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CNN NEWSROOM

Unarmed Man Shot In Driveway; Impact of Social Media

Aired July 31, 2013 - 15:00   ET

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


(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Deputies shoot an unarmed man in his own driveway, mistaking him for a car thief. Police say that's not the whole story. I'm Brooke Baldwin. The news is now.

The government says its snooping helped stop dozens of terror attacks. Well, one senator who seen the classified details says that's not the case.

Plus, a radio host live-tweets his mom's dying moment. You will hear what he wishes he would have done in life.

And sleeping on the job, stealing luggage, reports of bad behavior from some of the folks who pat you down.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: Good to see you on this Wednesday. I'm Brooke Baldwin. Here we go. Hour two.

We begin with the story out of Pensacola, Florida. Take you back to Saturday right around 2:30 in the morning and a 60-year-old man is returning home. What is he doing? He is searching for cigarettes, according to him, inside his car just as deputies pull up to the driveway.

They ask him to get out, put his hands up. Roy Middleton says that's exactly what he did. But the sheriff tells a different story. In the end, 15 shots, you see some of them, were fired. Two of those rounds hit Middleton in his leg.

And Roy Middleton is actually on the phone with me from his hospital bed.

Roy, you with me?

ROY MIDDLETON, SHOOTING VICTIM: Yes, I am.

BALDWIN: All right, sir. Do me a favor and just stand by about for 60 seconds here.

I want to get to Nick Valencia to tell the sheriff deputy's side of the story. Right?

We know these two deputies who appeared, they're both on paid administrative leave. What's their side of the story?

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Bottom line is Roy Middleton was mistaken for being a car thief. Around 2:30 in the morning he's coming home. He's looking for a cigarette to get out of his car when he says he thinks somebody's playing a joke on him. He heard someone yell at him to get his hands up where he could see them.

At that point, he thought someone was playing a prank whether it's his neighbor or someone else. He says though he did comply. Turns out it was sheriff's deputies, that he did comply. The sheriff's deputies, they tell a slightly different side of the story. They say he did not comply, he was not listening to them. As a matter of fact, they say he lunged at them with a shiny silver object in his hand. Two very different perspectives. I have some sound with the local sheriff.

Just take a listen to his perspective followed by the opposing view.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID MORGAN, ESCAMBIA COUNTY, FLORIDA, SHERIFF: What we see as the tragedy of this is again the noncompliance in the direction of law enforcement officers. Had that occurred we wouldn't be having this discussion. It's a tragedy all the way around. He is both a suspect and a victim.

CEOLA WALKER, MOTHER OF ROY MIDDLETON: How can you be a suspect and a victim at your own house? In your own yard? In your own car? I don't understand that. How can you be a suspect going in your own car?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VALENCIA: Brooke, there was a neighbor outside while this whole thing went down. But he says it was too dark to actually see the whole thing. But from what he saw from his perspective, Roy Middleton was compliant with the sheriff's deputies.

BALDWIN: Let's hear from the man himself, Roy Middleton on the phone with me here, as we mentioned, from the hospital bed.

Mr. Middleton, thank you so much for picking up the phone, because we just want to hear the story from your perspective.

So before you directly respond to the sheriff's side of this story, take me back to the wee hours of Saturday morning. You're coming home. Tell me about the moments right before you opened your car door.

MIDDLETON: All I can say is I pulled in my driveway. I heard somebody start yelling, show me your hands. I did think it was a neighbor. But I still was showing my hands. As soon as I showed my hands, I was shot upon. And I complied with the officers and they still opened fire on me. That's all I can say. Thank you.

BALDWIN: Hang on. Hang there with me, Mr. Middleton, because I have a couple more questions. You say you thought it was a neighbor saying show me your hands. I had read you were quoted in a Pensacola newspaper as thinking someone was joking. Was that the case?

MIDDLETON: Yes. I thought maybe it was my neighbor just kidding at first. But then when I did, they opened fire on me. So I still believed it was a neighbor. I complied with the order. And they opened fire on me and they didn't stop I guess until they ran out of ammunition.

