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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

"Baby Doe" Identified; Teen Arrested in Texas; Trump Blasted over Question. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired September 18, 2015 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:00] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Realize is that when our young people have a voice, they can learn to help and heal themselves.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Absolutely. If you want to learn more about this hero and so many more, please go to cnnheroes.com.

Thank you all so much for joining us "AT THIS HOUR."

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: LEGAL VIEW with Ashleigh Banfield starts now.

BOLDUAN: Have a great weekend.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone, I'm Ashleigh Banfield. Welcome to LEGAL VIEW.

We're going to begin with breaking legal news. Her story has broken America's heart. A little girl who was thrown out like the trash, found dead, wrapped in a trash bag on a rocky shoreline in the Boston's harbor. And ever since she was found on June 25th, we have only known this little face as "Baby Doe." The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children released this image, and it is just a composite of what she may have looked like. And it was a remarkable picture. But now law enforcement sources are telling CNN, this little face, this little girl, now has a name. She's been I.D.ed. And there's a suspect that they are questioning. Z

Poppy Harlow joining me live now, along with CNN legal analyst Paul Callan, a criminal defense attorney and former prosecutor, and also CNN legal analyst and defense attorney Danny Cevallos, and on the phone live with us as well, CNN contributor Larry Kobilinsky, who is a forensic scientist at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice and his knowledge plays into this story a lot.

Hold on for a moment, Larry, I have a lot of questions for you. But to the reporting first.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Sure.

BANFIELD: Who is she?

HARLOW: What we know is who she is, investigators believe, the daughter of. We don't have her name yet and we don't have the cause of death, but they believe they have finally identified this little girl. They're holding a press conference later today in Boston. We will likely find out the name and a lot more then.

But this is the little girl unidentified until now as "baby doe" found June 25th on Deer Island, right east of Logan Airport, just discarded like a piece of trash on the side there in that plastic bag. They previously had found pollen on her, Ashleigh. That pollen led them to trees and shrubs in New England, telling them -

BANFIELD: Pollen.

HARLOW: Pollen, telling them that this was a local girl. But where was she from? And that's when last night they got a tip. And tip that they thought was so credible, it led them, according to "The Boston Globe," to the Mattapan neighborhood of Boston and they have now taken a man into custody. That man we know is the boyfriend of this little girl's mother. Again, the boyfriend of the mother is in custody at this hour being questioned. He has not yet been charged.

We also don't know yet if he's cooperating, who his attorney may be, if he's even represented yet. But that is what we know.

BANFIELD: And what about the mom? Do we know her whereabouts?

HARLOW: We don't know - we don't know if the mother has been taken in. We don't believe so at this point in time. We don't know her whereabouts. And, frankly, we don't know her name yet.

BANFIELD: Oh.

HARLOW: There have been reports of names. We are still verifying that with our law enforcement source. We don't know her name yet. But as you said, this is a little girl who captured the attention of the entire nation, and who hundreds of tips were called in about from 30 states, more than four countries -

BANFIELD: So, Poppy, this - I just want to let you know -

HARLOW: Yes.

BANFIELD: This is a live picture from the area. And let me check with our producers. This is a live picture of the area where her body was found, am I correct, from WCVB? This is the spot, Bobby -

HARLOW: Deer Island.

BANFIELD: Poppy, where the little baby -

HARLOW: Right.

BANFIELD: We thought had maybe washed ashore, and now we're thinking perhaps not.

HARLOW: They don't think that now because although she was in a plastic bag, there's no evidence that she was ever in the water. You can access this island by boat or you can drive to it.

BANFIELD: Who puts a baby in a plastic bag? I mean there are so many questions that - that remain. And I want to bring you in on this if I can, Dr. Kobilinsky. When we heard the news of the pollen being a clue for forensic investigators to at least track down whether the baby may have washed ashore from far away or may have been local, that was really significant, wasn't it?

LARRY KOBILINSKY, FORENSIC SCIENTIST (via telephone): It was. And, you know, crime labs have a lot of capabilities. Examination of pollen is by microscopy. Each - each type of plant produces a pollen that appears different at the end of a microscope. And we know that looking at different kinds of pollen, you can kind of localize the geography. And in this particular case, clearly it was from the Boston area. But there was also soot that was found, which indicated it was more of an urban area in the Boston general area.

