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Military Stretched Thin; BTK Suspect Pleads Not Guilty; Brain Damaged Firefighter Begins Talking After 10 Years

Aired May 03, 2005 - 15:00   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, CO-HOST: Sunburned and a bit weak, but well enough to leave the hospital. Troy Driscoll was one of the two South Carolina teens who spent six days adrift at sea. The other teen, Josh Long, went home last night 40 pounds lighter.
U.S. troops in Iraq, U.S. troops in Afghanistan, U.S. troops in lots of other places, manning lots of other missions.

MILES O'BRIEN, CO-HOST: They can't do everything, says their senior uniformed commander, but they can do anything they have to do now or in the future.

CNN's Kathleen Koch at the Pentagon with more on that -- Kathleen.

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Miles, this is an annual reality check for the Pentagon, a report that the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff sends up to Congress every year, really looking at the U.S. military's ability to face threats world wide. And not surprisingly, it found that the U.S. military is stretched a bit thin.

According to a senior military official, the deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan will in the future likely cause other armed conflicts to last longer and produce higher casualties. The Pentagon is so concerned about reaction to this report that, as you can see, the chairman came out a few minutes ago to talk about its findings.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RICHARD MYERS, CHAIRMAN, JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF: We have very high standards in our -- in how we measure ourselves against our current plans. And so that's what we're measuring.

And we're measuring against the time lines that are already in plans that have been established several years ago, a year ago. And so we measure ourselves against that.

What we've said is we will be successful. We will prevail. The time lines may have to be extended. We may have to use additional resources, but it doesn't matter, because we're going to be successful in the end.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOCH: So there the Pentagon insisting that the most important thing to take away from this classified report is its final conclusion that the U.S. military would, indeed, have the ability to win any military conflict that it would enter anywhere in the globe. It may not be neat, it may not be pretty, but it would indeed get the job done.

The report does cite some specific areas that have become stressed as a result of the deployments in both Iraq and Afghanistan. One is the stockpile of precision weapons. Also equipment needed to fight battles. And finally, manpower. Reserve and National Guard units that are really providing the bulk of the combat support in Iraq.

But it is important to point out that, in addition to this -- this report from General Myers, there was also an addendum added to it by the defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld that cites the many ways that the Pentagon is planning to spend money or is already spending money to fix these areas where the military is coming up short.

O'BRIEN: Kathleen Koch, thank you very much.

Sure to be a factor in that capability equation at Pentagon, three straight months now of subpar recruitment. The Army hopes to sign up 80,000 new G.I.s by the end of September but having missed its targets in February, March and now April, a spokesman says it may only reach 85 percent of that.

Recruiters hoping for a blockbuster summer, so to speak, but surveys show the war in Iraq is taking a toll.

PHILLIPS: Now questions about your security, your Social Security that is.

Today President Bush took his road trip for Social Security reform to Canton, Mississippi but a new CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll shows the majority of Americans aren't getting on board with his message. When asked if they have more trust in Democrats or Republicans to deal with Social Security issues, 46 percent responded Democrats. Thirty-six percent said Republicans.

The poll, conducted April 29 to May 1, also found that 81 percent of respondents believed that the program would need major changes in coming years.

O'BRIEN: Dennis Rader has a day in court. He's the man police believe taunted them and terrorized Wichita, Kansas, for decades. The BTK suspect, as he's known, uttered only a few words at his arraignment this morning.

CNN's Jonathan Freed was there.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JONATHAN FREED, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For the past two weeks, Dennis Rader's attorneys have been telegraphing that he would plead not guilty to the charges against him. And this morning around 9:00 a.m. Wichita time here at the Sedgwick County courthouse, that is exactly what happened. Rader entered a plea of not guilty to the 10 counts of first degree charges that he is facing, where authorities are accusing him of being the infamous BTK strangler.

Let's listen to how all of that played out in the courtroom earlier today.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: At this time the defendant would stand mute as to the plea and ask the court to enter the appropriate plea and set the matter for trial.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Very will. The defendant standing mute, the court will enter a plea of not guilty.

FREED: Afterwards, I had a chance it talk to district attorney Nola Foulston, and I asked her why it was so important to her that this case ultimately go before a jury.

NOLA FOULSTON, SEDGWICK COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY: I think that whatever the facts are brought to the attention of the public, it is a very appropriate for the public to be able to see, to listen, to hear the facts of the case. I think that is the most important thing that can bring the closure that we need on this case.

FREED: Now a trial date of June 27 was set today but the district attorney's office and everybody, in fact, connected with this case is saying do not set your watches by that date. They say that since this case spans three decades and such great magnitude, it's going to take quite awhile to plow through all of the evidence and get ready for trial. They're suggesting October at the earliest but possibly even later than that.

