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LEGAL VIEW WITH ASHLEIGH BANFIELD
Four Investigations into Unexplained Death of Freddie Gray; U.S. Warships in Waters Off Yemen. Aired 12-12:30p ET
Aired April 22, 2015 - 12:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[12:00:20] ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Ashleigh Banfield and welcome to LEGAL VIEW.
If you're counting, the number of official investigations into the unexplained death of Freddie Gray now stands at four. The latest being a federal probe into potential civil rights violations arising from Gray's arrest a week ago Sunday in a Baltimore housing project.
The arresting officers say Gray was taken in, quote, without force or incident. But Gray's family and witnesses and at least two video clips from cell phones seem to suggest something very different. Somehow, enough force was used somewhere or somehow by someone, perhaps, to fracture Gray's spine and maybe even his larynx.
I'm going to play those clips for you at length, start to finish, so you may see unedited for yourself.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Breathe. I need a --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE)
(SHOUTING)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE).
(SHOUTING)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I know they (BLEEP).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (BLEEP).
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This making me mad, y'all. That's now you (INAUDIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (BLEEP).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get off me.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE). They can't be always busting somebody, always violating. Always. Always. Right. (BLEEP).
(SHOUTING) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (BLEEP) His leg -- (INAUDIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (BLEEP). Hey. His leg look broke. Look at his (BLEEP) leg. Look at his (BLEEP) leg. That boy leg look broke. His leg broken and you all are dragging him like that. (BLEEP).
(SHOUTING)
(BLEEP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stop right there.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BANFIELD: Now that was not the only cell phone video. I want you to now see the same takedown from a little bit closer in, and in a different angle.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(SHOUTING)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Don't ride, shorty. We recording this (BLEEP). We recording it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get off me, yo.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My arm. Tell them get off me.
(SHOUTING)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (BLEEP).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: His leg. He got (INAUDIBLE).
(SHOUTING)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shorty, that was after they tased the (BLEEP) out of him like that. Man, I been recording. I been recording it. I been recording it. What car did they come out of, yo? He on a bike right there, him right there. You on a bike. I got it, don't worry about it. Don't worry about it yo.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get his badge number.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: After they tased you like that you wonder why he can't use his legs.
(END VIDEO CLIPS)
BANFIELD: So I want to make a note here that while the voice on that clip, that second clip that you just saw, mentions that Gray was tased, that is not correct. He a apparently was not tased. The man who shot the clip does not want to be identified, but he does want you to know something. This is what he says he saw before he started recording. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They had Freddie Gray bent up into what I would like to call a pretzel type of move where they had the heels of his feet to his back and he was still in hand cuffs and then he had the knee like in the back of his neck. You could see that he was in obvious pain. And then as the video shows, you know, you can see that his legs were inoperable. He couldn't use them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BANFIELD: Freddie Gray's parents joined a third night of protests and more of those protests are planned at the police precinct today, at city hall, tomorrow. The family also plans an independent autopsy. The official autopsy points to catastrophic spinal injury without specifying how that happened.
[12:05:05] I'm joined now by Billy Murphy, the Gray family attorney. Mr. Murphy, thank you so much for being part pa of the program today. So many questions for you. But first and foremost, the witness that we just heard on tape suggesting that he feels he saw Mr. Gray in a pretzel-like condition, that his body was bent severely at this time of the arrest, had you been aware of that up until now? And if so what are your thoughts on that?
WILLIAM "BILLY" MURPHY, JR., GRAY FAMILY ATTORNEY: We've seen this video from the beginning and they were originally given to us. And this is a distressing video, to say the least. But the police have said there was no evidence that physical violence was used. Well, how do you account for the constant screams? That's not a normal part of an arrest unless the pain was real. And the police are disregarding that.
And now they have this theory that it must have happened after he was put in the -- in the police vehicle. But they throw their hands up and then say we don't know what happened. There are six police officers who, as far as we know, participated in all or part of this incident, and they have remained silent because we have a unique thing in Maryland called a police bill of rights. And it goes further than the citizens bill of rights, and it goes further than what right you have on any other job site in the United States. When there's something like this that happens, your job requires normally that you cooperate in whatever investigation --
BANFIELD: I'm going to --
MURPHY: -- goes on to get to the bottom of things, and they don't have to do that.
BANFIELD: -- talk to some of the police officers, representatives, actually about that very issue that you brought up, the police officer bill of rights.
