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New Day

Jury Selection to Begin in Boston Bomber Trial; Setbacks in Search for Flight 8501; Sexual Allegations Against Prince Andrew

Aired January 05, 2015 - 06:30   ET

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

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: The defense will argue he was controlled by his older brother,Tamerlan, and also that his upbringing and family history contributed to his role in the attack.

Deborah Feyerick is in Boston jury selection is set to begin in just a little while.

Good morning, Deborah.

DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning there, John.

And prosecutors say that Dzhokhar put that backpack on the ground, walked away and then detonated the device.

Today, some 1,200 prospective jurors expected to make their way to the federal courthouse just behind me. It will be several days as they fill out questionnaires and decide whether they are chosen to serve that jury.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FEYERICK (voice-over): Right near the marathon finish line on a holiday Monday in Boston -- two explosions, 12 seconds apart.

RICK DESLAURIERS, BOSTON SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE: It was a scene of utter devastation and carnage down there.

FEYERICK: The home-made bombs kill three people. Shrapnel tears through more than 200 spectators.

Rick DesLauriers ran the FBI's Boston office.

DESLAURIERS: We were collecting pieces of shrapnel that have contained inside the bombs, pieces of pressure cooker bombs, pieces of the backpacks.

FEYERICK: Day three, a break in the case. Of the more than 12,000 images and surveillance videos from businesses and spectators, a man in a white ball cap at the second blast site.

DESLAURIERS: He places that backpack down on the ground, sliding it off his shoulder and stands and mills around. A short time later, maybe 15 minutes later, he makes a cell call. Very shortly thereafter, you hear the first bomb go off. FEYERICK: Day four, the FBI asks the public for help finding two men,

later identified as Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Now on the run, officials say the brothers execute MIT Police Officer Sean Collier, carjack an SUV and get into a shootout with police.

Watertown Police Chief Ed Deveau says 26-year-old Tamerlan Tsarnaev is shot, but manages to reload about four times.

ED DEVEAU, WATERTOWN POLICE CHIEF: He runs out of ammunition and throws his gun at my sergeant. And he starts to run.

FEYERICK: Officers tackled Tamerlan. His brother tries to scatter police to free him.

DEVEAU: He drags his brother down. He's lodge underneath the stolen SUV. And he smashes into one of our cruisers.

FEYERICK: By sunrise Friday, millions in the Boston area are on lockdown.

When it is lifted that night, a resident calls 911. The suspect is hiding in his boat.

(on camera): He's got a sniper's rifle pointed right at his head, because he was still a threat. You didn't know.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He was still a threat. We didn't know if he had bombs on him.

FEYERICK (voice-over): After a tense standoff, he surrenders. At the hospital, he is questioned by FBI interrogators then read his rights.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FEYERICK: And Dzhokhar is expected to be in court today. He is entitled to be in court every day of his trial to sit and face the people filling out those questionnaires. The defense team had tried to move this trial to another city. They had also asked for more time to prepare. The judge said no in both cases -- Alisyn.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Deb Feyerick, thanks so much for all that background.

Let's dig deeper now with Evan Perez. He's our CNN justice reporter, and Mel Robbins, CNN commentator and legal analyst.

Evan, I want to start with you, because we understand that you have breaking news to report.

EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE REPORTER: That's right, Alisyn. We've heard from sources that the government and the defense team had had these talks for a guilty plea by Dzhokhar Tsarnaev under which he would plead guilty in exchange for life without parole.

Now, the reason why this did not work out and why the trial is expected to start in the next few hours is because the government refused to remove the possibility of the death penalty, which has been ordered as a possibility here for this case.

CAMEROTA: And if he had copped a plea deal and if he could spare, I mean, if the trial could spare Boston the emotion of going through a trial like this, why wouldn't the government take the death penalty off the table?

PEREZ: Well, the government says, once the attorney general has made the determination that this is a capital case that something new has to come up. There is various things that they, for example, his mental health, perhaps if he had offered some kind of assistance to the government that leads to new information in the case.

That is not the case. They believe they know everything that happened here.

CAMEROTA: Mel Robbins, I want to bring you in.

This case could not be any more emotional for the city of Boston. Here are two young men who allegedly massacred and maimed people at the Boston marathon. Do you think that this trial should have been moved out of the city?

MEL ROBBINS, CNN COMMENTATOR AND LEGAL ANALYST: Absolutely not. He will absolutely get a fair trial. They only need 18 jurors, Alisyn, 12 main, six alternate. There are millions a part of this potential jury pool.

And keep in mind, he is going to be found guilty, Alisyn. It's not a question of whether or not he's found guilty. The only question that remains is in the sentencing phase of the trial, will a jury of his peers sentence him to the death penalty, Alisyn?