In Wichita, Kansas, I'm Jonathan Freed.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'BRIEN: Imagine living next door to a suspected serial killer. You'll meet the neighbor of the BTK suspect, Rader, at 8 p.m. Eastern on "PAULA ZAHN NOW."

PHILLIPS: Elsewhere across America now, more officers take to the freeways in southern California after another motorist is shot. The bullet pierced the windshield of his SUV, just missing him. It's the eighth freeway shooting in two months. Four people have been killed. Authorities don't know if the shootings are related. A special unit has been set up to investigate.

Smash and grab doesn't get much bolder than this. A pick-up truck backs through the front door of a Costco store in Durham, North Carolina, and right up to the jewelry counter. A masked passenger jumps out, smashes the case, grabs the loot and off they go. Police later found the truck, stolen of course, abandoned nearby.

Return to sea, seven dolphins were released just a short time ago off the Florida Keys. They had been rescued two months ago after stranding themselves on a mud flat. O'BRIEN: Court of public opinion calling for retribution, but whether the court of law imposes a penalty for the runaway bride still up in the air. The city of Duluth, Georgia, Jennifer Wilbanks' hometown, they spent 60 grand searching for the wayward bribe. Of course, she turned up Saturday in Albuquerque.

The district attorney handling the case talked earlier on CNN of some possible repercussions.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DANNY PORTER, GWINNETT COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY: I think there's got to be some consequence, and that could be something that ranges from a sincere apology and restitution to some period of confinement. That's the one good thing about the criminal system, is we have a multitude of options to do -- to try and solve a problem.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: Despite all of this, the wedding is still apparently on. Here's what Wilbanks' would have been father-in-law had to say about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLAUDE MASON, JOHN MASON'S FATHER: According to John, it is. As far as a date, that's not been determined yet. But he's committed to her, and as it stands now he thinks there will be a wedding.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: All right. Maybe the two will choose to elope this time. I think an appropriate gift, Kyra, might be a GPS tracking device for the bride to be. What do you think? Just a thought.

PHILLIPS: Could borrow Martha's bracelet, maybe. They could share.

O'BRIEN: Ankle bracelet. Would be perfect.

PHILLIPS: The runaway bride could be in the new show. Then they could track them together.

O'BRIEN: I love it. This is high concept.

PHILLIPS: Good.

Well, the family of a brain damaged firefighter in Buffalo, New York, says that he has suddenly broken nearly a decade of silence. It's an amazing story we've been talking about all day.

O'BRIEN: It is. A firefighting injury left Donald Herbert unable to speak from December '95 until Saturday, and then he just started talking like a blue streak. There's no word on his current state however.

Michelle McClintock of affiliate WIDB with more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MICHELLE MCCLINTOCK, WIDB REPORTER (voice-over): Simon Manka is hesitant to use the word "miracle" when talking about his nephew Don Herbert. But he says it was nothing short of amazing to see the former firefighter converse for the first time in 9 1/2 years.

SIMON MANKA, HERBERT'S UNCLE: Donny was looking out of the window at the facility. And he said, "I want to talk to my wife." OK? At which time the staff here put him on the phone with Linda.

MCCLINTOCK: Out of nowhere, he said, "I want to talk to my wife," according to Manka. And before long, Don was talking to a room full of family and friends, catching up on lost time.

MANKA: He did initiate a question, "How long have I been -- been away?" And we told him almost 10 years, and his response to that was that he thought it was only three months.

MCCLINTOCK: It was December 1995 when Herbert became trapped under a collapsed roof while fighting a fire. Twelve minutes without oxygen caused a serious brain injury that doctors considered permanent. Video from years past shows Herbert as conscious but unable to communicate.

LT. ANTHONY LIBERATORE, BUFFALO, NEW YORK, FIRE DEPARTMENT: Yes, typical Donny Herbert. He was very concerned about his family. He was worried, you know, were the bills being paid? Was his wife being taken care of? How were the boys doing?

MCCLINTOCK: Fellow firefighter Lieutenant Anthony Liberatore visited with Don over the weekend. He says they talked about high school football and their firefighting days, but that Don spent most of his time focused on his four sons.

LIBERATORE: He stayed up till early morning talking to his boys and catching up on what they have been doing over the last several years.

