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The Nuts and Bolts of Jury Selection; Baby 81 Reunited With Family

Aired February 16, 2005 - 14:30   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.


KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: It may only be a matter of time. That's the CIA's new director says about al Qaeda and that group's potential use of chemical and radiological weapons against the United States. Porter Goss surprised some folks in the Senate Intelligence Committee today in his first testimony as intelligence chief.
Joining us now to talk about Goss and the threats he described today, former Republican Congressman from Georgia and CNN contributor, Bob Barr. Good to see you, Bob.

BOB BARR, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Thank you, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: One thing definitely, a lot of questions raised about a national intelligence director. No names being tossed around, no one has been designated to this post. What's going on and why the delay?

BARR: Well, I think what we see at play here is several things. First of all, this is going to be one of the most difficult positions ever to be filled in government. You have so many competing interests. Not just the Pentagon and the intelligence agencies in the military, but the CIA and the National Security Agency, all of them are going to be fighting with this new national intelligence director. So going in, whoever occupies that job, knows that they're going to have a humongous headache. So it's very difficult to find somebody.

Also, we don't yet know and that person would not know whether the president really intends to go to the wall to fight to make sure that that person has the authority that he's intended to have. So you're putting somebody in a very difficult position. Everybody's going to be shooting at them. And he doesn't know how much ammunition he's going to have.

PHILLIPS: Today, we met for the first time, on his first day on the job, the new secretary of Homeland Security. Is this position even more crucial than that?

BARR: It's certainly going to be more difficult because you have -- not just creating a new position, which was the case with the secretary of Homeland Security, but you're taking pieces of and interjecting yourself into other agencies, as well. And there's no real constituency out there to back you up in the intelligence business.

PHILLIPS: Now, Porter Goss coming out and talking about all the threats and how he plans on dealing with the threats of terrorism. But can you even begin to deal with those threats until you have this new director of national intelligence?

BARR: You can. The Central Intelligence Agency was created two generations ago with the precise mission to do what we know needs to be done. That is to pull all of this intelligence in from all of these different places, analyze it, and get it to the people that need to have it on a timely basis. We know that the CIA did not do the adequate job prior to 9/11 or prior to the Iraq invasion. But certainly, that agency is still there. It has wonderful people in it and it can do the job.

PHILLIPS: Now, a lot of those people within the CIA have quit. They've been forced out, so they say. David Ensor ran a special report, two-part report. He had some former spies. I want you to hear what one of them had to say, and then let's talk about it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MELISSA MAHLE, FORMER CIA OPERATIVE: I personally proposed an operation to penetrate a terrorist camp. Not an al Qaeda camp, but a different terrorist camp. And I had deafening silence from headquarters from Langley. Their response was, this is dangerous. And did you really consider how dangerous it was? We have so many rules and...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: She actually goes on to say -- make a couple more points about how there was a backlash from Congress, a lot of politics involved. She couldn't do her job. You're a Congressman. Is that true? Were there a lot of politics involved to where the CIA could not operate in a way that they needed to in order to prevent terrorism?

BARR: You're absolutely correct. Part of the problems that we had with the CIA, prior to 9/11 and prior to the Iraq invasion were of its own making. But also part of it was external restraint and constraints being placed on it by the prior administration and by Congress.

And Congress has to recognize if it's going to micromanage the intelligence business, then it cannot hold the intelligence agencies accountable when they screw up. Congress has to step back and let them do their job. If they do that, that will go a long way toward ensuring the success of whoever takes over that new job.

PHILLIPS: And Porter Goss also coming forward saying, look, we need to have more agents in the field, foreign agents. We need to recruit foreign agents that can blend in. I was reading even in an article that one former operations officer said that you can't just mingle at embassy cocktail parties anymore to get close to those of different countries. You have to get out of the embassies and recruit dirtballs, or people who can get close to those types of people. Do you agree with that? Is that a way of infiltrating the terrorist network in a stronger manner?

