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LEGAL VIEW WITH ASHLEIGH BANFIELD

Ginsberg Undergoes Heart Procedure; Wilson Speaks Out in Interview; Ferguson Violence During Protests; Holiday Travel Complicated by Weather

Aired November 26, 2014 - 12:00   ET

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


MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Follow along here at cnn.com. We'll see who gets back first.

That's it for us AT THIS HOUR. We'll be here tomorrow on Thanksgiving Day.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: "LEGAL VIEW" with Pamela Brown starts next.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Pamela Brown, in for Ashleigh Banfield. And welcome to LEGAL VIEW.

We begin this hour with breaking news from the highest court in the land. Not a decision, but a medical report on Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The court announced this morning that the eldest of the nine sitting justices is recovering from heart surgery. The 81-year-old Ginsburg received a stint after suffering, quote, "discomfort while exercising" last night. Our senior legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin, joins me now.

The court says Ginsburg is doing well. She should be home by this weekend. But, Jeffrey, this isn't her first health scare. She's had a series of health scares.

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Ruth Ginsburg has had cancer twice. She is somewhat stooped in appearance. But I'll tell you one thing about Ruth Ginsburg, she's about this tall, she's about 90 pounds and she is as tough as any NFL linebacker. So, I would --

BROWN: Tiny but mighty, as they would say.

TOOBIN: Tiny but mighty, that is for sure. So I would expect that she will be back on schedule, though, at her age, given her record of medical problems, this is obviously a cause for concern.

BROWN: Absolutely. And you say you wouldn't be surprised if she's back on the bench soon. Look at her history. I mean she's really been a fighter when she had pancreatic cancer, colon cancer. She was back on the bench no long after being diagnosed, going through therapy, chemotherapy during all of this. Even back on the bench a day after her husband died. She's tough.

TOOBIN: You know Ruth Bader Ginsburg, in this respect, used Sandra Day O'Connor as a role model, who was treated for breast cancer early in her tenure as a Supreme Court justice, also continued hearing cases while she was being treated. They're tough. And they want to serve on the court. And Ruth Bader Ginsburg is now the senior of the four liberals on the court. She's very much the leader of that group. But, you know, you hate to be ghoulish about this sort of thing, but Supreme Court justices' health has important political implications.

BROWN: Absolutely.

TOOBIN: Could President Obama have another vacancy to fill? Could he actually fill one with now a Republican Senate coming in for the final two years of his term? The politics of it get very dicey, although she may simply come back to work on Monday and all be returned to normal.

BROWN: And there's a big actually oral argument on Monday with a big case. But let's talk about her future on the bench, Jeffrey Toobin, because she's always said no, that she's not ready to leave. And she said -- let me read actually what she said to "L" magazine just a couple of months ago. She said, "who do you think President Obama could appoint at this very day, given the boundaries that we have, anybody who thinks that if I step down, Obama could appoint someone like me, they're misguided. I think I'll recognize when the time comes that I can't do the job any longer. But now I can." Do you see that changing?

TOOBIN: Well, we'll see. You know, heart surgery is not trivial. I mean Ruth Ginsburg, given her toughness, probably regards a heart stent like you or I would regard a tooth filling. But, you know, reality sinks in at some point and this may - this may take something out of her. If, in fact, she has to leave - you know she's a wise politician as well and she was pointing out that President Obama is in a politically weaker situation and her interview with "L" was before the Republicans took the Senate.

BROWN: Right. That's a good point.

TOOBIN: So the president is in an even weaker position. You know, I do think that someone could get confirmed over two years, but it would likely be a very big political battle. And we'll see if it even takes place.

BROWN: We will see. And we wish her a speedy recovery in the meantime. Jeffrey Toobin, thank you very much.

TOOBIN: Indeed.

BROWN: Well, the anger is spreading over the grand jury's decision not to indict Officer Darren Wilson in Michael Brown's death. And the man at the center of the controversy is finally coming forward. Officer Wilson broke his silence to ABC in an exclusive interview that aired last night. You will hear him explain why he felt he had to kill Michael Brown.

And in Ferguson last night, 44 arrests, far fewer than Monday night, protesters flipped over a police cruiser, broke out the windows and set it on fire. Nationwide, demonstrators flooded the streets in about 170 cities, blocking bridges, tunnels and major highways coast to coast.

