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Insurgents Armed With Weapons, Video Camera; Zacarias Moussaoui Expected to Plead Guilty; Juror in Trouble

Aired April 22, 2005 - 14:00   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: Who shot down a civilian chopper with Americans on board in Iraq? The latest on the investigation and what insurgents claim they did to a crash survivor.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Bigger. Getting stronger fast.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Which way is it heading?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's on the way for us.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've got big hail.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Tornadoes twist across the nation's Midwest. You'll hear from the storm tracker who shot this amazing video.

PHILLIPS: Live pictures now as a nasty storm system moves across the Southeast. Normally you'd see the Atlanta skyline in this live camera shot. We're tracking the storms for you.

HARRIS: And in just an hour and a half, Zacarias Moussaoui, the only man charged in the U.S. in connection with the September 11 attack, expected to plead guilty. The caravan carrying him arriving through a port in Alexandria, Virginia.

From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Tony Harris, in for Miles O'Brien.

PHILLIPS: And I'm Kyra Phillips. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM starts right now.

HARRIS: But we begin in Iraq, at a site now swarming with military investigators. But just a day ago it was surrounded by insurgents watching the fiery wreckage of a helicopter they say they shot down.

Most of the people on board already laid dead among the debris. One was still alive. And the insurgents were armed with both weapons and a video camera.

CNN's Aaron Brown reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

AARON BROWN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It happened north of Baghdad. Insurgents taped the aftermath. At least 10 people died, including six American contractors, men who act as bodyguards for diplomats and others.

The camera takes us on a grisly tour of the wreckage, of the carnage. The circumstances, though, of what comes next are in question.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stand up. Stand up.

BROWN: Unmistakably, an injured man is first interrogated, then helped to his feet. "Weapons, weapons?" they ask. He's unarmed.

Then, after the camera zooms in to get a better view, he's ordered to run.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Go! Go!

BROWN: "Go! Go!" they say. Then they open fire, something they wanted to show. But we don't and won't. So we stopped the video here.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARRIS: And we now know who that victim was. An official from the company that owned the helicopter says the man shot to death was one of the Bulgarian crew members. The helicopter crash and its aftermath are part of a disturbing trend in Iraq.

After weeks of decline, violence is one again on the rise. There are now about 50 attacks a day.

The latest happened today in Baghdad today. A suicide car bombing near a Shiite mosque killed at least nine people and wounded two dozen. The blast was powerful enough to knock down part of the building.

We'll talk about the growing violence in Iraq with our CNN military analyst retired Major General Don Shepperd. That's coming up at the half-hour.

PHILLIPS: Well, there's a new candidate for America's top military post. President Bush today nominated Marine General Peter Pace to become the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. If confirmed, he would be the first Marine in history to hold that job.

Pace has a long resume. He served as a Marine rifle platoon leader in Vietnam. He graduated from the Naval War College in 1986. And Pace then served as the chief of the ground forces branch in Korea until 1988.

He was promoted to general and appointed as commander in chief of the United States southern command in 2000. Pace is currently serving as vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In that role, he is the nation's second highest ranking military officer.

And our "Security Watch" begins now with an accused terrorist returned to court. Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person charged in the U.S. in connection with the 9/11 attacks, plans to plead guilty later today. But that's not sitting well with his lawyers.

CNN national correspondent Bob Franken joins us now from Alexandria, Virginia, with the latest.

Hi, Bob.

BOB FRANKEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good afternoon.

And we believe that Moussaoui has arrived. The caravan that we presume was carrying him went zooming into the courthouse here just a few minutes ago in preparation for a trial where we'll find out if he really meant what he said about pleading guilty to the six charges against him.

That plea, of course, was an announcement that he made within the last couple of weeks in a letter to Judge Leonie Brinkema. This is the judge who he has insulted many, many times. But in a hearing earlier this week, she decided that he was mentally competent to make the plea even though four of the six charges against him carry the possible death penalty.

Now, this plea comes over the huge objections of his defense lawyers. Of course he's had a long time adversarial relationship with his defense lawyers, tried to get rid of them at one point. They have filed another motion. They want to challenge his mental competence, his ability to make a plea, and challenge the possibility of the death sentence.

