we'll show it to our viewers live fire training exercises.
And they're shooting at targets which include one that looks like an American soldier. You see the USA on the helmet there. The text says kill the United States. Now we don't know where the footage was shot.
It was actually broadcast on North Korean state television today. You know, that video, as you know, Kyung, comes on top of ones we've seen recently with New York City in flames, the White House and capitol also under attack. What is the message here on this newest video?
LAH: Well, you know, the message is kind of clear. They don't like us. They feel that the U.S. is the enemy and should be destroyed. It is actually just the latest song in the symphony of crazy coming out of the kingdom. So this is something if you watch North Korea, you see quite a bit of.
But this is something important to note. It is a little more rare to see them firing at a paper soldier with the words USA on it. In the past, we've seen more typically they blow up a dummy of the South Korean president or run over a paper doll of South Korean president.
This is specifically pointing out that they feel the United States is the enemy. The important thing, though, to note is that they are speaking to a North Korean audience. That is what analysts largely believe. This message is to try to shore up the support within that country.
BURNETT: All right, Kyung Lah, thank you very much, reporting live from Seoul tonight. OUTFRONT tonight, our contributor retired Army General James "Spider" Marks who served as the senior intelligence officer in Korea and David Kang, Director of the Korean Studies Institute at the University of Southern California.
Appreciate both of you taking the time. General, let me start with you. We were showing that video of the North Korean soldiers shooting at a paper cut out of an American soldier with the words USA written across the helmet.
As our Kyung Lah reports, look, this is for a North Korean audience. But to you, how important are these videos, which seem to be coming out fast and furiously and very directly targeting the U.S.?
GENERAL JAMES "SPIDER" MARKS, U.S. ARMY (RETIRED): Erin, the key thing for us is to see what's a state of readiness with the North Korean military and has there been a change, a demonstrative change in terms of their ability to launch a no notice warning or a no warning attack against South Korea, which would come in the form of artillery or missiles. So this video of shooting against targets that are labelled as U.S. soldiers really is not significant. It's all the other intelligence collection that is taking place right now, which is clearly going on as United States makes moves that are different from what they have done before to see how North Korea will respond. That's what's most significant.
BURNETT: Now David, you know, he refers to all the other intelligence, of course. There's been a lot of that lately. It does seem like the Americans have the best intelligence on one level and I say this half facetiously. Do we know enough about this man, Kim Jong-Un, this young man, to know that he won't cross the line? That he won't take this just beyond rhetoric?
DAVID KANG, KOREAN STUDIES INSTITUTE, UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA: Well, we don't know actually much about him, which I think is one reason that people on the outside of North Korea are a little bit more worried.
Because in the first year of his rule, he is overseeing what's a pretty vitriolic propaganda campaign. At the same time that they're doing this, he's also watching basketball with Dennis Rodman and going to amusement parks with his pretty wife and telling his domestic audience everything is fine.
BURNETT: Yes, I mean, it's pretty amazing. Just imagine what goes on in the head of that man. Spider, you know, Jay Carney, the press secretary for the president was asked by a reporter today something, you know, we thought was pretty important.
A White House briefing and a reporter asked whether the United States plans to engage in a pre-emptive strike against North Korea, which is a crucial question. The reporter then pressed Carney with a follow up saying, why not try to bomb North Korea? Here's the exchange.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why not try to bomb North Korea?
JAY CARNEY, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Well, I don't think that's a serious question.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: And on that note, he ended the briefing. Now the question is one of whether to do a pre-emptive strike. How is that not a serious question?
MARKS: It's a very serious question. Frankly, what we have seen in North Korea we need to take very, very seriously. A new leader who has been in place now a year, quite young, is he worldly wise? We're not too sure. We know he's been connected to the world through the internet, et cetera, and some life experiences.
But what we really need to be aware of is what is his control or relationship with the military. The leadership in North Korea clearly takes its lead from the military. That is the governing body in the north. We have to be very, very serious about that.
So it's a serious question, but we have 60 years of experience in terms of trying to create and maintain a certain degree of stasis on the peninsula so it doesn't get out of control. Clearly, we don't want to be so provocative of the north that they end up doing something that really turns this into a conflagration.
The concern we had certainly is what is the control that China has over North Korea? We would guess that it's probably waning. What is our relationship with the south? It's very tight, but again, the south has its own national interests. We have to make sure we're married up with that.
