Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Live Today
Sentencing Expected in Case of Former Worldcom CEO Bernard Ebbers; 'Time' Magazine Reporter Matthew Cooper Testifying Before Grand Jury
Aired July 13, 2005 - 10:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Let's go back now to our top story, the federal courtroom in New York City, where sentencing is expected to come down in the case of former Worldcom CEO Bernard Ebbers.
Former U.S. attorney Kendall Coffey joins us live from Miami to shed more light on the case and what awaits Bernie Ebbers.
Hey, good morning, Daryn.
KENDALL COFFEY, FMR. U.S. ATTY.: Hey, good morning, Daryn.
KAGAN: It is for you, clearly not for Bernie Ebbers, who shoved a photographer on his way into the courthouse this morning. This sentencing, Kendall, pretty wide range of what people are asking for. Bernie Ebbers asking for leniency, citing his age, and his bad health and his charitable good works. And the other hand, you have prosecutors asking for 85 years, which would mean the rest of his life in prison.
COFFEY: Well, he was the CEO in the biggest corporate security scandal in U.S. history. Guilty as charged on all nine counts. And interestingly, Daryn, if it weren't for a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision, he would almost assuredly be going to prison for the rest of his life. Based on the Supreme Court decision, the federal sentencing guidelines are not mandatory; they are now advisory. So the judge does have discretion here, and she can cut him a break, grant some degree of leniency if she chooses to.
KAGAN: Do you think that she'll be influenced by the fact that Bernie Ebbers has basically given up his millions and millions of dollars in assets?
COFFEY: Well, I don't think that's going to be a big factor, because when CEOs and other criminals come before courts, usually they've lost or given up their money one way or another. And based on the jury's finding, a lot of that was ill-gotten gain.
I think what she's going to look at is the jury result, the dimensions and magnitude of this case and emphasize the fact that this has to be a serious sentence, because this wasn't just the captain of a ship; this was the pirate campaign of the most spectacular pirate ship in U.S. history.
KAGAN: So you don't think he has good chances on his appeal? COFFEY: Well, I think -- let's start out with the sentencing for a moment. When you look at the recent sentence, John Rigas, founder of Adelphia, 80 years old, bad health, he got 15 years. So I think for this kind of executive compensation, that's the minimum in executive compensation for the wages of sin.
KAGAN: OK. Now what about appeal?
COFFEY: Well, for appeal it's going to be tough, but what we've seen in a couple cases is the courts are looking very closely at jury instructions. You'll recall Arthur Anderson, the U.S. Supreme Court threw out that whole conviction based on wrong jury instructions. And in a recent case argued for Frank Quattrone, the banker with Credit Suisse, again, the federal appeals court no decision yet, looking very closely at jury instructions. So that's where I think his hope lies. The judge gave a very specific instruction here, saying that conscience avoidness could be a basis to find him guilty of criminal fraud. That may be the big issue on this appeal.
KAGAN: OK, and then for others that are still out there like some Enron cases, what's the message that's being sent?
COFFEY: Well, they're going to be almost as nervous watching the sentencing today as Bernard Ebbers. If you're Ken Lay, if you're Jeff Skilling, you're really thinking long and hard about whether you want to go to trial yourself and roll the dice, if, in fact, Bernard Ebbers ends up with a prison sentence of 20 years or more.
KAGAN: Kendall Coffey, live from Miami, thank you.
COFFEY: Thanks, Daryn.
KAGAN: We're watching from New York City with our Alan Chernoff. We'll bring you the latest news as it is available.
Right now, though, we turn to the investigation of a CIA operative's blown cover. "Time" magazine reporter Matthew Cooper testifying before a grand jury. You might remember Cooper wrote an article two years ago naming Valerie Plame as a CIA officer. A special prosecutor is trying to determine who leaked Plame's identity to Cooper. Cooper was facing jail time for refusing to reveal his source. He agreed to testify after the source gave him a personal waiver.
KAGAN: Matthew Cooper's notes indicate top presidential adviser Karl Rove was the source of the leak. An attorney for Rove says that he did nothing wrong and that Rove has nothing to fear with Cooper's testimony.
Our senior political analyst Bill Schneider has this background on the investigation.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST (voice-over): He's been called Bush's brain. President Bush called him the architect of his re-election strategy. But Tuesday, President Bush avoided answering questions about his deputy chief of staff, Karl Rove, and Rove's involvement in a growing White House controversy.
The controversy goes back to January 2003, two months before the Iraq war, when the president made this statement in his State of the Union speech...
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.
SCHNEIDER: Enter Joseph Wilson. It was six months later. Saddam Hussein had fallen. The former ambassador wrote an op-ed piece revealing that he had gone to Africa in 2002 at the CIA's request. He said he found no evidence to support the president's claim.