BANFIELD: Soot. Soot found -

HARLOW: Right. Exactly.

BANFIELD: On the clothing.

And, Larry, just while we're at the microscopic telltale signs that may have been on this child's body or on her clothing, it is possible, with all of your experience, that there is something else that the investigators are keeping close to the vest so that if they do end up in a courtroom at some point, they've got the microscopic smoking gun on someone?

KOBILINSKY: Well, I think that's a very good point. There has been an autopsy already. Unfortunately, the body was partially decomposed. And with soft tissue missing, you can't get a complete picture of what happened to the girl. The cause of death, which is a medical explanation, is still unknown. It's possible that the police have information that they're not revealing because only the killer would have this information, but it's just not known where - where we're going with this until we have more information from the police department.

[12:05:30] BANFIELD: Let me - let me bring in Paul and Danny on this. Guys, this is obviously something that we all wonder about, what else would they have, could they have? This image of this little girl, this composite creation of what she might have looked like, was shared upwards of 50 million times on the Internet. Fifty million view. And we're hearing that it might have been a tip. And might there be something else out there, if you're just searching through your potential evidentiary, you know, mother lodes, what do you think might else be out there?

PAUL CALLAN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, I think the first thing that would jump out at anybody is, why didn't the mother report the missing child to Boston Police?

BANFIELD: Right. CALLAN: Obviously, this was a highly publicized disappearance. The first place a mother would go is to the police. So it makes her involvement highly suspicious at this point in time, and I think that's what police will be looking at.

BANFIELD: Danny, I mean, that's almost the obvious. It's the elephant in the room. If there is a child missing, it was the first thing we thought about with Casey Anthony, how could you not report your child missing and wonder where she was for months.

DANNY CEVALLOS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes. The operative language is you. When you say, how could you not report your child, that's maybe you Ashleigh Banfield. But unfortunately, as anyone who has practiced in the world of dependency law, where children are taken away from unsafe homes, there are legions of children out there that are essentially flying under the radar, because their parent - you know, as long as the child isn't taken away, a parent doesn't have any obligation to show them to the government and say, hey, here they are, they're OK. There are many parents, and many dysfunctional families, that could potentially fly completely under the radar unless and until the government gets wind of it, DHS gets involved or child protective services, whatever it's called in any individual state, but it's a - probably the saddest area of the practice of law is dependency law, where parents often have their parental rights terminated because their child is not safe and its needs are not being met.

BANFIELD: And, again, you were just looking at that live picture of the area where this child's remains were found in a plastic bag, of all indecencies, now an identification, but not publicly disclosed. We do have one person who is in custody, being questioned. And, of course, CNN is going to follow this, and we will break in and let you know the minute we know who it is and whether that person is actually going to be charge and whether they will find out where this mother is. Thank you to all of you.

And, Dr. Kobilinsky, thanks to you, on the phone, as well.

Coming up next, the Texas teenager handcuffed, suspended from school, all because of building a clock that some people thought looked suspicious. Did his religion have anything to do with the way this young 14-year-old kid was treated? I'm going to talk to the police chief about one of his officer's comments and why so many were dispatched for this kid.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:11:38] BANFIELD: Now to a story that is getting huge attention nationwide. A 14-year-old boy from Irving, Texas, has gone from being handcuff and arrest and photographed on Monday, to later this week being invited to the White House and Facebook headquarters and MIT, just to name a few pretty exalted places. That terrified teenager you're looking at is Ahmed Mohamed. You can certainly see the look on his face about what he thinks of the cuffs he's wearing. Probably best for you to hear from him how he explains why he ended up in that predicament.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AHMED MOHAMED: I built the clock to impress my teacher, but when I showed it to her, she thought that it was a threat to her. So - so it was really sad that she took the wrong impression of it and I got arrested for it later that day.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: That pretty much sums it up. He built this. It's a homemade digital clock. I couldn't do it. You probably couldn't do it. But this 14-year-old kid could do it. He does a lot of things like this. And he's known in the school for being really smart. His teacher, however, thought it was a fake bomb, a hoax. Ahmed says his principal and five police officers summoned him out of class and then questioned him for nearly an hour and after half. He says they wouldn't let him call his parents. Listen to what he told MSNBC about what happened even before he got a chance to speak.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MOHAMED: One of the officers did comment on me walking into the room.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What did he say?

