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Underground Fire Burning in San Francisco; Ports Deal Nearing an End on Capitol Hill; Murder Suspect Also Suspected in Multiple Rapes; Missing Girl, 13, Found Alive

Aired March 09, 2006 - 13:00   ET

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

KYRA PHILLIPS, HOST: Breaking news out of San Francisco, California, to tell you about right off the top of LIVE FROM here. I want to get straight to Ted Rowlands. He joins us by phone. Evidently, some type of fire underground under Market Street there in central downtown San Francisco.
Ted, what do you know?

TED ROWLANDS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, there was smoke just pouring out of this underground rail system. There are two levels, two different underground systems in this portion of San Francisco. There's BART, the Bay Area Rapid Transit, and there's also Muni, a truly underground system. And trains have been halted on both of those systems.

Smoke was pouring out of -- from what the firefighters say here on the scene, the Muni level. And according to a passenger that was on one of the trains, they had to stop the train. They unloaded underground. Everybody basically ran out of this area and ran to safety.

According to the fire department folks here on the scene, nobody was treated for any sort of injury. And they are not sure of the cause. They're not -- they're confident that nobody has been injured and there's nobody trapped underground.

I can tell you, we're standing right outside right now, and the smoke has dissipated considerably over the last five to ten minutes. But as you might imagine, some tense moments here, when the fire was pouring out of there. And they're still looking for answers as to the cause. They are underground now. They've put water on the fire, and they're now trying to determine exactly what caused this. But for now, the system completely shut down in downtown San Francisco.

PHILLIPS: Ted, was it a subway train that caught fire or was it just something underground there?

ROWLANDS: Not sure if it was the -- something near the tracks or a train itself. According to the passenger that I talked to, he was on a train that actually stopped in between two stations. And everybody was ordered off.

So one might conjecture that it wasn't the train itself but actually a fire on the track. They were able to stop the train that was approaching the fire in time to avoid any catastrophic problems, in terms of having their passengers be injured.

So it seems as though it was a track fire, according to the firefighters and this passenger, and the train that was approaching this fire, according to the passenger, was halted in time so the passengers were all unloaded.

PHILLIPS: Ted Rowlands there in San Francisco, California. Keep us updated, Ted. Thanks so much.

Another story just in to CNN regarding the port security deal and a possible veto by the president. Ed Henry has the news now from Capitol Hill.

And Ed, I know I've been trying to get in touch with you. It's a bit confusing about this amendment, this deal. Can you try and hammer it out for us so we can understand it, in layman's terms?

ED HENRY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Let's just cut right to the chase. Two Republican sources now telling CNN that, in fact, this morning the speaker of the house, Dennis Hastert, the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, went to the White House, met with the president and told him bluntly, the port deal is dead on the Hill, regardless of any amendments, any veto threats. It's over. That was the message directly from Republican leaders to the president.

I'm hearing from my colleague, Dana Bash, at the White House that the president did not issue another veto threat. He simply restated what we know all along. He didn't even have to say it. He just made clear that his position has not changed. And we know that that is that he has threatened to veto any legislation that would kill the port deal.

But what we're told is that the Republican leaders say they now have veto-proof majorities in the House, probably the Senate, as well. We saw yesterday, the house -- Republican-led House Appropriations Committee voted 62-2 to kill this port deal. Still has to go to the House floor next week. But a 62-2 vote obviously shows there's overwhelming support in both parties to kill this deal.

Now I also spoke to the Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, John Warner, who told me that he worked literally through the night and into this morning with officials from the company DP World, trying to craft some sort of legislative compromise that could fix all of this, but Warner acknowledged to me the political realities of the situation. He said he's not giving up hope, but he's not prepared to release that legislation just yet.

He also met this morning with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Warner did, at the Pentagon, trying to find some sort of national security grounds to save this deal. But I can tell you various Republican sources on the Hill saying that even the prospects for Warner's fix are dimming. And he might not release that bill until next week. And at that point, the train may have already left the station.

