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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

NYPD Officers Shot Overnight; Setbacks in the Search for AirAsia Flight 8501; Arctic Chill Moves In; Boehner Faces Rebellion on Right; Prince, Attorney Fight Sex Scandal

Aired January 06, 2015 - 04:00   ET

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

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking news this morning: two New York police officers shot in the line of duty just days after two others are killed. Suspects on the loose this morning as tensions rise between the city's mayor and his police department. We'll break this all down live.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Happening now: new setbacks in the search for AirAsia Flight 8501. Storms keeping divers out of the water. The muddy ocean floor leaving search teams with zero visibility. This as the clock ticks down to find the black boxes and find those quickly deteriorating bodies of the victims. We are live with the frustration families and investigators are feeling this morning.

BERMAN: An arctic chill blasting millions this morning. Temperatures plunging up to 40 degrees. How long is this thing going to last?

ROMANS: What are you laughing about?

BERMAN: Ahead.

ROMANS: That sounds terrible.

BERMAN: Good morning. Welcome to EARLY START. I'm John Berman.

ROMANS: I'm Christine Romans. Tuesday, January 6th. It is 4:00 a.m. in the East. Nice to see all of you this morning.

Breaking news this morning: two New York City police officers shot responding to a robbery call at a store in the Bronx. Officers are now hospitalized, one in critical condition. Police are hunting for two gunmen with a $10,000 reward offered for information. That shooting comes among the back drop of high tension between New York Mayor Bill de Blasio and NYPD officers, high tension following the ambush murders of two police officers last month. De Blasio addressing the rift for the first time at a news conference Monday the mayor criticized as disrespectful, officers who have turned their backs on him on multiple occasions.

At the same time, the mayor and his police commissioner downplayed a drastic plunge in arrests for low level offenses, a drop of more than 90 percent in some categories of arrest, summons, is raising concern of a possible work slowdown by NYPD officers.

Our national correspondent Miguel Marquez standing by live with the very latest.

Good morning, Miguel.

MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you.

This is a very concerning and disturbing issue turn of events here with the latest shooting of two other officers. This was -- individuals who are responding to a robbery. There were in plain clothes. They were not targeted like in the previous shootings of Officer Liu and Officer Ramos. This robbery was taking place in the Bronx as the officers tried to enter a shop. One of the assailants came out of there, shot both of them, one in the elbow, one in the back. It is not clear whether the officers were wearing their bullet proof vest as they have been off duty in responding to a crime.

All of this as you said against a back drop of tension with the mayor and his police force. He addressed that yesterday in a press conference.

And the sound byte that we were going to run was the mayor of New York talking about the officers turning their backs on him twice in a row. Once at the funeral for Officer Ramos, then for Officer Liu. This was the first time the mayor has come out this strongly against his own department.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D), NEW YORK: Those individuals who took certain actions these last week, last two weeks really, they were disrespectful to the families involved. That's the bottom line. They were disrespectful to the families who had lost their loved ones. And I can't understand why anyone would do such a thing in the context like that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MARQUEZ: This shooting is not going to help the already poor morale in New York City police and there is tension at city hall and police department and within the police unions themselves about where all of this is going. It is not clear what the next move for the mayor is. There is no scheduled meeting with the mayor and any of the unions right now, and they say they are looking at all those numbers and the low numbers of arrests and whether or not there is some slowdown. They are looking into it. They said they are not ready to call it a slowdown yet.

BERMAN: Just to be clear, these two officers shot. Not life threatening injuries, though one is in critical condition right now?

MARQUEZ: Not life threatening, one in critical condition. Both expected to survive. It is not going to be good.

BERMAN: And the suspects on the loose? A manhunt as we speak. MARQUEZ: On the loose, 25 to 30-year-old Latino males, pretty generic

description, on the loose.

BERMAN: All right. Miguel Marquez, we're going to keep our eye on this. There's a lot of developments embroiling the force right now.

Disappointment and concern in Indonesia this morning as crews searching for AirAsia Flight 8501 race the clock in harsh conditions. The more time passes, the harder it becomes to find the wreckage on the flight, and the harder it will be to identify the deceased. Hope of rough weather would break today was dashed and none of the nearly 100 divers in the search zone had been deployed. More frustrations today.

CNN's Anna Coren live for us now in Surabaya.

Anna, what's the latest?

ANNA COREN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: John, there were such high hopes when the day began that they could get in the water. There were some 97 divers ready to continue the search. A couple got in and checked visibility. It was terrible.

So, they got back out. They are on stand by. We are waiting for word if they managed to get back in this afternoon. But, as you say, we are in the middle of monsoon season. The weather is bad. The seas are high.

