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CNN Saturday Morning News

Cleveland Victim's Whereabouts Unbeknownst To Anyone But Police; Ammonia Leak Prompts Emergency Space Walk; Authorities Pursue Charges Against First Emergency Responder On Scene Of West, Texas Explosion; Did Russia Drop The Ball On Boston Bombing Suspects?;

Aired May 11, 2013 - 09:00   ET

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

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everyone. I'm Brianna Keilar and you're watching our special edition of CNN SATURDAY MORNING. It is 9:00 and we're coming to you live from Cleveland, Ohio, and we're so glad that you could be with us this morning.

The Cleveland man accused of holding three women captive for almost a decade is now locked in a 9 x 9 cell. Officials say a test of Ariel Castro's DNA confirms he is the father of the six-year-old girl born to kidnapping survivor Amanda Berry. Police also have boarded up Castro's home to preserve the crime scene.

Meantime, the prosecutor handling the case says he plans to charge Castro for, quote, "each and every act" of sexual violence he allegedly carried out. Castro also could face murder charges related to claims that he starved and punched Michelle Knight to induce at least five miscarriages.

And this morning while relatives of Berry and Gina DeJesus continue to celebrate their safe return, Knight's family doesn't even know where she is. The 32-year-old woman has been released from the hospital but a family spokesman says police won't tell them where she went.

Let's bring in CNN's Pam Brown. It's not that she's missing. She is safe, we understand she is comfortable but she is not in touch with her family.

PAM BROWN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right. We know that she has left the hospital. She was released yesterday and according to the stepbrother of Michelle Knight, I spoke with, the family doesn't know where she is.

Now Michelle Knight, she is 32 years old. She is an adult. She could have asked authorities not to tell her family where she is. We know that according to reports that she had a strained relationship with some of her family members and that according to her family she was angry before her disappearance about losing custody of her son.

So it's a little bit complicated here but the stepbrother I spoke with says that the mom has been actively trying to reach out to Michelle, that she went to the hospital and was denied access to Michelle. That she has been trying to reach out since her release from the hospital and the brother says the mom hopes she'll get a call from her on mother's day, tomorrow, that she misses her and loves her.

And that authorities know where she is but they're not telling the family. Again, this could be because Michelle has requested authorities not tell the family, that's a possibility. But we don't know that for sure.

KEILAR: We don't know. The other issue is that Ariel Castro is facing kidnapping charges, four counts, it appears, obviously for the three women and the six year old. But now there's this new DNA evidence. It sort of raises a legal question. Even if this is his child by rape, does he have some sort of parental rights? Is this really did he kidnap someone who is his child? It's sort of a strange question, in an unprecedented case.

BROWN: It is. It's very unusual, Brianna. I just spoke to our legal expert Paul Callan about this, and essentially there's a couple of factors at play here. We know now that Ariel Castro is the father of Amanda Berry's little girl but the little girl was allegedly conceived through rape. So that brings more complicating factors but according to this legal expert I spoke with, there's really no viability to this fourth kidnapping charge of the little girl because he is a legitimate parent but he does add that a judge could look at a statute and say Castro doesn't deserve any benefits from this, because the child was allegedly conceived through rape that he shouldn't have legitimate parental rights. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL CALLAN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: The question and it's really an astounding question when you consider it is - does a rapist have parental rights with the child who was conceived through the rape. There's been some debate about this throughout the United States. Two- thirds of American states have no laws about the issue of whether a rapist has rights when a child is born from the rape. So the question is could a judge look at this and say it's not written specifically in the statute but he shouldn't benefit from his crime, which in effect he would be by not facing the kidnapping charges.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: And Paul Callan told me he does believe that charge in particular will be dropped but he said that prosecutors have so many other charges that they're exploring in addition to what he already faces with the rape and kidnapping charges So they'll have enough to work with there and it's just too difficult to prove this charge is what he's saying.

KEILAR: Sure. It sort of shows you what an unprecedented case this is both in the facts of the case and also in what is going to happen in the sort of legal arena that will come after this.

