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CNN Live At Daybreak

The Search for Chandra: Investigation Procedures

Aired July 12, 2001 - 08:30   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.
LINDA STOUFFER, CNN ANCHOR: And a new development in the search for Chandra Levy. CNN has confirmed that FBI agents have interviewed a Pentecostal minister.

The "Washington Post" reported today the minister described an affair between Congressman Gary Condit and the minister's 18-year-old daughter several years ago. The paper says the congressman warned the minister's daughter not to speak about the relationship. Also, D.C. police say they will comb abandoned buildings near Gary Condit's and Chandra Levy's apartments.

CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: The status of the investigation is critical at this point and we're lucky enough to have Mike Brooks here with us today. He was a detective with the Washington, D.C. Police Department for 26 years and worked intimately with the FBI on various different cases. Good morning, Mike.

MIKE BROOKS, CNN CONSULTANT: Good morning.

LIN: Let's start with this report about this 18-year-old girl being reported in the "Washington Post." What is the relevance, if this young girl, now a woman, had an affair with Gary Condit seven years ago, what's the relevance to Chandra Levy's disappearance?

BROOKS: Well, again, it was an alleged affair seven years ago. Does it have any relevance right now? Investigators don't know. They've interviewed the father. They will probably attempt to interview her in the very near future and try to find out exactly what relevance, if any, it has to the missing intern.

LIN: You know, here's why I ask you, because every morning we come in on this show and we just cringe at what we're going to learn next. And we want to make sure that we tie it back to the original case. So what is it that she could know about what might have happened to Chandra Levy that could help in that case short of, you know, revealing intimate details of a relationship with the congressman?

BROOKS: Well, they could take her interview and compare it with the interviews of other people that they've talked to already to see if there's, his conduct during their relationship, if they had, in fact, a relationship with the alleged relationship with the intern.

LIN: So... BROOKS: Take the two and compare the two, take all the different facts and see exactly how they, you know, how they parallel.

LIN: All right, so a bit of a fishing expedition at this point.

BROOKS: Basically so. But, again, it's an investigative lead that has to be run out and if it's part of the case, then they'll find out that for sure.

LIN: D.C. police searching with cadaver dogs some abandoned buildings, once they identify them, that are near Condit's apartment, as well as Chandra Levy's. What led them to those buildings?

BROOKS: Well, any abandoned building that's in the area is a possibility that someone could be in there. So I'm sure that they have gone through them already, but it's good to go back and follow that up again to see if there is anyone inside the buildings, to see if also there's any evidence inside the building. They're not just looking, with the cadaver dogs, they're not just looking for a body.

They're also looking for any other evidence that could be there, clothing, those kind of things. And, again, an abandoned building you may find quite a bit of clothing because in those areas we do have homeless that live in some of those abandoned buildings. So they're going to go through and carefully just, again, it's another investigative lead that needs to be followed up.

LIN: All right, do you think that search might have had to do with anything that they found in Gary Condit's apartment, the search just conducted a short while ago? And I know you talk to your sources.

BROOKS: I think that that's just another lead that they're going to follow up. Whether it has any connection with the search they did in Representative Condit's apartment, probably not.

LIN: What did they find in there?

BROOKS: They, I'm told that they found some, they took some personal effects and also some spots of blood. But there again...

LIN: Spots of blood?

BROOKS: Spots of blood...

LIN: Explainable?

BROOKS: Any house, any apartment that you go into, well, you're going to probably find little spots of blood. If, from cutting your finger, from shaving, from coughing. You know, when you expel different body fluids on a normal every day basis and you're going to find...

LIN: But it's the pattern of blood, where they found it. Did they find a splatter pattern with it in place... BROOKS: No, there's nothing, I'm hearing that there is nothing that would say, you know, oh, wow, this happened and there was nothing that the piece of evidence that they're looking for to break the case, that didn't happen. It was just small spots of blood and they're going to go back to see whether, in fact, they were spots of blood. But that's what was taken from the apartment.

LIN: Three men polygraphed, we know. We don't know who they are. But who would they likely be? What is their relationship to Chandra Levy?

BROOKS: If I was an investigator on the case, if someone is going to volunteer for a polygraph, definitely take him up on the polygraph. Most likely the people you would want to are friends and associates of Ms. Levy to see, again, someone during the initial interview if someone was being evasive. You use a polygraph as an investigative tool of elimination, to go back, and, again, it can be intimidating when law enforcement comes and asks you questions initially about a missing person.

LIN: So you think sometimes it's just for clarification of an original interview...

BROOKS: Clarification, elimination and, again, it's an investigative tool.

LIN: All right, as is everything these days.

BROOKS: Exactly.

LIN: Including the media.

BROOKS: Right.

LIN: All right, thank you very much, Mike.

BROOKS: Thank you, Carol.

LIN: We'll get some insight into this story just yet.

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