A motion was filed just a short time ago. It was filed under seal. But the arguments will be made in court. And depending on the what the judge decides, then it will be up to Moussaoui to decide himself whether he's going to follow through on his plan, his announced plan, at any rate, to plead guilty.

A lot of mystery, a lot of turmoil. But that's the kind of thing that has marked this trial since the beginning -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: So, Bob, what's the feeling there, if, indeed, he does make this plea? He's talked about signing this statement of facts, giving more details about 9/11 and the plans before 9/11. Do you think that will happen?

FRANKEN: Well, if that's how the script would go, there would be this proffer, this offering of facts that would be read and he would agree to. Then, what would come next would be a decision on whether there should be the death penalty.

The judge could make a decision that, for whatever legal reason, there should not be. Or, more likely, it would go to a jury that would be impaneled later. And that jury would decide whether to in fact impose the death penalty. PHILLIPS: All right. Bob Franken watching everything for us there in Virginia. Thank you so much.

And a courtroom across the Atlantic is also focusing on the September 11 attacks. Spain today opened the trial of 24 suspected al Qaeda members. Three of them are charged with helping to plan the terror strikes. And if convicted, these prime suspects face more than 60,000 years each in prison. That's based on the maximum sentence of the murder of each person who died in the 9/11 attacks.

HARRIS: And back in this country, the strange case of the fake hospital inspectors. The FBI is probing incidents of people falsely claiming to be with a group that survey hospitals.

The imposters were found looking around buildings in Boston, Detroit and Los Angeles. They were either asked to leave or left on their own. None was arrested.

The Department of Homeland Security says it doesn't have any intelligence that suggests terrorists are planning to attack hospitals. As always, stay tuned to CNN day and night for the most reliable news about your security.

PHILLIPS: We're going to switch gears and go to Miami Beach. That's a pretty fun place to go.

HARRIS: Yes.

PHILLIPS: And folks on the beach got a lot more than they bargained for this morning. Check this out. We just got this incredible video of twin waterspouts. Waterspouts revolving columns of air, kind of like a tornado over water. But usually much weaker.

Well, this is Earth Day, also, and we're told to focus on the environment. But as you just saw, for lots of folks the environment is focusing on us.

Nasty and potentially dangerous storms continue today. Part of the same system that produced this tornado in Parsons, Kansas.

No one was hurt in that twister yesterday, but it made for some spectacular pictures. This incredible video was taken by a storm chaser. His name Reed Timmer, and he talked with CNN's "AMERICAN MORNING" about his very close encounter with the storm.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REED TIMMER, STORM CHASER: The tornado is actually quite small in diameter, but that can be deceiving sometimes. Because just because a tornado is small, it doesn't mean it's weak.

If you see the circulation at the bottom of the tornado, you can see that it was -- it was extremely violent. And we were probably initially an eighth of a mile away from the tornado at this point.

And then we actually got much closer just after this, probably a couple of hundred yards, and we could see little vortices spinning on the bottom and trees getting shot up in the air, and there was softball-sized hail falling through the sky. So I guess it's good thing I brought my bike helmet out there.

It's not pouring, but there's sporadic hail, probably baseball- sized hail falling every now and then. Like getting thrown around the mezzo cyclone. And so it's fairly intense.

I mean, we actually were not worried about the tornado because we knew which direction it was moving. The main we worried about was the hail and the lightning. And you can't really predict either of those.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARRIS: We love the line about the bike helmet -- like that would help.

So where's the storm heading now? We have been hearing some cracks and some booms and noise here in downtown Atlanta. Let's go right to meteorologist Orelon Sidney upstairs in the CNN Weather Center -- Orelon.

ORELON SIDNEY, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Thanks a lot.

(WEATHER REPORT)

HARRIS: Orelon, thank you.

SIDNEY: You're welcome.

PHILLIPS: Straight ahead, a much more serious story, a man charged with killing his wife.

HARRIS: But now a woman on his jury may be the one who serves some actual jail time after what she's accused of doing at the 7- Eleven store. The case of the curious juror ahead on LIVE FROM.

PHILLIPS: And good news for Charlie. He's gotten the banana monkey off his back.

HARRIS: Oh my.

PHILLIPS: But the bad news is, he's got a new nasty habit. We'll light that one up just ahead on LIVE FROM.

