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Starting Point with Soledad O'Brien
No Final Resting Place For Tsarnaev; Assigning Blame Over Benghazi; Obama To Grads: "Do Better, Be Better"; Handgun Training In Church; Huge NASCAR Crash, Close Finish; Sanford Seeking Congressional Seat; Cocaine Bundles Wash Up On Florida Shore; "Iron Man 3" Is Box Office Gold
Aired May 06, 2013 - 07:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: -- dying in a confrontation with police, Boston bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev still hasn't been buried and there may not be a cemetery in Massachusetts willing to give him a final resting place. Tsarnaev's uncle says he should be buried in Cambridge, but the town won't even consider it.
Susan Candiotti live for us this morning from Boston. Good morning, Susan.
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi. This controversy just won't end. As you said the funeral home director cannot find a cemetery anywhere in the area that will provide a burial plot for the suspected bomber in this place -- in this case. Now not everyone feels the same way.
Nevertheless, no cemetery has come forward and so that is the key problem. In fact, the city of Cambridge, where the suspected bomber used to live, issued a statement on Sunday saying, it doesn't want to get involved at all and it reads in part this way.
Quote, "The difficult and stressful efforts of the citizens of the city of Cambridge to return to a peaceful life would be adversely impacted by the turmoil, protest, and widespread media presence at such an interment.
Now, the uncle of Tamerlan Tsarnaev says after all because Tsarnaev lived in Cambridge with his wife and child, and he lived here for almost 10 years in the area, he should be allowed to be buried here.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUSLAN TSARNI, UNCLE OF TAMERLAN TSARNAEV: I'm left alone to deal with this matter. And I also stress that Tamerlan Tsarnaev has no other place to be buried. There's no other place who would accept his body. And reasoning to it would be that he lived in America, he grew up here, and last 10 years, he resided here in Cambridge.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CANDIOTTI: Now the funeral home director says he plans to reach out to the governor of this state today to see whether somehow the state could get involved. We'll see -- Zoraida, Christine. ZORAIDA SAMBOLIN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, Susan Candiotti reporting live for us, thank you. In a moment, we'll talk with Worster funeral director who is in possession of Tamerlan Tsarnaev's body and ask about all the problems that he is now facing.
ROMANS: All right, today, we should learn more about the plan to help victims of the marathon bombing. The attorney in charge of the $28 million "One Fund" expected to talk about how that money will be distributed. Families of those who died in the blast could receive more than $1 million. Those who lost limbs are expected to get the same amount. The public is also being asked for feedback on that plan.
SAMBOLIN: There's no official word on what caused the deadly limousine fire over the weekend, but California Highway authorities say it may have started underneath that vehicle perhaps even in the trunk. New video if you're looking at there shows the limo engulfed. Five women died in the fire.
Four others and the driver did manage to escape. And reports say the women were all nurses, they were headed to a bachelorette party and they were just minutes away from their destination when the limo burst into flames. The bride-to-be was one of the five who died and the groom was said to be waiting at the hotel for that party to arrive.
ROMANS: Dive teams searching two four feet reservoirs in Calaveras County, California, near the home of 8-year-old Leila Fowler. She was stabbed to death just over a week ago in her home. Police investigators are also canvassing neighborhoods, knocking on doors, looking for potential witnesses.
SAMBOLIN: And where to place the blame over Benghazi? Greg Hicks, the former deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli, Libya told congressional investigators that the State Department's internal review of Benghazi let people off the hook. He also says he knew from the get-go that the attack was terrorists. He will testify Wednesday in a congressional hearing on the attack, which killed Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens and three other Americans as well.
And President Obama sending Ohio State grads off into the real world with a dare to do better, and be better. He also talked about citizenship in his commencement speech yesterday.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: We've seen courage and compassion, a sense of civic duty and a recognition we are not a collection of strangers, we are bound to one another by a set of ideals and laws and commitments, and a deep devotion to this country that we love. And that's what citizenship is.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SAMBOLIN: You know there was a call to action. He told the grads to tackle issues like gun violence, education, and the environment. ROMANS: A wet weekend means watchful eyes in the southeast. Emergency officials keeping close tabs on rivers and creeks that could come out of their banks, some of the most widespread flooding is along Black Creek near Jacksonville, Florida. It may not be over yet for that region.
Let's check in with Jennifer Delgado in the CNN Weather Center. Good Monday morning to you, Jennifer.