BARR: More and more, that is absolutely correct. You're not going to be able to gather the intelligence -- human intelligence you really need by going to cocktail parties at embassies. You're going to have to rely more and more on working people under non-official cover. Not official cover, but non-official cover into foreign political and economic organizations. That is very difficult. It takes a lot of time and anybody that thinks we can just turn a switch on and all of a sudden poof, all of those new agents are out there, has no idea what the intelligence business is all about.

PHILLIPS: Bob Barr, thank you so much.

BARR: Sure.

PHILLIPS: And, of course, CNN is committed to providing the most reliable coverage of news that affects your security. So stay tuned to CNN for the latest information day and night.

And if it weren't swirling in the Atlantic, well, we'd call it a hurricane. But storms in the Southwest Pacific Ocean are cyclones, and a big one is out there right now.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Good thing I got out in time.

Back in the saddle. Will it be lucky number seven for Lance Armstrong at the Tour de France?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: Here we go again with the high-profile trial. 12 men and women will make up a panel of Michael Jackson's peers and decide his guilt or innocence. Just who they are is yet to be determined. The proceedings against Jackson are now in the jury selection phase. And if you think this is part -- this part of the case is to be taken lightly by either side, think again.

Here's CNN's Jeffrey Toobin with the nuts and bolts of seating a jury.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST (voice-over): Twelve empty chairs, 12 ordinary citizens, a seemingly simple pairing at the heart of the American justice system, but playing out behind the scenes...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. Jones denies that he was left of center.

TOOBIN: ... the business of jury selection, a complicated and highly specialized science.

JASON BLOOM, JURY SPECIALIST: I'd pay particular attention to jurors No. 6 and juror No. 10.

TOOBIN: Enter the jury consultants.

GENE HACKMAN, ACTOR: Find something on every one of them. Pull their files. Review every word, every photo, every medical record. Do it.

TOOBIN: In the 2003 movie, "Runaway Jury," experts say Gene Hackman's portrayal of a consultant blinded by power was exaggerated. But in real life, a consultant can mean the difference between victory and defeat.

CINDY ANDREWS, JURY SPECIALIST: Ask them what they like best about their job.

TOOBIN: At CSI, Courtroom Science Incorporated, near Dallas, Texas, nothing about jury selection is left to chance. Its state-of- the-art facility claims to be the largest of its kind in the world with mock courtrooms, closed-circuit cameras, video editing and a high-tech control room that rivals some TV studios.

For jury specialists Jason Bloom and Cindy Andrews, it's a legal laboratory, perfect for pretrial experiments.

ANDREWS: I think people would be surprised to learn there is a great amount of effort that goes on in the front end of the jury selection process. It's not just what happens in the courtroom.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And your medical studies?

ANDREWS: There has been vast amounts of information gathered on the jurors ahead of time.

TOOBIN: Among CSI's services, mock trials and training workshops.

BLOOM: What we try to do is help the attorneys build rapport with the jurors, because rapport is a big part of persuasion. Maybe that involves stepping closer towards them. Maybe it involves smiling more.

ANDREWS: They're going to be highly attuned to everything that's going on in the courtroom.

TOOBIN: Their work is highly develop confidential, so CSI simulated a jury selection process for CNN's cameras.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Raise your hands if you can follow the law.

TOOBIN: It frequently starts with a written questionnaire, containing several red flag questions designed to root out jurors' potential biases.

BLOOM: You're fishing for information. So you need to be able to tell the attorney that if you want to find these fish, you need to use these pieces of bait.

TOOBIN: The next step is called voir dire, French for to "speak the truth." During this stage, attorneys ask potential jurors a wide variety of personal questions.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's your career background? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. And you said your father was a minister.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you more of a sympathetic person or more of a practical person?

TOOBIN: Every question is carefully crafted to reveal key information and insight into each juror. They also watch for clues in a juror's body language and appearance.

ANDREWS: I'm looking at how they're dressing, how they're carrying themselves in the courtroom, their level of deference to the judge.

BLOOM: It scares me when I get some closed body language, because it means that they're not really open to that attorney. Maybe they're even offended by some of the questions he's asking.

TOOBIN: While the process is called jury selection, the two sides are actually deselecting jurors who might rule against them. But in high stakes trials, consultants are increasingly on guard against a threat known as the stealth juror.