It just -- it doesn't look right, period.

HARRIS: It doesn't, you're right.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Oh, now that's classic. All right.

Here's a guy who needs to kick the habit. Everything about this picture is just wrong. Charlie is a chimpanzee who has taken to smoking. He's kept at a zoo in Bloemfontein, South Africa. He may be thrilling the crowds, but his keepers are not very amused.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DARYL BARNES, ZOO SPOKESMAN: Charlie picked the habit up from watching people. He learns by my mimicry. But, yes, we definitely want to say, please, stop.

You know, as you said, it's fun, people laugh. It looks funny to see a chimp smoking. But it's not good for his health.

You know, he's getting older. And as he gets older, obviously, you know, if he smokes, it will damage his lungs and it will just makes his time with us so much shorter. And it could lead to serious health problems as he gets older.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Are you listening, folks? Stop throwing your butts at Charlie. All right?

Staff says that Charlie sometimes even acts like a naughty schoolboy, hiding the smokes when one of them approaches. Good grief.

HARRIS: Oh my.

Ignore a judge's instructions at your own peril. A juror in a murder trial in Virginia is found in contempt after violating the court's order to avoid publicity about the trial. Now the conviction has been thrown out. And the juror could end up with the bill, and did I mention some jail time?

Gary Reals of CNN affiliate WUSA has the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GARY REALS, REPORTER, WUSA (voice-over): Forty-four-year-old Gerardo Lara was found guilty of murdering his wife Marissa two years ago. Now that jury verdict has been thrown out, a mistrial declared. And Lara will have to be tried all over again.

PAUL EBERT, PROSECUTOR: It's extremely frustrating. And we depend on honesty of jurors throughout the entire system.

REALS: One of the jurors got caught lying to the judge. It happened at this Manassas 7-Eleven hours before the guilty verdict was reached. Juror Lindy Heaster was seen purchasing two newspapers. The person who saw her was the attorney who had been representing Gerardo Lara before her all week.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I knew what I saw.

REALS (on camera): Defense attorney Shields did not contend that he saw the juror actually read the newspaper. Whether she did or not is mute.

(voice-over): The bigger problem came later that morning a few blocks down the street at the county courthouse, when Ms. Heaster was questioned by trial Judge Rossie Alston.

EBERT: This juror, of course, actually lied to the court about what she had done.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ms. Heaster flat denied having purchased any of these papers.

REALS: The judge let deliberations resume, resulting in Gerardo Lara's conviction for murder. Then came the videotape, the videotape from the 7-Eleven security camera.

JOHN SHIELDS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Puts the two papers down on the counter, pays for them and promptly...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's the only thing she did buy.

SHIELDS: It's the only thing she bought.

REALS: Ms. Heaster has been found in contempt of court and could be sent to jail by the judge.

EBERT: He's indicated that by saying she should get her affairs in order before she came back to court.

REALS (on camera): Do you have any idea how much jail time?

EBERT: I do not.

REALS (voice-over): At her home near Dale City, no answer. A neighbor tells us Lindy Heaster is a cancer survivor.

I'm Gary Reals, 9 News.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARRIS: And joining us now with more on this intriguing case and what happens next is David Oblon, a Virginia criminal defense attorney who knows the courthouse and the judge involved.

David, good to see you again.

DAVID OBLON, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Good to see you, too, Tony.

HARRIS: What do we promise to the court when we are assigned to a criminal case as a juror?

OBLON: You promise you're going to pay close attention. You promise at the very beginning that you're going to answer the questions from the lawyers and, of course, from the judge under oath, honestly. The system relies upon honesty of the jurors so that you can have a fair trial. HARRIS: So if this woman had simply told the truth, what would have happened then?

OBLON: Probably nothing. Because ultimately, the admonition that's usually given to jurors is, don't look at any publicity relating to this case. They don't say don't avoid any newspapers whatsoever.

HARRIS: Oh, I see.

OBLON: So this is an instance where the cover-up could be worse than the crime.

HARRIS: I see. So I was thinking that she would have -- they would have -- t HARRIS: Hhey would have just replaced her. You're saying that if she had read something else other than the publicity about this case, she might have been fined and been allowed to stay on -- on the case.