Finally, the vote you were talking about, 2 p.m. this afternoon, Eastern Time. There's going to be a test vote on whether or not the Senate is going to be able to move on to an amendment by Democrat Chuck Schumer that would kill the port deal.

Senate Majority Leader Frist late yesterday tried to block that. We're going to have a procedural vote to see whether or not they can move on to other business or whether they have to take up the Schumer amendment.

But the bottom line is Frist and other leaders today told the president, regardless of whether they stop Schumer today or tomorrow, the Democrats are going to keep bringing this up again and again, and the Republicans acknowledge they don't have the votes to stop it anymore, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right. So bottom line right now, Dubai Ports World will not acquire operations at six major U.S. ports? Bottom line?

HENRY: That's the bottom line. And one senior Republican aide who has been following this very closely noted to me that the only way out he sees here is for the White House to call DP World and tell them, "You have to pull out of the deal."

But there's some complications there, obviously, because they have shareholders to worry about, who are concerned about this lucrative contract going down. And there also could be potential lawsuits involved here, as well.

Bottom line is while there are -- a senior Republican aide involved in these negotiations, told me, either way we're headed for a train wreck. If the president still tries to go forward, he may end up having this veto -- having this veto showdown with fellow Republicans on the Hill. If the company does pull out and try to help the White House save face there, they could have lawsuits, there could be shareholder unrest.

So bottom line, the Republican aides saying train wreck, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right. Ed Henry, thanks so much.

Under guard and facing a lineup. The man New York police have been questioning in the grisly killing of a graduate student is also the focus of another case. CNN's Allan Chernoff is at the courthouse in Queens.

Allan, what do we know?

ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kyra, Darryl Littlejohn, who police describe as a person of interest in Imette St. Guillen's rape and murder, has just been brought over to a police precinct here in Forest Hills, New York, for a lineup in a separate rape case that did occur in Forest Hills, involving an Asian woman last October.

In order to get permission for Littlejohn to participate in the lineup, the Queens district attorney had Littlejohn show up this morning in Queens County court. He was handcuffed, wearing a gray sweatshirt and jeans, as well as sneakers. Mr. Littlejohn said nothing.

His defense attorney, Kevin O'Donnell, said that Mr. Littlejohn is eager to be placed in a lineup, and he maintains his innocence. The lawyer added that he has not discussed the St. Guillen case with Mr. Littlejohn. He said he didn't even represent him in that case, and he emphasized that Mr. Littlejohn has not been charged with any crime.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEVIN O'DONNELL, LITTLEJOHN ATTORNEY: The purpose of today's proceeding was to place him in a lineup. District attorney's office wants to put him in a lineup concerning a rape that occurred in October. I spoke with my client. He absolutely maintains his innocence. He feels like he's a scapegoat. His picture's been all over the paper. It's been all over the media nationally. So he's the easy -- he's the easiest target right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHERNOFF: Mr. Littlejohn has been held on violation of his 9 p.m. curfew after he served time for armed robbery.

Police are continuing their investigation into the St. Guillen murder. A DNA lab in Manhattan is still processing samples of hair and skin, extracting DNA from those samples, in order to try finally to bring evidence and bring charges in that murder case -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Allan, have any of your sources said to you that it's possible that this man could have been -- or could be alleged to be a serial rapist?

CHERNOFF: There's been lots of speculation about that, simply because of the fashion in which Ms. St. Guillen's body was found. Her face was taped with strips of packing tape, from forehead down to chin. So she was suffocated. She was strangled.

And then there was also the call to 911, an anonymous call, announcing where the body could be found. And those factors have led analysts, experts, in this area, to believe that there's a possibility that it was the work of a serial killer.

PHILLIPS: Allan Chernoff, thanks for the latest.

A missing girl, horrifying text messages, an early morning phone call from a cab driver and allegations of sexual assault. In New Jersey, a 13-year-old girl who disappeared Monday has turned up alive. But that's far from the end of the story.

CNN producer Dana Garrett is on the phone from New Jersey.

