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American Morning
Talk with Speicher Family Attorney
Aired April 30, 2003 - 08:17 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.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: A top Iraqi official is talking, but what he is telling U.S. investigators about Navy pilot Scott Speicher is not what the family would like to hear. Tariq Aziz claims that Speicher died when his F-18 fighter was shot down at the beginning of the Gulf War back in 1991.
Last October, the Pentagon changed Speicher's status from killed in action to missing. And just last week we learned that the initials MSS were found on the wall of an Iraqi prison, increasing speculation that Speicher may have survived.
So what is the Speicher family's reaction to Tariq Aziz? Their attorney, Cindy Laquidara, is in Jacksonville, Florida this morning.
Cindy, good morning.
Thanks for being with us once again.
CINDY LAQUIDARA, SPEICHER FAMILY ATTORNEY: Good morning.
KAGAN: What do you make of Tariq Aziz's statements?
LAQUIDARA: Well, it's simple. He's lying and it's an opening gambit in his negotiations. He's trying to get information from us and it's the same process I saw when I negotiated with Mohamed al- Douri in the months immediately preceding the war.
KAGAN: But, Cindy, this is a totally different time. This man obviously is not in power, has no chance of going back into power. What could possibly be his practical incentive for lying at this point?
LAQUIDARA: Well, there's a number of them, really. It's a game for him. He has certain amounts of knowledge and the question is what are we going to give him in return for that? So there's a couple of things he has to do. First, he has to figure out what it's worth to us, how important we see it. And secondly, he has to figure out what we know so he can calculate the value of what he can give us.
And I think our opening gambit back to him should be there's room for him in Guantanamo, for an indefinite period of time. I mean we should be able to out negotiate Tariq Aziz. Clearly, Scott did not die in that, in that crash and Tariq Aziz knows that, as we do.
KAGAN: When you talk about how important this is to us, as in the U.S. government, how important do you think that information is to the government and do you think they've made it a high enough priority?
LAQUIDARA: I think it's very important to the government. From the people I've spoken with, I'm reaching a comfort level that they are adhering to what they tell the servicemen, which is there's nothing more important than retrieving them. But at this point there's also the game that we want to win. We, it would be humiliating for us to be out negotiated by Tariq Aziz. He's in our custody, as you pointed out. We hold all the cards. And for him to open up with something we know to be untrue, there's, that's apparent from the crash site and from the two Iraqi defectors that we spoke with who saw Scott in 1991, is a bit of a spit in our face and we need to spit back.
KAGAN: Well, Tariq Aziz is clearly not the only former Iraqi official that's been taken into custody, that is being questioned.
LAQUIDARA: Correct.
KAGAN: There has to be other interrogations taking place. Are you getting any information from the U.S. government about other question and answer sessions concerning Scott Speicher?
LAQUIDARA: Yes, I am. And I'm not going...
KAGAN: And what can you tell us about that?
LAQUIDARA: I really don't want to interfere with those negotiations. What I can tell you is that what is typical is you will get a number of senior people. They will give you some conflicting information about each other. Each one wants to dump the responsibility on somebody else, that that is what's going on.
Now, you need to recognize if Tariq Aziz had a role in keeping Scott in Iraq and not informing the United States, he's a war criminal. And he's not easily going to put that on the table without knowing that he's not going to be tried for those crimes.
KAGAN: And just finally on a personal note, I can only imagine what the roller coaster, the emotional roller coaster this has been for the Speicher family, especially going into this war, seeing other POWs having been rescued. How are they doing at this point with the bits of information that are coming out at this time?
LAQUIDARA: They're doing better than anybody could possibly expect. They're very optimistic people. Each bit of information they know brings them closer to the final resolution.
KAGAN: Cindy Laquidara, family attorney for the Speicher family, thanks for being with us once again and for keeping us up to date on a story that I know a lot of people have a lot of interest in.
LAQUIDARA: Well, thank you for your interest.