And there are plenty of people in the state of Massachusetts that are against the death penalty. We haven't put anybody to death in 67 years. It's been outlawed for over 30 years. So, while this is a federal case, I think it is far from cut and dry, whether or not he will actually receive the death penalty when he's convicted -- and mark my words, he will be convicted.

CAMEROTA: So, in other words the jury, Mel, is able to say, we believe he deserves life in prison, but we will not give him the death penalty.

ROBBINS: Absolutely. I mean, what you will see here is the prosecution is going to put on an insurmountable case. They have an avalanche of evidence against Tsarnaev, and he will be found guilty. He will probably be found guilty on all 30 counts, Alisyn.

Then, the trial moves to a sentencing phase, the same jury will hear extremely detailed evidence that the defense will put forward attempting to mitigate the circumstances. They're going to talk about how he was influenced by his older brother, that he had no criminal record, his family history, being an honor roll student in high school.

You know, at some point, maybe the defendant will express tremendous remorse and all of these things a jury will take into consideration when they decide whether or not they are going to sentence him to death. And in a third, just a third of federal cases, Alisyn, has juries actually sentenced folks to the death penalty. Two-thirds of all federal cases, juries have chosen for life without the option for parole. I think they'll do the same in this case.

CAMEROTA: Evan, do we know how Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has been behaving behind bars, whether he has been cooperative at all?

PEREZ: The government says he hasn't shown remorse. So, that's one of the issues that's going to come up here. And as Mel has been mentioning, you know, even though Massachusetts doesn't have the death penalty, juries in Massachusetts, federal juries have handed down the death sentence before if recent years. So, it is something, it is a bit of a tossup as to whether they will go this way. If you remember, everybody is going to remember what happened on that day in Boston, in the marathon bombings, you know?

CAMEROTA: Mel, let me remind the viewers of what was found in the boat where Dzhokhar was hiding during the manhunt for he and his brother and when police found him and flushed him in the boat. But they say what they found behind written in his blood was, "We Muslims are one body. You hurt one, you hurt us all. Stop killing innocent people and we will stop. The U.S. government is killing our innocent civilians. I can't stand to see such evil go unpunished?"

Mel, how will his attorneys depict him as the sort of innocent brother under the sway of his older brother, given what Evan just reported, that he hasn't been cooperative and that they have this evidence?

ROBBINS: Well, just because he hasn't been cooperative doesn't mean he wouldn't show remorse during a plea, number one. And number two, that's evidence of his motive, which was revenge. But that doesn't discount what the defense is going to argue.

Again, this does not go to whether or not he is guilty of these crimes, arguing he was kind of persuaded, he was overtaken, he was brainwashed by his older brother, who is the mastermind of this, doesn't get him acquitted. It may save him from being executed. That remains to be seen, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Got it.

Mel Robbins, Evan Perez, thanks so much for this. Great to see you both -- John.

BERMAN: All right. Coming up for us: finding the wreckage of AirAsia Flight 8501. And it is proven to be a frustrating mission. And this morning, there has been a new setback. CNN takes you inside the search zone for a first hand look at the challenges.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: A familiar and frustrating development as the search for Flight 8501 is suspended for the day because of rough weather. There has been a new setback, however. One of the suspected plane parts that officials found is actually from a ship, year's old ship wreck, not collected to the jet. When the search resumes, it will move eastward as the area the search area is revised again.

CNN's Paula Hancocks is one of the few reporters who traveled to the search zone in the choppy waters of the Java Sea. Paula joins us now to tell us what it was all like -- Paula.

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, we have been hearing a lot about the summer monsoon, the adverse weather conditions. Officials saying it's the biggest obstacle at this point. So, on Sunday, we traveled to the search zone and we can show you first hand what it was like.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HANCOCKS (voice-over): The deserted beaches of west Borneo, Indonesia, belie the horrors out at sea. More than 100 nautical miles to the search zone, calm waters and sunshine soon disappeared.

(on camera): We have been on the sea now for about four hours. We got about three or four hours to go. And as you can see, the weather has started to close in, the closer we get to this crash location.

But we are being told that even though these waves are fairly high, but and you see, it's a lot choppier than it was, that this is still considered fairly good weather. This is better than it has been for some days.

(voice-over): The crew looks for debris and bodies. One of them spots something. He's unsure what, exactly.

The captain calls it in. A larger ship in the area will investigate. This search and rescue boat has a specific mission, to deliver a pinger locater to help with the vital search for the so-called black boxes.

But the captain is nervous about the weather.

"I feel a heavy moral burden," he says. "I have a responsibility to keep those on board safe, but it's so important to help find bodies and debris." "Larger ships can cope with these conditions," he says, "This is not a large ship."