MANKA: Donny's family requested Don's many friends in the public respect their privacy as Donny is being re-evaluated and the scope of this recovery is being determined.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: And former Buffalo Fire Commissioner Neil Keane remembers that terrible incident, December 1995, when a burning roof caved in on his firefighter, Donny Herbert. He was on the phone with us today. Pretty amazing interview. Keane said that he raced to the scene and to the hospital. Then he had to face the family.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NEIL KEANE, FORMER BUFFALO FIRE COMMISSIONER: It's like the worst nightmare of a fire chief to have to go to someone's family afterwards. And all I can say is I'm so full of emotion for his family, for his wife and his boys and his mother and the people who cared for him all of those years. And truly this is a miracle.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: At the same time the fire commissioner, of course, said when he saw the video of Donny and heard that he had finally talked to his family, he just -- it brought him to tears, he and his wife.

O'BRIEN: He's headed north soon. He said he can't wait to go see him.

PHILLIPS: That's right. He can't wait to see him. We're going to follow up with him.

O'BRIEN: Love to be a fly on the wall for that one. That would be an emotional thing.

So miracle. That's what the former commissioner says. Stroke of luck? Just science in action? Who knows? Straight ahead on LIVE FROM, a former firefighter's awakening of sorts. How it's possible. Why it is so rare. Or is it? We'll speak with a neurologist from Cornell University. He'll give us some answers.

PHILLIPS: Plus another identity theft scare, this time for a major U.S. employer. How did it happen? We'll talk about it.

O'BRIEN: And it's the show looking for the best. So why is this web site dedicated to voting for the worst? This whole "American Idol" thing is turning into quite a kafuffle, you might say. Stay with us.

ANNOUNCER: You're watching LIVE FROM on CNN, the most trusted name in news.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: Friends and family of a brain-damaged firefighter in Buffalo, New York, are waiting to see if his dramatic improvement will last. The family says Donald Herbert started talking Saturday after a firefighting injury plunged him into nearly 10 years of silence.

But is his recovery likely to hold? How does his recovery happen in the first place? We've got lots of questions. Dr. Joseph Fins of Cornell University, the Weill Medical College. He's an internist there, and he and his group have studied these issues specifically over the years.

Dr. Fins, good to have you with us.

DR. JOSEPH FINS, CORNELL UNIVERSITY: Good to be here.

O'BRIEN: First of all, we don't know a lot about this kind of recovery, do we? I know you've been focusing on it. But the number of people that have been focused on it over the years is very limited, isn't it?

FINS: Right. I mean, it's a handful of people. And I think we have here the force of another anecdote and we need to study it more systematically, look the at public health dimensions of this, understand how many of these people are in our nursing homes so we can do more to treat them and to help them.

O'BRIEN: All right.

FINS: It's unusual, certainly.

O'BRIEN: Unusual to say the least. And we're talking about it. We're just amazed after 9 1/2 years that the brain could suddenly recover, reboot, whatever you want to call it.

What is it that makes the brain recover? What do we know about the recovery process after an injury like this?

FINS: Right. That's an open question. And that's why we need to study hundreds if not thousand of patients like this so we can make generalizations. Right now we can't predict which patient will have this kind rebooting and who will remain in permanent unconsciousness.

There are a number of hypotheses about why this happens, whether the brain is a level of arousal and it gets rebooted. It gets turned on. The circuitry is basically intact. Whether or not there are certain circuits that are overriding normal mechanisms. Or whether there's a phenomenon of rewiring.

All these are hypotheses that are on the table right now that need to be studied over time with lots of patients and lots of patients like Mr. Herbert.

O'BRIEN: How many patients are out there, do you suppose? You just don't know about them, because they're, sad to say, they're just kind of wasting away...

FINS: Right.

O'BRIEN: ... in long-term care facilities like this.

FINS: Right, I mean, it's been prescribed as custodial care, which is a horrible phrase. And these people deserve better. They are not in academic medical centers. They often get unassessed for years and years and years.

The story of Terry Wallace in the news, who woke up after 19 years. His family was told that neurological assessment was too expensive and wouldn't make any difference. He woke up after 19 years and started communicating, continues to improve.

So this is a real pressing public health need for relatively young people who may have the possible for some modicum of recovery.

O'BRIEN: And when you say there's potential for a modicum of recovery, and the more you understand it that that raises the possibility of some sort of treatment.

FINS: Right.

O'BRIEN: Are there any treatments out there? Any drugs that can be given to somebody who's suffered an injury like this and might help them recover?

FINS: Right. There's some -- there's some clinical trials that are being undertaken right now, using drugs like Amantodine , but we really are at the very, very beginning of decades' worth of research to understand how these brains get injured, how they recovered, what prompts natural recovery and what might foster improved assistance to help the natural process along.

O'BRIEN: Amantodine, what's that?

FINS: It's a drug often used for viral infections, and it may have the ability to reboot the minimally conscious brain.

O'BRIEN: So...

FINS: Still, it's an open question.