What else do we know about this case?

DANA GARRETT, CNN PRODUCER: Well, Kyra, we know that, again, this young girl is alive in New York City. She had not been heard from for three days. Her mother had received a text message from her Monday night. But no one had her from her since.

But last night at -- or early it morning at 1 a.m., the young girl called her mother saying she was in New York City. She didn't know where she was. She was scared. Her parents told her to immediately find a cab driver, get to somewhere safe. She fortunately found a cab -- a cab driver who was a Good Samaritan, who took her to the police station.

She told police in New York that she had been raped by two men in New York, and so New York police are investigating that allegation. Right now, she's in the hospital being evaluated. Her mother is with her.

Once she's released, she will be brought back to New Jersey to Jersey City, where police here have many, many questions for her about her whereabouts over the last few days.

Now, police here in Jersey City have been questioning three young men they're calling persons of interest. This is a 20-year-old and two 19-year-olds. One of these men, the 20-year-old, this young girl apparently had met at the Newport Mall here in New Jersey. She had befriended him, been contacting him through her cell phone.

Police believe -- or they confirm that she did spend some time with this 20-year-old on Monday. But these men, who have been questioned, say that she left them at 2:30 in the afternoon and that they didn't see her since.

Now, throughout the day on Monday this young girl was sending chilling messages to her mother, text messages on her cell phone, saying that she was being kept in a dark room and asked to do disgusting stuff, she said. Credibility of those messages now are in question. Police are not saying yet whether it's a hoax, but they are very eager to speak with her just to see exactly what happened from 2:30 on until they heard from her at 1 in the morning.

Now we spoke with this young girl's father this morning. He also has many, many questions for her. He wants to know what happened. He is distraught about what might have happened over the last several days. But he is very relieved, obviously that his daughter is safe and alive this morning -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right, Dana Garrett, we're still on the story, thank you.

Now three young men whose promising futures may be up in smoke. Investigators in Alabama say they're as shocked as anybody. That's as the probe of last month's series of deliberate church fires led to three college kids. Two are budding actors. The third is the son of a doctor. All are being held and are due in court tomorrow.

Coming to us live from Birmingham, CNN's Fredricka Whitfield.

What else do we know about them, Fred?

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Kyra. Well, some of the church pastors, in fact, are already starting to express that there is some relief that it looks like the church burnings are behind them. At the same time, there is resounding sadness that the three college students now stand accused.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WHITFIELD (voice-over): One month after the first of nine Alabama churches were intentionally set, a stunning break that seemed to unsettle even seasoned arson investigators.

JAMES CAVANAUGH, BUREAU OF ALCOHOL, TOBACCO AND FIREARMS: I certainly still feel hurt for all the churches. They lost their historic buildings. I think I'm a little bit sad for the families of these three young people we've arrested.

WHITFIELD: The suspects, three college students. On the campus of Birmingham Southern College, where two of the suspects attended, disappointment and dismay.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's absolutely shocking.

MARK DEMPSEY, STUDENT: It's kind of appalling, but, you know, I guess you're innocent until proven guilty.

WHITFIELD: BSC sophomores Ben Moseley and Russell Debusk have been suspended and are banned from campus. Both are described as outgoing and talented.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're good in the theater department. They're both theater majors.

MOLLY BYNUM, STUDENT: Ben is a really great guy. He's a really interesting guy. He sometimes sits on the step playing the guitar. He has a lot of friends.

WHITFIELD: Investigators say Debusk and Moseley, along with 20- year-old Matthew Lee Cloyd, who attended the University of Alabama Birmingham, allegedly set the fires as a joke, but things got out of hand.

CAVANAUGH: In the complaint, you'll see that they said that after they lit the first two fires in Bibb County that it became too spontaneous.

WHITFIELD: So to throw investigators off track, officials say the arsonists set fires in the Birmingham area and then moved west. But authorities say they left a trail, literally, sets of unique tracks made by special order tires traced all the way to Cloyd's vehicle.