And this is really something that is really hampering the search process. We know that there are four main objects they've located by sonar. Another object located late last night. The speculation it could be that the tail of the aircraft, but really it is mere speculation.

We know that the black boxes are in the tail, but we cannot confirm whether that wreckage has been identified. And then late this afternoon, John, we got word that another two bodies had been spotted.

We're once again waiting to hear from officials if they are able to retrieve those bodies by helicopter, take them back to the military base where they will be prepared and brought here to Surabaya where they are then handed over to the disaster victim identification unit.

We spoke to the head of that unit who talked about how they are racing against the clock because it is now in day 10 and the bodies as we have been discussing are decomposing at a rapid rate. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTON CASTILANI, HEAD OF INDONESIA'S DISASTER VICTIMS IDENTIFICATION UNIT: From the first day, you can find the bodies in good condition. That's why you can just identify them using fingerprints. But lately, you will find that the dead bodies are more decomposed. And after the next few days, you will find maybe not in an intact body. You will find fragmented body or maybe worse than that. (END VIDEO CLIP)

COREN: That was Dr. Anton Castilani who has the grim task of identifying the bodies and returning them to their loved ones to bury them.

But he said that the bodies that they have recovered, the 37 bodies have mainly been intact. He does have serious concerns however about what the state of the bodies will be in the coming days. But it is hoped that the majority of the bodies are with the wreckage of the plane, which as we know is yet to be found, John.

BERMAN: They're not going to be any closer to getting that today.

Anna Coren for us in Surabaya, thanks so much.

ROMANS: All right. When Congress reconvenes today at noon, Republicans will be in control of both the House and Senate for the first time since 2006. But there are already obvious bumps in the road ahead for the GOP. The first, of course, is the president ready to veto any bills rolling back Obamacare o or elements of Obamacare, or executive action on immigration.

And there is a concern of internal rebellion, as some conservative Republicans are set to vote against reelecting John Boehner as House speaker.

Chief congressional correspondent Dana Bash has the latest.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: John and Christine, the big question on this opening day of the new Congress is how big will the rebellion of John Boehner be on the vote for House speaker? To put in perspective, when the new Congress is sworn in later today, there will be 246 House Republicans. And so far, there only about a dozen who say they're going to oppose John Boehner for the job of speaker.

So, those in the Republican leadership who I talked to say this is really just the group that they not so lovingly call the "hell no" caucus, but they're usually no votes on just about everything. The House speaker is elected, remember, by the entire House. So, Boehner has to get a majority of all house members, 218, that means he can afford to lose 29 Republicans and still be elected speaker.

I talked to his aides and confidants all day yesterday. They said they are monitoring this insurrection, but not that worried. Here is Tom Cole, the Republican congressman who is a Boehner ally.

REP. TOM COLE (R), OKLAHOMA: This is a last moment sideshow. But the sad thing is it distracts from what our message ought to be, we ought to be talking about the Republican agenda, about the possibilities now that we have the Senate, about Keystone, about fixes on Obamacare, trade, regulatory reform, those types of issues. Instead on the opening day of the Republican Congress, we've got Republicans, you know, at odds. And that's just unfortunate. It steps on the story and doesn't accomplish anything productive.

BASH: The argument that Cole and others make is that you can't replace someone with no one. And right now, there is no other House Republican who raised as much money or campaigned for as many people, or has the leadership experience and skills that comes close to getting 218 votes to be the speaker of the House.

Cole, who you just heard from, and other members of the team who I talked to, say that they are making calls to rank-and-file Republicans, just to be safe.

But, you know, if Boehner isn't deposed as speaker, he is going to start the Congress back on its heels a bit because of this rebellion, no matter how big it is -- John and Christine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: Our thanks to Dana Bash.

Senator Dianne Feinstein is calling for new laws and policy changes that will bar the U.S. government from torturing detainees. The outgoing chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee spearheaded a five-year investigation into the use of the enhanced techniques by the CIA after September 11th. She just sent a letter to President Obama calling for better CIA oversight and say she plans to introduce legislation in the new Congress that will outlaw torture and ban the spy agency from detaining prisoners.

ROMANS: Kurdish forces are slowly beating back ISIS fighters in the battle for the town of Kobani. The monitoring group says the Kurds now control 80 percent of the northern Syrian city after recapturing the government square. Fourteen ISIS: militants reportedly killed in Monday's battle. U.S. led airstrikes in the region helped the Kurds gain the upper hand.