And now to that interview with Officer Darren Wilson. Finally we are hearing and seeing him explain his side of the story for the first time since he shot and killed Michael Brown. We've read what's in the grand jury transcripts, we've seen the pictures of Wilson's injuries, some swelling to his face, scratches along the back of his neck, but now he's talking about what happened face to face in an exclusive interview with ABC's George Stephanopoulos on "Nightline." Wilson says, after the initial struggle in his vehicle, the two gunshots, Brown ran. But then he turned around and started charging toward Wilson, he says. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, ABC NEWS: You say he starts to run, does a stutter step, starts to come toward you?

DARREN WILSON, FERGUSON POLICE OFFICER: Uh-huh.

STEPHANOPOULOS: And?

WILSON: At that time, I gave myself another mental check, you know, can I shoot this guy, you know? Can -- legally, can I? And the question I answered myself was, I have to. If I don't, he will kill me if he gets to me. He's already overpowered me once. If he gets to me, I will not survive.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Even though he's, what, 35, 40 feet away?

WILSON: Once he's coming in that direction, why -- if he hasn't stopped yet, when is he going to stop?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: And for the legal view now, I want to bring in CNN legal analyst Danny Cevallos, HLN legal analyst Joey Jackson and CNN law enforcement analyst Tom Fuentes.

Joey, I want to start with you here. When you hear Darren Wilson's account, does he convince you that he had a reasonable fear of death or serious injury when he fired that fatal shot, because I think that's key here.

JOEY JACKSON, HLN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, you know, Pam, there's a couple of things to keep in mind. Understand that he's been working with his lawyers, as we all do as defense attorneys, to get two very important things really ironed down. One, the whole issue of imminent fear for his life, and, two, that his actions were reasonable. You know, when you're in the grand jury, that's the narrative he gave. And, of course, that's the narrative that he gave as he's speaking to George Stephanopoulos.

But there's more than that. A grand jury is not the best forum to challenge evidence. It's a forum to acquire evidence, but it's not very adversarial. And what I mean by that is that you want to put heat on a person so that you could examine the story. And understand as we're speaking about his testimony in the backdrop of the grand jury, prior to him getting into the grand jury, his sergeant testified about him having no disciplinary record, about him being a great officer, about him always smiling, about him being an upstanding citizen in addition to the facts of the particular case. And so that's a witness that we would say would bolster his testimony.

And so I'm not suggesting at all or otherwise attacking Darren Wilson, but what I am suggesting is that as an attorney and as a defense attorney, I want to probe further. I want to ask questions so that I can get the information I need to make an informed decision. I just don't want you to tell me what you think. I want you to answer the questions that I have about what happened.

BROWN: But, Danny, didn't the grand jury do that? And the prosecutor did say, look, we can only put so much stock in the suspect here in this case because of the fact of how it impacts him, right? I mean, and they looked at other - they talked to other witnesses and looked at the physical evidence.

DANNY CEVALLOS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, if you look at the grand jury testimony and your complaint is, you know, the prosecutor might have been a little bias. And you can clearly point to some questions that were very leading and helped the officer down the primrose path of establishing that reasonable fear, and I would say, you have a point. But, again, as Joey pointed out, this is not a trial. He is not subject to the crucible of cross-examination and subtle bias is always going to filter into a grand jury because it's the prosecutor's show.

And when you read it, you're struck by, well, like Joey said, Officer Wilson was very well prepared. He almost walks us through the force continuum. He tells us, first, I thought about my pepper spray but - or my mace, but I was too close and I would have gotten hit with it. Then I thought about my -- his expandable baton, but I was sitting on it. And only then I thought about my flashlight. And then, at the very end of the road, I considered my firearm as a last resort.

And, look, police officers are expert testifiers. They're very good at it. It's part of their job. They have to do it in court all the time. So it's no surprise that he was well versed in the law of self- defense.

BROWN: Right, and something else he talked about in the testimony and in the interview he did on ABC is how he was afraid and how he felt he had to get out of his vehicle. Let's take a listen to what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WILSON: Then I go to exit my car. And when I'm getting out, I used my walkie and I said, "shots fired, send more cars." And I start chasing after Michael Brown.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Why not stay in the car? He's running away.

