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Nancy Grace
The Schenecker Tapes
Aired May 07, 2014 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Breaking news tonight, live, Tampa suburbs. Police race to a million-dollar mansion, a little girl at her computer doing homework, dead, her little brother in the garage, buckled into the minivan, dead. Cops hone in on the shooter. It`s Mommy, found lounging by a luxury pool in the back yard in a bloody housecoat, Mommy calmly explaining she shoots her children dead in the mouth because they, quote, "talked back."
Bombshell tonight. In the last hours, Mommy in her own words after gunning down her two children, a stunning police tape played in court. We have the audio.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
JULIE SCHENECKER, MURDER DEFENDANT: The last straw, my daughter, my 16-year-old, was just mouthy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why did you want to shoot her in the mouth?
SCHENECKER: Because it angers me so much.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Her mouth angers you?
SCHENECKER: Yes.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
GRACE: And tonight, shockwaves. After the LA Clippers owner caught on tape in a sick race rant, reaming out his mistress for bringing African- Americans to events and daring to take photos with them, the rant goes viral. After his team protests their own owner, he`s got another problem, his wife suing the alleged mistress for millions he spends on her during the alleged affair.
Then Clippers owner Donald Sterling storms out on Barbara Walters as the alleged mistress claims, quote, "We`re just friends." What? He spends nearly $2 million on a friend? This as the NBA tries to ban the owner for life.
Tonight, bombshell. Did Sterling`s mistress try to extort millions from him with threats, threats she plans to release even more of his sick race rants?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STERLING: Yes, it bothers me a lot that you want to broadcast that you`re associating with black people. Do you have to?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now there`s reports that Stiviano is being investigated for possibly using the tapes to blackmail Sterling.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Another court is warming up, the legal court.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: That video from TMZ Sports.
And live to suburban New Hampshire, a dad handcuffed and arrested at a school board meeting for speaking out after his 14-year-old girl forced by the teacher to read a sexually explicit book, "19 Minutes," a book that details rough sex amongst teens, referring to (EXPLETIVE DELETED) and hot (EXPLETIVE DELETED) pooling on the carpet beneath her. OK, you know what? I`m not going to read any more. But now you see why Daddy`s angry! What I don`t understand is why Daddy is the one in handcuffs and not the teacher.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Move back, please.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) What are you charging me with?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Take a look at this, a dad of a 14-year-old freshman reportedly upset!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You`re under arrest for disorderly conduct.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Disorderly conduct.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: After his daughter is assigned to read what he deems a sexually explicit book.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because he broke the two-minute rule.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: And to the heartland -- reading, writing and beating. A fistfight breaks out fast and furious between two man-sized high school students much bigger than their teacher. When she tries to break up the fight with a kitchen broom, she`s the one who gets fired! What?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Two students pounding on each other, and when the two go to the floor, 31-year-old first-year Pershing (ph) teacher smacks one of the students on the back with a broom handle. For her actions with that broom, she was fired.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us.
Bombshell tonight, Tampa suburbs. Police race to a million-dollar mansion to find a little girl at her computer doing homework, dead, her little brother in the garage, buckled into the minivan, dead. Cops hone in on Mommy out back by the luxury swimming pool in a bloody housecoat, Mommy calmly explaining she shoots both her children dead in the mouth because they`re sassy. They talked back.
In the last hours, Mommy in her own words after she guns down the two children, as stunning police tapes played in court. We have the audio.
We are live at the courthouse. But first, I want you to hear what Julie Schenecker said immediately following gunning down her two students, one an honor student, the other a straight-A student and soccer player. Listen to this.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Tell us what happened yesterday.
SCHENECKER: I think it was -- the thing that -- I just toppled over, the last straw. My daughter, my 16-year-old, was just mouthy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
SCHENECKER: And it`s ridiculous.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
SCHENECKER: She calls me names.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What kind of names does she call you?