O'BRIEN: Wow, that's interesting. So really the cry that you have right now or the call that you have is for people out there, if you have a loved one or you know somebody who's in a situation, perhaps this is somebody you would like to study somehow to learn more about this.

FINS: Right, but I don't want to engender false hope.

O'BRIEN: OK.

FINS: I think that these are rare occurrences and we have to be very tempered about what we're saying. These are unusual, and we have to learn from what's unusual in order to perhaps make it more common for the vast majority of patients.

O'BRIEN: So on the one hand, the brain is incredibly fragile and yet maybe for the same reasons, it also has a tremendous ability to regenerate?

FINS: Yes. And the stories of brain injury narratives, of patients who have actually come back from less severe injuries is dramatic. It's almost as if the brain recovers in the same way that the brain develops as a child. And you hear people saying, "I had learn how to redo mathematics" from people who have been stock analysts and the like. And it's real interesting to see how the brain rediscovers itself and unifies fracture selves.

O'BRIEN: All right. Fascinating. Dr. Joseph Fins, thank you for your time. We appreciate it.

FINS: Thank you.

O'BRIEN: Dr. Fins is with Cornell University's Weill Medical College -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, a check of the markets is straight ahead. Plus, it's a show about music, but "American Idol" is starting to look more like a soap opera. Ugh, chock full of drama! More on the troubles, the gossip.

O'BRIEN: You love every minute!

PHILLIPS: The kafuffle.

O'BRIEN: You love "Idol." You love "Idol." Come on.

PHILLIPS: I've only seen half of one show, I have to admit.

O'BRIEN: Your kids are (UNINTELLIGIBLE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: All right, so if somebody comes up to you on the street, opens up his coat and says, "Psst, you want to buy a box full of tapes?" Do us a favor, call the cops, would you?

PHILLIPS: Don't buy them.

O'BRIEN: Don't buy them. Let us know.

PHILLIPS: They're not videos. They're not home movies.

O'BRIEN: It's all of us in there.

PHILLIPS: It's all of our personal information, and we'll get hosed.

Susan Lisovicz.

(STOCK REPORT)

PHILLIPS: Thank you very much, Susan.

O'BRIEN: Thank you very much.

PHILLIPS: Stay tuned. This is the story you've been waiting for.

O'BRIEN: She's an "Idol" fan, big one.

PHILLIPS: She is really?

O'BRIEN: Controversy brews, Paula Abdul stews. I'm the only one here who watches this thing, I think, over -- because of my kids. Tomorrow's planned "American Idol" expose on ABC's prime-time live. That's on a different network, all of that stuff.

PHILLIPS: That's why Miles is tuning in. Fans and detractors of the FOX network's ratings goliath "American Idol" are all twitter about a report that ABC is ballyhooing as explosive. O'BRIEN: And now of course ABC isn't giving out too much dirt, just enough to titillate a little bit. Speculation is swirling. The report will include an interview with a certain past contestant. Corey Clark maintains he had an affair...

PHILLIPS: An affair!

O'BRIEN: ... with Paula Abdul. And now Abdul's lawyers fired off a letter to ABC threatening legal action if the special airs. All of this a very carefully calculated effort to get us to watch. All right.

PHILLIPS: Meanwhile, someone has finally figured out that much of "American Idol's" appeal lies in bad-mouthing the competitors. Hence, the web site, VoteFortheWorst.com. It's urging callers and texters to hijack the contest with their votes, and the site is pushing fellow artists to keep voting for Scott Savol. Did I say that right?

O'BRIEN: Yes. He's awful.

PHILLIPS: In hopes that he will win.

O'BRIEN: He's awful. No one is going to understand why he's there still. And now we know. There's a site out there. They're just completely ruining the competition.

PHILLIPS: So what is it producers are saying here? Give producers, quote, "the monster that they've created?"

O'BRIEN: Well, yes. In any case that explains Scott as much as anything else.

PHILLIPS: Poor Judy. First a really bad animal story and now it's "American Idol" gossip.

O'BRIEN: Well, Judy Woodruff loved Constantine, right?

JUDY WOODRUFF, HOST, "INSIDE POLITICS": Hmm, no comment!

PHILLIPS: You know what? We'll talk to your kids.

Judy has got newspapers to read and politicians to talk to.

O'BRIEN: Much more important fish to fry.

WOODRUFF: Many more important things. No, of course not. All right, Miles, Kyra, thank you. And we'll see you tomorrow.

A Social Security plan by next month? Congressman Bill Thomas says it's an idea that is not so far-fetched. I'll talk with him and with Democratic Congressman Charlie Rangel for a look at this divisive issue.

Plus, Iraq has its first democratically-elected government. But did the ends justify the means? We'll look at how the American public views the war.