JENNIFER DELGADO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Good morning, Christine. Yes, Florida took a beating with the heavy rainfall over the weekend, as well, and some of these locations across parts of the Tennessee Valley and the southeast picked up four to five inches of rainfall.
You can see on here areas like Tennessee, especially through central parts kicked off some rainfall. Now as we show you on our graphic we still do have a lot of flood warnings and watches in place. A lot of these are going to last through the day. Take a little while to get some of these river levels to come back down, but still more rain is happening right now.
You can see right along the border of Georgia, Alabama, moving through the Ohio Valley and that's where the rain is going to be, basically going to be just into the southern parts of Pennsylvania, all the way down towards the southeast. Some of these locations could still pick up two or more inches of rainfall right along the Appalachian Mountains in Virginia, as well as into West Virginia.
Those are going to be our big problem spots today on a wider view overall out towards the west, picking up some much-needed showers through parts of Southern California. Of course, we all remember the wildfires that happened over the weekend. I think we have some video.
We do know that the fires have now been 60 percent contained. And that's good news now that we have that onshore flow and that's going to continue as we go through the next couple days so some positives out there. Christine, back over to you.
ROMANS: All right, Jennifer Delgado for us. Thank you, Jennifer.
SAMBOLIN: Well, very different kind of sermon this weekend at a church in North Texas. A teacher leading the congregation in a concealed handgun class, and the free training drew plenty of takers.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's a lot of crazy stuff going on in the world.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: School shootings, and movie theatre shootings, you just never know what's going to happen.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to be able to protect myself and protect my friends and family.
(END VIDEO CLIP) SAMBOLIN: Well, that class was offered to anyone who met state eligibility requirements.
ROMANS: Would you pay to watch videos on YouTube? The Google's own web site reportedly thinking about charging you. The financial "times" reports it will apply to as 50 of YouTube's very most popular channels. The report says viewers will be able to subscribe to each channel for around $1.99 a month to reach out to Google we're waiting for a response.
SAMBOLIN: So from the tanning booths to the recording booth, tanning mom, Patricia Krentcil is trying to spend her moment in the sun --
ROMANS: It's hard to see, isn't it?
SAMBOLIN: To extend her moment in the sun, so to speak, by releasing a rap single, a clip of the song called "It's Tan Mom." It's on TMZ. Listen.
ROMANS: Did you hear the Jersey accent in the way.
SAMBOLIN: That song is available for your listening pleasure on iTunes.
ROMANS: When you run and you are going to put that on your mix?
SAMBOLIN: Absolutely. Ahead on STARTING POINT, a last lap victory at Talladega almost overshadowed. Did you look? My goodness, it's a crash on the track is huge. Details next in our "Bleacher Report."
ROMANS: And a blow how "Iron Man" is barrelling into the record books coming up. You're watching STARTING POINT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROMANS: Big crash and an exciting finish at the NASCAR race in Talladega this weekend.
SAMBOLIN: Andy Scholes is here with this morning's "Bleacher Report." Good morning.
ANDY SCHOLES, "BLEACHER REPORT": Good morning, guys. The super speedway at Talladega is known for its multi-car crashes and yesterday's race did not disappoint. After an over 3-1/2 hour rain delay, HLN's own Robin Meade was on hand, she kicks things off singing the national anthem.
We saw a couple crashes in the race, a big one coming with just six laps to go here. Kurt Busch gets hit. He barrel rolls, ends up on top of Ryan Newman's car. Luckily everyone would be OK. After the restart David Ragan passes Carl Everett to take the checkered flag for his first win of the season.
On Saturday Orb galloped its way through muddy Churchill Downs to win the 139th running of the Kentucky Derby. Up next for Orb is the Preakness Stakes on May 18th, that's the second leg of the Triple Crown. Next hour, Orb's trainer, Shug McGaughey, he will join STARTING POINT to talk about the derby win and Orb's quest to become the first Triple Crown winner since affirmed back in 1978.
The second round of the NBA playoffs kicking off yesterday in the east, the Knicks were looking to build on their first round win over the Celtics, but the Pacers, they had other ideas. Behind a balanced attack, Indiana built a commanding second half lead and held on to beat New York 102-95.