BURNETT: David, what is the red line? When does President Obama feel he needs to act? George W. Bush didn't go to war to stop North Korea from getting that ultimate step of obtaining a nuclear weapon. What is the red line for President Obama? This is already a nuclear armed country. They're just trying to have weapons that will go further and have better aim.
KANG: I think the red line is if they attack us first, and I think that's why the comment earlier was it's not a serious question. The reason that it's not serious is we would not pre-empt North Korea because we actually take fairly seriously that they would respond.
So I think there is no question. In what we've been doing in the last couple of weeks has been showing North Korea if they do something first, we will respond. Everyone is making their point now. I think both sides take it pretty seriously that other side would respond, which is why deterrence is fairly stable.
BURNETT: All right, well, thanks very much. I appreciate both of you taking the time.
Still to come, last week, Ashley Judd, the actress announced she is not going to be running for the U.S. Senate. Everyone blamed, you know, people like Karl Rove. But was it really that or was it a Democratic Party takedown?
Plus the Colorado movie theatre shooter wants a plea deal. The D.A. though made its decision today.
And the most painful sports moment of the day, no, not that one. It's our president.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BURNETT: Our second story, OUTFRONT, sabotage. The real reason actress Ashley Judd decided not to run for a U.S. Senate seat from Kentucky, other Democrats. It's always your own kind. It's when you're in the mafia and they kill you it's the worst.
According to Judd's adviser, Jonathan Miller, a small group of Democrats duped the national press and helped push Judd out of the race, but is that whole story? Judd's adviser Jonathan Miller joins me along with Dana Milbank, "Washington Post" political columnist.
I appreciate both of you taking the time. Jonathan, let me start with you. You wanted Judd to run. She's got name recognition, beautiful woman. She's got money. She's got connections. She's got a lot of things that are really important for a candidate for public office. So why do you think she was sabotaged?
JONATHAN MILLER, FRIEND/ADVISER TO ASHLEY JUDD: Well, you know, I think that what happened was there are two groups of people that were being quoted most of all in the news media whether they were on the record or they were behind the scenes.
And some of them wanted another candidate, Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes and some for good reasons, they wanted her. They thought she'd be a stronger candidate. But others sought to either profit from her working on her campaigns or would love to have a friend in the U.S. Senate.
Then kind of ironically on the other side, you had people who weren't friends of Secretary Grimes who wanted to push her into the Senate race so that she would not be running for governor or lieutenant governor back home because she might be a rival of one of their preferred candidates.
So really the establishment on both sides turned against Judd. I'm sure they had some good reasons as well. But unfortunately, those reasons weren't being -- the negative reasons weren't being covered and the voters and the American people weren't getting a real good sense of why people were saying what they were saying.
BURNETT: Like I said, it's worse when you have your own side as your enemy. Because, you know, when we were covering this everyone was saying the reason that Ashley got out of the race was because Republicans. They were all on the anti-Judd bandwagon. They were worried about her. Let me just play quickly this ad by Karl Rove.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A leader who knows how to follow.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I will go wherever the president wants me to go.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Someone who will never forget where she came from.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It just clicked. Tennessee is home. It just clicked --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Kentucky.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Someone who knows what's good for us.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Obamacare has meant so much for us here in Tennessee.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Someone who shares our values.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Karl Rove or the Democrats, Dana?
DANA MILBANK, POLITICAL COLUMNIST, THE WASHINGTON POST: Well, the answer is, yes. It's a little bit of each here. The ones who definitely did want her to run were all of us in the media. We were dying for an Ashley Judd --
BURNETT: That's true. We would have loved it.
MILBANK: It would have been terrific for ratings, terrific for readers. It would have been good all around. I think the Republicans did want to run against her. I think they overplayed their hand. They expected her to be running. See, what the Republicans want to be doing was running a national campaign against Ashley Judd, not just there in Kentucky where let's face it, Mitch McConnell is in a very strong position there. Got a lot of money. And it's a very conservative state. It was going to be an uphill battle for anybody.
What Democrats were particularly worried about and what Republicans wanted to do was run against her in other red states. To sort of have the reverse of the Todd Akin effect, to try to make other people answer for what they would say were Hollywood liberals. So that's why I think Jonathan is right. The Democrats were antsy about it and perhaps not for all the same reasons. But they definitely were antsy about the candidacy.
BURNETT: All right. I want to squeeze one other topic in today because I can't resist. You know, the sports moment of the day -- if you all think that I'm talking about, you know, that horrible leg incident, and you obviously aren't watching the video -- because I want to show the video of the president. You know, you know he's great at basketball, right?