BLOOM: Stealth jurors are people that want to get on the jury because they've got a hidden agenda. Other people in high profile cases may want to get a book interview, may want to get a TV interview, may have other alternative agendas for wanting to get on that jury.

TOOBIN: What's good for the prosecution may not be good for the defense. But both sides try to avoid certain high-risk jurors: people with strong personalities.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They're ridiculous. They are ridiculous.

TOOBIN: Self-appointed experts.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Where you can actually assign, like, percentages of negligence.

TOOBIN: Leaders, who could all have the power to sway a jury, like Henry Fonda did in "12 Angry Men."

HENRY FONDA, ACTOR: No jury can declare a man guilty unless it's sure.

TOOBIN: Consultants also pay attention to a group's interaction. To that end, they recruit a pool of people who match their ideal jury and closely watch them during mock deliberations.

BLOOM: Watching to see who's talking the most, watching to see how one person can sway another person or another group of people, looking to see, really, where the heat of the battles are in the deliberations.

TOOBIN: Cindy ranks every potential juror with a score or grade.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What did we give No. 1?

ANDREWS: We graded her an F.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. And No. 7?

ANDREWS: Likewise, an F.

TOOBIN: Then she compiles a strike list of dangerous jurors to eliminate and a wish list of ideal jurors to keep.

ANDREWS: There's a little bit of gamesmanship or chess-playing in the sense that you're trying to outsmart the other side.

TOOBIN: Finally, each side takes turns dismissing jurors in a rapid-fire elimination process known as "peremptory challenges." Some call it "the big spin."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Defendants challenge No. 13, your honor.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Plaintiff exercises their first peremptory challenge to juror No. 3.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Defendants challenge No. 9, your honor.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Plaintiff will exercise its second peremptory challenge as to juror No. 7, your honor.

TOOBIN: All this research isn't cheap. A trial consultant's day rate can be as high as $5,000, and a mock trial can run another $20,000 a day.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'BRIEN: That was Jeff Toobin. Something else to consider here, if you've ever sat in a trial to observe the proceedings, you might be interested to learn that some of the people sitting next to you could have been paid spectators. Consultants often organize and pay shadow juries who closely match the real jury. They quietly observe the trial and then give feedback each night about what worked and what did not. The cost for this added service, another $2,500 per day.

PHILLIPS: Well, a super cyclone is slamming the South Pacific right . Olaf skirted the main island of American Samoa, but it just blew over some smaller islands. Phone service is out, so officials don't know the extent of that damage. Wind gusts now up to 190 miles an hour. Forecasters have warned that it could be extremely dangerous and cause flooding.

(WEATHER REPORT)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Baby 81 is finally going home. The 4-month-old Sri Lankan infant is reunited with his real parents thanks to some high- tech DNA tests. Nine couples claimed him after he was found in the debris of the Asian tsunami the day after Christmas. CNN's Satinder Bindra has his story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SATINDER BINDRA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The moment an entire nation has been waiting for, a court official hands over Baby 81 to his parents, ending a seven-week long saga of separation and suffering.

"I went without food and sleep for days," says mother Juniba Jeyraja. "Now I'm very happy."

Earlier in the day, the Jeyrajas' 4-month-old son was brought into a packed courtroom, escorted by police. Baby 81 slept through the lengthy court proceedings. But the world has been watching his parents go through weeks of emotional turmoil, to be reunited with him.

(on camera): On December 26th last year, Baby 81 was swept away from his mother's arms by the tsunami. He was found almost a mile away in that direction, wrapped in a pile of garbage. The man who found him says he floated to safety on an old tire.

(voice-over): The baby became the 81st patient to be admitted to a local hospital that day, giving him his nickname Baby 81.

As word got around of his miraculous escape, nine couples began fighting for him, claiming they were the parents. Only the Jeyrajas, though, agreed to a DNA test, which proved they were his parents.

To show their appreciation and as an offering to the Gods, the entire Jeyraja family smashes 101 coconuts at this temple.

Later, the Jeyrajas take their son, Abalaj (ph), to his old home, which was completely destroyed by the tsunami.