BERMAN: The embattled leader of Mexico, Enrique Pena Nieto, visits the White House. His meeting with President Obama is sparking some controversy. The Mexican leader is under intense fire at home where drug violence is raging and corruption charges are mounting.

Right now, protests in Mexico are turning violent as outrage bills over the disappearance of 43 students. Those students who are allegedly killed by drug traffickers after being handed over by corrupt police in the city of Iguala.

ROMANS: All right. Eleven minutes past the hour. Time for an early start on your money this morning.

An ugly start to the year for stocks.

BERMAN: Yes.

ROMANS: U.S. stock futures down a bit right now after a big selloff yesterday. The Dow dropped -- get this -- 331 points. The S&P fell about 2 percent. The main reason here is oil. Crude oil fell more than 5 percent

yesterday. It is currently below $50 a barrel for the first time since April 2009. And was it that low in April of 2009? A global recession, not good reason to have low oil prices.

Prices falling now on weak demand. That is causing concerns about potentially global weakness. It is because of a supply boom in the U.S. There is a glut of oil. The Iraqis are producing a lot of oil. The Russians are producing a lot of oil. The Saudis are producing a lot of oil. And so are we here.

Those prices are great for drivers, but devastating for energy producers and countries who depend on oil revenue. Experts now predict oil to fall as low to $30 or $40 a barrel before finding a floor.

But I will tell you something, what goes down goes up. What goes up must go down. Those markets can very volatile and snap back very quickly.

BERMAN: There is a lot of jitters in Europe overall. Not just, you know, well past the oil.

ROMANS: Oh, yes. Some of these frackers in the U.S., at what point do they have to fold up and go home?

BERMAN: Watch your mouth.

(LAUGHTER)

BERMAN: All right. Twelve minutes after the hour.

Happening right now, a polar plunge across the country. Millions facing fast falling temperatures. How low will they go and how long will it last? That's coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: The coldest blast of Arctic air so far this winter is hitting the U.S. right now.

ROMANS: Yes, many states seeing temperatures up to 35 degrees below average for early January. South Dakota slammed by snow and sub-zero temperatures. So, you see people out on the roads. Half foot of snow is expected in some areas.

BERMAN: A 20-car pile up closed down parts of Interstate 80 near the great city of Des Moines in the great state of Iowa.

ROMANS: That's Altoona (ph) there.

BERMAN: We were told that several people were taken to the hospital. Fortunately, they are expected to be OK.

ROMANS: To the east, snow coming down hard in Fulton, New York. Three inches falling in an hour. Officials say the lake-effect snow prompted more accidents than 911 dispatchers could count.

BERMAN: Friday moments for a mother in Maine, driving with her son. Ice and snow -- look at -- flying off the car in front of them shattering their windshield. Fortunately, no one was hurt. Heather Rosinger (ph) told our affiliate WNTW her adrenaline was pumping.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It could have been worse. It could have been an accident, you know? It could have gone through my windshield.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: You have to leave more than a car length between cars.

BERMAN: It is awful when it does that.

These temperatures are pushing south and east from the Midwest. I want to go to meteorologist Pedram Javaheri for an early look at our weather.

PEDRAM JAVAHERI, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Hey, good Tuesday morning, John and Christine. Let's talk about what's happening here nationally.

Pretty impressive set up when it comes to massive Arctic air across the central and northern tier of the country. Some snow showers in the forecast out there in northeast. But the major metro cities generally are going to see light flurries across the region, not much in the way of accumulations. But this area of high pressure among the strongest areas of high pressure we have ever seen across the Lower 48. It kind of sets up in place and anywhere surrounding this region, you're going to have generally clear skies. But it looks like it's nice outside.

But look at the wind chills. Tuesday morning, 8:30 in the morning, local time, anywhere from 22 to 20 below zero across portions of Chicago up to Minneapolis. Come Wednesday morning, even colder. Chicago touching 30 below zero, and almost 40 below zero in and around Minneapolis.

Of course, we know some schools have been closed here because of how cold it is. You don't want your kids outside. But for some buses, even the diesel buses having a tough time starting today. So, certainly not a setup that you want with these temperatures across the board.

National perspective, 5 is the best we can do in Minneapolis. Highs getting up into the mid-20s around New York City. Even colder still come Wednesday across that region.

Let's send it back to you.

ROMANS: All right. Pedram, thank you for that.

A member of the grand jury that cleared Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson in the Michael Brown shooting is suing to lift a gag order preventing them from speaking publicly about the case. A federal lawsuit named the St. Louis County prosecutor as defendant. It says the unidentified grand jury wants to talk about the experience to contribute to the national conversation on race relations.