I mean, I probably could have made that shot. Not made it, made it as badly as he made it. This is the White House Easter Egg Roll. He made a stop at the basketball court, shooting a few hoops with some NBA players. That's probably why he was -- maybe he was nervous. 15 shots before he got a basket. He made two out of 22.
What do you think about that, Dana? I mean, this is a blow to his pride. Maybe this puts the criticism to rest recently that he's taking so much vacation. I guess if he's taking a lot of vacation, he would have been, you know, a little bit more up to snuff.
MILBANK: This could be the worst presidential moment since that unfortunate bowling incident during the 2008 campaign. This is ugly. He should be able to - two out of 22 he should be able to do with blindfolds. But then the kid comes after him and makes the lay-up. So, that's just unfortunate.
BURNETT: I know. Jonathan, this leads me to maybe a conspiracy theory here. Maybe the president was purposely taking bad shots to look good. Like, look, you know, I'm not practicing very much. MILLER: Well, I think it really is going to hurt him in Kentucky. Thank goodness he doesn't have to run here again. You know, our state, Kevin Ware episode last night, the broken leg has united our state for the first time, I believe, in the Bluegrass state history between the U of L and the UK fans. I'm a UK fan, andI was rooting for U of L after that incident. And it didn't hurt that they were playing Duke, who we all hate from western to eastern Kentucky.
BURNETT: Oh, wow, I got to agree. I don't like Duke, either. But my partner, Will Sarahi (ph), loves Duke. So, all right. Thanks very much, guys. Appreciate it.
All right. Still to come, the D.A. rejects a plea deal from the Colorado movie theater shooter. Will he face death?
Plus, the op-ed that everyone is talking about. A woman says girls should go to college to find a husband. Sexist or smart? Well, guess what? She's OUTFRONT tonight.
And another oil spill: thousands of barrels of crude pouring out of a ruptured pipeline in this country. We have the pictures.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BURNETT: Our third story OUTFRONT, an eye for an eye. Prosecutors in Colorado will seek the death penalty for James Holmes in the movie theater shooting deaths of 12 people. The district attorney today said he's not going to consider a plea deal because in this case and, I want to quote his words, "Justice is death." Jim Spellman is OUTFRONT tonight with a special report from Centennial, Colorado.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JIM SPELLMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Minutes after prosecutors declared they would pursue the death penalty against James Holmes, frustrated victim Marcus Weaver sends a message directly to the defendant from outside the court.
MARCUS WEAVER, AURORA SHOOTING VICTIM: Mr. Holmes, if you're listening to a victim and somebody who was hurt by what you did, if you just plead guilty, we could all move forward, you know?
SPELLMAN: Weaver is one of 60 victims D.A. George Brockler spoke with before making his decision and telling a courtroom inside full of victims, family members and Holmes' own parents that in this case, justice is death.
Welcome news to Bryan Beard whose friend, Alex Sullivan, was gunned down in the attack.
BRYAN BEARD, FRIEND OF AURORA SHOOTING VICTIM: Give me a front row ticket. I want to be there for it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why is that?
BEARD: Why? He took my good friend from this earth. SPELLMAN: Last week, it appeared that a deal was in works, with Holmes offering to plead guilty if the death penalty was taken off the table. But prosecutors said they couldn't take the deal without more information. And for the moment, it seems the deal is not being considered.
The judge anticipates a trial lasting well into 2014 at the earliest, frustrating victims and families and friends.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There is no punishment that this kid deserves more so than being in excruciating pain every single day the rest of his life. But sadly that's not the way that we can work in the judicial system right now. So to me, whatever we can do to have this justice quick and to provide closure for friends and familiar is the most important thing.
SPELLMAN: For Marcus Weaver whose arm still goes numb from the shotgun blast he took to the shoulder, it's time for Holmes to put an end to some of his suffering.
WEAVER: We feel that you already know you are guilty. So, why don't you just plead guilty and accept your fate?
SPELLMAN: Holmes could change his plea at any time to not guilty by reason of insanity, further delaying the trial and further frustrating the victims and families. Erin?
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BURNETT: All right. Thanks very much to Jim.
And still to come, just two months after a deputy district attorney is gunned down in Texas, his boss also murdered in cold blood. Prosecutors are now living in fear.
Plus, an OUTFRONT investigation tonight. An all-white student group patrolling a college campus to fight what it says is an increase in black-on-white crime. Well, we investigated. Do the numbers add up?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BURNETT: Welcome back to the second half of OUTFRONT. We start with stories we care about where we focus on our reporting from the front lines.