SCHENECKER: Stupid. And I forgot to get the mail yesterday.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You forgot to get the mail? What happened?
SCHENECKER: She had a lot of mail.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your daughter did?
SCHENECKER: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What kind of mail did she have? Do you remember?
SCHENECKER: No. She didn`t show it to me, but that`s OK because I knew that we were committing suicide.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You knew you were coming to what?
SCHENECKER: I knew we were going to commit suicide because she`s been so bad, snotty, nasty. But I try not to say anything or I just cry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you know what the difference between suicide and homicide is?
SCHENECKER: Suicide, you kill yourself. Homicide is when you kill someone else.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Oh, yes, she`s not crazy!
Straight out to Steve Helling, writer with "People" magazine, joining me at the courthouse. Steve Helling, she comes out and tells the cops, yes, suicide is when you kill yourself, homicide`s when you kill somebody else. She is completely coherent, and she clearly states that she was angry with her daughter because her daughter, Calyx, because her daughter said she was ridiculous.
I mean, this is not an insane woman! What`s happening in court today?
STEVE HELLING, "PEOPLE" MAGAZINE: Well, you know, you noticed that, Nancy, and you know who else noticed that was the jury. I noticed a few of them taking notes right at the time when she said homicide was killing someone else. So clearly, they`re seeing that she was lucid enough to be able to explain the difference between homicide and suicide. And that`s not going to play well with the jury. It just isn`t.
GRACE: Everyone, take a listen to what Julie Schenecker said. This was just played a couple of hours ago in front of the jury. Do you think she`s crazy or just plain-out mean? Take a listen.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What happened when you got back to the house? Was she being mouthy with you there?
SCHENECKER: Yes, she was mouthy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. And you said it was the last straw. It really pissed you off? Is that what happened?
SCHENECKER: She says, When I get out of here, I`m never going to come back and see you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
SCHENECKER: She just -- she changed over the last two years.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She really upset you?
SCHENECKER: Yes, made me cry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. Kids do that when they get older. They break your heart sometimes. What happened when you got back to the house after track? What happened?
SCHENECKER: I came up behind her.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What was she doing?
SCHENECKER: Homework.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She was doing homework on the computer? Yes? You came up behind her with what?
SCHENECKER: With a .38.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. And what happened?
SCHENECKER: I shot her in the back of the head.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because she was running her mouth at you?
SCHENECKER: Yes. And then I shot her, I think, in the mouth.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
SCHENECKER: (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why did you want to shoot her in the mouth?
SCHENECKER: Because it angers me so much.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Her mouth angers you?
SCHENECKER: Yes.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
GRACE: OK. Repeatedly, she says, I wanted to shoot her in the mouth because I was angry she talked back at me.
Also joining me at the Tampa courthouse, Meredyth Censullo. Meredyth Censullo has been in the courtroom all day long -- Tampa reporter. Meredyth Censullo, what did you observe?
MEREDYTH CENSULLO, TAMPA REPORTER: Well, when this audio was being played -- it`s actually divided up into three portions. What you`re hearing now is from the first big chunk, and that`s from the actual interview the morning of January 28, 2011. That`s when the scene was discovered there in that new Tampa home. It`s a very nice neighborhood here in Tampa.
And I really observed the jury paying attention, all but one of them reading along with the transcript. It`s kind of hard to understand what Julie`s saying. A lot of her words are very garbled and slurred. So most of the jurors, except for one, actually reading along with that transcript.
I didn`t notice a lot of emotion on the face of the jurors as they were reading this. I think they were trying to...
GRACE: Right.
CENSULLO: ... digest this information. I did notice Julie started to cry at one point when they were interviewing her about her son, Beau. That the 13-year-old. So I did notice some emotion from her then.
GRACE: Well, that`s interesting because...
CENSULLO: But I think...
GRACE: That`s interesting, Meredyth Censullo, joining me at the courthouse, because she also wrote very coherently, I offed Beau. She`s talking about her son. I offed Beau.
