http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1212/06/ijvm.01.htmlJANE VELEZ-MITCHELL
Police Confirm Bodies are Missing CousinsAired December 6, 2012 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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Straight out to Jon Lieberman, investigative reporter. You`ve got new information tonight. What have you got?
JON LIEBERMAN, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER: Yes, Jane. Well, first of all, thoughts and prayers go out to this family for this terrible loss. Police can`t say it, but this is a double murder investigation at this point.
I`ve been talking to police sources for the past 24 hours or so, and they stress to me that they have a lot of information, but the reason why they are not releasing much of it is because much it`s information that only the killer or killers would know, and they do not want to jeopardize the investigation.
That said, my sources tell me the following, which we can report: No. 1, bodies were not found, according to my sources, smack dab next to each other. They were found about 40 to 50 feet next to each other.
The second key point is the theory right now is that this was the dump site. That they are looking for the primary murder scene. In other words, where the bodies were found is not where these two little girls were killed.
In addition, I am told...
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold on. Let`s stop you right there. You`re saying the location where the bodies were found is, according to your police sources, not where the girls were killed, correct?
LIEBERMAN: That is correct. Police are looking for the primary murder scene.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I want to stop for a second to go to Mike Brooks, HLN law enforcement analyst. How would authorities be able to deduce, looking at -- and you`re seeing some of the wooded areas. The girls were found about 25 miles north from where the lake where they disappeared in this wooded area, which is sort of a county park. And now we`re hearing from our sources that they were not killed there. How would cops be able to deduce that from looking around the crime scene?
MIKE BROOKS, HLN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, they`re not finding certain evidence that should be there because they know -- they probably have a pretty good idea of how the girls died, or at least they most likely do, Jane. But they`re -- things they`re seeing there that wouldn`t -- that aren`t there, that would be there if they had been killed right there in that specific area.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, see, our sources are telling us more than we`re gaining from authorities.
BROOKS: Yes.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Because authorities at the news conference said they`re not releasing the exact location of where the bodies have been found in order to preserve the crime scene. Let`s listen to what they said minutes ago.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are processing that at this time. I don`t need to tell you I don`t want that area to get compromised. Preservation of that scene is paramount, and so I`m not going to release that at this time.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: All right, so, the bodies were found in the Seven Bridges wildlife area about 25 miles north or about a 30-minute drive from where they went missing.
So, Lyric and Elizabeth were last seen at their grandma`s house. They got on their bikes. There`s actually surveillance footage, if we can pull that up, of them riding their bikes. They were -- they left their grandmother`s house at about 12:15. They were spotted between 12:30 and 1 here. You can see those bikes going by. That`s the last image of these precious children before they died. Look at that.
They go to this lake where their bikes are found. Now maybe they were abducted before they got to the lake, but the bikes were found at the lake.
And now, it turns out that about 25 miles north of that lake, where their bikes were found, you have the bodies turn up.
But, Rita Cosby, investigative journalist, we`re now hearing from Jon Lieberman that authorities, according to his police sources, don`t believe they were killed there. They were killed somewhere else and moved to that location. What do you make of in terms of finding out who was responsible?
RITA COSBY, INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALIST: Well, I think authorities have a lot of information in this case, and Jane, I keep going back to the fact that, early on, authorities said that the family has not been as cooperative as they`d like.
The other thing -- and I think this is one of the most significant things in this case, Jane -- the father. This is the father of -- this is of Lyric Cook, Daniel Morris. He was working on a plea deal with authorities. They were prosecuting him for domestic assault and also meth and other drug charges. He backed out of that plea deal a day before his daughter goes missing.
I don`t believe in a lot of coincidences in cases. You and I have covered a lot of cases through the years. I think that it`s very significant.
When you make a plea deal, you`re giving up information. You could be giving up information on maybe, what, another drug dealer? Another methamphetamine dealer, somebody in this chain of events? And maybe somebody found out he was about to rat them out and could be tied to this, whether he`s aware of it. Maybe he wasn`t even aware that somebody was playing this role and was getting this information.
I think there`s still a lot of unanswered questions, and I think authorities have a lot more in this case than they`re tipping us off with.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I agree. The idea that he backed out of a plea deal the day before these girls go missing.
And, again, as you said, you give something up. Well, maybe he got cold feet and backed out of giving something up, but somebody else didn`t get the message that he backed out of giving something up. It could have been a communications problem.
COSBY: Exactly.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I want to go out to Jim Spellman, CNN correspondent, who`s been all over this from the very beginning.
Obviously, police aren`t saying that the father is a suspect. We do not want to, in any way imply that, but we can say that he has been the focus of scrutiny, that he himself said that he felt like he was treated like a suspect because of his criminal history and his arrests for alleged methamphetamine involvement as well as domestic violence. What do you know about that, Jim?
JIM SPELLMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It was really strange, Jane, because Misty Morrissey, the mother of Lyric, came to me in the early days of this investigation and said, "Jim, I want to tell you about the problems we have." And they told me about drug use, methamphetamine, about the plea bargain that was going on. They said, "Please, do whatever you can to report this. Get this out there now. It`s going to come out, so we can focus on the kids."
They -- Misty told me that she was polygraphed two times. They did for a period of time stop talking to police, but it was only for a few days.
I actually think they were fairly receptive to being interviewed by the police, but they felt like they were being harassed and they took a little break from it, and they came back.