Here, he's changed out of his hospital clothes. Many family members, including his grandmother, break down.

Over the next few days, the family says they won't be doing much. "We'll not be celebrating, because," he says, "30,000 people have lost their lives."

All that matters to the Jeyrajas is that Abalaj is home. And all they want to do, they say, is raise him as a normal child.

Satinder Bindra, CNN, Clalmani (ph), eastern Sri Lanka.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Well, last year it was the joy of six. This year, it could be seventh heaven. Lance Armstrong will be going for his seventh straight win in the Tour de France this summer. The announcement ends speculation on whether he would skip the prestigious race to concentrate on other events, maybe his love life with Sheryl Crow. O'BRIEN: You know what she says to him as advice?

PHILLIPS: What does she say?

O'BRIEN: Remember, Lance, it's a long and winding road.

PHILLIPS: Oh. I thought that was the Beatles. Anyway...

O'BRIEN: No, no, no. Every day is a winding road. I'm not going to do that. I just did a Sibila Vargas. Let's go to business, shall we, and check the markets?

(STOCK MARKET REPORT)

O'BRIEN: And the winner of this year's best in show award is -- well, you've got to wait. There were so many great dogs at the Westminster Dog Show. See who took home top honors in our next hour of LIVE FROM. Keep your channel pointed in our direction.

PHILLIPS: And a little east wing drama at the White House. America's first lady makes an unusual move.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: Here's what's going on "Now in the News."

Fed chairman Alan Greenspan pressing Congress to do something now to shore up Medicare and Social Security. He says both programs face shortfalls as Baby Boomers retire. While endorsing the idea of private Social Security accounts, he added any change must be cautious and gradual.

The president was in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, today, keeping up his offensive on Social Security. He says private accounts will enable Americans to manage of their own retirement. Mr. Bush has promoted his plan in eight states since his State of the Union address earlier this month.

Celebrex, Bextra, and other popular pain medications under the microscope. The FDA evaluating the safety of so-called cox-2 inhibitors. Studies have shown the prescription drugs may be linked to increased risk of heart problems. Advisory committees are hearing from doctors and the public as they weigh the risks and the benefits.

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 February 16, 2005 - 14:30   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: It may only be a matter of time. That's the CIA's new director says about al Qaeda and that group's potential use of chemical and radiological weapons against the United States. Porter Goss surprised some folks in the Senate Intelligence Committee today in his first testimony as intelligence chief.
Joining us now to talk about Goss and the threats he described today, former Republican Congressman from Georgia and CNN contributor, Bob Barr. Good to see you, Bob.

BOB BARR, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Thank you, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: One thing definitely, a lot of questions raised about a national intelligence director. No names being tossed around, no one has been designated to this post. What's going on and why the delay?

BARR: Well, I think what we see at play here is several things. First of all, this is going to be one of the most difficult positions ever to be filled in government. You have so many competing interests. Not just the Pentagon and the intelligence agencies in the military, but the CIA and the National Security Agency, all of them are going to be fighting with this new national intelligence director. So going in, whoever occupies that job, knows that they're going to have a humongous headache. So it's very difficult to find somebody.

Also, we don't yet know and that person would not know whether the president really intends to go to the wall to fight to make sure that that person has the authority that he's intended to have. So you're putting somebody in a very difficult position. Everybody's going to be shooting at them. And he doesn't know how much ammunition he's going to have.

PHILLIPS: Today, we met for the first time, on his first day on the job, the new secretary of Homeland Security. Is this position even more crucial than that?

BARR: It's certainly going to be more difficult because you have -- not just creating a new position, which was the case with the secretary of Homeland Security, but you're taking pieces of and interjecting yourself into other agencies, as well. And there's no real constituency out there to back you up in the intelligence business.

PHILLIPS: Now, Porter Goss coming out and talking about all the threats and how he plans on dealing with the threats of terrorism. But can you even begin to deal with those threats until you have this new director of national intelligence?

BARR: You can. The Central Intelligence Agency was created two generations ago with the precise mission to do what we know needs to be done. That is to pull all of this intelligence in from all of these different places, analyze it, and get it to the people that need to have it on a timely basis. We know that the CIA did not do the adequate job prior to 9/11 or prior to the Iraq invasion. But certainly, that agency is still there. It has wonderful people in it and it can do the job.