So we begin with a massive cleanup which is underway in Mayflower, Arkansas. 12,000 barrels of oil spilled there over the weekend. It's called the Pegasus Pipeline. It runs more than 800 miles from Illinois to Texas. It's ruptured, and so heavy crude is now flowing like a river in one neighborhood. An EPA coordinator tells OUTFRONT the fumes were so strong that 22 homes actually had to be evacuated. He is hoping residents will be home within a week. It's going to take that long. They still don't actually know what caused the leak. Well, jury selection begins tomorrow in the wrongful death lawsuit filed by Michael Jackson's mother against his concert promoter. That company is called AEG Live. The lawsuit alleges AEG was negligent in its supervision of Dr. Conrad Murray who is, of course, the personal physician found guilty of manslaughter for giving Jackson lethal levels of Propofol, which is a powerful anesthetic. If he is called to the stand, Dr. Murray said he'll plead the fifth.
Now, USC law professor Jodie R. Moore tells us that the Jacksons actually has a strong case if they can prove the doctor was pressured by AEG to take risks to get Jackson to show up. If the Jacksons prevail, he says, though, they could recover billions of dollars.
Well, CNN has learned that Caroline Kennedy is being vetted to be the United States next ambassador to Japan. Kennedy, you may recall, was a key supporter of President Obama's during the election.
Now, this is a bipartisan thing, this kind of crony ambassadorship thing. Former George W. Bush chief of staff Andrew Card noted on this program that since the 1960s, about a third of diplomatic positions tend to go it political backers, not to career diplomats who have the experience. So, a lot of people say this is ridiculous and it's bad. But Card argues that some nations prefer having someone in the ambassadorship who can get the president on the phone.
Well, outrage, ire, gaffe, war on Easter. I think we overuse the word war in our culture. But anyway, these are just some of the words being used to describe the anger some feel after Google chose to commemorate Cesar Chavez with a famous doodle instead of Easter.
I'm sorry we have to burst your bubble if you're among the outraged, because we did some digging and found that last time Google actually honored Easter was more than a decade ago. So it's not a sudden snub.
And moreover, we said, look, is this an anti-Christian thing? Nope, it's not. Google does not usually celebrate any religious holidays no matter the flavor. Even around Christmas time, the site leaves religion out of the doodles.
Well, it has been 606 days since the U.S. lot of its top credit rating. What we going to get it back?
Stocks sell from their record today, and Wall Street talked about an op-ed in "The New York Times" this weekend by Ronald Reagan's budget director, David Stockman.
Markets are in a bubble and that when it bursts, quote, "we should be very afraid. America will descend into an era of zero sum austerity and virulent political conflict."
And now our fourth story OUTFRONT: we have breaking news. CNN has been learning new details about the murder of Texas district attorney Mike McLelland and his wife Cynthia. The two were found dead in their home over the weekend. And their murders came almost two months to the day after McLelland's assistant Mark Haase was gunned down.
Ed Lavandera is in Kaufman following the story.
And, Ed, what are the new details tonight?
ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, these are a few details that are emerging from a search warrant affidavit that was filed here in Kaufman County late this afternoon. And what is interesting is that it shed light as to when and how the bodies of Mike McLelland and his wife were found.
According to this search warrant document, the last time anyone had spoken with the McLellands was Friday night. And then their bodies were discovered 6:45 on Saturday night. So, almost about a full 24 hours when friends had gotten too worried about not being able to talk to them so long. They went over to the house and that's when their bodies were discovered with, quote, "multiple gunshot wounds" to both victims.
So, the last conversation with them was on March 29th, which was last Friday night. And it also revealed -- the documents also revealed that investigators are also getting the phone records of both Cynthia and Mike McLelland for the last two months and trying to go over those as well.
So, those are the latest tidbits that have come out from this search warrant affidavit that we've got a hold of.
BURNETT: And, Ed, you know, it's been two months. We don't yet know what happened to Mr. Haase. Mike McLelland had been vocal about putting a dent in the Aryan Brotherhood in the past year. Are investigators saying anything about a publicity of white supremacists being involved in these murders or are they hesitating?
LAVANDERA: Well, you know, officially, they're not saying much. But a lot of this stems back to originally two months ago when Mark Hasse was killed as he was walking to work. And that the allegations of perhaps some Aryan Brotherhood connection emerged after.