OBLON: Yes. She could have stay on this case under most circumstances.

Now, I don't know what the specific order was for this particular trial. But usually the judge says, avoid publicity regarding this case.

So if she was looking in the newspaper to read about the Nationals score, that isn't a violation of the admonition. What the judge is trying to do is to keep the jurors deliberating on information presented at trial, not information that they learn on their own through their own research. That's the goal.

HARRIS: Why do you allow this case -- as the judge, why do you allow this case to go to the jury and to penalty phase without checking on the claims of the defense attorney who has come forward to say, hey, look, this juror's reading newspapers?

OBLON: Well, the system, again, depends on honesty. And this woman testified under oath that she did not purchase any newspapers. And the judge accepted her testimony.

BLITZER: Yes, but, David, you know what I'm getting at. I mean, it's a pretty simple claim to check. We certainly had videotape.

OBLON: Well, it's simple now. I mean, she -- there happened to be a very good lawyer who followed up on this.

HARRIS: Yes.

OBLON: Most lawyers don't follow up on this. This is a credit to this particular defense attorney, who did a wonderful job in following up on the evidence. And once the evidence was presented to the judge, then the testimony becomes a lot weaker.

HARRIS: You expect that the juror will do some time here? OBLON: No, I don't think she's going to do any time. I know Judge Alston. She -- he's a judge who is a judge for a lot of our clients. And we have a lot of experience with him.

He's a very fair-minded judge. I think he will impose the costs of both sides, the prosecution and the defense, as well as the court, which could be about $50,000 in total. But if he imposes that amount, and if this juror comes in with sufficient amount of remorse, bona fide remorse, then I think she could avoid a jail cell of her own.

HARRIS: It would send a heck of a message if the juror did have to do some jail time about the seriousness of this process, wouldn't it?

OBLON: Well, this is a national news story.

HARRIS: Yes.

OBLON: I think that the message has been sent already. And I think this juror, if she had to do it all over again, would do something a lot differently.

HARRIS: Yes. That's a good point, David. David Oblon, we appreciate it. Thanks, David.

OBLON: Good to see you, Tony. Thanks.

PHILLIPS: Well, straight ahead, severe storms moving across the Southeast. We're keeping an eye on them for you. So keep it here at CNN.

Also, we've got our eye on the dessert cart and the big baked Alaska, all 900 pounds of it. Find out why its makers hope the ice cream and cake concoction will save the environment, if not your waistline.

KATHLEEN HAYS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Kathleen Hays at the New York Stock Exchange. Up next, investors are ga-ga for Google. I'll tell you what the search engine is doing right coming up on LIVE FROM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: As Kathleen told you just a moment ago, Wall Street is going ga-ga for Google again today. So just why is Google so hot?

PHILLIPS: Hey, so many people use it.

HARRIS: Well, yes.

PHILLIPS: We use that and a lot of other search engines.

(STOCK MARKET REPORT)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARRIS: And checking stories "Now in the News." Brace yourself. Thunderstorms are expected across the East today. And in the South, storms could pack large hail and strong wind gusts. Bad weather also forecast for parts of Texas and Louisiana. In the West, light rain and snow expected in the Pacific Northwest.

President Bush headed down to the Great Smoky Mountains to commemorate Earth Day today. But instead of mountains in the background, bad weather forced the president to make his remarks inside a hangar at an airport near Knoxville, Tennessee. The Smokies are in the nation's most visited and most polluted national park.

Ben & Jerry's, yes. The ice-cream company joined in a protest against Washington's environmental policies today. A gigantic 900- pound baked Alaska made their point. The company, known for its activism on social issues, fears Washington may allow oil drilling in the Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

And Zacarias Moussaoui plans to plead guilty today to charges related to the 9/11 attacks, but his attorneys are not going along with the plan. They say they will object, and want a full hearing to determine whether Moussaoui is mentally competent to plead guilty. The hearing is scheduled for 3:30 Eastern.

The punishment fits the crime -- so says the Virginia Supreme Court. Today it upheld John Muhammed's murder conviction in the 2002 D.C.-area sniper spree. Muhammad's lawyers argued that, since Lee Boyd Malvo was the actual triggerman, Muhammad's death sentence was too severe.