"INSIDE POLITICS" begins in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

END

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Aired May 3, 2005 - 15:00   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CO-HOST: Sunburned and a bit weak, but well enough to leave the hospital. Troy Driscoll was one of the two South Carolina teens who spent six days adrift at sea. The other teen, Josh Long, went home last night 40 pounds lighter.
U.S. troops in Iraq, U.S. troops in Afghanistan, U.S. troops in lots of other places, manning lots of other missions.

MILES O'BRIEN, CO-HOST: They can't do everything, says their senior uniformed commander, but they can do anything they have to do now or in the future.

CNN's Kathleen Koch at the Pentagon with more on that -- Kathleen.

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Miles, this is an annual reality check for the Pentagon, a report that the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff sends up to Congress every year, really looking at the U.S. military's ability to face threats world wide. And not surprisingly, it found that the U.S. military is stretched a bit thin.

According to a senior military official, the deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan will in the future likely cause other armed conflicts to last longer and produce higher casualties. The Pentagon is so concerned about reaction to this report that, as you can see, the chairman came out a few minutes ago to talk about its findings.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RICHARD MYERS, CHAIRMAN, JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF: We have very high standards in our -- in how we measure ourselves against our current plans. And so that's what we're measuring.

And we're measuring against the time lines that are already in plans that have been established several years ago, a year ago. And so we measure ourselves against that.

What we've said is we will be successful. We will prevail. The time lines may have to be extended. We may have to use additional resources, but it doesn't matter, because we're going to be successful in the end.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOCH: So there the Pentagon insisting that the most important thing to take away from this classified report is its final conclusion that the U.S. military would, indeed, have the ability to win any military conflict that it would enter anywhere in the globe. It may not be neat, it may not be pretty, but it would indeed get the job done.

The report does cite some specific areas that have become stressed as a result of the deployments in both Iraq and Afghanistan. One is the stockpile of precision weapons. Also equipment needed to fight battles. And finally, manpower. Reserve and National Guard units that are really providing the bulk of the combat support in Iraq.

But it is important to point out that, in addition to this -- this report from General Myers, there was also an addendum added to it by the defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld that cites the many ways that the Pentagon is planning to spend money or is already spending money to fix these areas where the military is coming up short.

O'BRIEN: Kathleen Koch, thank you very much.

Sure to be a factor in that capability equation at Pentagon, three straight months now of subpar recruitment. The Army hopes to sign up 80,000 new G.I.s by the end of September but having missed its targets in February, March and now April, a spokesman says it may only reach 85 percent of that.

Recruiters hoping for a blockbuster summer, so to speak, but surveys show the war in Iraq is taking a toll.

PHILLIPS: Now questions about your security, your Social Security that is.

Today President Bush took his road trip for Social Security reform to Canton, Mississippi but a new CNN/"USA Today"/Gallup poll shows the majority of Americans aren't getting on board with his message. When asked if they have more trust in Democrats or Republicans to deal with Social Security issues, 46 percent responded Democrats. Thirty-six percent said Republicans.

The poll, conducted April 29 to May 1, also found that 81 percent of respondents believed that the program would need major changes in coming years.

O'BRIEN: Dennis Rader has a day in court. He's the man police believe taunted them and terrorized Wichita, Kansas, for decades. The BTK suspect, as he's known, uttered only a few words at his arraignment this morning.

CNN's Jonathan Freed was there.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JONATHAN FREED, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For the past two weeks, Dennis Rader's attorneys have been telegraphing that he would plead not guilty to the charges against him. And this morning around 9:00 a.m. Wichita time here at the Sedgwick County courthouse, that is exactly what happened. Rader entered a plea of not guilty to the 10 counts of first degree charges that he is facing, where authorities are accusing him of being the infamous BTK strangler.

Let's listen to how all of that played out in the courtroom earlier today.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: At this time the defendant would stand mute as to the plea and ask the court to enter the appropriate plea and set the matter for trial.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Very will. The defendant standing mute, the court will enter a plea of not guilty.

FREED: Afterwards, I had a chance it talk to district attorney Nola Foulston, and I asked her why it was so important to her that this case ultimately go before a jury.

NOLA FOULSTON, SEDGWICK COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY: I think that whatever the facts are brought to the attention of the public, it is a very appropriate for the public to be able to see, to listen, to hear the facts of the case. I think that is the most important thing that can bring the closure that we need on this case.

FREED: Now a trial date of June 27 was set today but the district attorney's office and everybody, in fact, connected with this case is saying do not set your watches by that date. They say that since this case spans three decades and such great magnitude, it's going to take quite awhile to plow through all of the evidence and get ready for trial. They're suggesting October at the earliest but possibly even later than that.