TROY KING, ALABAMA ATTORNEY GENERAL: I stand before you today very, very proud of the work that law enforcement across this state has done. What they've done is just good, old-fashioned police work.

(END VIDEOTAPE) WHITFIELD: Which led them, then to these three college students. And by the way, Kyra, the two students who attended Birmingham Southern, they had just recently been featured in their campus newspaper as being such promising actors that they were also going to be celebrating being in a new feature film that's out soon. And the students are quoted as saying expect bigger and greater things from us, especially after graduation.

So certainly a lot of disappointment. So much so that the campus is actually vowing to help rebuild some of those churches, and that means financial support, as well as some real sweat hours from the students and faculty -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Fredricka Whitfield, thank you.

Well, tornado warning in Mississippi now. Let's check in with CNN meteorologist Reynolds Wolf -- Reynolds.

(WEATHER REPORT)

PHILLIPS: Reynolds, thanks so much. We're going to continue to follow the severe weather all afternoon.

The news keeps coming. We'll keep bringing it to you. More LIVE FROM next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PHILLIPS: At this hour, tense hostage drama unfolding in France. Our Carol Lin working the story for us from the news room.

Hey, Carol.

CAROL LIN, ANCHOR: Hey, there, Kyra. It's Le Mans, France, and the situation is that a former teacher walked into this school with a handgun. She's armed with a handgun. There are maybe as many as two dozen children being held hostage, maybe even some other adults.

We've got Jim Bittermann on the telephone with us right now. He's heading to the scene.

Jim, what do you know about how the police are going to be handling this situation and if anybody has been hurt yet?

JIM BITTERMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The police have brought in their 40-man SWAT team from Paris that is on the scene now. They arrived a short while ago.

And the other members of the gendarme are around the school surrounding -- this is a technical high school, normally about 1,500 students. We understand there's 18 students that are being held hostage, as well as several adults. Not quite clear how many adults are among them.

The hostage taker is a 33-year-old former teacher at the school who was teaching up to about two years ago. He had a contract that ran out and hasn't been able to find work since then. So he went into the school this afternoon and took the hostages.

He says that he's not going to harm anybody; he's not going to harm the students. One gets the impression that perhaps he's pretty well known around the school.

He put his gun down at one point, a short while ago, and took the bullets out of the gun. So he may make good on his promise of releasing the students unharmed.

LIN: What is he -- what is he trying to accomplish, Jim?

BITTERMANN: Well, I think he's looking for employment. I think one of the things -- the only thing so far that we know he has asked for is to see Francois Fillon, who is the former education minister, as well as the former mayor of this town, which is over near Le Mans, France, in southwestern Paris. And so he's asked to have a meeting with him. And we understand that Fillon is on his way and will there be in another hour or so to talk to him.

So that's the only request that we know so far. But some of the school -- people at the school, school secretary and whatnot, said that he was in a kind of depressed state because he hasn't been working for the last two years.

LIN: Well, this is certainly not the way to get a job. Do you know what they have set up for the parents of the students held inside?

BITTERMANN: They've brought the parents inside the school to the school infirmary. And that's where they are staying right now. They're quite anxious, of course, as one can imagine, because they're wanting to know how this is all going to turn out.

I think it probably is -- at least is somewhat comforting to know that this guy is someone that's known to quite a few of the school people. And also may know some of the students. At one point, he was reported to be sort of chatting with his hostages amiably this afternoon.

So I think -- it sounds like a situation that's probably going to end peacefully. There's been no one harmed just yet. But just in case, there's that 40-man SWAT team standing by.

LIN: You bet. Jim Bittermann, a developing situation. We're going to stay in touch. Jim Bittermann en route to the scene at the school in Le Mans, France, where a teacher is holding now, we have confirmed, 18 students and two adults hostage, Kyra.

We're going to stay on top of this, because it sounds like it may evolve and conclude pretty quickly if this suspect has unloaded his gun inside the school.

PHILLIPS: All right, Carol Lin. Thank you so much.