And then was back in December, the Texas Department of Public Safety had put out a statewide bulletin warning law enforcement agencies that perhaps they had intelligence that some of these members of the groups were actively planning retaliation. So, all of that had been kind of floating around out there. But WFAA-TV here in the Dallas area reported last night that they had exchange e-mails with Mike McLelland over the last couple days before he was murdered and in those e-mails, he seemed to down play that connection.
BURNETT: All right. Well, thank you very much, Ed. We appreciate your time.
While investigators searching for answers and possible links between the two murders, prosecutors across the state are taking extra precautions for their own safety.
WFAA-TV reporter Rebecca Lopez has been communicating with prosecutor Mike McLelland in the weeks before his murder, and she's OUTFRONT tonight.
Rebecca, I appreciate your taking the time to speak us with. Let me just start with this. I know you have been e-mailing with the prosecutor Mike McLelland. Did he give you any indication that he was concerned about his safety?
REBECCA LOPEZ, WFAA-TV: Not at all. In fact, we got an e-mail from him three days before he was murdered. And there was no indication that he was concerned at all.
In fact, right after Mark Hasse's murder, he came out and said we're going to come and hunt you down. We're going to hunt down the person that did this. We're going to dig you out of your hole. He was not afraid at all.
There was obviously extra security measures that were put in place in Kaufman County after Hasse's murder.
And so, there were some security measures. But he didn't seem concerned. In fact, in one of the e-mails, he also talks about Hasse and whether or not he was concerned about any of the cases that he had prosecuted and he said he wasn't scared of anyone that he had prosecuted and wasn't living in any state of paranoia.
And so, there didn't seem to be a lot of worry on his part that maybe he was on a hit list or anything like that.
BURNETT: And I know the FBI is also involved in this case. Rebecca, what are your sources telling you about what the FBI is trying to do to track down who has done this horrific murder that we saw this weekend and as to whether those murders are linked to Mark Hasse's murder two months ago?
LOPEZ: Yes, they haven't said for sure if there is any forensic evidence that are linking these murders. However, they have since Hasse's murder, they brought in a bunch of people, they questioned people in prison, they have questioned members of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas as well as the Aryan circle. So, they have been questioning everyone basically, throwing out a big dragnet out there.
And a little while ago, as Ed Lavandera mentioned, in one of the affidavits, they're also saying they're seeking several records from all the cell phone carriers out there, wanting evidence single phone number that they could get off their cell phone towers. And the hopes of maybe somebody made a phone call out there and that will lead them to whoever did this. But right now, they really have no idea who did this.
BURNETT: And what about just the fear there? You know, the state moved quickly. Governor Perry, Brandi Fernandez now named as the interim district attorney replacing him today, and moved incredibly quickly. You would think that's a job not a lot of people want right now with the district attorney, with the district attorney -- I mean, you know, there are three people now murdered in cold blood. What kind of protection can they offer? I mean, these cases all happened, these people were armed. They were supposedly getting protection. And, yet, they were murdered.
LOPEZ: And there is a lot of concern about that and there's a lot of law enforcement down in Kaufman County right now. But the biggest concern is simply the unknown. I mean, are there other prosecutors on the list? Does it include people or would it include people from other counties that have worked on cases together and corroborated together?
I mean, it's just -- they just don't know. And they are offering some protection to people and in, fact, the district attorney here in Dallas is expected to go before the county commissioner's court here tomorrow and ask for more money for protection of himself and also the prosecutors in his office to get more deputies out there at the county courthouses. And so, yes, there is a state of fear right now. And, again, it's simply because of the unknown.
BURNETT: Yes. Just horrific situation, hard to even comprehend it. Thank you, Rebecca.
And now to an OUTFRONT investigation. An all white student organization is creating controversy on the campus of Towson University in Maryland. This week, the group is expected to begin patrolling campus in an effort to cut down on what it says is a growing problem of black on white crime.
Do the numbers add up?
We send our David Mattingly to the Maryland campus for an OUTFRONT investigation.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center both call him a white supremacist. One writer says he is what the future of organized hate might look like.
But college senior Matthew Heimbach greets us with a smile.
(on camera): Are you proud of that?
MATTHEW HEIMBACH, WHITE STUDENT UNION: Well, I'm proud of what the fact the SPLC and ADL are denouncing us. But we're not the future of organized hate.
MATTINGLY (voice-over): His critics say his actions suggest otherwise? This is Heimbach on surveillance video just last summer, posing with a rebel flag outside the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Alabama.