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 April 22, 2005 - 14:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Who shot down a civilian chopper with Americans on board in Iraq? The latest on the investigation and what insurgents claim they did to a crash survivor.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Bigger. Getting stronger fast.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Which way is it heading?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's on the way for us.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've got big hail.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Tornadoes twist across the nation's Midwest. You'll hear from the storm tracker who shot this amazing video.

PHILLIPS: Live pictures now as a nasty storm system moves across the Southeast. Normally you'd see the Atlanta skyline in this live camera shot. We're tracking the storms for you.

HARRIS: And in just an hour and a half, Zacarias Moussaoui, the only man charged in the U.S. in connection with the September 11 attack, expected to plead guilty. The caravan carrying him arriving through a port in Alexandria, Virginia.

From the CNN Center in Atlanta, I'm Tony Harris, in for Miles O'Brien.

PHILLIPS: And I'm Kyra Phillips. This hour of CNN's LIVE FROM starts right now.

HARRIS: But we begin in Iraq, at a site now swarming with military investigators. But just a day ago it was surrounded by insurgents watching the fiery wreckage of a helicopter they say they shot down.

Most of the people on board already laid dead among the debris. One was still alive. And the insurgents were armed with both weapons and a video camera.

CNN's Aaron Brown reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

AARON BROWN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It happened north of Baghdad. Insurgents taped the aftermath. At least 10 people died, including six American contractors, men who act as bodyguards for diplomats and others.

The camera takes us on a grisly tour of the wreckage, of the carnage. The circumstances, though, of what comes next are in question.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stand up. Stand up.

BROWN: Unmistakably, an injured man is first interrogated, then helped to his feet. "Weapons, weapons?" they ask. He's unarmed.

Then, after the camera zooms in to get a better view, he's ordered to run.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Go! Go!

BROWN: "Go! Go!" they say. Then they open fire, something they wanted to show. But we don't and won't. So we stopped the video here.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARRIS: And we now know who that victim was. An official from the company that owned the helicopter says the man shot to death was one of the Bulgarian crew members. The helicopter crash and its aftermath are part of a disturbing trend in Iraq.

After weeks of decline, violence is one again on the rise. There are now about 50 attacks a day.

The latest happened today in Baghdad today. A suicide car bombing near a Shiite mosque killed at least nine people and wounded two dozen. The blast was powerful enough to knock down part of the building.

We'll talk about the growing violence in Iraq with our CNN military analyst retired Major General Don Shepperd. That's coming up at the half-hour.

PHILLIPS: Well, there's a new candidate for America's top military post. President Bush today nominated Marine General Peter Pace to become the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. If confirmed, he would be the first Marine in history to hold that job.

Pace has a long resume. He served as a Marine rifle platoon leader in Vietnam. He graduated from the Naval War College in 1986. And Pace then served as the chief of the ground forces branch in Korea until 1988.

He was promoted to general and appointed as commander in chief of the United States southern command in 2000. Pace is currently serving as vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In that role, he is the nation's second highest ranking military officer.

And our "Security Watch" begins now with an accused terrorist returned to court. Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person charged in the U.S. in connection with the 9/11 attacks, plans to plead guilty later today. But that's not sitting well with his lawyers.

CNN national correspondent Bob Franken joins us now from Alexandria, Virginia, with the latest.

Hi, Bob.

BOB FRANKEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good afternoon.

And we believe that Moussaoui has arrived. The caravan that we presume was carrying him went zooming into the courthouse here just a few minutes ago in preparation for a trial where we'll find out if he really meant what he said about pleading guilty to the six charges against him.

That plea, of course, was an announcement that he made within the last couple of weeks in a letter to Judge Leonie Brinkema. This is the judge who he has insulted many, many times. But in a hearing earlier this week, she decided that he was mentally competent to make the plea even though four of the six charges against him carry the possible death penalty.

Now, this plea comes over the huge objections of his defense lawyers. Of course he's had a long time adversarial relationship with his defense lawyers, tried to get rid of them at one point. They have filed another motion. They want to challenge his mental competence, his ability to make a plea, and challenge the possibility of the death sentence.