But I want to get from you some other information. Today getting information that the official autopsy conducted has pointed to catastrophic spinal injury without really specifying what happened. And yet I'm seeing in a report from "The Atlantic" publication that family members apparently told the magazine that Mr. Gray had been treated in the hospital for three fractured vertebrae and a crushed voice box. Is that what the doctors told your clients, Freddie Gray's family?
MURPHY: That's what we've been told. And we haven't been able to verify that. Of course, the best evidence of that is a properly done autopsy. We don't have to rely on hearsay or --
BANFIELD: Who was it who told you? I'm just curious -- when Mr. Gray was alive in the hospital for a week before he died, were there x-rays done? Were the doctors treating him, updating your clients, Mr. Gray's family, and telling them exactly what condition Mr. Gray was in? That's why I'm wondering. Where the information of three fractured vertebrae and crushed voice box get to you from? What was the source of that information?
MURPHY: Well, I don't reveal my sources at this point because I'm in a pre-litigation posture and so there's no need for me to do that.
The other thing is that we're waiting for the medical records. They have not yet been completed. That's normal. You usually have to wait 60 to 90 days for medical records. And we're just as anxious as you to see what the doctors contemporaneously wrote before they knew that this was going to be the problem that it has become. And that's good evidence. So we're looking to see what that evidence is before we speculate about what may have happened or what may not have happened.
BANFIELD: Very wise of you and, as an attorney, I know you know that is critical, just not to speculate until the facts are in.
Mr. Murphy, let me ask you about the two stops apparently that the police van made while Mr. Gray was inside. Are you being informed at all by the police or any other authoritative sources what those stops were about? And why another person actually was in the van as well, albeit separated, as I understand, by some kind of divider? But another suspect of some kind was in the van as well in between the time Mr. Gray got in the van and Mr. Gray came out of the van?
MURPHY: We have some information about that from people who saw all or part of that first stop, but we have not yet heard from any witness who saw the second or the third stop. We think there were at least three. There may have been one more. But the police have not reliably reported on that part of the case either.
And it's a puzzle because on the one happened, we sincerely believe that mayor is trying to get to the bottom of it. Why wouldn't she want to? She's a child of a civil rights leader of great respect. She is an experienced leader in the community. She's a lawyer who used to be a defense lawyer.
[12:10:01] And so she very much wants to get to the bottom of it. But she has to depend, like the rest of us, on a thorough, fair, and objective the police investigation and she's becoming skeptical, just like we are, that that's not what she's getting. For example, the police claim they had probable cause to arrest this
man, knowing that if they didn't that's trouble for them. And all we can come up with is that it was reckless eyeballing at the police followed by running. And last time I know, black man running is not a crime. And if the man made a mistake, he didn't run fast enough. That's what this incident teaches.
So that goes out the window. And she's not going for that one. The other one that she's not going for is that he had a knife. Well, how did you know that when he was running? And how could that have been the reason that you were chasing him unless you're telepathic? And so she's not impressed with that excuse either, nor are the rest of us.
So it looks very much like this was an arrest without probable cause and without reasonably articulable suspicion.
BANFIELD: And in all fairness to the other side on this, as they gather more facts and like you just said it is critical before speculating why they went after this arrest, there was one report the they had seen that part of the knife clipped to the inner belt of Mr. Gray. Perhaps that coupled with the fact that he ran, or the perhaps the fact these officers may or may not have known anything about his past, there are all sorts of factors that, in a cocktail, may have added to what they thought was probable cause. But without us knowing that, it's unfair to say they did or didn't have it.
Mr. Murphy, thank you so much for being on the program today. I hope you'll speak with us as this case widens out and as more it facts become available, sir.
MURPHY: I will.
BANFIELD: Thank you. Appreciate it.
And by the way, I should let you know that we've just received word as well that the family says that they're hopeful that they will get Freddie Gray's body released to them at some point today.
Coming up next, if a witness says that Baltimore police had him bent into a pretzel-like formation, then why is Freddie Gray's fatal injuries still such a mystery? Were the police officers who chased him down following proper procedure? And then what about those screams?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[12:15:42] BANFIELD: Our lead story is the growing demand for answers in the death of a Baltimore man, perhaps at the hands of the Baltimore police. Today may be the first opportunity for investigators to question the police who arrested Freddie Gray on April 12th and apparently, inexplicably, may have injured him so badly that he died one week later.