BALDWIN: Describe being open -- having these bullets --

MIDDLETON: It felt like I was in front of a firing squad, ma'am. Laying down, I felt like I was in front of a firing squad. And I asked you guys -- I told you guys I would give this interview. And that's really all that I have to say is, I complied and I was fired upon. Thank you.

BALDWIN: Hang on. Hang with me, please, sir, because we want to make sure we get your side of the story. Please don't hang up. Roy Middleton, please don't hang up.

MIDDLETON: That's just -- that's why I don't like doing interviews.

BALDWIN: Well, I promise I don't bite. I just ask some tough questions, Roy.

So, just hold on with me. I have got three more questions. I will leave it at three. But when they say, specifically the deputies, when they say you came out of the car with more of a lunging motion and that the deputies were standing by and you had what appeared to be a metallic object in your hand, what was in your hand? And were you lunging?

MIDDLETON: No. Why would I lunge at somebody? How am I going to lunge out of my car?

Only -- anything I had in my hand was a key chain. And a key chain have a little cigarette lighter on it, a little-bitty cigarette lighter that I got from my daughter just returned from Afghanistan a few weeks ago. That's all I had in my hand.

BALDWIN: So, here you are. You're in this hospital bed. I understand you have a metal rod now in one of your legs? A leg was shattered? Is that the case? How are you?

MIDDLETON: Yes. The whole the whole hip bone is blown out. And I have metal rods in it.

BALDWIN: What do you want? We know these two deputies are on paid administrative leave as this is being investigated. Ultimately, this goes to the state attorney to see if a law or laws have been broken. What do you want, sir?

MIDDLETON: I can't say what I want, because I can only still -- I'm still asking why.

BALDWIN: Why what?

MIDDLETON: Why it happened.

BALDWIN: The other issue I wanted to ask you about is the fact that the sheriff says this was a tragedy. And I'm quoting: "It's a tragedy because we had an individual, a citizen, who for whatever reason, either impairment due to alcohol or drugs or just taking it upon himself not to be compliant to follow basic orders."

I just have to ask just to get your direct response to that, were you drinking? Were you taking drugs that night?

MIDDLETON: No. No, I wasn't. I wasn't drinking at that particular time. No, I was not drinking.

BALDWIN: And --

(CROSSTALK)

MIDDLETON: I was just going in my house to eat. And I was looking for some cigarettes before I go in my house. Thank you.

BALDWIN: I understand. I understand. So you want the answer.

MIDDLETON: OK. OK.

BALDWIN: You want the answer as to why.

Roy Middleton, thank you so much for staying on the phone with me.

(CROSSTALK)

MIDDLETON: All right. Thank you very much.

BALDWIN: Thank you.

There you have it, Roy Middleton in his own words.

And, Nick Valencia, thank you very much.

VALENCIA: You bet.

BALDWIN: Wasn't sure if he was going to hang up on us or not.

Now to this. O.J. Simpson has been kept behind bars for nearly five years. Now the Nevada parole board has granted Simpson parole on some, not all, of the charges related to this 2008 kidnap and holdup when Simpson tried to take sports memorabilia from a couple of dealers in that Las Vegas hotel room. His plea for freedom in front of the parole board just last week looks to have worked. Here he was.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

O.J. SIMPSON, CONVICTED FELON: Make no mistake. I would give it all back to these guys. They can have it all to get these last five years back.

They have been somewhat illuminating at times and painful a lot of times. I missed my two younger kids who worked hard getting through high school. I missed their college graduations. I missed my daughter's -- my sister's, I should say, funeral.

I missed all of (INAUDIBLE) various things. When I went to that place that night, I had already discussed it with my kids. I spoke about it with my sister and brother-in-law, older sister and brother-in-law, who were originally going to go with me up until the last hour.