BROWN: Right. And I think a lot of people will be looking at the case of Jaycee Dugard. She had two children and, but her, you know, her kidnaper did plead guilty to kidnapping and rape charges so I think that's something we can look at as a precedent for this. KEILAR: All right. Pam Brown here in Cleveland with me. Thank you very much. Of course that road to recovery is going to be long ,likely painful for these kidnap victims. No one knows that better than Colleen Stan. She was abducted and kept in a box for seven years. Her incredible story of survival and hope will amaze you. She will join us live next hour to share her story.

Let's head back now to Atlanta and Victor Blackwell, he is standing by with some of this morning's other top stories. Hi there, Victor.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, Brianna.

Let's take some live pictures now from the International Space Station. An emergency space walk has started and we're actually looking at mission control and these are the two men who are going out on this 168th space walk at the ISS, Chris Cassidy and Tom Marshburn, they have done each two space walks in the past so this is not the first for them.

They're going to go out and repair an ammonia leak that could cause some problems. I want to bring back John Zarrella, he's covering this from Miami. John, NASA tells us that there was a leak that was repaired back in November. Do we know if this is the same leak that's being repaired again?

JOHN ZARRELLA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They don't think so. NASA believes that this is a whole different leak in the same general area where that one took place but that this may well be and probably is a different leak in a pump box out there or right close to that pump box. So what we know right now is the astronauts are moving pretty quickly, Marshburn and Cassidy are already along the handrails making their way to the "work site" the work station where they're going to try to determine, eyeballing first exactly what the situation is there, if they can find the leak and if they do determine it's in the pump box which pumps ammonia coolant.

Ammonia coolant is used to remove heat from the International Space Station, clearly it's a critical item. They have other cooling units but they want all of them working. One of the things obviously we're not seeing pictures from inside, now right there in that picture you see there, the man in the blue shirt there, that is veteran astronaut Mike Fink. Whenever they have these space walks they call in a veteran space walking astronaut to help them through the entire process.

Fink is a veteran of nine space walks, so he's got plenty of experience. They're running through a checklist of dos and don'ts and things they don't want the astronauts to touch while they're out there, along the handrails, for instance. They're even telling them when you get to handrail 5337 there's going to be a sharp, jagged edge there. Be careful. So everything is choreographed so that nothing happens while they're out there so they can get this space walk in, hopefully isolate the problem and if it's determined that it's from that pump, they'll pull that old pump out and they'll put a replacement pump in that's being stored at the space station. We should be getting pictures back momentarily from the space station, Victor, as soon as they reestablish contact through the tracking and data relay satellite system that's up there.

Right now they're just in one of those few blackout areas and when they do come back it will be nighttime where they're flying, so we'll see the first video we should have of the astronauts will be a nighttime video of them working outside the space station.

BLACKWELL: All right, John, we'll check back with you when we get the video of Marshburn and Cassidy on the space walk. Thank you, John.

ZARRELLA: Sure.

BLACKWELL: In Newtown, Connecticut, one group has proposed tearing down the site of last year's mass shooting, in a unanimous decision the Sandy Hook Task Force says the elementary school should be demolished and another one built in its place.

The group says that this will help the community erase at least some of the emotional scars, not all, but some that are left behind after 26 children and adults were killed in December. This proposal will go to the school board and then to the voters.

While Texas authorities open a criminal investigation into last month's deadly fertilizer plant explosion in West, Texas, they're also pursuing charges against one of the first emergency responders on the scene that day. The only question is do these two things have anything to do with each other?

CNN's David Mattingly is covering the story for us in Waco. David, the man's name is Bryce Reed. Who is he?

DAVID MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Bryce Reed was one of the emergency medical responders responding to that explosion at the fertilizer plant three weeks ago, that massive explosion in west Texas, and what we're finding out is that on Friday, he was arrested and appeared in federal court facing charges now. He is accused of possessing bomb-making materials the way authorities found out about this, a resident in the area according to court documents unwittingly accepted these materials from this man. They turned those over to authorities and able to find these included a small pipe, caps, fuses, also a powder used in making pipe bombs.

So now he's charged with a federal charge with these materials and if found guilty, this is a pretty serious charge, he could be seeing up to 10 years in prison if he's found guilty, but federal prosecutors are not even speculating at this point and making it clear that they are not having any connection at this point between this charge, this man, and the explosion at that fertilizer facility. Victor?