A motion was filed just a short time ago. It was filed under seal. But the arguments will be made in court. And depending on the what the judge decides, then it will be up to Moussaoui to decide himself whether he's going to follow through on his plan, his announced plan, at any rate, to plead guilty.

A lot of mystery, a lot of turmoil. But that's the kind of thing that has marked this trial since the beginning -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: So, Bob, what's the feeling there, if, indeed, he does make this plea? He's talked about signing this statement of facts, giving more details about 9/11 and the plans before 9/11. Do you think that will happen?

FRANKEN: Well, if that's how the script would go, there would be this proffer, this offering of facts that would be read and he would agree to. Then, what would come next would be a decision on whether there should be the death penalty.

The judge could make a decision that, for whatever legal reason, there should not be. Or, more likely, it would go to a jury that would be impaneled later. And that jury would decide whether to in fact impose the death penalty. PHILLIPS: All right. Bob Franken watching everything for us there in Virginia. Thank you so much.

And a courtroom across the Atlantic is also focusing on the September 11 attacks. Spain today opened the trial of 24 suspected al Qaeda members. Three of them are charged with helping to plan the terror strikes. And if convicted, these prime suspects face more than 60,000 years each in prison. That's based on the maximum sentence of the murder of each person who died in the 9/11 attacks.

HARRIS: And back in this country, the strange case of the fake hospital inspectors. The FBI is probing incidents of people falsely claiming to be with a group that survey hospitals.

The imposters were found looking around buildings in Boston, Detroit and Los Angeles. They were either asked to leave or left on their own. None was arrested.

The Department of Homeland Security says it doesn't have any intelligence that suggests terrorists are planning to attack hospitals. As always, stay tuned to CNN day and night for the most reliable news about your security.

PHILLIPS: We're going to switch gears and go to Miami Beach. That's a pretty fun place to go.

HARRIS: Yes.

PHILLIPS: And folks on the beach got a lot more than they bargained for this morning. Check this out. We just got this incredible video of twin waterspouts. Waterspouts revolving columns of air, kind of like a tornado over water. But usually much weaker.

Well, this is Earth Day, also, and we're told to focus on the environment. But as you just saw, for lots of folks the environment is focusing on us.

Nasty and potentially dangerous storms continue today. Part of the same system that produced this tornado in Parsons, Kansas.

No one was hurt in that twister yesterday, but it made for some spectacular pictures. This incredible video was taken by a storm chaser. His name Reed Timmer, and he talked with CNN's "AMERICAN MORNING" about his very close encounter with the storm.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REED TIMMER, STORM CHASER: The tornado is actually quite small in diameter, but that can be deceiving sometimes. Because just because a tornado is small, it doesn't mean it's weak.

If you see the circulation at the bottom of the tornado, you can see that it was -- it was extremely violent. And we were probably initially an eighth of a mile away from the tornado at this point.

And then we actually got much closer just after this, probably a couple of hundred yards, and we could see little vortices spinning on the bottom and trees getting shot up in the air, and there was softball-sized hail falling through the sky. So I guess it's good thing I brought my bike helmet out there.

It's not pouring, but there's sporadic hail, probably baseball- sized hail falling every now and then. Like getting thrown around the mezzo cyclone. And so it's fairly intense.

I mean, we actually were not worried about the tornado because we knew which direction it was moving. The main we worried about was the hail and the lightning. And you can't really predict either of those.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARRIS: We love the line about the bike helmet -- like that would help.

So where's the storm heading now? We have been hearing some cracks and some booms and noise here in downtown Atlanta. Let's go right to meteorologist Orelon Sidney upstairs in the CNN Weather Center -- Orelon.

ORELON SIDNEY, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Thanks a lot.

(WEATHER REPORT)

HARRIS: Orelon, thank you.

SIDNEY: You're welcome.

PHILLIPS: Straight ahead, a much more serious story, a man charged with killing his wife.

HARRIS: But now a woman on his jury may be the one who serves some actual jail time after what she's accused of doing at the 7- Eleven store. The case of the curious juror ahead on LIVE FROM.

PHILLIPS: And good news for Charlie. He's gotten the banana monkey off his back.

HARRIS: Oh my.

PHILLIPS: But the bad news is, he's got a new nasty habit. We'll light that one up just ahead on LIVE FROM.