It is a crime for grand jury members to speak out without permission.

BERMAN: That is a really interesting case. The ACLU is backing it. And given that the transcript release, it's not impossible that maybe a judge would say this grand juror could speak and could be --

ROMANS: It could also argue, though, that their job on the grand jury was there part on the national discussions on race relations, and that it should end there.

BERMAN: We will have to wait and see.

Eighteen minutes after the hour. Day two of the jury selection of the trial of accused Boston marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. The defendant was in court on Monday. Tsarnaev is facing 30 criminal counts in the 2013 marathon bombings, which killed three people and injured 260 others. Also charged in the alleged murder of an MIT police officer days later.

Seating the jury could take as long as a month. Now, prosecutors and defense lawyers reportedly had discussed a plea deal in which Tsarnaev would get life without parole. But those talks failed. Federal prosecutors would not take the death penalty off the table.

ROMANS: Attorney General Eric Holder will represent the Obama administration at the funeral for Mario Cuomo. The former three-term New York governor will be laid to rest at a Manhattan church later this morning. Cuomo died of heart failure on New Year's Day at the age of 82. On Monday, a host of dignitaries paid respects at a wake for Cuomo. Among them, the Vice President Joe Biden and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.

BERMAN: United States ski team is reeling this morning from the deaths of two up and coming stars. Twenty-year-old Ronnie Berlack of Vermont and 19-year-old Bryce Astle of Utah, they were killed in an avalanche in Austria. Four other skiers who were with them, they managed to escape with their lives.

ROMANS: Seven-year-old Sailor Gutzler is back home in Illinois this morning, in the arms of her family. The resilient little girl is the sole survivor of the plane crash that killed her parents, her sister and her cousin. Relatives will now raise Sailor who somehow escaped a burning plane in the Kentucky woods and wandered a mile in the bitter cold, before finding help at the door step of Larry Wilkins.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LARRY WILKINS, HELPED 7-YEAR-OLD CRASH SURVIVOR: Let me know legs all bleeding, crying and told me that her parents were dead and that she was in a plane crash and the plane was upside down.

It was below 40, between 35 and 40 degrees, had a little bit of a mist, that little girl was, I would say, damp, not wet, but she was damp all over. And, of course, she was barefooted. She had one sock on one foot. Tremendous little girl.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Pictures show a family very full of life.

Funeral services for Sailor's cousin, 14-year-old Sierra Wilder, they are planned for tomorrow. A private service is scheduled for Friday for Sailor's mother, father and her 9-year-old sister.

BERMAN: Same-sex marriage is now legal in Florida. The statewide ban ended at midnight. Florida becomes the 36th state to legalize gay marriage. On Monday, couples of Miami-Dade County, they got to jump on things with marriage licenses in hand. Two women who sued the state for the right to marry, obviously very happy and shared the news with their adopted son.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFED FEMALE: We got it!

(CHEERS)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have been in a committed relationship, full of love and joy. And now, three children for ten years. So, for us, it's just a piece of paper, but it's a nice validation from the state.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: U.S. Supreme Court has a chance to take up the issue of same- sex marriage again this week. Justices will consider whether to act on cases that could perhaps help settle the matter nationwide.

ROMANS: All right. She is a serial liar, the words of a prominent U.S. attorney accused, along with Prince Andrew in a sex slave scandal. The new developments, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: Buckingham Palace is denying allegations that Prince Andrew had sex with an underage girl as U.S. attorney Alan Dershowitz facing similar claims takes a harder line. Both men are named in legal papers filed in Florida by Virginia Roberts. She claimed that American billionaire Jeffrey Epstein forced her to have sex when she was underage with Prince Andrew and also Dershowitz.

Dershowitz says Roberts is lying.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALAN DERSHOWITZ, U.S. CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: And believe me. I remember everybody I ever had sex with. I'm not that old that I would forget. I did not have any sexual contact whatsoever under any circumstances. She made the whole thing up. I can prove it by flight records. I can prove it by my travel records. (END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Neither Dershowitz nor the prince are parties to Roberts' legal claimed, but Dershowitz says he is filing a motion to intervene in the case and he's filling disbarment papers against her lawyer.

Buckingham Palace taking a cautious stance. "TIME" magazine reporting that the palace will not fully rule out some kind of legal action.

BERMAN: Twenty-five minutes after the hour.

Breaking news this morning: two New York police officers shot in the line of duty just days after two others were killed. There is a manhunt this morning. The suspects are on the loose. This all coming as there are serious tensions between the department and city's mayor. We will break down the developments live after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)