PHILLIPS: Now, a lot of those people within the CIA have quit. They've been forced out, so they say. David Ensor ran a special report, two-part report. He had some former spies. I want you to hear what one of them had to say, and then let's talk about it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MELISSA MAHLE, FORMER CIA OPERATIVE: I personally proposed an operation to penetrate a terrorist camp. Not an al Qaeda camp, but a different terrorist camp. And I had deafening silence from headquarters from Langley. Their response was, this is dangerous. And did you really consider how dangerous it was? We have so many rules and...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: She actually goes on to say -- make a couple more points about how there was a backlash from Congress, a lot of politics involved. She couldn't do her job. You're a Congressman. Is that true? Were there a lot of politics involved to where the CIA could not operate in a way that they needed to in order to prevent terrorism?

BARR: You're absolutely correct. Part of the problems that we had with the CIA, prior to 9/11 and prior to the Iraq invasion were of its own making. But also part of it was external restraint and constraints being placed on it by the prior administration and by Congress.

And Congress has to recognize if it's going to micromanage the intelligence business, then it cannot hold the intelligence agencies accountable when they screw up. Congress has to step back and let them do their job. If they do that, that will go a long way toward ensuring the success of whoever takes over that new job.

PHILLIPS: And Porter Goss also coming forward saying, look, we need to have more agents in the field, foreign agents. We need to recruit foreign agents that can blend in. I was reading even in an article that one former operations officer said that you can't just mingle at embassy cocktail parties anymore to get close to those of different countries. You have to get out of the embassies and recruit dirtballs, or people who can get close to those types of people. Do you agree with that? Is that a way of infiltrating the terrorist network in a stronger manner?

BARR: More and more, that is absolutely correct. You're not going to be able to gather the intelligence -- human intelligence you really need by going to cocktail parties at embassies. You're going to have to rely more and more on working people under non-official cover. Not official cover, but non-official cover into foreign political and economic organizations. That is very difficult. It takes a lot of time and anybody that thinks we can just turn a switch on and all of a sudden poof, all of those new agents are out there, has no idea what the intelligence business is all about.

PHILLIPS: Bob Barr, thank you so much.

BARR: Sure.

PHILLIPS: And, of course, CNN is committed to providing the most reliable coverage of news that affects your security. So stay tuned to CNN for the latest information day and night.

And if it weren't swirling in the Atlantic, well, we'd call it a hurricane. But storms in the Southwest Pacific Ocean are cyclones, and a big one is out there right now.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Good thing I got out in time.

Back in the saddle. Will it be lucky number seven for Lance Armstrong at the Tour de France?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: Here we go again with the high-profile trial. 12 men and women will make up a panel of Michael Jackson's peers and decide his guilt or innocence. Just who they are is yet to be determined. The proceedings against Jackson are now in the jury selection phase. And if you think this is part -- this part of the case is to be taken lightly by either side, think again.

Here's CNN's Jeffrey Toobin with the nuts and bolts of seating a jury.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST (voice-over): Twelve empty chairs, 12 ordinary citizens, a seemingly simple pairing at the heart of the American justice system, but playing out behind the scenes...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. Jones denies that he was left of center.

TOOBIN: ... the business of jury selection, a complicated and highly specialized science.

JASON BLOOM, JURY SPECIALIST: I'd pay particular attention to jurors No. 6 and juror No. 10.

TOOBIN: Enter the jury consultants.

GENE HACKMAN, ACTOR: Find something on every one of them. Pull their files. Review every word, every photo, every medical record. Do it.

TOOBIN: In the 2003 movie, "Runaway Jury," experts say Gene Hackman's portrayal of a consultant blinded by power was exaggerated. But in real life, a consultant can mean the difference between victory and defeat.

CINDY ANDREWS, JURY SPECIALIST: Ask them what they like best about their job.

TOOBIN: At CSI, Courtroom Science Incorporated, near Dallas, Texas, nothing about jury selection is left to chance. Its state-of- the-art facility claims to be the largest of its kind in the world with mock courtrooms, closed-circuit cameras, video editing and a high-tech control room that rivals some TV studios.