Enter Robert Novak. A week after Wilson's op-ed, the syndicated columnist called Wilson's credibility into question, saying the CIA regarded Wilson's report as less than definitive.
"Wilson never worked for the CIA," Novak wrote, citing two senior administration officials, "but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an agency operative on weapons of mass destruction." It's a crime to identify someone intentionally as a covert agent if the government is trying to conceal that agent's identity. Wilson charges it was political retribution by Karl Rove.
In September 2003, the CIA asked the Justice Department to investigate the leak. The president's response?
BUSH: If there's a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. And if the person has violated law, that person will be taken care of.
SCHNEIDER: In December 2003, the attorney general appointed a special prosecutor. Throughout 2004, the prosecutor subpoenaed White House officials and reporters to probe for leaks. Karl Rove's name came up. The White House dismissed the charge. Rove himself offered a carefully-worded denial.
KARL ROVE, WHITE HOUSE ADVISER: I didn't know her name and didn't leak her name.
SCHNEIDER: It's now 18 months into the investigation. "New York Times" reporter Judith Miller refuses to testify about her sources. She goes to jail.
"Time" magazine reporter Matthew Cooper does agree to testify after getting permission from his source. "Newsweek" identifies the source as Karl Rove. Rove's attorney confirms it.
So where are we? Three unresolved issues. Was there a crime? That could be hard to prove given the specific requirements of the law.
Did the White House deliberately mislead the public for the past two years? And why wasn't Rove fired if the president knew he was involved?
Last but not least, is it appropriate for a White House official to try to discredit a critic of the president, in this case Joseph Wilson, by leaking inside information on what the reporter called "double supersecret background"?
Bill Schneider, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: Let's find out more on what's happening at the U.S. district court in Washington D.C., our Kathleen Koch is live this morning.
Kathleen, good morning.
KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning.
"Time" magazine correspondent Matt Cooper arrived here earlier this morning. He was to begin testifying before the grand jury here at 9:30, and of course this is an appearance that he fought for many months to avoid making, appealed all the way to the Supreme Court, both he and "Time" magazine, but the court refused to hear their appeal.
And then it was suddenly before a judge last week when he was about to face up to four months in jail for contempt, that he gave the -- made the dramatic announcement that he had got what he called, quote, "personal consent" to reveal his source, and "Newsweek" magazine reported in its Monday edition, indeed, that was Karl Rove, the deputy White House chief of staff. But now overshadowing what's going on here right now in court is the debate over the future of Karl Rove. And up on Capitol Hill, there are many Democrats who are very angry about his role in this whole controversy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. NANCY PELOSI (D), MINORITY LEADER: The president said two years ago he wanted to get to the bottom of this. If he were sincere, it would have happened. For two years, there's been an investigation that has not produced results. No results were produced until a reporter was sent to jail.
It is reckless for anyone in the White House to release -- for anyone, period, President Bush Sr. called it a traitor's act, for anyone to release the name of a CIA covert operative.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KOCH: However, Republican leaders up on Capitol Hill, as one might predict, are very vehemently defending Karl Rove, and charging Democrats with playing politics.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROY BLUNT (R), HOUSE MAJORITY WHIP: This is so much business as usual. This is the kind of thing you talk about if you don't have any policy positions. And our friends on the other side just aren't coming forward with any policy positions that would change the country, so they want to pick out whatever the target of the week is and make the most out of that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KOCH: Now Matt Cooper has been, as I said, appearing before the grand jury for about an hour and 10 minutes. We have no idea how long he would be in there. He did not answer reporter's questions as he was entering court, but he did promise to talk to the cameras when he comes out, though of course grand jury testimony is secret, so he will be certainly limited in what he'll be able to say. Back to you.
KAGAN: All right, Kathleen Koch in Washington D.C., thank you for that.
A trash collector in Wisconsin has reason to be proud this morning. He is a real hero. Ahead, how his quick thinking saved the life of a little boy who had a little bit too much adventure on his mind.
And a near fatal mistake at a pharmacy. What happened when a little girl got an adult's prescription for a heart problem.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: In Wisconsin this morning, one mother is thanking a garbage collector for his quick thinking that recently stopped a potential tragedy. Myra Sanchick of our affiliate WITI has their story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JENNIFER DETES, JACOB'S MOTHER: I was horrified and I thought -- I didn't know what to think.
MYRA SANCHICK, WITI REPORTER (voice-over): What Jennifer Detes saw from inside her home is hard for even her to grasp. Her 4-year- old son Jacob crawled into a duffel bag in a pile of trash. At that moment, the garbage truck came. Jacob, still hiding inside the bag, was tossed into the compacter.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I went for the bag, you know? I went like this (INAUDIBLE) inside. And then I push the button so the hopper can run. And as soon as the hopper started to run like this, and then I hear a scream.