Interesting fact here, the Knicks have never won a playoff series after losing game one at home. Well, in the west, the top-seeded Thunder was in trouble late in game one of their series against the Grizzlies. Here comes Kevin Durant to the rescue. K.D. knocking down the clutch jump shot here with 11 seconds to go. Thunder gone to win the game 93-91.
Sunday Lebron James was named the league's MVP making him the youngest player to win the award four times. Lebron was nearly the first unanimous MVP selection, but Gary Washburn from the "Boston Globe" voted for Carmelo Anthony. That's definitely a head scratcher there. But Lebron isn't too worried about the voting process or winning individual awards.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LEBRON JAMES, 2013 NBA MVP: This really doesn't mean much to me. I'm humbled, and I'm happy about it, but I wish there were 15 of these up here, because I'm with a great group of guys that allow me to be the MVP, each and every night.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCHOLES: All right, well may the force be with you. The Toledo Mud Hens getting in the spirit of the May 4th "Star Wars" holiday this weekend. Players wore Chewbacca-like jerseys and Chewbacca himself making his way onto the field before the game. There's Darth Vader with the light saber around.
Fans came dressed in their favorites as well, definitely a fun day at the ball park for everyone celebrating the whole star wars saga. The force apparently not too strong with the mud hens this weekend, they unfortunately lost both of their games, but still a lot of fun out there, everyone supporting their favorite star wars characters.
ROMANS: It's awesome.
SAMBOLIN: You know, while you were talking about them. I was looking up game one today for the Miami Heat and the Chicago Bulls.
SCHOLES: Yes, Zoraida.
SAMBOLIN: Do you think the Bulls have any chance?
SCHOLES: Well, you know, they've got a lot of injured players, and who knows, they played inspired against the Nets in game seven. Maybe we'll see that tonight, who knows? Fingers crossed maybe Derek Rose will end up playing sometime.
SAMBOLIN: Gosh, wouldn't that be great? All right, thank you very much. Wasn't it the Bulls who stopped the Miami Heat streak earlier?
SAMBOLIN: Yes, it was. Anything is possible. Ahead on STARTING POINT, "Iron Man" blasts into the record books in its opening weekend. What makes the franchise so successful where others have failed? That's next. You're watching STARTING POINT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SAMBOLIN: Welcome back to STARTING POINT. Former South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford finds out tomorrow just how forgiving voters in his state are as he tries to resurrect his career in a special congressional runoff election. The latest polls show Sanford and Democrat Elizabeth Colbert-Busch in a virtual dead heat. Sanford left office in disgrace after admitting he lied about an extramarital affair in 2009.
ROMANS: Authorities in Florida trying to determine where the cocaine that washed up on its beaches actually came from. The St. John's County Sheriff's Office says at least four bundled packages of cocaine came ashore last Friday between Pont Verde Beach and Crescent Beach. Officials aren't saying much about the discovery except that it's a significant amount of drugs.
SAMBOLIN: That's a head scratcher. And the "Rolling Stones" back on the road banging out one classic song after another on their 50th anniversary tour. They kicked it off Friday in Los Angeles. Gwen Stefani, Keith Urban and former Stone Nick Taylor, all make appearances with the band on stage. Let's listen a little. They're still sounding good, aren't they? By the way, Mick Jagger turns 70 this summer.
ROMANS: And the tickets were really expensive, so I mean they liked it, so they're going right to the bank. There are some people complaining that it was just too expensive. The tickets were just too expensive. For 15 bucks you could see this "Iron Man" indestructible at the Box Office. The third film in the marvel movie franchise has opening worthy of a superhero, raking in more than $175 million.
SAMBOLIN: And that is the second best opening weekend ever. CNN's Nischelle Turner live in Los Angeles to tell us all about it. You saw it so do tell.
NISCHELLE TURNER, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT: You know, it was by far the biggest opening movie this weekend taking in the $175, and I want to get this correct, $0.3 million, all together. That does put it in number two on the list of biggest openings ever in North America.
Second, only to another movie that's full superheroes, that was the "Avengers" last year. Now internationally "Iron Man 3" proved unstoppable as well. Worldwide the movie has not made $680 million not too bad for a trequel, in fact, Robert Down Jr. Is threatening to take over Will Smith's crown as the undisputed king of summers movies. Check out the performance of Downy's most recent summer films. Listen to this. Last year, "The Avengers," boom, $1.5 billion. The year before that, "Sherlock Holmes, Game of Shadows," $545 million. In 2010, iron man 2 made $585 million. Before that, Sherlock Holmes the first one $524 million.
