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CNN Sunday Morning

Interview With Don Clark

Aired October 13, 2002 - 07:20   ET

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


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


CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: We have a very special guest joining us today to talk more about the serial killer and the police investigation. Joining me from Houston is Don Clark. He is a former FBI investigator. He was also overseeing the antiterrorism unit up in New York City over the World Trade Center bombing. And also, Don, you were part of the investigation into -- let's see -- the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) serial killer, Rafael Resendez Ramirez (ph), right?
DON CLARK, FORMER FBI AGENT: Yes, that's right. Good morning.

LIN: Good morning. We're luck to have you this morning.

First, I want to get your reaction to what happened in Indonesia. Do you believe this is another act of terrorism, perhaps the work of al Qaeda?

CLARK: Well, I couldn't pin this to the work of al Qaeda, and I'm sure more intelligence information would come out, but clearly, just what we know of the surface, that you've got to be looking to a terrorist organization that would go to the depth of putting together these types of bombing attacks. Usually, normal criminal activity does not extend itself to bombings that are as sophisticated to be able to kill as many people as we've heard died so far in this, so I think the first leaning has to definitely be towards a terrorist group. Keep in mind, however, though, there are a number of terrorist groups out there, and they don't always -- in fact, in few cases do they work together.

LIN: Well, you know, protecting ourselves seems to be on the minds of a lot of Americans these days. I mean, you not only have U.S. military being attacked overseas; now you have tourists. You also have people in the Washington, D.C. area fearing for their lives, not even be able to go out to the gas pump without wondering whether they're going to be shot to death. What is it, if anything, that people can do in this day and time to protect themselves, Don?

CLARK: Well, I think we've got to go on with our lives and our business, and we've got to depend on our governmental structures in this country and abroad, because terrorism is just not in the United States. In fact, it's very new to the U.S. 9/11 was the first terrorist attack of that nature that we've had in the U.S., except back in February of 1993, when we had the first World Trade Center bombing. So around the world, people are going to have to go on with their lives, and governmental structures are going to have to be put in place to try to collect the intelligence, to be able to go back again to that keyword, and prevent these attacks from occurring. LIN: Massive investigation going on in the Washington, D.C. area. We are waiting for a news conference in a couple of hours, for the latest out of Montgomery County. But give me your take on the quite weekend. Does that make you nervous? It doesn't seem like the sniper strikes on Saturdays or Sundays.

CLARK: Well, let's hope not, and let's hope that the sniper doesn't strike again. But you just can't count on that. And I know the investigators are not either. They are not going to look at this as a downtime here. They are going to be with their resources out there, trying to cover every possible avenue that they can, and put the information out there. I see that they've put a composite sketch out about a possible vehicle that's out there, and I should stress that even though that sketch is out there, and I think they're going to talk a little bit more about it in the news conference coming up, that we as American citizens, in that area or anyplace, shouldn't just become so fixated on that that we don't look at everything else that's around us, because we don't really know for sure, but I suppose that this is certainly a good step in that sketch that's out there.

LIN: Right. Right. How to be a good witness? I mean, if you hear -- if you're out at a gas station or out at a school and you hear a gunshot, my attention would be drawn to the direction of the sound. I wouldn't necessarily be looking for other things. Is that a mistake, or is that what I'm supposed to do?

CLARK: Absolutely not, and that is the appropriate thing to do is to try to look at the sound. And what usually happens though, most of us in a sincere effort to help will go towards the victim, and there will be people who should and will go toward the victim, but you've got to go and look towards that sound, because that's where it came from, so that's where you're likely to see some type of activity going on that may be beneficial to the law enforcement community in trying to gather evidence to solve this type of the case.

LIN: Where is the break going to come in this case? Do you think it's going to come from eyewitnesses, or do you think it's going to come from the sniper making yet more attacks, but hopefully more mistakes?

CLARK: You know, so many of these cases are solved by a good citizen seeing something that they don't know that it's a significant detail or not, but they see something, they relate it to the activity that's going on and they report it to the police. They give a tip somewhere; they see a vehicle that's been put out there. They pass that information to the police, and that usually gives the police the heads-up on these cases. Rarely in my experience have the police been on the scene of the particular activity unless there has been previous information. So I'm going to gamble on having good citizens being able to provide that tip at the right time -- some person out jogging, some person doing something in their daily activities. They see something, they report it to the police, and it's the right signal.

LIN: Well, one piece of information that wasn't supposed to get out was about the Tarot card left behind at one of the crime scenes, in theory a message from the sniper. If he communicated once, do you think he is continuing to communicate with investigators, and we just don't know that? For example, that yellow piece of paper found at one of the shooting scenes, I think it was on Friday.

CLARK: Well, first of all, we don't know that the Tarot card that was out there is authentic from the killer. There is that possibility that that could have been placed by someone else. Maybe it wasn't, but that possibility exists, and I'm sure that law enforcement community is probably working with that.

As to whether or not that this person has communicated or attempted to communicate with law enforcement community, again, that's possible also, but in all likelihood, unless it's leaked out, they're not going to tell us whether that information has come out, because they need to keep secret information that is going to be very beneficial to their investigation. On the other hand, there is a significant amount of other information that they can pass out to all of us, because that's what is going to be beneficial in helping to bring this to a conclusion.

LIN: Well, what's really encouraging is the sheer number of witnesses that they interviewed to get the composite sketch of that truck. We didn't know before that there were so many people who saw that much detail, so that's good news indeed. Thank you very much, Don Clark.