I even talked to two lawyers about it, one the night before that I knew and had a conversation with a lawyer that day who I didn't know. I had no intention. My intent was not to rob anybody. I knew both of these guys had my stuff. I was a little upset with them. And I think I wasn't as civil as I should have been.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: O.J. Simpson in his own words here.

It is important to note, even though he's been granted parole, he's still going to be locked up for a while yet as he serves some of his time for some of those crimes.

CNN's Ted Rowlands is following this for us today.

And so how much time in prison does he have left, Ted?

TED ROWLANDS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: At least four years, Brooke, because he's serving a number of these sentences concurrently rather than consecutively.

They really threw the book at him, quite frankly, for this robbery charge and kidnapping charge in Las Vegas. He's got another -- even though he has parole granted with this round, he has another at least four years. That's assuming he gets paroled again on these other two charges.

He's going to be in prison for a while. His best chance of getting out should come in the next two weeks. That is a decision on a pending motion for a new trial that O.J.'s lawyers really believe they have a good shot at.

BALDWIN: I know we had talked, you know, he's been this model prisoner. That's certainly factored into this board giving him parole. I'm also just curious, you know, who could forget the O.J. Simpson trial where he ultimately was found guilty in a civil suit in the wrongful death of his ex-wife. Did that factor into the decision at all?

ROWLANDS: Not in the parole board's decision. But, in fact, I talked to a juror a couple weeks ago working on a story about O.J. who sat on the Las Vegas robbery trial. He think that absolutely had something to do with the sentence. He was a juror who said, yes, he was guilty of the robbery. But he thought that O.J. would get, maybe 10, 12 years.

When he found out he got 33 years, he was shocked. A lot of people were. A lot of people believe it had something to do with justice in terms of Nicole and Ron Goldman's murder and karma, rather than the incident in Las Vegas.

BALDWIN: Interesting. Ted Rowlands, thank you very much.

Secret government documents now available for you, the public, to see. Top intelligence officials release information on how and why they collect information from your phone calls, from your e-mails. We will talk to a former FBI official, see if Americans should at all be concerned.

And this story, I know, has a lot of people talking, including me. I tell you, this story actually brought me to tears as I was reading it last night. A radio host lets the country hear into one of the most emotional times of his life, the death of his mother. So he took to Twitter to post these messages, these very intimate messages, about his mother's final moments in the hospital and the incredibly personal tweets have gone viral. That story is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Your government is revealing top secret details and problems with how it collects information on phone calls, your e-mails, all in the name of protecting you from potential terror plots. The director of national intelligence, James Clapper, released these three declassified documents today, hours before lawmakers started grilling the NSA on its controversial surveillance programs.

The documents say that the NSA's two bulk collection programs have had a number of technical and a number of human compliance issues since 2009. But according to these documents, the problems are being addressed.

So, Tom Fuentes, CNN law enforcement analyst, I wanted to ask you about this, because one of the big questions is really about compliance and oversight. I mean, what assurances have you heard that the NSA can deal with the compliance problems that obviously allowed Edward Snowden to, you know, leak as much as he has?

TOM FUENTES, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Hi, Brooke. It's a very good question.

I still have a hard time believing that he had the kind of access that he did and obtained the documents that he obtained. All my dealings when I was still in the FBI, the dealings with NSA, the dealings in the intelligence community, and the communications between agencies and the ability to password into databases and get information was incredibly difficult.

And there were all kinds of tracking mechanisms to see who was accessing data. It left a record of which computer, which person logged in to get information and what was taken. You weren't allowed to put thumb drives in. They were disabled. And if you had a classified drive, it was tracked.

I still am -- quite frankly, I'm still baffled at how he could do it and not have anybody -- not raise any alarms with the people at the agency until he came forward.

BALDWIN: Yes, I know we're hearing in another "Guardian" article he could tap into even the president's information. But then you hear someone like a Mike Rogers, chair of the House Intel Committee, saying he's lying.