Unleash the lawyers, Areva Martin, LA, David Benowitz, Washington, D.C. I don`t know if the two of you have tried cases where you introduce a transcript before. But I can make out her words very, very plainly, Areva Martin. And I`ve noticed that whenever I gave the jury a transcript, they almost always looked down at it and read as it was being played in court.
I don`t know that they couldn`t understand her, but they were reading the transcript, which is extremely powerful. No matter which side you`re on, it`s a double whammy. You hear it and you`re reading it at the same time. So these words are really sinking in to them, Areva.
AREVA MARTIN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: You`re right, Nancy. You know, people -- a lot of people are visual learners, so being able to read those transcripts definitely will have an impact on them.
But I think we can`t lose sight of the nature of this case. And there`s so much more evidence that`s going to come out. That was just a snippet. We`re going to hear about...
GRACE: Yes, but right now, I`m just focusing on what has happened in the last hours, this devastating tape that police caught on tape of her statement.
I want to get back on track. David Benowitz, we`re talking about evidence that just happened today. Everyone, in the last hours, the state is playing the tape of Julie Schenecker. This is just hours after she killed both of her children.
David Benowitz, how do you fight something like that? Because she is making coherent sentences. She clearly understands what she did. She even knows the difference between homicide and suicide.
DAVID BENOWITZ, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Right. But Nancy, I disagree with you. I mean, what I heard -- first of all, she`s slurring her words. And we know that when the police went to the house, there were I don`t know how many pill bottles there. But she`s drunk, with all the pills. She`s in a bloody housecoat...
GRACE: Yes, she reeked.
BENOWITZ: Reeked, right. So then she`s slurring her words during this tape. She`s talking about saying, It`s coming to suicide? What is she talking about? That doesn`t sound coherent to me.
GRACE: She said, We were going to commit suicide, because her story is she was going to kill herself, but she fell asleep. And you know, David Benowitz, I`m glad you brought that up because, as both of you practicing lawyers know, voluntary use of drugs or alcohol is never a defense. So if she`s drunk, boozed out or high on Oxycontin, that`s not going to be a defense.
Everybody, I want to show you what we have amassed. It is the evidence locker of photographic evidence that has come into this trial. Take a look. This is just as the jury is seeing. First of all, there is Schenecker. She`s still wearing the bloody housecoat with her own children`s blood on it. The coat has stains all over it. She was out lounging by -- there`s her bloody hands -- lounging by the pool, reading a magazine article called, Eight simple ways to be happy. I don`t think murdering your children was one of them.
There you see where the state, the police, have circled blood. There`s the blood trail we learned about from Calyx`s computer. She dragged the body of her little girl to the bed. Her honor student teen, Calyx, had been doing her homework. The bulk of the blood there -- dragged to the bed. There you`re seeing more of the child`s blood on the carpet. Again, that`s the homework area where Calyx was doing her homework.
The jury seeing all of this evidence. We`ve got it on our Web site so you can look at it in depth.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: Everybody, in the last hours, the jury in the Julie Schenecker case hears Schenecker in her own words. Does this mean she`s not going to take the stand? Don`t know that yet. But what I do know is this jury is hanging on every word, Julie Schenecker caught on tape, describing how she shot both of her children because they were mouthy.
Take a listen. I want you to hear it just like the jury did.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How did she end up in her bed?
SCHENECKER: Oh, I carried her.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You carried her over there? OK. You didn`t want to leave her at the computer where she was at after that happened?
SCHENECKER: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No? You took her and put her in the bed? Did you cover her?
SCHENECKER: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. All right...
SCHENECKER: (INAUDIBLE) too.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did you say anything to her before?
SCHENECKER: I said, I love you. I wrote a suicide note.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
SCHENECKER: It was really long.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And that`s what your intention was to do after, was to kill yourself?
SCHENECKER: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What happened?