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 October 13, 2002 - 07:20   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: We have a very special guest joining us today to talk more about the serial killer and the police investigation. Joining me from Houston is Don Clark. He is a former FBI investigator. He was also overseeing the antiterrorism unit up in New York City over the World Trade Center bombing. And also, Don, you were part of the investigation into -- let's see -- the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) serial killer, Rafael Resendez Ramirez (ph), right?
DON CLARK, FORMER FBI AGENT: Yes, that's right. Good morning.

LIN: Good morning. We're luck to have you this morning.

First, I want to get your reaction to what happened in Indonesia. Do you believe this is another act of terrorism, perhaps the work of al Qaeda?

CLARK: Well, I couldn't pin this to the work of al Qaeda, and I'm sure more intelligence information would come out, but clearly, just what we know of the surface, that you've got to be looking to a terrorist organization that would go to the depth of putting together these types of bombing attacks. Usually, normal criminal activity does not extend itself to bombings that are as sophisticated to be able to kill as many people as we've heard died so far in this, so I think the first leaning has to definitely be towards a terrorist group. Keep in mind, however, though, there are a number of terrorist groups out there, and they don't always -- in fact, in few cases do they work together.

LIN: Well, you know, protecting ourselves seems to be on the minds of a lot of Americans these days. I mean, you not only have U.S. military being attacked overseas; now you have tourists. You also have people in the Washington, D.C. area fearing for their lives, not even be able to go out to the gas pump without wondering whether they're going to be shot to death. What is it, if anything, that people can do in this day and time to protect themselves, Don?

CLARK: Well, I think we've got to go on with our lives and our business, and we've got to depend on our governmental structures in this country and abroad, because terrorism is just not in the United States. In fact, it's very new to the U.S. 9/11 was the first terrorist attack of that nature that we've had in the U.S., except back in February of 1993, when we had the first World Trade Center bombing. So around the world, people are going to have to go on with their lives, and governmental structures are going to have to be put in place to try to collect the intelligence, to be able to go back again to that keyword, and prevent these attacks from occurring. LIN: Massive investigation going on in the Washington, D.C. area. We are waiting for a news conference in a couple of hours, for the latest out of Montgomery County. But give me your take on the quite weekend. Does that make you nervous? It doesn't seem like the sniper strikes on Saturdays or Sundays.

CLARK: Well, let's hope not, and let's hope that the sniper doesn't strike again. But you just can't count on that. And I know the investigators are not either. They are not going to look at this as a downtime here. They are going to be with their resources out there, trying to cover every possible avenue that they can, and put the information out there. I see that they've put a composite sketch out about a possible vehicle that's out there, and I should stress that even though that sketch is out there, and I think they're going to talk a little bit more about it in the news conference coming up, that we as American citizens, in that area or anyplace, shouldn't just become so fixated on that that we don't look at everything else that's around us, because we don't really know for sure, but I suppose that this is certainly a good step in that sketch that's out there.

LIN: Right. Right. How to be a good witness? I mean, if you hear -- if you're out at a gas station or out at a school and you hear a gunshot, my attention would be drawn to the direction of the sound. I wouldn't necessarily be looking for other things. Is that a mistake, or is that what I'm supposed to do?

CLARK: Absolutely not, and that is the appropriate thing to do is to try to look at the sound. And what usually happens though, most of us in a sincere effort to help will go towards the victim, and there will be people who should and will go toward the victim, but you've got to go and look towards that sound, because that's where it came from, so that's where you're likely to see some type of activity going on that may be beneficial to the law enforcement community in trying to gather evidence to solve this type of the case.

LIN: Where is the break going to come in this case? Do you think it's going to come from eyewitnesses, or do you think it's going to come from the sniper making yet more attacks, but hopefully more mistakes?

CLARK: You know, so many of these cases are solved by a good citizen seeing something that they don't know that it's a significant detail or not, but they see something, they relate it to the activity that's going on and they report it to the police. They give a tip somewhere; they see a vehicle that's been put out there. They pass that information to the police, and that usually gives the police the heads-up on these cases. Rarely in my experience have the police been on the scene of the particular activity unless there has been previous information. So I'm going to gamble on having good citizens being able to provide that tip at the right time -- some person out jogging, some person doing something in their daily activities. They see something, they report it to the police, and it's the right signal.

LIN: Well, one piece of information that wasn't supposed to get out was about the Tarot card left behind at one of the crime scenes, in theory a message from the sniper. If he communicated once, do you think he is continuing to communicate with investigators, and we just don't know that? For example, that yellow piece of paper found at one of the shooting scenes, I think it was on Friday.

CLARK: Well, first of all, we don't know that the Tarot card that was out there is authentic from the killer. There is that possibility that that could have been placed by someone else. Maybe it wasn't, but that possibility exists, and I'm sure that law enforcement community is probably working with that.

As to whether or not that this person has communicated or attempted to communicate with law enforcement community, again, that's possible also, but in all likelihood, unless it's leaked out, they're not going to tell us whether that information has come out, because they need to keep secret information that is going to be very beneficial to their investigation. On the other hand, there is a significant amount of other information that they can pass out to all of us, because that's what is going to be beneficial in helping to bring this to a conclusion.

LIN: Well, what's really encouraging is the sheer number of witnesses that they interviewed to get the composite sketch of that truck. We didn't know before that there were so many people who saw that much detail, so that's good news indeed. Thank you very much, Don Clark.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com