For jury specialists Jason Bloom and Cindy Andrews, it's a legal laboratory, perfect for pretrial experiments.

ANDREWS: I think people would be surprised to learn there is a great amount of effort that goes on in the front end of the jury selection process. It's not just what happens in the courtroom.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And your medical studies?

ANDREWS: There has been vast amounts of information gathered on the jurors ahead of time.

TOOBIN: Among CSI's services, mock trials and training workshops.

BLOOM: What we try to do is help the attorneys build rapport with the jurors, because rapport is a big part of persuasion. Maybe that involves stepping closer towards them. Maybe it involves smiling more.

ANDREWS: They're going to be highly attuned to everything that's going on in the courtroom.

TOOBIN: Their work is highly develop confidential, so CSI simulated a jury selection process for CNN's cameras.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Raise your hands if you can follow the law.

TOOBIN: It frequently starts with a written questionnaire, containing several red flag questions designed to root out jurors' potential biases.

BLOOM: You're fishing for information. So you need to be able to tell the attorney that if you want to find these fish, you need to use these pieces of bait.

TOOBIN: The next step is called voir dire, French for to "speak the truth." During this stage, attorneys ask potential jurors a wide variety of personal questions.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's your career background? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. And you said your father was a minister.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you more of a sympathetic person or more of a practical person?

TOOBIN: Every question is carefully crafted to reveal key information and insight into each juror. They also watch for clues in a juror's body language and appearance.

ANDREWS: I'm looking at how they're dressing, how they're carrying themselves in the courtroom, their level of deference to the judge.

BLOOM: It scares me when I get some closed body language, because it means that they're not really open to that attorney. Maybe they're even offended by some of the questions he's asking.

TOOBIN: While the process is called jury selection, the two sides are actually deselecting jurors who might rule against them. But in high stakes trials, consultants are increasingly on guard against a threat known as the stealth juror.

BLOOM: Stealth jurors are people that want to get on the jury because they've got a hidden agenda. Other people in high profile cases may want to get a book interview, may want to get a TV interview, may have other alternative agendas for wanting to get on that jury.

TOOBIN: What's good for the prosecution may not be good for the defense. But both sides try to avoid certain high-risk jurors: people with strong personalities.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They're ridiculous. They are ridiculous.

TOOBIN: Self-appointed experts.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Where you can actually assign, like, percentages of negligence.

TOOBIN: Leaders, who could all have the power to sway a jury, like Henry Fonda did in "12 Angry Men."

HENRY FONDA, ACTOR: No jury can declare a man guilty unless it's sure.

TOOBIN: Consultants also pay attention to a group's interaction. To that end, they recruit a pool of people who match their ideal jury and closely watch them during mock deliberations.

BLOOM: Watching to see who's talking the most, watching to see how one person can sway another person or another group of people, looking to see, really, where the heat of the battles are in the deliberations.

TOOBIN: Cindy ranks every potential juror with a score or grade.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What did we give No. 1?

ANDREWS: We graded her an F.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. And No. 7?

ANDREWS: Likewise, an F.

TOOBIN: Then she compiles a strike list of dangerous jurors to eliminate and a wish list of ideal jurors to keep.

ANDREWS: There's a little bit of gamesmanship or chess-playing in the sense that you're trying to outsmart the other side.

TOOBIN: Finally, each side takes turns dismissing jurors in a rapid-fire elimination process known as "peremptory challenges." Some call it "the big spin."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Defendants challenge No. 13, your honor.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Plaintiff exercises their first peremptory challenge to juror No. 3.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Defendants challenge No. 9, your honor.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Plaintiff will exercise its second peremptory challenge as to juror No. 7, your honor.

TOOBIN: All this research isn't cheap. A trial consultant's day rate can be as high as $5,000, and a mock trial can run another $20,000 a day.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'BRIEN: That was Jeff Toobin. Something else to consider here, if you've ever sat in a trial to observe the proceedings, you might be interested to learn that some of the people sitting next to you could have been paid spectators. Consultants often organize and pay shadow juries who closely match the real jury. They quietly observe the trial and then give feedback each night about what worked and what did not. The cost for this added service, another $2,500 per day.