In Wichita, Kansas, I'm Jonathan Freed.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'BRIEN: Imagine living next door to a suspected serial killer. You'll meet the neighbor of the BTK suspect, Rader, at 8 p.m. Eastern on "PAULA ZAHN NOW."

PHILLIPS: Elsewhere across America now, more officers take to the freeways in southern California after another motorist is shot. The bullet pierced the windshield of his SUV, just missing him. It's the eighth freeway shooting in two months. Four people have been killed. Authorities don't know if the shootings are related. A special unit has been set up to investigate.

Smash and grab doesn't get much bolder than this. A pick-up truck backs through the front door of a Costco store in Durham, North Carolina, and right up to the jewelry counter. A masked passenger jumps out, smashes the case, grabs the loot and off they go. Police later found the truck, stolen of course, abandoned nearby.

Return to sea, seven dolphins were released just a short time ago off the Florida Keys. They had been rescued two months ago after stranding themselves on a mud flat. O'BRIEN: Court of public opinion calling for retribution, but whether the court of law imposes a penalty for the runaway bride still up in the air. The city of Duluth, Georgia, Jennifer Wilbanks' hometown, they spent 60 grand searching for the wayward bribe. Of course, she turned up Saturday in Albuquerque.

The district attorney handling the case talked earlier on CNN of some possible repercussions.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DANNY PORTER, GWINNETT COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY: I think there's got to be some consequence, and that could be something that ranges from a sincere apology and restitution to some period of confinement. That's the one good thing about the criminal system, is we have a multitude of options to do -- to try and solve a problem.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: Despite all of this, the wedding is still apparently on. Here's what Wilbanks' would have been father-in-law had to say about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLAUDE MASON, JOHN MASON'S FATHER: According to John, it is. As far as a date, that's not been determined yet. But he's committed to her, and as it stands now he thinks there will be a wedding.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: All right. Maybe the two will choose to elope this time. I think an appropriate gift, Kyra, might be a GPS tracking device for the bride to be. What do you think? Just a thought.

PHILLIPS: Could borrow Martha's bracelet, maybe. They could share.

O'BRIEN: Ankle bracelet. Would be perfect.

PHILLIPS: The runaway bride could be in the new show. Then they could track them together.

O'BRIEN: I love it. This is high concept.

PHILLIPS: Good.

Well, the family of a brain damaged firefighter in Buffalo, New York, says that he has suddenly broken nearly a decade of silence. It's an amazing story we've been talking about all day.

O'BRIEN: It is. A firefighting injury left Donald Herbert unable to speak from December '95 until Saturday, and then he just started talking like a blue streak. There's no word on his current state however.

Michelle McClintock of affiliate WIDB with more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MICHELLE MCCLINTOCK, WIDB REPORTER (voice-over): Simon Manka is hesitant to use the word "miracle" when talking about his nephew Don Herbert. But he says it was nothing short of amazing to see the former firefighter converse for the first time in 9 1/2 years.

SIMON MANKA, HERBERT'S UNCLE: Donny was looking out of the window at the facility. And he said, "I want to talk to my wife." OK? At which time the staff here put him on the phone with Linda.

MCCLINTOCK: Out of nowhere, he said, "I want to talk to my wife," according to Manka. And before long, Don was talking to a room full of family and friends, catching up on lost time.

MANKA: He did initiate a question, "How long have I been -- been away?" And we told him almost 10 years, and his response to that was that he thought it was only three months.

MCCLINTOCK: It was December 1995 when Herbert became trapped under a collapsed roof while fighting a fire. Twelve minutes without oxygen caused a serious brain injury that doctors considered permanent. Video from years past shows Herbert as conscious but unable to communicate.

LT. ANTHONY LIBERATORE, BUFFALO, NEW YORK, FIRE DEPARTMENT: Yes, typical Donny Herbert. He was very concerned about his family. He was worried, you know, were the bills being paid? Was his wife being taken care of? How were the boys doing?

MCCLINTOCK: Fellow firefighter Lieutenant Anthony Liberatore visited with Don over the weekend. He says they talked about high school football and their firefighting days, but that Don spent most of his time focused on his four sons.

LIBERATORE: He stayed up till early morning talking to his boys and catching up on what they have been doing over the last several years.

MANKA: Donny's family requested Don's many friends in the public respect their privacy as Donny is being re-evaluated and the scope of this recovery is being determined.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: And former Buffalo Fire Commissioner Neil Keane remembers that terrible incident, December 1995, when a burning roof caved in on his firefighter, Donny Herbert. He was on the phone with us today. Pretty amazing interview. Keane said that he raced to the scene and to the hospital. Then he had to face the family.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NEIL KEANE, FORMER BUFFALO FIRE COMMISSIONER: It's like the worst nightmare of a fire chief to have to go to someone's family afterwards. And all I can say is I'm so full of emotion for his family, for his wife and his boys and his mother and the people who cared for him all of those years. And truly this is a miracle.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: At the same time the fire commissioner, of course, said when he saw the video of Donny and heard that he had finally talked to his family, he just -- it brought him to tears, he and his wife.