BLACKWELL: Now, the timing would be astounding if they have nothing to do with each other but let's look at it from the other angle. Is there anything explicit that says that he indeed played a role in causing the fire or the explosion thus far? MATTINGLY: Well, we have a couple of investigations going on right now. The investigation into the fire, and now a criminal investigation that's been launched by state and county authorities. County authorities and the state are saying they have no information.

They have nothing to link this man and this device or any sort of explosive device to that fire but out of an abundance of caution, out of trying to make sure that there is public confidence in this investigation, this criminal investigation has been launched to see if there is any stone that has not been unturned, also to make sure that everyone is aware that every question has been asked, every possible person has been talked to in this criminal investigation, so that's going on.

Also fire officials in Texas are telling us this happened earlier this week, they said that they originally had planned to give an announcement yesterday about what their findings were but earlier in the week they said "We'll have to push this back a couple of weeks" saying they've only been able to rule out a couple of factors like whether any sort of natural occurrence that might have caused that explosion, what they have not been able to do is actually find the cause. Victor?

BLACKWELL: All right. David Mattingly for us this morning in Waco, Texas. David, thanks.

A question, important question, did Russia drop the ball on the Boston bombing suspect? One lawmaker says yes. More on that coming up.

Plus the suspect's body has put a rural community in Virginia on the map and people there are not thrilled about this.

Plus new live pictures coming in from the International Space Station as the two men, Chris Cassidy and Tom Marshburn, both NASA astronauts start this space walk. Live pictures right now as they begin what will be a six and a half hour journey. They're about 25 minutes in. We will continue to follow this and show you more and tell you more after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: Let's take a live look at pictures from the International Space Station. This is an emergency space walk that is under way. You are getting a point of view shot from the astronaut's cameras. They are actually trying to repair an ammonia leak that they detected. This could cause problems with the cooling and the power systems. They detected this leak on Thursday and we are going to continue to be checking in on their progress throughout this half hour.

Obviously a very delicate sort of I guess you could say a repair job that they're doing up there in space at the International Space Station. We'll be monitoring this.

Meantime at least one lawmaker says Russia dropped the ball on the Boston bombing suspect and things might have turned out differently if Moscow had shared more of its intelligence. Let's go now to CNN's Paula Newton in Boston for more details on this. Good morning, Paula.

PAULA NEWTON, CNN INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Brianna. That lawmaker is Mike Rogers. He's the chair of the house intelligence committee and he's basically saying "Look Russia had a piece of information, this was first reported by "The Wall Street Journal" that Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the older brother, did want to join an extremist group in Russia. That in fact, he had made the text messages to his mother and there had been that discussion.

The problem here though, Brianna, even American officials are saying "Look, even if we had had that kind of information to give the Russians we may not have given that information over to them just trying to protect sources." What is clear and what came out during congressional hearings this week in Washington is that there were more pieces to this puzzle that could have been put together before and what would that have changed, Brianna?

It might have meant Tamerlan Tsarnaev would have been under some kind of surveillance before the Boston bombings and that might have meant things would have turned out differently. Brianna?

KEILAR: Paula Newton for us live in Boston this morning.

As you know, for women, being pregnant can be scary enough but certainly - actually we're not going to be covering that story.

We are going back to those live pictures coming to us from outer spa space. The International Space Station where astronauts there are trying to repair and ammonia leak. You're getting a really interesting view here from a camera of one of the astronauts outside the International Space Station.

On Thursday they detected an ammonia leak. It almost kind of looked like because of the zero gravity up there, it almost kind of looked like snow was coming off of the International Space Station. So they detected that leak and now they are trying to fix this, very critical. This is an emergency space walk as they try to make sure that they can restrict that leak, fix it up, and so that it won't have any effect on their cooling systems which as you can imagine are critical up there. We are going to continue to monitor this. We'll bring you more after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLACKWELL: This weekend we celebrate Mother's Day but across the country lots of mothers to be are homeless. They're living on the streets or in shelters. San Francisco in particular is seeing some of the highest number of pregnant homeless women in its history and this week's CNN hero is helping these expectant moms break the cycle of poverty for good. Meet Martha Ryan.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Years ago my daughter and I were homeless. My main priority was to get high. Then I got pregnant again and I was like what am I doing? I need to change. MARTHA RYAN: I have never met a woman who wanted to hurt her unborn baby, but I've met a lot of women that did not know how to do the right thing. The common denominator is poverty and poverty is an accident of birth. Pregnancy is a wonderful window of opportunity. Mother can turn her life around.