KAGAN: Cindy, thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired April 30, 2003 - 08:17 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: A top Iraqi official is talking, but what he is telling U.S. investigators about Navy pilot Scott Speicher is not what the family would like to hear. Tariq Aziz claims that Speicher died when his F-18 fighter was shot down at the beginning of the Gulf War back in 1991.
Last October, the Pentagon changed Speicher's status from killed in action to missing. And just last week we learned that the initials MSS were found on the wall of an Iraqi prison, increasing speculation that Speicher may have survived.
So what is the Speicher family's reaction to Tariq Aziz? Their attorney, Cindy Laquidara, is in Jacksonville, Florida this morning.
Cindy, good morning.
Thanks for being with us once again.
CINDY LAQUIDARA, SPEICHER FAMILY ATTORNEY: Good morning.
KAGAN: What do you make of Tariq Aziz's statements?
LAQUIDARA: Well, it's simple. He's lying and it's an opening gambit in his negotiations. He's trying to get information from us and it's the same process I saw when I negotiated with Mohamed al- Douri in the months immediately preceding the war.
KAGAN: But, Cindy, this is a totally different time. This man obviously is not in power, has no chance of going back into power. What could possibly be his practical incentive for lying at this point?
LAQUIDARA: Well, there's a number of them, really. It's a game for him. He has certain amounts of knowledge and the question is what are we going to give him in return for that? So there's a couple of things he has to do. First, he has to figure out what it's worth to us, how important we see it. And secondly, he has to figure out what we know so he can calculate the value of what he can give us.
And I think our opening gambit back to him should be there's room for him in Guantanamo, for an indefinite period of time. I mean we should be able to out negotiate Tariq Aziz. Clearly, Scott did not die in that, in that crash and Tariq Aziz knows that, as we do.
KAGAN: When you talk about how important this is to us, as in the U.S. government, how important do you think that information is to the government and do you think they've made it a high enough priority?
LAQUIDARA: I think it's very important to the government. From the people I've spoken with, I'm reaching a comfort level that they are adhering to what they tell the servicemen, which is there's nothing more important than retrieving them. But at this point there's also the game that we want to win. We, it would be humiliating for us to be out negotiated by Tariq Aziz. He's in our custody, as you pointed out. We hold all the cards. And for him to open up with something we know to be untrue, there's, that's apparent from the crash site and from the two Iraqi defectors that we spoke with who saw Scott in 1991, is a bit of a spit in our face and we need to spit back.
KAGAN: Well, Tariq Aziz is clearly not the only former Iraqi official that's been taken into custody, that is being questioned.
LAQUIDARA: Correct.
KAGAN: There has to be other interrogations taking place. Are you getting any information from the U.S. government about other question and answer sessions concerning Scott Speicher?
LAQUIDARA: Yes, I am. And I'm not going...
KAGAN: And what can you tell us about that?
LAQUIDARA: I really don't want to interfere with those negotiations. What I can tell you is that what is typical is you will get a number of senior people. They will give you some conflicting information about each other. Each one wants to dump the responsibility on somebody else, that that is what's going on.
Now, you need to recognize if Tariq Aziz had a role in keeping Scott in Iraq and not informing the United States, he's a war criminal. And he's not easily going to put that on the table without knowing that he's not going to be tried for those crimes.
KAGAN: And just finally on a personal note, I can only imagine what the roller coaster, the emotional roller coaster this has been for the Speicher family, especially going into this war, seeing other POWs having been rescued. How are they doing at this point with the bits of information that are coming out at this time?
LAQUIDARA: They're doing better than anybody could possibly expect. They're very optimistic people. Each bit of information they know brings them closer to the final resolution.
KAGAN: Cindy Laquidara, family attorney for the Speicher family, thanks for being with us once again and for keeping us up to date on a story that I know a lot of people have a lot of interest in.
LAQUIDARA: Well, thank you for your interest.
KAGAN: Cindy, thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