The question begins with why Mr. Gray was stopped to begin with. And Baltimore's mayor is among those waiting for answers.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR STEPHANIE RAWLINGS-BLAKE (D), BALTIMORE: I know what probable cause is. I haven't heard of probable cause in this case yet. And that's one of the questions that I want answered. I know that having a knife is not necessarily probable cause for a stop or an arrest. That's why I have significant questions about what happened and that's why I'm determined to get to the bottom of it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BANFIELD: I'm joined now by Cedric Alexander, who is the head of public safety in Dekalb County, Georgia, and the president of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives. And joining me here in New York is Harry Houk, who's a former NYPD detective and now a consultant.
Mr. Houk, first to you, I want to ask you about this new information that we're hearing from one of these witnesses who doesn't want to be identified, but essentially voiced over his own self-camera phone video and suggested that Mr. Gray was in a pretzel-like condition, that his legs were somehow bent terribly over his back. I wanted to ask about the possibility that that's the kind of position that police officers may try to take a suspect down in to stop him from whatever it is they think he's doing, if he's running, et cetera. Does that sound like anything in protocol to you?
HARRY HOUK, FMR. NYPD DETECTIVE: Well, it's kind of hard for me to think that the man's body gets in some type of a pretzel position on a takedown. That doesn't make sense to me. You know, the takedown would probably --
BANFIELD: Why not? With momentum.
HOUK: Yes, but it comes from the upper part of the body, the takedown. That's the only way you're taking somebody down or a little bit lower to the waist and you take them down.
What does he mean by pretzel? I mean, I don't understand this. I mean, is his legs so far back up that, you know, the back of his feet are touching his back? I don't know what he means by a pretzel position, so it doesn't really make a lot of sense to me at all.
BANFIELD: So Chief Alexander, perhaps you can weigh in on this. You sort of wear two hats in thsis whole notion that of course you want the search for justice. At the same time the benefit of the doubt to be afforded to those who are under suspicion right now.
In that kind of a takedown, is there a benefit of the doubt that you can ascertain hearing that description, if -- by the way, if that witness is accurate? This a witness voicing over a cell phone video using the person's name, so clearly that person may or may not have seen some coverage of this case already. And so I can't tell you whether that's an accurate witness account or not. I've seen it happen before where witness accounts turned out not to be accurate. So I want to be clear about that. But does this speak to anything in your perspective with regard to how this takedown may have happened? And if there's any possibility that the police may have come upon this situation and it could have been a terribly unfortunate confluence of circumstances?
CEDRIC ALEXANDER, NATL. ORG. OF BLACK LAW ENFORCEMENT EXECUTIVES: Well, you know, the thing here, Ashleigh, is this, is that the investigation is going to give us some real indication of what went on here. There's a lots are lot of speculation, there's a lot of rumor, innuendo, around what happened, but until physical evidence and forensics evidence come together to give us some idea, No. 1, how did he end up on the ground? No. 2, how did he end up in that contorted type of posture he was in? Clearly we hear him screaming for help -- or he's in pain, I should say. And then when they stand him up here, he appeared to be dragged along and unable to walk on his own.
That's all very clearly evident from the -- from what we see as something going wrong there. Now, where that blame begins and ends is still yet to be determined.
What I'm really interested in, Ashleigh, more than anything else. It's been ten days, that community and, of course, even the mayor mentioned to herself, who have grave concern about this and I applaud her for making herself visible and available.
[12:20:08] And she is a wonderful mayor who provides great leadership for that community, and I'm quite sure she's going to help to get to the bottom of this as well too.
BANFIELD: That ten day issue, you're spot on, Chief, because ten days is the opportunity afforded under their officers bill of rights to effectively retain counsel and not have to answer to their superiors. It's not the same in every jurisdiction but that is one of the issues in this jurisdiction.
Mr. Houk, just quickly, the screaming. You cannot listen to that series of cell phone videos and be so affected by what sounds like horrifying pain.
HOUK: Yes.
BANFIELD: When you're training to be a police officer, what are you taught about those arrests? We've seen arrests where people scream in anger, in, you know, sort of righteousness, in entitlement, in protest, and you have seen arrests where people are really in distress. What are you taught in a circumstance like what we're seeing with Freddie Gray? It was so clear to me, in retrospect, that he was terribly -- he was suffering terribly.
HOUK: Well, that's where experience comes in. They can't teach you this at the police academy.
BANFIELD: You don't have to teach me that; I knew and I'm an anchor.
HOUK: What I'm saying is that you've got to make the determination as the officer. If you've done a lot of takedowns and made a lot of arrests like I have, you're always going to get people saying I can't breathe, it hurts, screaming in pain, all right, and you got to get them handcuffed.
BANFIELD: And when are you supposed to stop and say he does need medical attention?