MARK POTOK, SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER: He writes about how white Southern men ought to rise up once again to defend Southern white womanhood. Well, you know, the last time we heard that cry was from the reconstruction era Klan.
HEIMBACH: I call myself a Southern nationalist. I believe in the identity of a Southern people and believe with --
MATTINGLY (on camera): The white identity? European identity. White European identity?
HEIMBACH: Of course. I'm white. My culture is white, my customs are white and my language is white.
MATTINGLY (voice-over): Last year, he led a group writing "white pride" and other pro white slogans in public areas at Maryland's Towson University where he is enrolled. Heimbach commented, "No longer will the homosexual, Muslim and black supremacist groups be allowed to hijack our campus."
MARAVENE LOESCHKE, TOWSON UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT: I think this group is attempting to promote white supremacy issues, issues of non- inclusion on a number of levels.
MATTINGLY: Now, the leader of a new group, the White Student Union, Heimbach complains about campus crimes, saying, "Every single day, black predators prey upon the majority white Towson University student body."
He's organizing white security patrols armed with pepper spray.
(on camera): Is this your agenda? Is this a racially-based, racially motivated agenda? Because this comment makes it very clear black and white.
HEIMBACH: I like (INAUDIBLE). The idea is --
MATTINGLY: This is very serious stuff.
HEIMBACH: I agree with you. The idea that the campus is offended that white students are going to try to make our community a better place, let's look at this way, if a black student was doing this, they would be called heroes. They would be getting a medal from the mayor, and the key to the city.
MATTINGLY (voice-over): Doubtful, the crime wave Heimbach is so alarmed about appears to be one he invented. Just 6.01 crimes reported per 1,000 students, 2012 brought the lowest crime rate on campus in 17 years.
HEIMBACH: There is a black on white problem. But it's also a crime problem in general where everyone is at risk.
MATTINGLY (on camera): You can say it over and over and over again if you want. But the numbers just don't back you up.
HEIMBACH: The numbers do back me up. Well, let's look in terms of national crime statistics.
MATTINGLY: Let's look at this campus, single digits. They have been going down steadily since 1995.
HEIMBACH: There's a reason why a majority of the people in my organization are women. They don't feel safe on this campus going across the street at night.
MATTINGLY (voice-over): In spite of his claims, Towson is the safest of all Maryland public universities, at least seven of the last 10 years. He also claims to have 50 members, a number university officials strongly dispute.
(on camera): Heimbach has managed to provoke one change here at Towson, university police say they will be much more visible on campus in the days to come. Not out of a need to deter any new wave of crime, but to deter any new feelings of insecurity.
(voice-over): So far, Heimbach hasn't broken any rules. The university can't do anything about it. He plans to graduate this spring with a degree in history.
For OUTFRONT, David Mattingly, Towson, Maryland.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BURNETT: Still to come, tourists are kidnapped, robbed and raped in Brazil and an American is involved.
And a controversial op-ed says women should spend their time in college looking for a husband. Sexist? Smart? The woman behind the article is OUTFRONT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BURNETT: We are back with tonight's "Outer Circle," where we reach out to our sources around the world. And so, tonight, we start in France where a man is arrested for stealing an elephant tusk from a Paris museum. But this wasn't just any old elephant tusk, it came from the skeleton of an elephant that once belonged to Louis XIV.
I asked Nick Paton Walsh how this bizarre man was caught.
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NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Erin. Imagine this, 3:00 Saturday morning in the fifth district of Paris, near the Natural History Museum, neighbors hear a chain sawing noise coming from inside the museum, ring police who then arrest a 19-year- old man on the street outside it seems carrying a large elephant tusk that he's removed from inside from an exhibit which is an elephant skeleton given to the French by the king of Portugal in the 17th century. He injured his ankle apparently in this and is now in custody. But police don't know exactly what it was he intended to do with that tusk, Erin.
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BURNETT: A strange story. And now, we go to Brazil, where two tourists, a man and a woman, were kidnapped and robbed. The woman was raped and it all happened over a course of several hours in Rio de Janeiro. I asked our Shasta Darlington who is there about the American.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SHASTA DARLINGTON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Erin, we just got confirmation from the U.S. embassy that one of the two foreign tourists kidnapped and brutalized aboard a minivan in Rio this weekend is an American citizen. We don't know if it was the man or the woman. And police are really trying to protect their identities.