My name is Martha Ryan and I help expectant mothers, many who were homeless, break the cycle of poverty for good. You can't just be saved. You have to do the work yourself. I learned very early on that prenatal care alone was not enough.

We need a place as soon as possible.

We will help you with housing as well. These women needed help with complex issues and now we serve the entire family.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you so much.

RYAN: You're so welcome.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Given opportunities. Nothing stops.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Getting over my addiction wasn't the hardest part. I love you. Getting my kids stable, finding my confidence. Smaller circles. I work here now. I am so happy to be able to relay the things I've learned to moms. This program gave me the tools and I found my self-worth.

RYAN: We are investing in people. Believe in yourself and just take one day at a time. Their ability to change their lives. Now that is inspiring.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: We need your help to find great stories like this one so go to cnnheroes.com to nominate someone you know who is making a difference and deserves to be recognized.

We're also monitoring live picture this is morning from the International Space Station. We've got helmet cams live from 240 miles above the earth. It's amazing that we can watch this live, an emergency space walk is happening right now to fix an ammonia leak that could cause some problems with the cooling and power systems there. Stay with us. We'll have more right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: Checking top stories.

The man accused of holding three women captive for almost a decade is now locked in a 9'x 9' split cell. Officials say tests of Ariel Castro's DNA confirm he is the father of a six-year-old girl born to kidnapping survivor, Amanda Berry. Meanwhile, the lead prosecutor says he may charge Castro with murder related to claims that he starved and punched Michelle Knight to induce at least five miscarriages. And this morning, while relatives of Berry and Gina DeJesus continue to celebrate their safe return, Knight's family doesn't know where she is. The 32-year-old woman has been released from the hospital but a family spokesman says police won't tell them where she went.

Next hour you will be hearing more from this man, Charles Ramsey, hero, from the Cleveland kidnappings and now an internet sensation. He is in Washington today talking about the rescue.

And in west Texas, one of the emergency responders on the scene of that horrific fertilizer plant explosion has been arrested. Police say Bryce Reed had all the parts needed to build a pipe bomb. Texas officials have opened up a criminal investigation into the fire and blast that killed 14 people. Despite the timing, agents have not suggested that Reed played a role in that disaster.

And let's take a live look now. These are pictures coming to us from the International Space Station. This is where an emergency space walk is under way. Astronauts trying to repair an ammonia leak that could cause problems with cooling and power systems. The leak was discovered on Thursday.

NASA astronauts Chris Cassidy and Tom Marshburn are the guys making the repairs and we will be keeping an eye on this with CNN's John Zarrella. He's covering this from Miami, and I know John looks at this and he sees some things that I don't necessarily see. What are they doing, John?

ZARRELLA: Brianna, what they're doing now is they're preparing to remove that pump that they think is where the ammonia leak and that's a cooling substance that they use to remove heat literally from the instruments and systems on the International Space Station and 48 hours ago they noticed white flakes coming out of the station in this area, so they decided to go in and take a look.

Now right there you're looking at that I believe yes, Chris Cassidy's helmet cam, on the bottom right you may be able to make out the number 20. That's an indication that it's Chris Cassidy's camera we're looking at, as he's doing some prep work and the helmet cam 18, if you see that one, that's Tom Marshburn's camera, and he literally had a camera in his hand a little bit ago; they're going to start taking some images and pictures around that area to send down to Mission Control so they can get an idea of what may or may not be happening.

But Cassidy already reported at one point that he doesn't see anything, they don't see any flakes out there, Brianna, those white flakes again, so this may be a little more difficult than they had anticipated, finding this leak.

KEILAR: John Zarrella, thank you so much for that as we keep an eye on this emergency space walk.

And thank you to all of you for watching this morning. I'll see you back here in 30 minutes. But first, Christine Romans welcomes Christiane Amanpour for a special edition of "YOUR MONEY" that starts right now.