SCHENECKER: I`ve always wanted to kill myself.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
GRACE: OK, wait! Wait, wait, wait! She wrote a note, I love you, then she was going to commit suicide but didn`t.
We are taking your calls. Doris in Virginia. Hi, Doris. What`s your question?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I just wanted to make a statement.
GRACE: OK.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don`t think that she`s -- I think that she`s got an anger issue, plus a control issue. And I think that she needs the death penalty.
GRACE: You know, Doris, I can`t agree with you more.
And another thing -- I`m going to go to a shrink on this, Caryn Stark, Doris, to follow up on what you`re saying because in later e-mails or writings to her husband in her journal, she`s saying, you know, I know divorce is imminent, and I can`t live by myself. So she kills her children.
You know, it`s classic, Caryn Stark. The anger between the husband and the wife boils over, and somebody kills the children or takes it out on the children. It`s textbook.
CARYN STARK, PSYCHIATRIST: It is, Nancy. And it`s so interesting that she keeps talking about suicide, knows the difference, but she didn`t kill herself. She was able to know not to kill herself. And I really do believe this woman was very disturbed. She certainly needed help. Somebody should have done something. But...
GRACE: Well, I think somebody did, Caryn, because...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: Caryn, I think the husband tried to.
STARK: Yes, Nancy?
GRACE: You know, he`s stationed over in Qatar, working, and he finally wrote her family behind her back, which infuriated her, saying, She`s sleeping in bed until 5:00 or 6:00 o`clock every day. She refuses to give the children anything to eat. She won`t cook for them. She`s driving drunk. She`s getting high on Oxycontin. Guys, help me out. Go check on her.
But bottom line, choosing to get high on booze and Oxycontin and drive your children around is not a defense.
Caryn, take a listen to her caught on tape.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What happened with Beau? How did that all happened?
SCHENECKER: He`s talking what Calyx does.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, so he`s starting to act up and talk back, too?
SCHENECKER: (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
SCHENECKER: (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
SCHENECKER: (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) him or her?
SCHENECKER: Both of them.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where was he at when he -- when...
SCHENECKER: In the car. I shot him in the car. I wasn`t expecting to get him in the car.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
SCHENECKER: (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Beau was smarting off to you?
SCHENECKER: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And then where did -- did you shoot Beau?
SCHENECKER: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: With that .38?
SCHENECKER: In the side of the head.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
SCHENECKER: And then I did his mouth, too.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, you shot him twice in the head?
SCHENECKER: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
SCHENECKER: Because they`re too sassy.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
GRACE: Everybody, you can go to our Web site, where we have all the evidence on the Julie Schenecker crime, crime scene photos, testimony from Schenecker. It`s all at HLNTV.com/nancy.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: Welcome back, everybody. We are live at the Tampa courthouse bringing you the latest in the trial of, literally, a soccer mom. There she is, a gorgeous woman, two beautiful children, a husband that loved her, apparently, climbing his way up the ladder in the U.S. military, both of her children found dead at her home, both shot dead in the mouth, mouth area.
Schenecker came under target by police, found in the back yard, lounging by the pool in her housecoat, covered in blood, reading a magazine article about how to be happy.
In the last hours, caught on tape, Schenecker giving her side of the story to police just after the children found dead. Take a listen.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What do you think about what happened?
SCHENECKER: I think I feel horrible.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
SCHENECKER: I just feel horrible. But I`ve been thinking about doing this for a long time.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Have you told your psychiatrist that?
SCHENECKER: No. He said...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He said what?
SCHENECKER: You better make it on the first try.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Make what on the first try?
SCHENECKER: A successful shot.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your doctor told you that?
SCHENECKER: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And was he talking about suicide or was he talking about...
SCHENECKER: Suicide.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
SCHENECKER: Because I kept talking about it.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
GRACE: That is Julie Schenecker saying she knew she had to make it on the first shot.