It just -- it doesn't look right, period.

HARRIS: It doesn't, you're right.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: Oh, now that's classic. All right.

Here's a guy who needs to kick the habit. Everything about this picture is just wrong. Charlie is a chimpanzee who has taken to smoking. He's kept at a zoo in Bloemfontein, South Africa. He may be thrilling the crowds, but his keepers are not very amused.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DARYL BARNES, ZOO SPOKESMAN: Charlie picked the habit up from watching people. He learns by my mimicry. But, yes, we definitely want to say, please, stop.

You know, as you said, it's fun, people laugh. It looks funny to see a chimp smoking. But it's not good for his health.

You know, he's getting older. And as he gets older, obviously, you know, if he smokes, it will damage his lungs and it will just makes his time with us so much shorter. And it could lead to serious health problems as he gets older.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Are you listening, folks? Stop throwing your butts at Charlie. All right?

Staff says that Charlie sometimes even acts like a naughty schoolboy, hiding the smokes when one of them approaches. Good grief.

HARRIS: Oh my.

Ignore a judge's instructions at your own peril. A juror in a murder trial in Virginia is found in contempt after violating the court's order to avoid publicity about the trial. Now the conviction has been thrown out. And the juror could end up with the bill, and did I mention some jail time?

Gary Reals of CNN affiliate WUSA has the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GARY REALS, REPORTER, WUSA (voice-over): Forty-four-year-old Gerardo Lara was found guilty of murdering his wife Marissa two years ago. Now that jury verdict has been thrown out, a mistrial declared. And Lara will have to be tried all over again.

PAUL EBERT, PROSECUTOR: It's extremely frustrating. And we depend on honesty of jurors throughout the entire system.

REALS: One of the jurors got caught lying to the judge. It happened at this Manassas 7-Eleven hours before the guilty verdict was reached. Juror Lindy Heaster was seen purchasing two newspapers. The person who saw her was the attorney who had been representing Gerardo Lara before her all week.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I knew what I saw.

REALS (on camera): Defense attorney Shields did not contend that he saw the juror actually read the newspaper. Whether she did or not is mute.

(voice-over): The bigger problem came later that morning a few blocks down the street at the county courthouse, when Ms. Heaster was questioned by trial Judge Rossie Alston.

EBERT: This juror, of course, actually lied to the court about what she had done.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ms. Heaster flat denied having purchased any of these papers.

REALS: The judge let deliberations resume, resulting in Gerardo Lara's conviction for murder. Then came the videotape, the videotape from the 7-Eleven security camera.

JOHN SHIELDS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Puts the two papers down on the counter, pays for them and promptly...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's the only thing she did buy.

SHIELDS: It's the only thing she bought.

REALS: Ms. Heaster has been found in contempt of court and could be sent to jail by the judge.

EBERT: He's indicated that by saying she should get her affairs in order before she came back to court.

REALS (on camera): Do you have any idea how much jail time?

EBERT: I do not.

REALS (voice-over): At her home near Dale City, no answer. A neighbor tells us Lindy Heaster is a cancer survivor.

I'm Gary Reals, 9 News.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARRIS: And joining us now with more on this intriguing case and what happens next is David Oblon, a Virginia criminal defense attorney who knows the courthouse and the judge involved.

David, good to see you again.

DAVID OBLON, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Good to see you, too, Tony.

HARRIS: What do we promise to the court when we are assigned to a criminal case as a juror?

OBLON: You promise you're going to pay close attention. You promise at the very beginning that you're going to answer the questions from the lawyers and, of course, from the judge under oath, honestly. The system relies upon honesty of the jurors so that you can have a fair trial. HARRIS: So if this woman had simply told the truth, what would have happened then?

OBLON: Probably nothing. Because ultimately, the admonition that's usually given to jurors is, don't look at any publicity relating to this case. They don't say don't avoid any newspapers whatsoever.

HARRIS: Oh, I see.

OBLON: So this is an instance where the cover-up could be worse than the crime.

HARRIS: I see. So I was thinking that she would have -- they would have -- t HARRIS: Hhey would have just replaced her. You're saying that if she had read something else other than the publicity about this case, she might have been fined and been allowed to stay on -- on the case.