WILSON: Because he's not -- my job isn't to just sit and wait. You know, I have to see where this guy goes.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So you felt it was your duty to give chase?

WILSON: Yes, it was. I mean that's what we were trained to do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: All right, so let's bring in Tom Fuentes now.

Tom, I want to hear your perspective on this. Do you think there really was a duty here to give chase? What are law enforcement officers trained to do in a situation like that?

TOM FUENTES, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, yes, I think he had a duty to give chase because, at this point, we don't know the - or the officer wouldn't know the extent of the -- what occurred at the convenience store, but he would know that he has just been punched in the face, wrestled at his car, that his gun - you know, that they had a struggle over the weapon. There were shots fired in the car. And now Brown takes off, the officer assumes that his radio is still on the same channel that he used to say, I have the suspects from the grocery store, I'm exiting the car now. So that first call would have gone out that he sees the suspects on the street.

His second call, he doesn't realize the radio station, the channel dial has been turned on his radio. He calls for backup, says shots fired. Now, from my experience, as a street cop, when you - when anyone radios "shots fired," you will have about 100 police cars there within five minutes. That's the most serious call that can go out, or "officer needs assistance." Either of those calls going out. So if he could reasonably assume he does have back-up and they will be there very quickly.

As far as going after Michael Brown, no police officer, after having been punched and wrestled for a gun and shots fired, is just going to let him run off because that only increases the danger factor. You have nearby apartments. What if - what if the suspect runs into an argument? He may live in one of those apartments or he may take a hostage. He may have access then to a butcher knife or a weapon, other kind of weapon, hammer, hatchet, that may be available in one of those residences. And it would be 10 times more dangerous for the arriving police officers to have to pursue Michael Brown into an apartment complex with all types of innocent people -- at 12:00 noon on a sunny Saturday afternoon, you would have children out and about. You would have a lot of danger to the public. At the time, the officer would have to try to effect the arrest right there as quickly as possible before he escaped.

BROWN: OK. So we hear you. You can keep - it was -- he did the right thing by getting out of the car and giving chase. Tom Fuentes, thank you.

Joey Jackson and Danny Cevallos, be sure to stay with me. We have more coming up in this show.

And we are not done examining Darren Wilson's interview. The officer says he has remorse but wouldn't do anything differently if the same situation happened again. How Michael Brown's parents are responding, just ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: Two nights of turmoil have taken a heavy toll on businesses and neighborhoods in Ferguson, Missouri. CNN's Ana Cabrera is there right now.

Ana, tell us what you're seeing.

ANA CABRERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Pam, it is calm. It is quiet. It's almost eerily desolate out here off of West Florissant Avenue. This is the heart of the destruction during those protests on Monday night. You can see, police here have the road blocked off. And as you look around, it's almost like every building has some sort of mark of damage from all of that activity, from burned-out auto parts store, to boarded-up windows on this Chinese restaurant. Really, you look all around and you see broken windows, you see plywood or, you know, cardboard wood of sorts put up.

And some of these businesses admittedly have closed up shop well before those protests took place. So some of the boards that are in place were put up intentionally ahead of the protests to try to protect their stores. Others have been put up after the windows were broken out.

But what I can tell you consistently out here is you really don't see a lot of these businesses preparing to reopen. It gives you a sense that they are still anticipating perhaps more unrest, Pam.

BROWN: Wow. Thanks, Ana Cabrera. We appreciate you bringing that to us.

And what many people want to know is, how does Officer Darren Wilson feel about taking a life, shooting and killing Michael Brown, just 18 years old? Does he have any regrets? ABC's George Stephanopoulos asked him during his exclusive interview that aired last night on "Nightline."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHANOPOULOS: Is there anything you could have done differently that would have prevented that killing from taking place?

WILSON: No.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Nothing?

WILSON: No. If he would have gotten on the sidewalk when -- and followed Dorian Johnson to the sidewalk, I probably never would have noticed the cigarillos (ph). I would have gone and gotten lunch and continued my day, he would have continued his.

STEPHANOPOULOS: The Brown family came out with a statement last night where they said, "we are profoundly disappointed that the killer of our child will not face the consequences of his actions." What do you think when you hear that? WILSON: I think those are grieving parents who are mourning the loss

of their son. And I don't think there's anything I could say, but, again, you know, I'm sorry that their son lost his life. It wasn't the intention of that day. It's what occurred that day. And there's no -- nothing you can say that's going to make a parent feel better.