HOUK: When you make the determination that he's really injured. I mean, you can clearly see here -- the thing that's an indicator to me is, you know, the officers don't know anything about spinal injuries. But the fact that he said he didn't have his inhaler and that he couldn't breathe tells me the kid's got asthma. All right. And that's something you need to take care of right away because somebody could die very quickly from asthma, not being able to breathe. So I think that was a very important factor.
BANFIELD: So many more facts have yet to come in. Clearly that happened off a video as well.
HOUK: Right.
BANFIELD: And he was in that van for 30 minutes and he came out in --
HOUK: That's a big question.
BANFIELD: Cedric Alexander, thank you so much for your time. Harry Houk, as well.
ALEXANDER: Thank you for having me.
BANFIELD: Thank you as well for your perspective. This is not the last that we're going to discuss this topic. And as you have both said, and everyone in the story has said, the facts are the most critical here before anybody jumps to conclusions, suppositions, or demands answers that they don't even yet have a trail to.
Coming up next, the president, President Obama saying it certainly sends a clear message to Iran. The Pentagon says putting warships in place near Yemen gives them, quote, "options". So message options. What does that mean?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[12:26:05] BANFIELD: United States warships, nine of them in total now, including a big one, an aircraft carrier, are now positioned in the waters off of the coast of Yemen. Here's what the Pentagon says. It's for security. To make sure that commerce runs smoothly in the Arabian Sea.
But the other reason is clearly Iran. They're keeping an eye on some Iranian ships that just might be bricking some weapons, maybe some supplies, maybe some other things too, to the rebel group that has overrun Yemen, the Houthis. They forced the president of that country to leave.
Saudi Arabia, pounding rebel targets inside Yemen now for nearly a month, and despite calling an end to those air strikes, the Saudis starting hitting Houthi positions again today. An interesting end. Houthis are enjoying the support of another nation, Iran, at least ideologically tthey are right now. Because it's not known for sure if Iran has given them any weapons. That's a big yet.
President Obama says he wants the military part of this conflict in Yemen to end now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Right now, there are a lot of people inside of Yemen suffering. What we need to do is bring all the parties together and find a political arrangement. It is not solved by having another proxy war fought inside of Yemen. And, you know, we've indicating to the Iranians that thy need to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BANFIELD: With me now, retired U.S. Navy commander Chris Harmer, who once served with the U.S. Fifth Fleet, which operates in the Persian Gulf in the Arabian Sea, and also former Navy SEAL Jonathan Gilliam.
All right, Commander and Lieutenant, there seems to be sort of a unique wording going on. If you talk to the Pentagon, this is all about keeping the shipping lanes good to go. And then if talk about the president, he says that, too, yet he also says this is about sending a message. Rather than another conflict in the region, we need to settle this now.
So first to you, Commander, what is this? Is it a message or is it truly just want to keep that commerce going?
CMDR. CHRISTOPHER HARMER (RET.), U.S. NAVY: Well, there's always a message we see politically and publicly what we're intending to do, and then there's an actual message we're sending to our enemies or competitors in the region. So the verbal message, the written message, the message we're releasing publicly is that we're just there to keep the seas open for commerce, keep the sea lines of communication open, free trade on the high seas, no piracy, et cetera.
The real reason we're doing this is to make sure the Iranians know we've got significant military forces there, up close and personal, keeping an eye on what the Iranian Navy is up to.
One further point I would like to quickly make is I don't think there's any doubt that the Iranian regime is in fact supplying the Houthi rebels with arms and ammunition. They may not be supplying that directly with Iranian flag vessels, but one way or another, it's the Iranians supplying the Houthis.
BANFIELD: So if that is the case and if it's been over land and if there is an effort to get the ships -- I assume the Iranians may say otherwise and they might suggest it's humanitarian relief that's on the way to Yemen, because that's much needed as well. But, Lieutenant, there are about 10,000 servicemen aboard all those floating assets and that's just the Americans. JONATHAN GILLIAM, FORMER NAVY SEAL: Sure.
BANFIELD: Then all of the international assets as well. That sure doesn't look like shipping. That looks like possible intercept and that is not what the Pentagon is saying. In fact, they're saying that's a mistake the media has been making.
GILLIAM: Well, I think we have a real cross pollinization now with the State Department and the DOD, because the DOD is starting to talk like the State Department. And anybody that's been with the DOD or federal law enforcement can always -- or in the agency, the CIA -- will always tell you that the State Department is a thorn in the side of the force that backs up diplomacy. When they start getting too involved with the force, the diplomacy itself takes a huge hit, because diplomacy without force to back it up is empty diplomacy.
