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American Morning
Prosecutor Says Report on Snipers Inaccurate; Boston Diocese May Take First Amendment Defense
Aired December 24, 2002 - 07:20 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.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Yet another twist in the Washington area sniper case. A report out singled out the teenager, 17-year-old John Lee Malvo, as the trigger man in most, if not all, the shootings. Right now that report is being disputed.
We talked a lot about this yesterday. Let's talk about it again today, the leading development, with our analyst Jeffrey Toobin. Nice to see you.
JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Good morning. Happy holidays to you.
HEMMER: Now let's talk about the D.C. case first off. Report yesterday that John Lee Malvo is the man who may be responsible for firing that rifle the entire time.
Late yesterday afternoon the prosecutor comes out and says, hold it. That's not the way the evidence looks right now. What happened there?
TOOBIN: It was a really remarkable press conference. The commonwealth's attorney, Horan, really emotionally denied this report and said, it's not true, 60 percent of it is wrong. But they didn't say what was wrong, so "The New York Times" story is really not refuted at this point except in sort of this very general way.
HEMMER: And if you're a prosecutor, do you protect your evidence in this situation? Are you trying to protect the case now?
TOOBIN: It seemed to me somewhat of an overreaction. Whatever trial is at least, I would say, a year away. It would be better, I think -- yes, there's going to be news reports one direction or another for quite some time. I don't know why he felt compelled to respond to this if he wasn't going to respond to its particular.
I think it is clear that Malvo is going to have a much greater role than many of us suspected when the evidence comes forward. After all, he was the kid and Muhammad seemed like the mentor. And he was the trained sniper. So I think many of us assumed that the evidence would point more to Muhammad. But we'll see how it unfolds in court.
HEMMER: OK, but can you get a definite conviction against Muhammad if you do not prove the man fired a shot?
TOOBIN: Muhammad is charged under a new law, this anti-terrorism law in Virginia, passed post-9/11. It's never been tested, but if that law is upheld, and most laws are upheld, he could get the death penalty, even if he didn't fire a shot.
HEMMER: Let's go to Boston quickly here. The church coming out and saying separation of religion and state. They talked about the First Amendment rights of the church, essentially filing this defense of sorts.
Do they have a leg to stand on?
TOOBIN: Some courts, not many, but some courts have said that yes, this argument can stand. The idea is, if you're charging the church with failure to supervise priests, the business of supervising priests, training priests, is part of religious activity and courts can't regulate that.
It's a very tough argument to make, especially when you're dealing with...
HEMMER: But it has been done?
TOOBIN: It has been done. There was a Wisconsin case that upheld it. Most courts have rejected it.
HEMMER: What about this claim about the insurance company, they must file this in order to stay in line with their policy. Does that fly?
TOOBIN: It flies to a certain extent, but it's the Catholic church that's running the defense in this case. This is not about the insurance companies.
They're doing a carrot and stick operation here. You know, the new bishop is saying, we want to settle these cases. We want to, you know, be accommodating to these victims.
But they're also saying, look, if you want to fight us in court, we may declare bankruptcy, tie you up for years. We may fight you on First Amendment grounds. So they're saying, look, settle these cases and settle them on our terms or we're going to fight you tooth and nail in court.
HEMMER: Interesting. We'll say what it brings in that jury.
And we'll see where you go on...
TOOBIN: Well, I hope I go back here.
HEMMER: Happy new year.
TOOBIN: Thanks.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Diocese May Take First Amendment Defense>
Aired December 24, 2002 - 07:20 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Yet another twist in the Washington area sniper case. A report out singled out the teenager, 17-year-old John Lee Malvo, as the trigger man in most, if not all, the shootings. Right now that report is being disputed.
We talked a lot about this yesterday. Let's talk about it again today, the leading development, with our analyst Jeffrey Toobin. Nice to see you.
JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Good morning. Happy holidays to you.
HEMMER: Now let's talk about the D.C. case first off. Report yesterday that John Lee Malvo is the man who may be responsible for firing that rifle the entire time.
Late yesterday afternoon the prosecutor comes out and says, hold it. That's not the way the evidence looks right now. What happened there?
TOOBIN: It was a really remarkable press conference. The commonwealth's attorney, Horan, really emotionally denied this report and said, it's not true, 60 percent of it is wrong. But they didn't say what was wrong, so "The New York Times" story is really not refuted at this point except in sort of this very general way.
HEMMER: And if you're a prosecutor, do you protect your evidence in this situation? Are you trying to protect the case now?
TOOBIN: It seemed to me somewhat of an overreaction. Whatever trial is at least, I would say, a year away. It would be better, I think -- yes, there's going to be news reports one direction or another for quite some time. I don't know why he felt compelled to respond to this if he wasn't going to respond to its particular.
I think it is clear that Malvo is going to have a much greater role than many of us suspected when the evidence comes forward. After all, he was the kid and Muhammad seemed like the mentor. And he was the trained sniper. So I think many of us assumed that the evidence would point more to Muhammad. But we'll see how it unfolds in court.
HEMMER: OK, but can you get a definite conviction against Muhammad if you do not prove the man fired a shot?
TOOBIN: Muhammad is charged under a new law, this anti-terrorism law in Virginia, passed post-9/11. It's never been tested, but if that law is upheld, and most laws are upheld, he could get the death penalty, even if he didn't fire a shot.
HEMMER: Let's go to Boston quickly here. The church coming out and saying separation of religion and state. They talked about the First Amendment rights of the church, essentially filing this defense of sorts.
Do they have a leg to stand on?
TOOBIN: Some courts, not many, but some courts have said that yes, this argument can stand. The idea is, if you're charging the church with failure to supervise priests, the business of supervising priests, training priests, is part of religious activity and courts can't regulate that.
It's a very tough argument to make, especially when you're dealing with...
HEMMER: But it has been done?
TOOBIN: It has been done. There was a Wisconsin case that upheld it. Most courts have rejected it.
HEMMER: What about this claim about the insurance company, they must file this in order to stay in line with their policy. Does that fly?
TOOBIN: It flies to a certain extent, but it's the Catholic church that's running the defense in this case. This is not about the insurance companies.
They're doing a carrot and stick operation here. You know, the new bishop is saying, we want to settle these cases. We want to, you know, be accommodating to these victims.
But they're also saying, look, if you want to fight us in court, we may declare bankruptcy, tie you up for years. We may fight you on First Amendment grounds. So they're saying, look, settle these cases and settle them on our terms or we're going to fight you tooth and nail in court.
HEMMER: Interesting. We'll say what it brings in that jury.
And we'll see where you go on...
TOOBIN: Well, I hope I go back here.
HEMMER: Happy new year.
TOOBIN: Thanks.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Diocese May Take First Amendment Defense>