Hard to know what any of that means, but I can tell you, Jane, never before in my career has someone came to me and said, "Listen, here`s all of this stuff that we`re mixed up in. Please report on it as soon as you can." But there was no doubt that the family was the focus of the investigation, at least for a while.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: And Jim, to add to that, you`re taking a look at this video that we have of Lyric`s mom and dad talking to us when their child went missing along with their child`s cousin. We found out that they had been separated for years. And they sort of presented this united front, but we also had read published reports that, after that years of living separated, they had just decided to file for divorce. Right around the time before these -- their daughter and the cousin disappeared. We`re going to analyze that and take your calls on the other side.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We`re praying for the family, both families. It`s heart-breaking. Just pray for the Morrisseys and the Cooks as a whole and that we get some answers, that the family gets answers about their little girls.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: This is a heart-breaking story and our condolences to the family. We feel like we have grown to know these -- know these two little girls, been talking about them and doing stories on them since July when they vanished. And it`s heart-breaking to have to say that police are confident that their bodies have been found in a wildlife area, about 25 miles north of where their bikes were found.
Let`s go out to the phone lines. Lisa, Wisconsin, your question or thought, Lisa?
CALLER: Hi, Jane.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Hi.
CALLER: I was just wondering if there was any molestation sexually or physically on the girls?
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, we don`t have the answer to those questions. And I could certainly tell you that, while the parents of Lyric -- obviously there`s two sets of parents here. And one set of parents seems to be absolutely squeaky clean in terms of their histories. But they don`t have anything to do with molestation or anything of that nature. So we want to clear that up.
And we say this, of course, not to embarrass anybody, because it`s part of the investigation. It`s why we`re mentioning it.
Missing Lyric`s mother and father each have criminal records. Lyric`s mom, Misty Cook, was released from a halfway house just a few months ago. She pleaded guilty to conspiracy to manufacture and distribute meth, as well as illegal drug use.
And her estranged husband, Dan Morrissey, has been convicted of burglary and theft. He was arrested last year on conspiracy to manufacture meth and possession of meth with intent to deliver. He`s also facing a domestic assault charge.
And Lyric`s mom, Misty, says their history with drugs is the reason cops questioned them so thoroughly. Let`s listen to Misty for a second.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MISTY COOK, MOTHER OF LYRIC: In my opinion, they`re probably focused on my family or Dan and I because we do have criminal history. That`s the only thing that I can think of.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: So, Mike Brooks, people can have criminal history, and that doesn`t mean anything.
However, the world of methamphetamine manufacturing is a very, very dangerous world, and it can attract extremely dangerous people.
So you have this odd, could be coincidence that this man you`re looking at here, the father of Lyric, reportedly backed out of a plea deal the day before these girls disappeared. What do you make of that?
BROOKS: Well, you know, it`s interesting. When we were playing the interview with Dan Morrissey, and he was saying, "They`re looking at me like a suspect," they think he`s holding back.
Usually, Jane, when you go into an interview with somebody, and you want to go down a certain road, you ask questions that you most likely already know the answers to. And it sounds to me they weren`t getting the answers that they thought they should be getting from this guy, and that`s the reason they wanted to play hardball with him.
Did it have something to do with this plea deal? There`s a good possibility. Did it also have something to do with maybe his friends and associates? That also probably had something to do with it.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: And then you add the odd, again, possible coincidence, that after years of living separated, Lyric`s mom and dad also just decided to get divorced right before the girls disappeared, according to published reports.
We`re going to take your calls, and we`ve got new information from our investigator, Jon Lieberman, on the other side.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I`ve taught them, you know, if you`re approached and somebody actually grabs hold of you, drop your body to the ground, scream, kick, fight, gouge eyes, do whatever you have to do. Don`t let them get you to a vehicle. You know, I told the girls, you know, once you`re in a vehicle, the chances decrease of your survival.
And so I have a feeling whoever approached them had some type of weapon, something that scared them very, very badly that made them get into a vehicle.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: That poor woman has lost two nieces, according to police, who are confident now that the bodies found yesterday in that secluded wildlife area are those of young Lyric Cook and Elizabeth Collins, two cousins who disappeared, ages 8 and 10.
Elizabeth`s mother wrote this on her Facebook page after the heart- breaking discovery: "We knew when our girls went missing that would be two outcomes. Unfortunately, this is not the one we wanted. Our girls are dancing up with our savior."
Jon Lieberman, you`ve got new information. Tell us.
LIEBERMAN: Yes. It`s heart-breaking when you read that quote from the family.
A couple of things that we know. I`m told by police sources that they were able to make an eyeball identification, meaning looking at the bodies and knowing in their heads that it was these two girls, very, very quickly. I`m told is that it didn`t appear that the bodies had been out exposed to the elements for the four or five months since they went missing. That`s No. 1.
I`m also told that there was some articles of clothing belonging to these two girls found at that scene, as well. And also we did some researching, and there are 18 registered sex offenders within ten miles of this 125-acre camping area. So that is something that law enforcement is looking at, as well.
But really what they`re focusing on is, and there`s the graphic, is the timeline. They need to figure out what happened when and how long these girls had been out in that park.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, Rita Cosby, investigative journalist, I got chills when Jon just said that these bodies had been kept somewhere, and then when they were put there in this wildlife park, they were easily identifiable. I mean, it`s horrifying to think that they were kept in some -- it implies that they were possibly kept in some kind of refrigeration or something that preserved them.
COSBY: Or were they kept alive all this time, held hostage? We`ve covered these stories where young boys or somebody, where they`re taken. The question is were there any ransom calls?
The other thing I`ve always found very significant about this case, Jane. These kids, both the kids, they went missing at Myer`s Lake. It`s a very popular recreation area. They were headed towards that area. That`s where the bikes are found. I -- you know, it`s baffling to me that nobody in that area saw something, which makes me think these people are fairly professional. Somebody with a criminal record like a sex offender or somebody tied to drugs.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: And remember, the police were looking for a mystery kayaker or a boater on that lake who they felt may have seen something significant. And last we heard, they never found them.
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