STEPHANOPOULOS: It sounds like you don't think you were responsible.

WILSON: I did my job that day.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Do you feel any remorse?

WILSON: Everyone feels remorse when a life's lost. Like I told you before, I never wanted to take anybody's life. You know, that's not the good part of the job. That's the bad part of the job. So, yes, there is remorse.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: Wilson says there is remorse, as you just heard, but Michael Brown's parents do not believe him. They appeared on CBS this morning to respond to Wilson's interview.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LESLEY MCSPADDEN, MICHAEL BROWN'S MOTHER: He didn't do what he had to do. He did what he wanted to do.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK, what he wanted to do?

MCSPADDEN: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) you think he wanted to kill your son?

MCSPADDEN: I don't think he wanted to kill my son, but he wanted to kill someone.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Wanted to kill someone.

MICHAEL BROWN SR., MICHAEL BROWN'S FATHER: Again in his statement he said, he'll do it again. So --

MCSPADDEN: His conscience is clear?

BROWN: His conscience is clear.

MCSPADDEN: How could your conscience be clear after killing somebody, even if it was an accidental death?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: I want to bring back CNN legal analyst Mel Robbins, Danny Cevallos, along with HLN legal analyst Joey Jackson.

All right, Danny, I'm going to start with you this time. He said, I was just doing my job. What is your reaction to that? Do you think he could have done anything differently?

CEVALLOS: Number one, very well-coached. I mean that's the right response to the question because it's a trick question. You know, consider yourself in Officer Wilson's position. He's been at the center of this massive controversy for what he believes was a righteous (ph) killing and what a grand jury concluded was also a righteous kill. And I don't mean to use those words glibly, but that's how it's often referred to in the law enforcement business. So now he's being asked - now after this no true bill, people are demanding, well, we want an apology. And in his mind, what he probably wants to say is, for what? But he needs to be sensitive. And in this -- he has to respond to that question carefully because, does he regret it? I have to imagine he does. Someone is dead. But on the other hand, there are many people watching him, scrutinizing his words, to look for civil liability and other kinds of liability down the road. So he has to be careful.

In a way, does that prevent him from maybe expressing his true remorse? Maybe. But he also has to watch himself at this point and be very careful with every word he says. It will be used against him later on.

BROWN: Mel, he talked about in the interview, as we just heard, he said, if Michael Brown had just gotten on the sidewalk, this wouldn't have happened. Do you think that's blaming the victim here?

MEL ROBBINS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: There's a blizzard outside right now on the East Coast, but it is frigid in here when you look at that cold guy. I mean, honestly, to me, he does nothing in that interview to help himself. And while I have been somebody sitting here saying, the indictment is the correct result in terms of voting for no indictment. The fact that they had a grand jury I felt was a fair process because the prosecutor certainly could have just said, hey, guess what, there's not enough evidence here, sorry, Brown family, sorry, citizens of Ferguson, I'm not even going to call a grand jury, I'm just going to make the judgment call.

But for this officer, knowing everything that's going on - and, you know, to your point, Danny, you're right, he's got two federal investigations going on. He's definitely got a civil lawsuit coming up. But he's a human being. And everybody is watching. And there is nothing wrong with saying, look, I was beaten in the car. I chased him because it's my job. He turned around and rushed me. Do I -- did I want to shoot him? Of course not. I didn't have a choice. But the bottom line is, is now this kid is dead and I feel terrible about that.

BROWN: Joey, I want to know what struck you out of this, and also respond to what Michael Brown's mom said, saying that maybe he didn't want to kill her son, but he wanted to kill someone.

JACKSON: Listen, I certainly don't know what is or was in Darren Wilson's mind. I would certainly hate to believe that any officer patrolling the street wants to kill someone, anyone. I mean we don't really expect that or anticipate that. But I think what has the community so concerned here, Pam, and has the parents and family upset, is the process. And many people say, it was a wonderful process, everything was presented to that grand jury. But the reality is, could a grand jury and should the prosecutor really be prosecuting the police? In other words, should there be an independent entity that would do that to engender the confidence in the community that things were done rightly, appropriately and fairly? And that's the issue. If I work with you every day, Pam, and I'm depending upon you, should I be put in a situation where I investigate you? I think not.