OBLON: Yes. She could have stay on this case under most circumstances.

Now, I don't know what the specific order was for this particular trial. But usually the judge says, avoid publicity regarding this case.

So if she was looking in the newspaper to read about the Nationals score, that isn't a violation of the admonition. What the judge is trying to do is to keep the jurors deliberating on information presented at trial, not information that they learn on their own through their own research. That's the goal.

HARRIS: Why do you allow this case -- as the judge, why do you allow this case to go to the jury and to penalty phase without checking on the claims of the defense attorney who has come forward to say, hey, look, this juror's reading newspapers?

OBLON: Well, the system, again, depends on honesty. And this woman testified under oath that she did not purchase any newspapers. And the judge accepted her testimony.

BLITZER: Yes, but, David, you know what I'm getting at. I mean, it's a pretty simple claim to check. We certainly had videotape.

OBLON: Well, it's simple now. I mean, she -- there happened to be a very good lawyer who followed up on this.

HARRIS: Yes.

OBLON: Most lawyers don't follow up on this. This is a credit to this particular defense attorney, who did a wonderful job in following up on the evidence. And once the evidence was presented to the judge, then the testimony becomes a lot weaker.

HARRIS: You expect that the juror will do some time here? OBLON: No, I don't think she's going to do any time. I know Judge Alston. She -- he's a judge who is a judge for a lot of our clients. And we have a lot of experience with him.

He's a very fair-minded judge. I think he will impose the costs of both sides, the prosecution and the defense, as well as the court, which could be about $50,000 in total. But if he imposes that amount, and if this juror comes in with sufficient amount of remorse, bona fide remorse, then I think she could avoid a jail cell of her own.

HARRIS: It would send a heck of a message if the juror did have to do some jail time about the seriousness of this process, wouldn't it?

OBLON: Well, this is a national news story.

HARRIS: Yes.

OBLON: I think that the message has been sent already. And I think this juror, if she had to do it all over again, would do something a lot differently.

HARRIS: Yes. That's a good point, David. David Oblon, we appreciate it. Thanks, David.

OBLON: Good to see you, Tony. Thanks.

PHILLIPS: Well, straight ahead, severe storms moving across the Southeast. We're keeping an eye on them for you. So keep it here at CNN.

Also, we've got our eye on the dessert cart and the big baked Alaska, all 900 pounds of it. Find out why its makers hope the ice cream and cake concoction will save the environment, if not your waistline.

KATHLEEN HAYS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Kathleen Hays at the New York Stock Exchange. Up next, investors are ga-ga for Google. I'll tell you what the search engine is doing right coming up on LIVE FROM.

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HARRIS: As Kathleen told you just a moment ago, Wall Street is going ga-ga for Google again today. So just why is Google so hot?

PHILLIPS: Hey, so many people use it.

HARRIS: Well, yes.

PHILLIPS: We use that and a lot of other search engines.

(STOCK MARKET REPORT)

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HARRIS: And checking stories "Now in the News." Brace yourself. Thunderstorms are expected across the East today. And in the South, storms could pack large hail and strong wind gusts. Bad weather also forecast for parts of Texas and Louisiana. In the West, light rain and snow expected in the Pacific Northwest.

President Bush headed down to the Great Smoky Mountains to commemorate Earth Day today. But instead of mountains in the background, bad weather forced the president to make his remarks inside a hangar at an airport near Knoxville, Tennessee. The Smokies are in the nation's most visited and most polluted national park.

Ben & Jerry's, yes. The ice-cream company joined in a protest against Washington's environmental policies today. A gigantic 900- pound baked Alaska made their point. The company, known for its activism on social issues, fears Washington may allow oil drilling in the Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

And Zacarias Moussaoui plans to plead guilty today to charges related to the 9/11 attacks, but his attorneys are not going along with the plan. They say they will object, and want a full hearing to determine whether Moussaoui is mentally competent to plead guilty. The hearing is scheduled for 3:30 Eastern.

The punishment fits the crime -- so says the Virginia Supreme Court. Today it upheld John Muhammed's murder conviction in the 2002 D.C.-area sniper spree. Muhammad's lawyers argued that, since Lee Boyd Malvo was the actual triggerman, Muhammad's death sentence was too severe.

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