Also coming into us right now, we're getting word that Abu Ghraib prison is going to be changing hands. The U.S. military says that infamous Iraqi compound just west of Baghdad will be handed back to the Iraqi government with its 4,500 inmates moved to a new facility being built in Baghdad.

You'll remember, Abu Ghraib was a torture center under Saddam Hussein. It became a household name with the publication of photographs showing U.S. troops apparently abusing and humiliating inmates in 2003 and 2004.

Iraqi civil war, still a clear and present danger in the minds of many U.S. lawmakers. At a hearing on military spending, Democratic Senator Robert Byrd pressed Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld to explain the role of the U.S. military if all-out civil war should break out.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: The plan is to prevent a civil war and to the extent one were to occur, to have the -- from a security standpoint, have the Iraqi security forces deal with it to the extent they're able to.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIPS: Rumsfeld is there to ask for $91 billion more dollars, mainly for the wars in Baghdad and Afghanistan.

Ten more civilians killed in Baghdad, maybe more, including two people on their way to the hospital. CNN's Aneesh Raman is in Baghdad with the latest -- Aneesh.

ANEESH RAMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kyra, good afternoon.

At least 13 people killed today in the capital alone. A number of attacks.

First this morning, as you mentioned, a roadside bomb detonating in western Baghdad, a predominantly Sunni neighborhood. The intended target it seems, an Iraqi army convoy that was passing by. That target, though, escaped unharmed. Instead six civilians were killed including a child, some seven others wounded.

A few hours later in the central part of the capital, a car bomb detonated near a main hospital here. That as an Iraqi police patrol was passing by. They, again, seem to have been the target. But again, instead it was civilians that were killed; at least two civilians died in that incident. In all, again, 13 killed today here -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Aneesh, and just prior to coming to you, we were talking about Donald Rumsfeld at this hearing, being pressed to explain the role of the U.S. military if an all-out civil war should break out.

You know, a lot of people here in the United States say what are you talking about, there is a civil war already taking place in Baghdad. What's your take on his comments and the issue of a civil war? RAMAN: Well, in terms of a civil war essentially it's how you define it. We've heard from any number of analysts that what is going on here, there's a brewing sectarian conflict. At low levels we are seeing Shia kill Sunnis, Sunnis exact revenge on the Shia. The back and forth is taking place.

Now, does that erupt into large-scale violence is the question. It has not yet.

But in the comments Secretary Rumsfeld said just a few days ago about exaggeration, he felt, in media reports about what took place after the bombing of the Shia shrine, many Iraqi government officials were openly talking at that point about civil war, saying they were more fearful than ever that it was at the brink, the country at the brink of civil war. And in terms of numbers, they really had no idea, as much as the military had no idea, how many mosques were being attacked, how many civilians were being killed.

It's important to note that for Sunnis, for example, many of them did not report incidents to the police who they felt were infiltrated by Shia militias. Instead, they reported them to Sunni politicians. So trying to decipher what exactly was taking place at that time no one was capable of doing with full certainly.

But the country was very close to the brink. We heard from U.S. ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad essentially that, and he as well, has said that the threat remains for civil war here. But again, it's a matter of all-out civil strife rather than what we already see on a daily basis, Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Aneesh Raman, live from Baghdad. Thanks, Aneesh.

In medical news, bird flu hits the stone martin. That's a weasel-like creature that apparently was stricken in Germany and the second mammal species to fall victim to the virus in Europe.

Stone martins, like cats, are known to feed off births, and several European cats have gotten bird flu, as well.

Yesterday, the U.N. chief for bird flu issues warned that the illness is likely to reach North America in six to 12 months, possibly sooner. The World Health Organization believes the world is on the brink of a flu pandemic, perhaps due to bird flu but maybe another strain.

Straight ahead, a teacher says he knows how to win the war on terror, and he's putting it to the test in Afghanistan and Pakistan, one child at a time. We'll talk live with an Army vet and mountain climber turned teacher, Greg Mortensen (ph), just ahead.

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