MOHAMED: He got back in the recline chair and he relaxed and he was like, and he said, that's who I thought it was.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: "That's who I thought it was." That's a police officer saying those words, "that's who I thought it was." And that young boy said he'd never seen that police officer before. But the police officer said, when he saw him, "that's who I thought it was."

So Ahmed was arrested, cuffed, suspended, and the suspension didn't even end until yesterday, even though it was determined the bomb was not - or the - the clock was not a bomb. It wasn't even a fake bomb. It was never a hoax. It was just an amazing feat of engineering from a kid who's really good at that stuff.

You think that MacArthur High School would be really proud of him, but Ahmed says he's not going back there. He's, instead, exploring his options at a new school potentially inside the country, maybe even outside the country, he says.

I want to bring in Larry Boyd. He's the Irving, Texas, police chief.

Chief Boyd, thanks so much for taking the time to be on with me today. I'm sure this can't be easy for you. The mayor of your city said, "I do not fault the school or the Irving Police for looking into what they saw as a potential threat." Hindsight is often 20/20, Chief Boyd. Do you fault yourself or your force for how you handled this boy?

CHIEF LARRY BOYD, IRVING, TEXAS POLICE: Well, as you said, hindsight is 20/20 and, of course, we always want to looking back and using the perfect 20/20 hindsight and evaluate all of the decisions that were made. You know, they - the officers responded to what was a suspicious device. I've seen the picture of the device, like you have, and it's not readily available and not readily apparent what it is. But - so the - what they were investigating, they pretty quickly determined it was not a bomb and wasn't going to explode. What they were investigating was whether or not this was done with the intention of creating an alarm or causing a reaction by law enforcement, which is against the law.

[12:15:14] BANFIELD: I understand.

BOYD: And so that was what they were really - and the officers were looking into. Ultimately we were able to concluded that, no, he had no intention of doing that and no charges were filed and the case was dropped.

BANFIELD: So, I respect what you're saying. Here's what I don't understand. Hindsight is 20/20 and you're absolutely right, but you are much better at this than I am. I only read the 4th Amendment in my little, you know, tiny bedside table book that I look at all the time. You've studied it, you know it, you have something call Miranda, and yet this boy's backpack was searched and his electronic devices taken. The Supreme Court just recent ruling you cannot do that, sir. You cannot take someone's phone or electronic device and search it without probable cause. Did you read this boy Miranda rights?

BOYD: Well, so there's a lot of questions that you just asked there. The - the recent Supreme Court hearing has to do with, you cannot search the contents of an electronic device without a warrant.

BANFIELD: He says you did.

BOYD: Which we - which we did not. You cannot interview someone if they have asked for an attorney, which we did not. You know, the - the comment about the - just to correct something real quickly, and it's easily for these things to get kind of misunderstood, misconstrued.

BANFIELD: OK.

BOYD: But when the school resource officer arrived in the room, actually, and because I - when I first heard that comment, I was concerned about it, too, when the comment was, that's who I thought it was and I wanted to know what was the context of that. So what's been reported to me was the officer said the exact opposite thing, which was, when he walked in the room and said that's not who I thought it was going to be. Obviously this is an event for this young man that was not something he's used to dealing with and certainly easy to get the context and the situation confused.

BANFIELD: OK. And I respect this could have been a misunderstanding about those words, that's not who I thought it was or that's who I thought it was. But, you're right, I threw a lot of questions at you all at once, so let's go back to the one that we missed. The backpack. His backpack was searched. And, again, 4th Amendment, unreasonable search and seizure. And may I just add, this is a boy. This isn't just any person. I mean this isn't a grown-up. This is a boy who needs his parents to help him navigate this and he says he wasn't even allowed to call his parents. So two questions I need you to answer.