SANCHICK: Ines Ramadini (ph) stopped the compacter seconds away from crushing the bag with Jacob inside.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE:: He started to put his head out, you know?
SANCHICK (on camera): You saw his little hands?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: His little hands, he was pulling them out from the bag. And I grabbed the boy and gently and I put it on the ground, then he ran by his house inside.
SANCHICK: And you said thank you?
JACOB DETES, RESCUED BOY: Yes.
SANCHICK: Good. What would you tell him, if you could?
JENNIFER DETES: I would say thank you. I would say thank you so much for being so smart and I'm so sorry it was so horrifying for you. I can't even imagine.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank God I acted so quickly. You've got a seconds, split seconds.
SANCHICK (voice-over): Myra Sanchick, Fox 6 News.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: All right, let's take a look at some other stories makes news coast to coast. A 4-year-old Massachusetts girl was hospitalized. She was given the wrong prescription. A CVS pharmacist had incorrectly given the girl's mother a drug used for irregular heart beat. That girl is now home and she is fine.
A 9-year-old boy has done something no other "Harry Potter" fan in America has done, got his hands on a copy of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" before its official release on Saturday. You have heard the extraordinary security measures being taken with Potter book. Somebody forget to tell workers at a drug store in Kingston, New York. The boy's mother bought it there, but didn't get to keep it. The family returned the book to the publisher.
And more Potter mania, this time from Vancouver. An 11-year-old foster child has won an essay contest on the boy wizard. James Traver is one of ten winners out of 8,000 entries. He gets a trip New York and to then to London, his first time on a plane. James just became hooked on the Potter series.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES TRAVER, CONTEST WINNER: It helps me escape from, like, any other worries, like if something went wrong in school today, I just read and I forget about it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KAGAN: Well, congratulations to you, James.
Gas prices, that's something you might want to escape from. They are continuing to set records. Now the government says the pain at the pump is not going to ease any time soon. Kathleen Hays joins us live from the New York Stock Exchange with the latest gas report, right after this break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, ENTREPRENEUR: One, two, three.
(APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KAGAN: Of course he has golden scissors and a golden ribbon. With that, Donald Trump might say "Viva Las Vegas." Yesterday the real-estate mogul broke ground on a luxury hotel condo that will be the tallest residential building on the Las Vegas strip. There's no plan for a Trump casino, but plans for a second residential tower are already in the works.
(STOCK MARKET REPORT)
KAGAN: Let's check the time around the country. It is 8:50 a.m. Mountain Time in Green Valley, Arizona, where burnout operations are planned to control a wildfire. And it is 10:51 a.m. Eastern at the Kennedy Space Center where Space Shuttle Discovery is set to launch in about five hours. We keep watching the live pictures from the launch pad. We'll do more of that.
Stay with us. We'll be back with a quick check of your morning's forecast.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VERONICA DE LA CRUZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: America is looking to return to manned space flights with the launch of Space Shuttle Discovery. Get cleared for takeoff at CNN.com. Discovery and its crew of seven astronauts are ready for liftoff at Florida's Kennedy Space Center. The mission will be the first for the shuttle program since the 2003 Columbia disaster in which seven astronauts died.
You can countdown remaining time with CNN's countdown clock, follow online at CNN.com/shuttle, and sync your clock with ours.
Five Americans, one Australian, and one Japanese astronaut will guide Discovery to the International Space Station. Two of the Americans are women. During the mission, astronauts will conduct three spacewalks, install equipment and test repair techniques.
You can click through this gallery to meet the crewmembers, starting with Commander Eileen Marie Collins, who has already logged more than 537 hours in space.
And find out what's ahead for the Discovery crew. You can check out some of the highlights on the 13-day mission, starting with day one. The crew will set up onboard equipment and replay launch video, sending it to NASA overnight for review.
The clock is ticking. Countdown to liftoff at CNN.com/shuttle.
From the dot-com newsdesk, I'm Veronica De La Cruz.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KAGAN: This raging wildfire in Arizona is causing worry and woe, and forcing many to flee. It's burning in the San Arita (ph) Mountains, near Green Valley. That's in southern Tucson -- southern Arizona, and started by lightning last Thursday. The fire is now twice as big as it was yesterday. It's jumped a containment line, and it has burned through almost 4,500 acres. Residents of some 30 homes nearby are being told to evacuate by tonight.
(WEATHER REPORT)
KAGAN: We are keeping an eye on shuttle discovery and the launch with our Miles O'Brien. There's a live picture of the launch pad. Much more on that ahead as CNN LIVE TODAY continues.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