But then, you know, the NSA, we know, collects phone call times and length and dates. But let me ask you, Tom, what about just even a person's location? Do these documents reveal whether or not the NSA collects information on a person's location using cell phone information?

FUENTES: Well, the metadata would include the location. In the modern era when your cell phone's turned on and when it's connected to a cell tower in whatever system it is, anywhere in the world, the phone company knows which tower it's hitting.

If it hits enough towers they can track you within about 100 yards of where you are on the earth accessing the phone system. So that metadata is included in what's being collected, the location of the phone, the number dialed, the number received, the duration of the call. That is part of the data. That is not the content. That's been one of the arguments ongoing.

And I know Snowden claimed early on that he could tap into anybody's phone or e-mails or either one. I don't know that that's actually true for him personally. It might be.

BALDWIN: Tom Fuentes --

FUENTES: But if I could add one quick thing --

BALDWIN: Go for it.

FUENTES: -- phone company technicians, if you read the fine print of your contract, it says the phone company technicians can listen in for a minute to make sure the line's working. Maybe he's referring to that because he's one of the technicians make sure these computer systems communicate with each other.

(CROSSTALK)

FUENTES: Maybe he had that kind of technician access. I don't know. But I can't believe that they couldn't track him being in the system like that.

BALDWIN: Yes, I don't know. I feel like there's a lot of information we are missing on this whole thing.

Tom Fuentes --

FUENTES: I agree.

BALDWIN: -- thank you very much.

FUENTES: Thank you, Brooke. BALDWIN: Coming up next, keep the Kleenex close, because if you have not told your mom I love you today, this story might make you pick up the phone. This NPR host sweets about his mother's final moments from her hospital bedside. The tweets have gone viral. We will tell you what he posted. It's pretty incredible stuff.

Plus, we will talk to a psychologist and talk about social media. Is that helping people grieve? That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: A son, a grown son sitting with his mother on her deathbed tweets her final hours.

This is Scott Simon, NPR host of "Weekend Edition Saturday," has spent the last week lovingly documents his mother's life and illness and her death in just 140 characters. Here's one tweet. "Mother asks, will this go on forever? She means pain. Dread. No, she says. But we will go on forever, you and me."

His tweets were raw and they were honest. Another one: "I love holding my mother's hand. Haven't held it like this since I was 9. Why did I stop? I thought it was unmanly? What crap."

CNN's Ted Rowlands has the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SCOTT SIMON, NPR: Hi, I'm Scott Simon of NPR.

ROWLANDS (voice-over): For more than 30 years, Scott Simon has been a familiar voice on National Public Radio. But for the past week, Simon has been communicating from his mother's bedside at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, sharing with his 1.2 Twitter followers his mother's final moments.

"Breathing hard now," he tweeted at one point over the weekend. "She sleeps, opens eyes a minute, sleeps. I sing I will always be there, as frightened as you."

Later, he tweeted later: "Mother cries help me at 2:30. Been holding her like a baby since. She's asleep now. All I can do is hold on to her."

The sharing of what's normally a profoundly private experience made people take notice. From one follower: "I listen to you all the time. Sending you hugs and prayers."

Maria Shriver sent this tweet. "My heart goes out to Scott Simon. I applaud him for the conversation on grief. So needed."

Some people, however, think tweeting a death is inappropriate. "It just makes me feel gross thinking of sharing something so deeply personal and having people watch and wait."

On "CBS This Morning," Scott Simon talked about why he wanted to share something so personal.

SIMON: I meant for people to know my mother. She at some level was a performer. In her pain and in her misery, she was giving not just me, but us a great performance. And I wanted to share it. I'm glad I shared it with the world.

ROWLANDS: Simon describes his relationship with his mother as extremely close. Several years ago, he had her on his radio show as a guest.

SIMON: So people hear me on the radio. And they think I have very good manners.

PATRICIA LYONS SIMON NEWMAN GILBAND, MOTHER OF SIMON: Oh, OK. Well, yes.

SIMON: And that comes from you. That could only come from you.

GILBAND: Thank you.