BOYD: Right. So -

BANFIELD: Why could he not call his parents as a minor, and why was his backpack searched?

BOYD: So this was a - a combined operation or combined event I would say between when the school district was involved in it and then later the police department was involved. In terms of searching the backpack, I'm not aware that our officers searched the backpack.

BANFIELD: Ahmed says they did.

BOYD: Right. And, of course, I understand that. And so in terms of questioning him, and the interrogation, you know, it didn't last the hour and a half and, you know, the way it's been described. I'm sure it seemed to him to be an hour and a half.

BANFIELD: Why was his backpack searched?

BOYD: You know, I answered that question, which was, you know, I'm not aware of the fact that our officers searched the backpack. The school district was involved in this along with us, and so I'm not aware that we did.

BANFIELD: OK. And then - and then the issue about his parents. He tried to call his parents and he wasn't allowed. It just seems unconscionable to me.

BOYD: Right.

BANFIELD: I'm a mother of two children. They're not yet 14. But when they are, they better bloody well be able to call me before police arrive on the scene.

BOYD: Right. And so that's, obviously, another area of concern. And I get that. I'm a parent too. And I understand the desire, the need, the want to be there with your child in circumstances like this. Of course when you first get there, they're trying to figure out what's happening. They don't even know if they have anything yet in terms of an offense that requires our presence. I've also asked about that. What I've discovered so far is that no one was asked to have the parent there. That question - I know it's been reported. I understand -

BANFIELD: He says he tried to - sir, I'm sorry, I'm just going to have to tell you, Ahmed says he tried to call his dad and he wasn't allow. And you mentioned at the beginning of this interview, there was no request for a lawyer. He's 14. I'm sure he doesn't know his Miranda rights.

BOYD: Right. No, I - I understand that. I get that. I'm just clarifying the questions that you're asking. Was the parent - did he ask to speak to his parent. What I've received so far is that, no, that request wasn't made. Now, again, I understand, as a father that, you know, we're dealing with a 14-year-old child. We definitely want to look at all the things that happened here, and understand the decision points and the alternatives that were available.

We had two objectives when we got there. The first objective, what has to happen to keep all the students in the school safe. That was the first and primary objective. Once we got past that, the next objective is, how do we best handle this for this student? How do we have the outcome that we're hoping for -

[12:20:10] BANFIELD: I think we - we had all determined sir - I'm sorry, I'm just going to have to disagree with you there, that safety wasn't an issue at this point. If safety were an issue, those children in that school would have been evacuated. It was determined pretty quickly that it was just a hoax situation -

BOYD: Right.

BANFIELD: So there was no need for speed, no concern about other kids' safety. And, really, that's where I don't understand. If there had been a concern about safety of children and that that was the greater interest, perhaps that would make things more understandable. But this had nothing to do with that.

BOYD: Right. I think we agree with each other, because that's what I said is that they pretty quickly determined that the safety for the school was not an issue. So then it transitioned to -

BANFIELD: The school had determined that before you were even on the premises or the school would have evacuated their students. The school had determined that. It wasn't even - it was never an issue. The school had figured that out. I still don't understand why a 14-year- old boy needed to be taken into a questioning period, interrogation is what he calls it, for I think over an hour without the ability to call his parents. And I think you and I both know our children would ask right away to call us no matter what.

BOYD: Again, I agree with you. They determined, the officers, that's what I'm talking about, they determined pretty quickly that the safety issue was a - was taken care of. So they switch to, what's the best outcome for how we handle this situation. How do we deal with this? Unfortunately, there was a lot of things that - that they didn't know at the time, that we were able to find out later that was - enabled us to drop this charge and not pursue it any further.

So, clearly, there's a lot of different opinions about how this should have been handled. I'm getting a lot of feedback on it. One thing's for certainly, that no matter what we decided, there's going to be people who strongly agree with it and strongly disagree with it. What we need to do now - this won't be the last time we have a decision point like this is to look at it all, figure out, what was the best outcome for handling it for this student at this point in time, and that's really where we're at right now. I can't change what happened then, that's where we are now.