Also joining us tonight, from New York, Dr. Panchali Dar, physician. Dr. Dar, thank you for being with us. Question. When Julie Schenecker was taken out of her home the day that she killed her children, she was shaking, visibly shaking. Could that be because of voluntary intoxication and use of those pills? There were 500 pills in her home, including Oxycontin.
DR. PANCHALI DAR, PHYSICIAN: Well, I think that she is heavily medicated. She`s heavily medicated now in court, also, if you look at her. The alcohol -- she could have been in alcohol withdrawal, Oxycontin withdrawal. It looks like that would cause tremors. Some of the antidepressants that she was on, like Effexor, circuit court of appeals (ph), they can cause tremors, too.
GRACE: When we come back, did the owner of the LA Clippers, Donald Sterling`s, mistress try to extort millions from him with threats that she plans to release even more of his sick race rants?
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
V. STIVIANO, GIRLFRIEND: People call you and tell you that I have black people on my Instagram, and it bothers you?
DONALD STERLING, LA CLIPPERS OWNER: Yes, it bothers me a lot if you want to broadcast that you`re associating with black people. Do you have to?
STIVIANO: You associate with black people.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
GRACE: Then later, a fistfight breaks out fast and furious between two man-sized high schoolers much bigger than their teacher. She tries to break them up with a kitchen broom, then she gets fired!
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: Did the L.A. Clippers` owner, Donald Sterling`s mistress, try to extort millions from him with threats she plans to release even more of his sick race rants?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD STERLING: Come to my games, don`t bring black people or don`t come.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is V. Stiviano trying to blackmail billionaire Donald Sterling?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Whether in fact those tapes were recorded with (inaudible) consent--
V. STIVIANO: Part of the audio which the world heard was only 15 minutes. There`s a number of other hours that the world doesn`t know.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: That is from Dead Spin and ABC`s 20/20. Tonight, reports emerging that Donald Sterling`s mistress, V. Stiviano, has actually tried to extort millions of dollars from him, with threats she`ll release even more of his sick race rants. Not only that, is he just biding his time, like the fox circling the henhouse? Think about it, tax implications. If he`s forced by the NBA to sell the Clippers, will he have a loss of what, $300, $400 million? That is a huge tax plus. Is he protesting a little too much? Can he make a killing off his sick race rants? To Chris Dimino, sports radio talk show host. What about it, Chris? What about these claims that there she is, the alleged mistress, who says we`re just friends, but he spent $2 million on her, that we know of. That`s some friend. What about these claims she`s extorting millions with the threat she`s going to release more of his sick race rants?
CHRIS DIMINO, SPORTS RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: Let`s all be honest. The minute we heard the beginning of this, we said if there`s $2 million, how much more might there be? We didn`t know enough about her past to sort of lay that at her feet publicly, but people thought it, and they said what is the advantage to actually having a recorder around Donald Sterling? Would it be somewhere down the road being able to turn that into dollars, big piles of dollars? Donald Sterling, according to some reports, said to DuJour magazine, I wish I`d just paid her off. There`s certainly an indication there that it was at least asked for. Something was asked for, and now the idea that she`s (inaudible) initiated a phone call saying I will trade you these tapes for that amount of money. Of course it`s going to get looked into it. It didn`t take much to figure out -- to connect the dots, now there is a paper trail that you can actually say this is what it is and put a charge attached to it.
GRACE: OK. This leaves the question, are there more sick race rants from the owner of the L.A. Clippers? Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STERLING: It`s the world. You go to Israel, the blacks are just treated like dogs.
STIVIANO: Do you have to treat them like that, too?
STERLING: There`s white Jews and black Jews, do you understand?
STIVIANO: Are the black Jews less than the white Jews?
STERLING: 100, 50, 100 percent.
STIVIANO: And is that right?
STERLING: It isn`t a question. We don`t evaluate what`s right and wrong, we live in a society, we live in a culture. We have to live within that culture.
If you don`t feel it, don`t come to my games. Don`t bring black people and don`t come.