At the search zone, the contact boat is in sight. Time to hand over the equipment -- easier said than done.

(on camera): One of the men who is in charge of that equipment was going to jump across, quite frankly, he doesn't want to. He said it's simply too dangerous.

(voice-over): Next job, transferring the boat from which to operate the equipment. A task the crew struggles with until dark. They have to admit defeat at least for today. An exhausted crew returns to land with only half the mission accomplished.

(END VIDEOTAPE) HANCOCKS: It is a huge international effort. The U.S. has two ships in place, France, Russia, Australia, Malaysia, Singapore to name a few that are helping. But unless the weather improves, there is really a little to what they can do.

Alisyn, John, back to you.

BERMAN: All right, Paula.

CAMEROTA: Paula, thanks. So many challenges for them to deal with. Thanks, so much.

Well, the royals responding forcefully to allegations against Prince Andrew that he sexually assaulted a minor. The allegations are sordid with other big names allegedly involved. We'll have more, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: Buckingham Palace fighting back forcefully against sex abuse allegations involving Prince Andrew. A woman identified as Virginia Roberts filing a lawsuit in the U.S., claiming that a wealthy investor forced her into sex slavery when she was a minor, making her available for his powerful friends. One of the men she claims to have encounters with is Prince Andrew.

Max Foster is following all the developments for us and the denials.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MAX FOSTER, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPODENT (voice-over): Buckingham Palace on damage control, a rapid response to a lawsuit alleging that Prince Andrew had sex with an under aged girl several times in 1999 and 2002. The royal family issuing a rare second statement, refuting the claims, even naming the alleged victim, saying, "It's emphatically denied that his Royal Highness, the Duke of York, had any form of sexual contact or relationship with Virginia Roberts. The allegations made are false and without any foundation."

Roberts referred to as Jane Doe 3 in court papers last week alleges she was kept as a sex lave for three years by the prince's former friend, billionaire businessman and registered sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. During this time, Roberts claims she was forced to have sexual relations with the prince when she was a minor. According to court filing, Epstein told Roberts to give the prince whatever he needed and required.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She has to prove it was Prince Andrew, what we have is going to be very damaging evidence, very damaging discussion and the palace are frantically trying to find a way of limiting this.

FOSTER: The prince came under harsh criticism for his friendship with Epstein back in 2011, eventually leading to his resignation from the position as ambassador for British business.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was his decision, very bad judgment to befriend Mr. Epstein in the first place. FOSTER: According to court documents, Roberts says Epstein routinely

leant here to powerful figures for sex, including well-known criminal defense attorney, Alan Dershowitz. Dershowitz said in a statement, quote, "The entire story is completely made up, and the claims are all about money." He is launching an effort to disbar the lawyers who filed the case.

In a statement reacting to the denials from Dershowitz, Prince Andrew and Epstein, Roberts insists that she'll pursue all available recourse, saying these times of aggressive attacks are exactly the reason why sexual abuse victims typically remain silent and that she's not going to be bullied back into silence.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FOSTER: Well, it's very rare for Buckingham Palace to comment on any ongoing illegal proceedings. For now, today, we've had an unprecedented fourth statement in relation to this case. A suggestion that Roberts went as far as meeting the queen, but the palace is telling me today there is nothing to suggest this is true. We have no record of a meeting with the queen -- Michaela.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Max Foster, thanks so much for that.

For more on the story, we want to turn to CNN world commentator, and expert on all things royal, Victoria Arbiter.

Good to see you. And happy New Year.

VICTORIA ARBITER, CNN ROYAL COMMENTATOR: Good morning. Thank you.

PEREIRA: It's a shame that this is the first thing we're kicking off the New Year to talk you about the royals. It's quite unsavory.

ARBITER: Very unsavory. You are right, given this is a year they stand to break Queen Victoria's record, we have a new royal baby on the way. This is not how the royal family would have liked to start 2015.

PEREIRA: What do you make of what Max said, the fact that this is terrifically unprecedented, a fourth statement now from the palace, very strongly worded? This is unprecedented?

ARBITER: It is unprecedented. Also, given the fact that it's a legal proceeding in another country makes it more unprecedented.

But here's the deal, these are proceedings filed in a court in the USA. Prince Andrew is not party to this case, as such he's not able to issue a formal response. And so, it became absolutely imperative that Buckingham Palace release this so it's on the record.

PEREIRA: And on the record multiple times, too. I find that really interesting.

ARBITER: Multiple times, allegations like this are incredibly sordid and when you are painted with this brush, it is very hard to shake this type of accusation. The royal family seems to get back on track with a focus on Andrew's charity endeavors, his working the technology sector. He is due at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland later this month.

I don't think this story is going to go away any time soon. The family is going to fight it.