SIMON: Because you were so intent on making certain that I said please and thank you and was respectful to people.

GILBAND: Oh, I see. Well, I think any parent, most parents are that -- your father had lovely manners.

ROWLANDS: Simon tweeted how thankful he was to the nurses and staff and even injected some humor. "Wish clever minds that inspected space shuttle or rumba could devise an oxygen mask that doesn't slip every 20 minutes."

As his mother passed away Monday night, Simon tweeted the moment at 7:17. "The heavens over Chicago have opened and Patricia Lyons Simon Newman Gilband has stepped on stage."

Ted Rowlands, CNN, Chicago.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: It's gripping, isn't it? His colleague Peter Sagal at NPR quoted in "The L.A. Times" saying this about his colleague -- quote -- "We usually only get to see moments like this in fiction, right? It sounds awful, exploitative and weird. But when you look at Simon's Twitter feed, it's not."

Joining me now, licensed psychologist Erik Fisher.

Welcome.

ERIK FISHER, PSYCHOLOGIST: Thanks for having me.

BALDWIN: My goodness. Like I said, I read this "L.A. Times" piece last night and I was boo-hoo-hooing over this. When you read this and you saw, when you go -- he has over a million followers, when you read sort of backwards, tweet by tweet by tweet, what did you make of it?

FISHER: I think that it's a process that is changing in our culture.

I think we have been in the dark ages for some time in terms of dealing with grief and loss. My brother died in 1974. It wasn't something that you talked about. It wasn't something people asked about. But grieving is a process we are going to go through. I think to have it as a public process that people can see what people go through as well as know what to expect during a death process, it's OK.

There's a couple things to look at is what are the person's motivations for sharing that? Is it narcissistic to bring attention back to me? Is it to feel -- to share information, keep people in the loop? Or is it a way that person's grieving? That's one piece. The other piece is how does that other person that's in the dying process feel about this being shared?

Given that his mother was on his show previously and probably was very part -- she's probably comfortable with the process. I think it's important for us not to judge.

BALDWIN: I feel like -- and I agree. I think part of it just reading this "L.A. Times" article which was so great, they quoted some of these followers who are reading all these tweets. One person put it this way. "Comforting to know others are going through the same thing as my family. Your mom passed peacefully. And I hope my father will as well."

I think about, well, why do I tweet? Sometimes it's news. Sometimes I just want to share. It's a community. And I don't know him. But I would imagine it's just sort of consoling to know there are others out there who can be part of a greater community to help one with your grief.

FISHER: Well, as people, we look for validation. We look for comfort from each other. We're social animals. We have to understand that dealing with emotions in isolation is not healthy. That's what our research shows from how it affects our physical health, our emotional health, our lifestyles.

So, being able to share these things together and pull together as a community, not just as a community as a few people, but a community of a world of followers, I think isn't a bad thing. Was it done respectfully? I think it was. Was it done appropriately? Yes. But are our boundaries changing in our social media world? Absolutely. Is it always good? Not necessarily. But I think this was OK.

BALDWIN: I loved Maria Shriver's note just about we should have -- thank you for this conversation on grief. It's not something we all want to talk about, but it's such a reality for so many of us, those who have lost loved ones, those who will eventually . Just takes your breath away a little bit.

Erik Fisher, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

FISHER: Thank you for having me. BALDWIN: And speaking of this subject, Sunday night, we want you to watch Morgan Spurlock's "Inside Man," which explores the topic of elder care. That is 10:00 p.m. Eastern and Pacific right here on CNN.

Coming up next, a landmark ruling that affects everyone with a cell phone. The government can get information about the dates, the times, the numbers you call without, let me repeat, without any probable cause. More on that case.

Plus, the man who confessed to kidnapping and raping and holding up these three young women in his home for a decade learns his fate tomorrow. We have also just learned if Ariel Castro will himself speak in court. Stay here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BALDWIN: Going to tell you about a major court ruling that some are calling a blow to your privacy rights.