STIVIANO: Do you know that you have a whole team that`s black that plays for you?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: That is Donald Sterling recorded secretly. That`s from Deadspin. Pat Lalama, correspondent, Investigation Discovery. What about reports this whole thing has been her and she`s now extorting millions from Sterling in exchange for not releasing even more of these rants?
LALAMA: The impression we were given initially, Nancy, was that he called her up and said, what can I do to make this go away? Now we`re hearing that she actually made the phone call, initiated the talks with him. If that`s the case, that could be extortion. I was on the phone with the district attorney`s office today. The information with them is hermetically sealed. They will not confirm or deny. However, I did speak to V. Stiviano`s attorney. He says she, meaning Stiviano, has not been contacted by anyone from the district attorney`s office at this point. But I`m going to guess they`re probably looking into it.
GRACE: David, of course she hasn`t, because if she`s a target of an extortion investigation, they`re not going to call her. That would be unconstitutional. If she`s already been named a target or a person of interest, they can`t talk to her without a lawyer.
BENOWITZ: That`s absolutely right. She has lawyered up at this point, and there`s no -- the district attorney`s office, and no law enforcement agent can come and talk to her at this point. She`s absolutely protected.
GRACE: Justin Freiman on the story. What about if he is forced under the law, say the NBA forces him to sell the Clippers, forces him out of the stadium, what then? How will that affect him monetarily?
FREIMAN: It could actually help him. He could actually not have to pay taxes on all this money that he can make. Because in California, there are tax laws that say if your property is stolen or appropriated by the government or otherwise involuntarily converted, you don`t pay taxes.
GRACE: OK. Guys, how much will Donald Sterling pay to keep more of this from going public? Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STIVIANO: People call you and tell you that I have black people on my Instagram and it bothers you?
STERLING: Yes, it bothers me a lot if you want to broadcast that you`re associating with black people. Do you have to?
STIVIANO: You associate with black people.
STERLING: I`m not you and you`re not me. You`re supposed to be a delicate white or a delicate Latina girl.
STIVIANO: I`m a mixed girl. And you`re in love with me. And I`m black and Mexican, whether you like it or not.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: So much for them just being friends.
When we get back, a dad handcuffed and arrested at a school board meeting for speaking out when his 14-year-old girl is forced to read a sexually explicit book, "19 Minutes." What I don`t understand is why he`s the one in handcuffs and not the teacher?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A dad of a 14-year-old freshman upset after his daughter is assigned to read what he deems a sexually explicit book.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What are you charging me with?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Arrest for disorderly conduct.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: And later, a fistfight breaks out fast and furious between two man-sized high school students, much bigger than their teacher. When she tries to break it up with a kitchen broom, she is the one who gets fired.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: Live, suburban New Hampshire. A dad handcuffed and arrested at a school board meeting for speaking out when his 14-year-old girl is forced to read a sexually explicit book, "19 Minutes," a book that details rough sex amongst teens and other graphic sex acts. Now I see why daddy`s angry. What I don`t understand is why is he the one in handcuffs and not the teacher?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is ridiculous.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A dad of a 14-year-old freshman reportedly upset after his daughter is assigned to read what he deems a sexually explicit book. He tries to speak again, he`s arrested and it`s all caught on tape.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Okay. This is very disturbing for a father to be arrested in a school board meeting for speaking out when his daughter is assigned to read a book. You know what? I really can`t even read it all. Relax, Matt, murmured, sinking his teeth into her shoulder, pinning her hands over her head, grinding his hips against hers. She could feel [ bleep ] -- excuse me. (bleep) against her stomach -- this is for a 14-year-old girl. Take a look at what happened in the school board meeting when he dared to speak out.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you won`t move back --
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Disorderly conduct?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My arm is messed up. My arm is messed up.
So disorderly conduct?
I`m not resisting. My arm is messed up. You want to see the medical records? I have a pinched nerve in my neck. (inaudible).