BROWN: There was a lot of debate about that and we're going to continue this conversation on that note. Thank you to all three of you, Mel Robbins, Joey Jackson, Danny Cevallos.

JACKSON: Thank you.

BROWN: Stick around. More to discuss.

Well, today is one of the busiest travel days of the year. Millions of people headed home for the holidays. But that commute could really be a mess. A monster storm is moving up the East Coast and that could have rippling effects across the country. An update, up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROWN: A winter weather system barreling up the East Coast today, just in time to wreak havoc on one of the busiest travel days of the year. The storm is affecting millions of people and causing hundreds of flight cancellations and delays as we kick off the Thanksgiving Day weekend. Meteorologist Jennifer Gray is at LaGuardia Airport for us and Rosa Flores is on the Massachusetts Turnpike.

All right, Jennifer, we're going to start with you now. What's the latest on flights right now?

JENNIFER GRAY, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, it looks like flights are starting to be canceled left and right. We had a little bit of a slowdown this morning. The problem was, the inbound flights couldn't get here because of a low ceiling. The clouds were very low. And so it's starting to have that domino effect.

Look on the wall behind me. You can see a little bit more red on the wall. So flights are being canceled. We're also seeing a lot more delays. In fact, Flight Aware is reporting over 500 flights delayed within the past three hours and about 22 cancellations. Do we expect that number to increase? Of course, LaGuardia and Newark both expecting about 10 percent of their flights to be canceled for today.

And those snowplows, though, are ready. Right now we are seeing a wintry mix here in New York. We did have snow earlier. The snow/rain line very, very close to the city. We do expect more snow as the afternoon goes on. But the airport does tell us they have folks working 12-hour shifts, they have those plows ready and so they are going to be on top of it as the day goes on. But if you are heading to the airport, get here early and do have some patience.

Pamela.

BROWN: Why is it that we always get the bad weather during holiday weeks? I think I remember this happening last year as well.

Rosa, I'm going to turn to you now because according to AAA, about 90 percent of the holiday travelers are going to be driving. So what are the travel conditions where you are?

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, the temperature has been dropping and so has the speed limit, Pamela. Hear this, right now, 32 degrees where I'm at. The speed limit, just 30 miles west is down to 40 miles an hour from 65.

Now, let me paint a picture here. This is the type of snow that we've been seeing for the past three and a half hours, light, but it is accumulating some here on the ground. If you take a look at the roadways, you don't see much accumulation there. You're taking a look at the Massachusetts turnpike.

Now, these are the westbound lanes headed towards New York. Now, like I was saying, just 30 miles from here, that speed limit drops to about 40. And from talking to state police, they tell us that they're expecting the entire turnpike, by the end of the day, to be down to 40 miles an hour because of the precipitation and because of the temperature conditions. So, Pamela, as you were saying, a lot of people are traveling, so they're going to have to pack a little patience because these roadways are going to be pretty treacherous as the day continues.

Pamela.

BROWN: All right, Jennifer Gray, Rosa Flores, thanks to both of you.

All told, about 30 million people will have their holiday affected by this storm. Flight cancellations, delays continue to mount rapidly, as we just heard. The good news, though, airlines have announced they won't charge a fee for rebooking. So let's bring in CNN meteorologist Chad Myers.

Chad, who's getting the worst of it right now and what area should we be bracing for trouble soon.

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: You know, the biggest number I've seen is Bear Creek in Pennsylvania. That's in the Poconos, almost eight inches of snow right now. But Rockville, Gaithersburg, areas west of Baltimore and Washington, now changing over to all snow and not going back.

We had some rain earlier. A rain/snow mix. But that's done. All snow now. Once you change over to snow, you're likely not going to go back to rain. It's going to be that way the rest of the day.

Just north of D.C., almost to Baltimore and north of there, we had thunder snow about an hour ago. And that's possible. It's coming down so hard and the friction of those snow grains and that gropple (ph) and those then dendritic cells falling making static in the atmosphere and that static coming down just like a thunderstorm, just like you'd have the thunder and lightning, the rumble of thunder goes for a very long time.