PEREIRA: Well, they're going to fight it. And it's not as though it won't derail other plans. I mean, he has already cut short his skiing vacation to I'm assuming to deal with the meetings with the queen and probably go into crisis control mode. No?

ARBITER: Absolutely. The monarchy at the end of the day is a business. So, crisis management has kicked into overdrive. He flew home from Switzerland yesterday, along with his daughter, Princess Eugenie. He is meeting with legal advisers, senior palace aides today.

He will be meeting with the queen. I would imagine very soon, just to assure her about --

PEREIRA: I would love to be a fly on the wall for some of those conversations.

Let me read to you actually a bit of the statement. This is the second statement. Apparently, there are four now. The second statement reads in part, "A very serious allegation of sex with a minor was leveled at the duke in a legal document submitted to a U.S. court is emphatically denied, that the Duke of York had any form of sexual contact or relationship. They have now named this woman, Virginia Roberts. Any claim to the contrary is false and without foundation."

I keep going back to that the notion when you are tarred with an allegation like this, it's very difficult to essential un-tar yourself. I mean, this is potentially incredibly damaging.

ARBITER: It is incredibly damaging. Not just to the prince, but when you look at the negative cloud over Buckingham Palace now, when you look at his charitable endeavors. So, I think moving ahead is going to be -- trying to reign everything in. But at the same time when you are Prince Andrew, certainly over the week, he was tried in the court of public opinion on social media.

PEREIRA: Is there a sense, do you think, in the United Kingdom that there is any truth to any of this? Does he have the reputation of being lewd and lascivious?

ARBITER: Certainly, it doesn't benefit to speculate at this point. But Andrew does have a record of having a bad choice of friends, which his only crime is his poor judgment in his friends, maintaining a friendship with Mr. Epstein. But he had a string of girlfriends in the past, some suitable, not so much -- some not so such, nicknamed Randy Andy.

I mean, Prince Andrew has made a number of grasps in the past, certainly nothing of this level and really this damaging.

PEREIRA: Does he have any chance, can he sue for libel? I mean, is there any --

ARBITER: Royals don't sue. Really all it does is prolong the story.

It's only to get worse. There is talk one of the women involved in these proceedings is talking about releasing a memoir. That has not been written. If it is, we seen the paper go to town already with the sordid nature of these details.

It doesn't look like it will be a particularly good year for Prince Andrew.

PEREIRA: Certainly not. 2015 is not the way they want it to start out.

Victoria, I really like to have you with us. Thanks so much.

ARBITER: Thank you.

PEREIRA: In our next hour, we're going to speak live with one of the men named in that lawsuit. Harvard law professor and attorney, Alan Dershowitz, he vehemently denies the accusation leveled against him.

We are certainly following a whole lot of news this morning. Let's get right to it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We are at day nine.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It has been more than a week since AirAsia Flight 8501 disappeared.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We are in the area where some bodies have been found. The conditions are less than ideal.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The only survivor of a plane crash that killed her family.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Her little legs and arms were scratched up all over. That's what amazed me that she kept on walking.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No one really knows why someone survives and someone doesn't.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When we die, it does not mean we lose cancer.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I love you, Stuart, wherever you are, Godspeed, rest in peace.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have a great rest of your life.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: Good morning, everyone. Welcome to NEW DAY. I'm John Berman, alongside Alisyn Camerota.

The search for AirAsia Flight 8501 is now wrapping up its tenth day. And so far, it's turned up mostly disappointments and obstacles. At least one of the suspected plane parts on the floor of the Java Sea. It has turned out to be a year's old ship wreck, with mud on the sea floor slowing efforts even more to identify other objects.

CAMEROTA: And meanwhile, the search for the black box is still coming up empty. Investigators are not hearing any of the pinging, and they want to know what brought down the plane and whether ice could be the culprit.

This as Indonesia's navy chief expanding the search area eastward, as severe weather again forces an early end to the aerial search.

So, let's go right to CNN's Anna Coren. She's live on the ground in Indonesia.

What's the latest, Anna?

ANNA COREN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Alisyn, it's just gone 7:00 p.m. here. But several hours ago, authorities did suspend the search because as you say bad weather was hampering efforts. It has been for days now.

But certainly, there was a window of opportunity where at least 57 divers got into the water for a short period. Unfortunately, there is so much mud at the bottom of the ocean and due to the swell, it is making visibility almost impossible.

On top of that, you have the swell, the rain, the thunderstorms, it is slowing down efforts to locate the plane, locate the bodies and, of course, the vital black box flight data recorders.

Now, three extra bodies were located today, retrieved and have been sent here to Surabaya, where they will then be identified. It's a painstaking task, considering how much time they've spent in the water.