BANFIELD: Chief Larry Boyd, I - I appreciate your taking the time to come on and tell me your side and I hope that when you are finished with your investigation, we'll be able to get to the bottom of the rest of all of those questions that we have unanswered, unfortunately, between how the communication ended up in that room.

Thank you, sir. I appreciate your time.

I don't know if the chief can hear me any longer, but we're going to continue to follow this story. Just, by the way, the president, himself, was on this pretty quickly. He tweeted out, "cool clock, Ahmed. Want to bring it to the White House? We should inspire more kids like you to like science. It's what makes America great." We also know that the clock is no longer an evidence issue and apparently it's available for pick up. Whether it's been picked up already, I don't know, but maybe Ahmed will take it to the White House (INAUDIBLE).

Coming up next, Democrats and Republicans alike piling on Donald Trump today, this time for something he did not say.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:26:32] BANFIELD: New just - just in from the Trump campaign trail. The candidate is cancelling a scheduled appearance today in South Carolina citing a significant business transaction. No further details forthcoming. Donald Trump is still taking heat for what he did not say yesterday about something that a supporter of his did say. I want you to listen to the very first question that Donald Trump faced at a campaign event in New Hampshire.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP SUPPORTER: We have a problem in this country, it's called Muslims. We know our current president in one.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Right.

TRUMP SUPPORTER: You know he's not even an American.

TRUMP: We need this question. This is the first question.

TRUMP SUPPORTER: Birth certificate, man. But anyway, we have training camps growing where they want to kill us.

TRUMP: Uh-huh.

TRUMP SUPPORTER: That's my question. When can we get rid of them?

TRUMP: We're going to be looking at a lot of different things. And, you know, a lot of people are saying that and a lot of people are saying that bad things are happening out there. We're going to be looking at that and plenty of other things.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: OK, what the frontrunner for the Republican nomination for president did not say in that answer was that President Obama is not a Muslim and, number two, that he was born in the United States. You can compare that to John McCain's very firm, but respectful response in a virtually identical questioning situation back in the '08 campaign.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I can't trust Obama.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: (INAUDIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have read about him and he's not - he's not - he's a - he's an Arab. He is not - no?

MCCAIN: No, ma'am. No, ma'am. He's a - he's a - he's a decent family man, a citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues, and that's what this campaign is all about. He's not. Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: All right, that was '08. So, today, Trump's campaign says that he did not hear the question. Here's the quote. "All he heard was the question about training camps, which he said we have to look into. The media want to make this an issue about Obama, but it's about him waging a war on Christianity." Trump, himself, refused to tell reporters why he didn't correct the man. And speaking with "The Washington Post," his campaign manager refused to say whether Trump believes the president is, in fact, a Muslim.

Hillary Clinton tweeted this, "Donald Trump not denouncing false statements about the president and hateful rhetoric about Muslims is disturbing and just plain wrong. Cut it out."

I want to bring in "Daily Beast" contributor and political comedian and also Muslim Dean Obeidallah, who's here with me live, and from Manchester, New Hampshire, is Paula Johnson. She's the co-chair of Women for Trump and she was actually at yesterday's event.

So if I could begin with you, Ms. Johnson. You were at the event. We were all looking at the - at the - at the supporters, at the people in the audience, to try to get a sense of how that man's question landed, whether it was awkward, uncomfortable. And since you were in the crowd, maybe you could characterize it for me.

PAULA JOHNSON, FORMER N.H. STATE REPRESENTATIVE: Well, first of all, I want to say thank you for allowing me to your show today.

You know, we - a lot of people ask a lot of questions of Mr. Trump. And since we don't have censorship there, you know, it is his 1st Amendment right to ask the question. He did ask the question. Mr. Trump answered it as best as he could. I think it was an awkward question.

[12:29:52] But I don't feel that - and this is just my feeling - that it was a wrong question. And in respect that, you're going to be upset by Mr. Trump if he answered that, and you're upset with him because he gave an answer, he said, we're going to look into this. So, you know, if he does - if he gives the wrong answer or the right answer, I guess there's no right answer or wrong answer with Mr. Trump right now.