PHILLIPS: Well, a super cyclone is slamming the South Pacific right . Olaf skirted the main island of American Samoa, but it just blew over some smaller islands. Phone service is out, so officials don't know the extent of that damage. Wind gusts now up to 190 miles an hour. Forecasters have warned that it could be extremely dangerous and cause flooding.

(WEATHER REPORT)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Baby 81 is finally going home. The 4-month-old Sri Lankan infant is reunited with his real parents thanks to some high- tech DNA tests. Nine couples claimed him after he was found in the debris of the Asian tsunami the day after Christmas. CNN's Satinder Bindra has his story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SATINDER BINDRA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The moment an entire nation has been waiting for, a court official hands over Baby 81 to his parents, ending a seven-week long saga of separation and suffering.

"I went without food and sleep for days," says mother Juniba Jeyraja. "Now I'm very happy."

Earlier in the day, the Jeyrajas' 4-month-old son was brought into a packed courtroom, escorted by police. Baby 81 slept through the lengthy court proceedings. But the world has been watching his parents go through weeks of emotional turmoil, to be reunited with him.

(on camera): On December 26th last year, Baby 81 was swept away from his mother's arms by the tsunami. He was found almost a mile away in that direction, wrapped in a pile of garbage. The man who found him says he floated to safety on an old tire.

(voice-over): The baby became the 81st patient to be admitted to a local hospital that day, giving him his nickname Baby 81.

As word got around of his miraculous escape, nine couples began fighting for him, claiming they were the parents. Only the Jeyrajas, though, agreed to a DNA test, which proved they were his parents.

To show their appreciation and as an offering to the Gods, the entire Jeyraja family smashes 101 coconuts at this temple.

Later, the Jeyrajas take their son, Abalaj (ph), to his old home, which was completely destroyed by the tsunami.

Here, he's changed out of his hospital clothes. Many family members, including his grandmother, break down.

Over the next few days, the family says they won't be doing much. "We'll not be celebrating, because," he says, "30,000 people have lost their lives."

All that matters to the Jeyrajas is that Abalaj is home. And all they want to do, they say, is raise him as a normal child.

Satinder Bindra, CNN, Clalmani (ph), eastern Sri Lanka.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Well, last year it was the joy of six. This year, it could be seventh heaven. Lance Armstrong will be going for his seventh straight win in the Tour de France this summer. The announcement ends speculation on whether he would skip the prestigious race to concentrate on other events, maybe his love life with Sheryl Crow. O'BRIEN: You know what she says to him as advice?

PHILLIPS: What does she say?

O'BRIEN: Remember, Lance, it's a long and winding road.

PHILLIPS: Oh. I thought that was the Beatles. Anyway...

O'BRIEN: No, no, no. Every day is a winding road. I'm not going to do that. I just did a Sibila Vargas. Let's go to business, shall we, and check the markets?

(STOCK MARKET REPORT)

O'BRIEN: And the winner of this year's best in show award is -- well, you've got to wait. There were so many great dogs at the Westminster Dog Show. See who took home top honors in our next hour of LIVE FROM. Keep your channel pointed in our direction.

PHILLIPS: And a little east wing drama at the White House. America's first lady makes an unusual move.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: Here's what's going on "Now in the News."

Fed chairman Alan Greenspan pressing Congress to do something now to shore up Medicare and Social Security. He says both programs face shortfalls as Baby Boomers retire. While endorsing the idea of private Social Security accounts, he added any change must be cautious and gradual.

The president was in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, today, keeping up his offensive on Social Security. He says private accounts will enable Americans to manage of their own retirement. Mr. Bush has promoted his plan in eight states since his State of the Union address earlier this month.

Celebrex, Bextra, and other popular pain medications under the microscope. The FDA evaluating the safety of so-called cox-2 inhibitors. Studies have shown the prescription drugs may be linked to increased risk of heart problems. Advisory committees are hearing from doctors and the public as they weigh the risks and the benefits.

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