O'BRIEN: He's headed north soon. He said he can't wait to go see him.

PHILLIPS: That's right. He can't wait to see him. We're going to follow up with him.

O'BRIEN: Love to be a fly on the wall for that one. That would be an emotional thing.

So miracle. That's what the former commissioner says. Stroke of luck? Just science in action? Who knows? Straight ahead on LIVE FROM, a former firefighter's awakening of sorts. How it's possible. Why it is so rare. Or is it? We'll speak with a neurologist from Cornell University. He'll give us some answers.

PHILLIPS: Plus another identity theft scare, this time for a major U.S. employer. How did it happen? We'll talk about it.

O'BRIEN: And it's the show looking for the best. So why is this web site dedicated to voting for the worst? This whole "American Idol" thing is turning into quite a kafuffle, you might say. Stay with us.

ANNOUNCER: You're watching LIVE FROM on CNN, the most trusted name in news.

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O'BRIEN: Friends and family of a brain-damaged firefighter in Buffalo, New York, are waiting to see if his dramatic improvement will last. The family says Donald Herbert started talking Saturday after a firefighting injury plunged him into nearly 10 years of silence.

But is his recovery likely to hold? How does his recovery happen in the first place? We've got lots of questions. Dr. Joseph Fins of Cornell University, the Weill Medical College. He's an internist there, and he and his group have studied these issues specifically over the years.

Dr. Fins, good to have you with us.

DR. JOSEPH FINS, CORNELL UNIVERSITY: Good to be here.

O'BRIEN: First of all, we don't know a lot about this kind of recovery, do we? I know you've been focusing on it. But the number of people that have been focused on it over the years is very limited, isn't it?

FINS: Right. I mean, it's a handful of people. And I think we have here the force of another anecdote and we need to study it more systematically, look the at public health dimensions of this, understand how many of these people are in our nursing homes so we can do more to treat them and to help them.

O'BRIEN: All right.

FINS: It's unusual, certainly.

O'BRIEN: Unusual to say the least. And we're talking about it. We're just amazed after 9 1/2 years that the brain could suddenly recover, reboot, whatever you want to call it.

What is it that makes the brain recover? What do we know about the recovery process after an injury like this?

FINS: Right. That's an open question. And that's why we need to study hundreds if not thousand of patients like this so we can make generalizations. Right now we can't predict which patient will have this kind rebooting and who will remain in permanent unconsciousness.

There are a number of hypotheses about why this happens, whether the brain is a level of arousal and it gets rebooted. It gets turned on. The circuitry is basically intact. Whether or not there are certain circuits that are overriding normal mechanisms. Or whether there's a phenomenon of rewiring.

All these are hypotheses that are on the table right now that need to be studied over time with lots of patients and lots of patients like Mr. Herbert.

O'BRIEN: How many patients are out there, do you suppose? You just don't know about them, because they're, sad to say, they're just kind of wasting away...

FINS: Right.

O'BRIEN: ... in long-term care facilities like this.

FINS: Right, I mean, it's been prescribed as custodial care, which is a horrible phrase. And these people deserve better. They are not in academic medical centers. They often get unassessed for years and years and years.

The story of Terry Wallace in the news, who woke up after 19 years. His family was told that neurological assessment was too expensive and wouldn't make any difference. He woke up after 19 years and started communicating, continues to improve.

So this is a real pressing public health need for relatively young people who may have the possible for some modicum of recovery.

O'BRIEN: And when you say there's potential for a modicum of recovery, and the more you understand it that that raises the possibility of some sort of treatment.

FINS: Right.

O'BRIEN: Are there any treatments out there? Any drugs that can be given to somebody who's suffered an injury like this and might help them recover?

FINS: Right. There's some -- there's some clinical trials that are being undertaken right now, using drugs like Amantodine , but we really are at the very, very beginning of decades' worth of research to understand how these brains get injured, how they recovered, what prompts natural recovery and what might foster improved assistance to help the natural process along.

O'BRIEN: Amantodine, what's that?

FINS: It's a drug often used for viral infections, and it may have the ability to reboot the minimally conscious brain.

O'BRIEN: So...

FINS: Still, it's an open question.

O'BRIEN: Wow, that's interesting. So really the cry that you have right now or the call that you have is for people out there, if you have a loved one or you know somebody who's in a situation, perhaps this is somebody you would like to study somehow to learn more about this.