I guess I`m not used to walking with my hands cuffed behind my back and being dragged, okay?
What are you so nervous about?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Violated the two-minute rule.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I guess you`ll have to arrest me.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Does somebody in the back --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is ridiculous.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Okay, Liz, I also want to go to the sound where the father is arguing or trying to at least state his case about what is wrong with a 14- year-old girl reading this book, assigned to her by the teacher. What happened "To Kill a Mocking Bird," what happened to "Tale of Two Cities," what happened to "Ann Frank`s Diary?" Clark Goldband, what do you know?
GOLDBAND: It seemed the problem the parents had is not that this book was being read at the school necessarily, but they were not notified until a week after it had been handed out. According to reports. There appears to be a two-minute rule at the school board meeting. I`ve watched this meeting multiple times, watched the footage, and this man speaks for his two minutes. He asked them some questions. They responded -- no, no, this is not a question and answer session. You got two minutes and you`re done. He sits down, a few other parents start to speak. When he chimes in, that`s when the school board becomes upset, law enforcement is called, and what you see on your screen is the end result.
GRACE: Dan O`Donnell, anchor at WISN, what`s going on? When is it impermissible for a father to stand up and not -- and complain about what his children are assigned to read? Dan?
O`DONNELL: That`s the question that he`s asking. He`s an attorney and he`s arguing that his First Amendment rights have been violated here because he spoke for what, two minutes and ten seconds? Two minutes and 20 seconds?
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: Why did they have to arrest him? And look at what he is complaining about. Everybody, the book refers to his [ bleep ] hot against her stomach. A pool of [ bleep ] pooling between her. She clawed at Matt`s back to bring him closer. I mean, look at what the girl is asked, ordered to read by the family. It`s incredible.
What I don`t understand is why he had to be handcuffed and arrested at a school board meeting. Caryn Stark, psychologist, I don`t think this is appropriate for a 14-year-old girl to read.
STARK: Well, Nancy, I don`t know that that`s true. I can`t say that I would agree with you, because of the Internet, because of what teenagers are exposed to now. However, I do feel that --
GRACE: Can I ask you a question, Caryn Stark?
STARK: -- the parents should have the right to make that decision.
GRACE: What is wrong with "Ann Frank`s Diary?" What`s wrong with "Tale of Two Cities?" What`s wrong with Shakespeare? What`s wrong with "Hamlet?" Why does she have to read about somebody`s [ bleep ] hot against her stomach and [ bleep ] pooling beneath her. Why does she have to read about rough sex? With all the things there are to read in the world, why are they forcing this on her?
STARK: That I don`t know because I`m not sure why the teacher chose it.
GRACE: You just said it was appropriate. Out of all the things in the world she could read, a 14-year-old girl, the whole class, why do they have to read that? You said it was okay.
(CROSSTALK)
STARK: -- there was something in that book that the teacher thought was worthwhile. However, the parents really should have been notified so they could make their own decision about what they want their children exposed to.
GRACE: So Clark, what`s going to happen?
GOLDBAND: That`s the question, Nancy. He is facing a charge, the charge is disorderly conduct, and the fine is $1,200. Now, we know from this dad that he was taken to jail. He was booked, had a mugshot taken. Said he had the bail bondsman come down. Was released on a $700 recognizance bond.
GRACE: Clark, you`re a new father and I can tell you since you didn`t ask, let me give you some advice. Go to the book fairs at school and read the books. How do we know what they`re going to give our children to read? I don`t blame the dad. I think it`s the teacher that needs to be hauled off in handcuffs.