But what we do know is that these two foreign tourists boarded a minivan in the Copacabana district of Rio early Saturday morning. And shortly afterwards three men got aboard that mini bus, they forced all of the other passengers off and that is when their nightmare began.
The man was tied up and beaten. The woman was repeatedly sexually assaulted. Both of them had their credit cards taken. They were driven around different gas stations where they took money out of ATMs. And again this lasted for six hours. They were dumped in a city near Rio.
Police say they've already arrested two men for these crimes and they're searching for a third suspect. All of this will have people asking whether or not Rio has solved its historic crime problems, Erin.
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BURNETT: Thanks to Shasta.
And now, let's check in with Wolf Blitzer. He's in for Anderson and has a look at what's coming up on "A.C. 360."
Hey, Wolf. Good to see you this time of the evening.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks, Erin. Thanks very much.
We're going to have much more on the shocking killing of the Texas district attorney and his wife. That's ahead on "360." Were the murders the work of a lone wolf or part of a larger plot? There's been some speculation. It's the work of a white supremacist prison gang. We'll speak with a former top recruiter for the skinhead movement.
Also coming up tonight, a controversial shotgun give away in a high crime neighborhood in Tucson. The man behind the plan says it will bring down crime rates.
We'll also ask Mark Kelly, whose wife was nearly killed at a shooting in Tucson, what he thinks of the plan.
Those stories and Dr. Sanjay Gupta. He weighs in on the gruesome injury to the Louisville basketball player Kevin Ware whose leg was broken so badly that his teammates turned away in horror. Amazingly today, he's already out of bed. He's getting on crutches. We'll talk to Sanjay about the surgery, the chances that he'll play basketball again, and a lot more, Erin. That's coming up at the top of the hour.
BURNETT: All right, Wolf. We'll see you in a few moments.
And now, get ready, our fifth story OUTFRONT. Ladies, get a degree and a ring. That is the basis of a controversial column from Susan Patton, one of the first female Princeton graduates.
In a letter to the Princeton student newspaper, Patton who has two sons, both of whom, went to Princeton advises the daughter she never had to, quote, "find a husband on campus before you graduate. Smart women can't, shouldn't marry men who aren't at least their intellectual equal. There's a very limited population of men who are as smart or smarter than we are and I say again, you will never, again be surrounded by this concentration of men who are worthy of you."
But are these really words of wisdom?
OUTFRONT tonight, the woman who wrote the article, Susan Patton, radio host Stephanie Miller and CNN contributor Reihan Salam.
All right, Susan, you stepped in it. Let me start.
SUSAN PATTON, PRINCETON ALUMNA: I did.
(LAUGHTER)
BURNETT: Let me start with you. All right, you've been called an anti-feminist and embarrassment, excruciating, regressive, but you instant by what you said?
PATTON: I totally stand by what I said. I don't think anything about this is anti-feminist. It's not retrogressive. It's not even radical.
Women do aspire to having children and marriage. However, the messages that are being given to young women today are so totally focused on developing careers. Nobody is saying to them, if in addition to your career, you also want to be married and have children, you should really start thinking earlier about it than you might be planning to.
BURNETT: All right. You're saying in addition your career and understand that.
PATTON: Yes.
BURNETT: But there is another way of looking at this, some might say. Let's look at the annual cost of going to Princeton. By the way, shock warning to anybody out there. I don't think it's worth going to those colleges anymore. But that's a separate issue.
Princeton right now is $57,000 a year.
PATTON: And worth every penny. BURNETT: All right. All right. And after four years, a minimum of $230,000. That's paying a lot of money to -- some might criticize you for saying get, quote-unquote, "get an RMS degree."
PATTON: That's not at all what you are paying that money for. You're paying that money for a world class education. Further, you're paying that money to experience a community that will provide you with such a rich population of people with whom to form lifelong friendships and if you're lucky, a life partner who you can grow with, form a family with and raise children with.
BURNETT: Stephanie, that's your response? Did she convince you, Susan?
STEPHANIE MILLER, RADIO HOST: Wow, Erin. No offense and I feel like I got in the car from "Back to the Future" and we are in 1952.
Really? You have to get married in college?
(CROSSTALK)
MILLER: Don't studies show that the earlier people get married the more likely they are to get divorced? Well, but you're saying find a husband while at Princeton or you are screwed? I mean --
PATTON: No.
MILLER: Is that the only choice? What if you can't afford to go to Princeton?
PATTON: Firstly, I'm not suggesting you are screwed. I'm not suggesting to get married before you graduate.