FINS: Right, but I don't want to engender false hope.

O'BRIEN: OK.

FINS: I think that these are rare occurrences and we have to be very tempered about what we're saying. These are unusual, and we have to learn from what's unusual in order to perhaps make it more common for the vast majority of patients.

O'BRIEN: So on the one hand, the brain is incredibly fragile and yet maybe for the same reasons, it also has a tremendous ability to regenerate?

FINS: Yes. And the stories of brain injury narratives, of patients who have actually come back from less severe injuries is dramatic. It's almost as if the brain recovers in the same way that the brain develops as a child. And you hear people saying, "I had learn how to redo mathematics" from people who have been stock analysts and the like. And it's real interesting to see how the brain rediscovers itself and unifies fracture selves.

O'BRIEN: All right. Fascinating. Dr. Joseph Fins, thank you for your time. We appreciate it.

FINS: Thank you.

O'BRIEN: Dr. Fins is with Cornell University's Weill Medical College -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Well, a check of the markets is straight ahead. Plus, it's a show about music, but "American Idol" is starting to look more like a soap opera. Ugh, chock full of drama! More on the troubles, the gossip.

O'BRIEN: You love every minute!

PHILLIPS: The kafuffle.

O'BRIEN: You love "Idol." You love "Idol." Come on.

PHILLIPS: I've only seen half of one show, I have to admit.

O'BRIEN: Your kids are (UNINTELLIGIBLE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: All right, so if somebody comes up to you on the street, opens up his coat and says, "Psst, you want to buy a box full of tapes?" Do us a favor, call the cops, would you?

PHILLIPS: Don't buy them.

O'BRIEN: Don't buy them. Let us know.

PHILLIPS: They're not videos. They're not home movies.

O'BRIEN: It's all of us in there.

PHILLIPS: It's all of our personal information, and we'll get hosed.

Susan Lisovicz.

(STOCK REPORT)

PHILLIPS: Thank you very much, Susan.

O'BRIEN: Thank you very much.

PHILLIPS: Stay tuned. This is the story you've been waiting for.

O'BRIEN: She's an "Idol" fan, big one.

PHILLIPS: She is really?

O'BRIEN: Controversy brews, Paula Abdul stews. I'm the only one here who watches this thing, I think, over -- because of my kids. Tomorrow's planned "American Idol" expose on ABC's prime-time live. That's on a different network, all of that stuff.

PHILLIPS: That's why Miles is tuning in. Fans and detractors of the FOX network's ratings goliath "American Idol" are all twitter about a report that ABC is ballyhooing as explosive. O'BRIEN: And now of course ABC isn't giving out too much dirt, just enough to titillate a little bit. Speculation is swirling. The report will include an interview with a certain past contestant. Corey Clark maintains he had an affair...

PHILLIPS: An affair!

O'BRIEN: ... with Paula Abdul. And now Abdul's lawyers fired off a letter to ABC threatening legal action if the special airs. All of this a very carefully calculated effort to get us to watch. All right.

PHILLIPS: Meanwhile, someone has finally figured out that much of "American Idol's" appeal lies in bad-mouthing the competitors. Hence, the web site, VoteFortheWorst.com. It's urging callers and texters to hijack the contest with their votes, and the site is pushing fellow artists to keep voting for Scott Savol. Did I say that right?

O'BRIEN: Yes. He's awful.

PHILLIPS: In hopes that he will win.

O'BRIEN: He's awful. No one is going to understand why he's there still. And now we know. There's a site out there. They're just completely ruining the competition.

PHILLIPS: So what is it producers are saying here? Give producers, quote, "the monster that they've created?"

O'BRIEN: Well, yes. In any case that explains Scott as much as anything else.

PHILLIPS: Poor Judy. First a really bad animal story and now it's "American Idol" gossip.

O'BRIEN: Well, Judy Woodruff loved Constantine, right?

JUDY WOODRUFF, HOST, "INSIDE POLITICS": Hmm, no comment!

PHILLIPS: You know what? We'll talk to your kids.

Judy has got newspapers to read and politicians to talk to.

O'BRIEN: Much more important fish to fry.

WOODRUFF: Many more important things. No, of course not. All right, Miles, Kyra, thank you. And we'll see you tomorrow.

A Social Security plan by next month? Congressman Bill Thomas says it's an idea that is not so far-fetched. I'll talk with him and with Democratic Congressman Charlie Rangel for a look at this divisive issue.

Plus, Iraq has its first democratically-elected government. But did the ends justify the means? We'll look at how the American public views the war.

"INSIDE POLITICS" begins in just a moment.

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END

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