Everybody, when we come back, a fistfight breaks out fast and furious between two man-sized high school students, much bigger than the teacher. When she tries to break the fight up with a kitchen broom, she`s the one that gets fired?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Teacher smacks one of the students on the back with a broom handle, desperately trying to stop the fight.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now she ain`t got no job.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: To the heartland. Reading, writing and beating? A fistfight breaks out fast and furious between two man-sized high school students, much bigger than their teacher. When she tries to break up the fight with a kitchen broom, she`s the one that gets fired?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This vicious fight went down inside a Pershing (ph) high school classroom. Teacher smacks one of the students on the back with a broom handle, desperately trying to stop the fight.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now she ain`t got no job, and she was a good teacher. She was a good, excellent teacher.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My daughter is very distraught about this whole situation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Straight out to Vickie Thomas, city beat reporter with WWJ CBS. Vickie, why is the teacher -- I mean, look at this. The teacher can`t -- these guys are bigger than her, so she uses the kitchen broom instead of getting into the middle of it, or it gets worse and somebody getting killed. So she gets fired?
THOMAS: She gets fired. And I think there`s a firestorm of controversy, too, Nancy, over this video that captures everything vividly. I mean, it`s total chaos in the classroom, as you mentioned. These guys are ninth graders, but they`re pretty big boys, you know, and they get into this all-out brawl and they hit the floor hard. They knock over chairs. They knock over desks. You can hear the classmates screaming in the background. Some are using profanity. It is definitely chaos in the classroom, and all of a sudden you see this little lady, 5`2, step in and try to break up this fight, even as some of the kids in the classroom were trying to egg these guys on to continue fighting. And you can clearly hear in the audio the teacher -- they are pretty hard smacks because you can hear them loud. About five smacks on the back of one of the students with the broom handle. And these guys, they break it up for a hot second, and then one of them charges the other one again. And she gets caught in the middle, and eventually somebody steps in to break it up, but it was definitely chaos in the classroom. She`s getting a lot of support too, Nancy, I can tell you from members here in the Detroit community.
GRACE: Vicky Thomas joining me from WWJ CBS. You are seeing video from Youtube. Here`s the deal. They put her in the position of what? They wanted her to just stand back and make her basically ineffective in front of the students? They want the teacher just to sit back and let this fight go down? No way.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Fired for violating the Education Achievement Association`s policy about striking a student. It looks like one student is going to inflict serious damage on the other, and her instincts were to protect the kids. Not hurt them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Okay. Why did she get fired when she breaks this fight up with a broom stick? Clark Goldband, what was she supposed to do, sit back and wash her hands of the whole thing and let them kill each other?
GOLDBAND: Not quite, Nancy. According to reports, they say she`s supposed to use her school-issued walkie-talkie, but according to reports, one problem with that -- the walkie-talkie was broken. But guys, take a look at this video behind me. I really want you to see this here. This is not just two kids fighting. Look at all the other kids in the background. And as these kids go flying and tumbling and tussling to the ground, it`s just a matter of time you need to believe before these other kids get hurt. The fighting continues. There you see desks are flying. Chairs are flying. And it`s a matter of time before this teacher moves in with the broom.
She does not stop the fighting. They continue fighting. After being hit with a broom. But luckily the broom apparently dazes the students enough that other kids in the class move in and separate the combatants. Each of these kids, Nancy, suspended for ten days.
GRACE: Well, you know, it`s amazing to me they get suspended for ten days and she gets fired.
Okay. Everybody, let`s stop. On a happy note. Here`s a Youtube video I found of Marines singing "Let It Go" from Disney`s "Frozen." The Marines cheering, singing along with Queen Elsa. This made me and my little Lucy so happy, and my 6-year-old son flipped when he saw Marines singing "Frozen." Or now maybe he won`t flip out anymore when Lucy and I break out with "Let it Go" in the minivan. You know, we love our U.S. military. And I am so happy to see them chilling out singing "Frozen." Incredible.
To all of you mothers out there celebrating Mother`s Day, go to nancygrace.com. We have a contest running to win a set of our handcuff necklaces and our new handcuff bracelets. Other Mother`s Day surprises. All the proceeds go to a home for abused children. Log on to nancygrace.com. Everybody, Drew up next. I`ll see you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern, and until then, good night, friend.
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