I'm suggesting, keep an open mind, keep an eye out for who you are surrounded by during your under graduate years if you are on Princeton's campus. Now, the idea if at 20 or 22, you're too young to be married because you don't know who you are going to involved by the time you're on your 30s, I get that. If you delay marriage until you are 30, you don't know who you are going to evolve into by the time you are 40. So, this is an ever moving target.
What doesn't -- what doesn't change --
MILLER: Susan --
PATTON: -- is women have a limited opportunity within which -- that women have a limited opportunity within which to bear children of their own. So, the idea that you spend the first 10 years out of college doing nothing but develop your professional life, you will find yourself in your early 30s or your mid-30s with nothing but a professional life.
I'm just suggesting. Take a good look.
BURNETT: All right. Reihan, let me bring you in here, an appropriate moment -- (CROSSTALK)
MILLER: Nobody could be a bigger, single loser than me, but I'm just going to say, you are not asking women to lean in, you're asking them to lean back and think of Ward Cleaver.
PATTON: I'm not doing anything of the sort.
(CROSSTALK)
BURNETT: Let me bring Reihan is a man here, as a man here. All right? There's three of us and then you.
What's your view on this? Because what Susan is basically saying is, let me quote something she writes, "Men regularly marry women who are younger, less intelligent, less educated. It's amazing how forgiving men can be about a woman's lack of erudition if she is exceptional pretty."
And us women I think, it is safe to say, are incredibly unforgiving of our potential spouses.
REIHAN SALAM, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: And I am not going to touch that specific question with a 10-meter cattle prod, I will say --
BURNETT: Less intelligent, less educated, Reihan.
SALAM: I will say this. There has been a change. There is more -- people delay marriage a lot longer than they used to whether they're college-educated or not. Part of what happened is that people used to see marriage as a cornerstone. They used to see it as part of the foundation for becoming an adult. The idea was, you'd find a partner and you'd basically together become adults and meet the various challenges that you encounter early in your career and what have you.
BURNETT: Right.
SALAM: You basically invest in each other.
Whereas now, the idea is that marriage is a tax stone. Marriage is something -- it's the cherry on top and what you get to do when you achieved various goals.
The problem is that actually for a lot of people, marriage is what helps you achieve a lot of those goals you want to achieve both professionally and personally.
BURNETT: Well, traditionally, it has been for men, because women stayed home --
(CROSSTALK)
SALAM: That's a big problem with men, period because the thing is, that actually, a lot of the problem is that the quality of men has deteriorated. And that's part of the point that she's raising implicitly. Look, I'm part of this problem too. I mean, you know, my God, I mean, I can wake up in the morning. I could grow my hair out, I could do more, I could button this, I could wear a tie. I could do all kinds of things to be a more respectable gentlemen caller.
But the thing is that -- but it's a real issue. The labor market and educational outcomes for men are bad and getting worse, whereas for women, they are really improving. And I think that to the extent that women are generally going to see a man who is their equal or who is maybe a little bit ahead of them in terms of status and professional accomplishment, that is mathematically getting harder as men prove to be a total disaster.
BURNETT: Or going extinct, some have written, or maybe a little bit too far.
All right. Thanks to all three of you. We appreciate it. And please weigh in with your point of view. You can reach me on Twitter @ErinBurnett.
OUTFRONT next, tonight's essay: naked journalism. And I don't exaggerate.
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BURNETT: A journalism mainstay could be ready to pack it in. No, not Barbara Walters, I'm talking about but the page three girl. Since 1970, the British newspaper "The Sun" has featured a photo of a topless woman on the third page of every issue. Shockingly, the page is rather popular and it's helped "The Sun" become the most read newspaper in Britain.
But the page three girl could soon be no more. A group called No More Page Three has launched an online campaign advocating for the topless photos to be removed from "The Sun". They say page three objectifies and demeans women and the movement has picked up steam with the deputy leader of the Labour Party who said a Labour government would ban page three girls.
It might surprise you, but I am siding with page three on this one, because newspapers should be covering the boobs in government, the government shouldn't be covering the boobs in the newspaper. You might be a bit dramatic to say this is the end of journalism as we know it, but if we let them take our topless women, how long before they remove my beloved horoscope, the crossword puzzle or chess updates?
So, in honor of our friends at page three, and I haven't told CNN about this, we decided to showcase our page three girl tonight, no editing, no blurring this. This girl is completely topless. And since this is a live show there is nothing Jeff Zucker can do about it.