And the original "Iron Man" back in 2008, that took home more than $623 million. So Mr. Downey Jr. has established himself as an iron clad box office draw and considering how much money "Iron Man" is making. Well, his salary looks like a pretty investment. So are you guys wondering how much he got paid for "Iron Man 3" so? Take a guess.
ROMANS: It's $15 million.
TURNER: What did you say?
ROMANS: It's $15 million.
TURNER: That's pocket change. Go up a little bit.
SAMBOLIN: It $30 million, $40 million, seriously, Michelle?
TURNER: He told "GQ" magazine that he will pull in $50 million for this movie.
ROMANS: Wait, do they have like write riders that if hit certain numbers they get bonuses they get bonuses or something? If this movie does really well --
SAMBOLIN: I suspect yes.
TURNER: Sometimes yes. Sometimes what actors will do, we saw this one of the first to do this was Eddie Murphy during Shrek, they will take money off the back he said on the more money the movie makes, the more money they will make. So that's an interesting way to do things sometimes. That's so much money I need to say it like this, fifty -- you know, that so much million dollars.
SAMBOLIN: What competition will they face next week?
TURNER: You know, the big opening next weekend is the "Great Gatsby." But I will have to say even though this movie has gotten promotion like no other. It is a totally different market that they will go for. So we'll have to see how it does up against iron man. I tend to think iron man 3 will still be the winner.
SAMBOLIN: I'm going to go with you. Nischelle Turner live in Los Angeles. Thanks for getting up early for us. We appreciate it.
TURNER: Absolutely, anytime.
SAMBOLIN: I'm going to try to read Great Gatsby again before I see the movie. There is so much going on. Ahead on STARTING POINT, could Orb be the next horse to win the Triple Crown? We'll talk to his trainer about the horse's chances. ROMANS: And then if Syria retaliates against Israel, will the U.S. be forced to take military action? We'll talk with Israel's deputy defense minister in moments.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SAMBOLIN: Good morning. Welcome back to STARTING POINT. I'm Zoraida Sambolin.
ROMANS: And I'm Christine Romans. Our STARTING POINT this morning, the family of the dead Boston bombing suspects struggling to bury his body as communities fight to keep him out. As his friend appears in court, could we be learning more?
SAMBOLIN: And it was supposed to be a night of celebration, but it ended in tragedy. Five women including the bride to be killed in a horrific limo fire. We're live with details about what went wrong.
ROMANS: And Israel accused of launching rocket attacks against Syria with Iran encouraging retaliation. Will the U.S. be forced to respond?
SAMBOLIN: And heart pounding moments at the Kentucky Derby as Orb takes the win. But can he win the Triple Crown? We'll talk with his trainer live about this victory.
ROMANS: It's Monday, May 6. STARTING POINT begins right now. There may not be a cemetery in the state of Massachusetts or the United States that is willing to be the final resting place of Tamerlan Tsarnaev. The uncle of the suspected Boston bombers wants him buried in Cambridge. He says it was Tamerlan's home. But town officials say no way.
Susan Candiotti is live from Boston this morning. Good morning to you, Susan.
CANDIOTTI: Good morning. No cemetery, no burial plot and funeral director wondering what he's supposed to do. The city of Cambridge also weighing in saying it wants no role in burying the body of a suspected bomber.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Send him back to Russia.
CANDIOTTI (voice-over): For days, protesters outside of Woster Funeral Home making it clear suspected bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev is as hated much dead as he would be alive. One side reads, bury the garbage, but not in America. His remains in limbo at a funeral home much to the chagrin of its director.
PETER STEFAN, FUNERAL DIRECTOR FOR TSARNAEV FAMILY: We have to bury this guy. Whoever he is, in this country, we bury people.
CANDIOTTI: So far not a single cemetery will take Tsarnaev's remains. His uncle from Maryland who in the days after the bombing called his two nephews losers spent Sunday at a funeral home to cleanse and shroud the body as required by Islamic faith.
TSARNI: I'm left alone to deal with this matter and I want to stress that Tamerlan Tsarnaev has no other place to be buried.
CANDIOTTI: President Kennedy's assassin Lee Harvey Oswald is buried in the Dallas area. Home grown Oklahoma City terrorist bomber Timothy McVeigh's ashes were scattered after his execution. Where remains a mystery.
