Tornadoes Strike Colorado; Texas Court Rules in Favor of Polygamist Families
KEILAR: Last hour, two tornadoes were on the ground in Colorado north of Denver. There is tornado damage at this hour in at least two towns in Weld County, one Windsor and the other one Greeley. Let's bring in now Shane Scofield. He is the deputy sheriff of Weld County. You are in Greeley, I believe, right, sir?</s>SHANE SCOFIELD, WELD COUNTY DEPUTY SHERIFF: Yes, ma'am. That's correct. I'm at our emergency operations center now.</s>KEILAR: What have you heard of reports of damage?</s>SCOFIELD: I was actually in a local town that's in our county named Windsor at the time this occurred. And there's a lot of damage to physical structures, homes and businesses. Some are completely demolished and unrecognizable, just masses of timber, cars, including semis, completely overturned, crushed together, large hail, a lot of hail damage to cars that did survive. And we have at this time reports of one confirmed fatality. And I'm not sure if that was from the Windsor storm or not.</s>KEILAR: Tell us about reports of injuries.</s>SCOFIELD: Other than the fatality, I don't have any specific reports of injuries right now. The emergency operations center is starting to staff up with representatives from all local jurisdictions here that were involved. And I don't have any other information given to me at this time.</s>KEILAR: Sir, can you tell us exactly where you were when this tornado came over, what the experience was like, what you heard, if you -- what you saw, if you could see anything from where you were?</s>SCOFIELD: I was actually over at a golf tournament at one of the golf courses in Windsor. And the storm came right over us. And it just developed very quickly. It was a hailstorm. Initially, it started off with light rains and very quickly within a few minutes turned into heavy rains, large hail, over-golf-ball-sized hail.</s>KEILAR: And were you on the golf course?</s>SCOFIELD: We had just finished up and we were in a covered area on the ground that was being set up for food and refreshments.</s>KEILAR: What is the response at this point? What's the emergency response?</s>SCOFIELD: It's all being coordinated pretty much through our dispatch center and also through the emergency operations center here. There's multiple jurisdictions that are helping each other out and responding through mutual aid agreements.</s>KEILAR: And is it too early really to tell exactly what the damage is and what the injuries are?</s>SCOFIELD: It is at this point just because I don't have that information right now. I have launched our emergency operations center Web page at weldsheriff.com. And there will be updates posted on there, including photos and closures and anything else that we need to release.</s>KEILAR: Now, it seems strange to us, because it seems like, especially when we look at how big this tornado was, judging by what our meteorologist Chad Myers said looking at it, that it appeared to be a very large tornado. It seems unusual for that area. Is that how you feel about this?</s>SCOFIELD: From what I'm accustomed to watching just on TV and other outlets of storms, they seem to cover localized areas. And to have multiple towns in our county -- our county is 4,000 square miles. So, to have multiple towns that were specifically affected by this storm, it sure seems different. That's for sure.</s>KEILAR: All right, sir, thank you so much for talking to us. I know you must be very busy. So, we're going to let you get back to your work dealing with this emergency there on the ground, Shane Scofield, deputy sheriff of Weld County, Colorado.</s>LEMON: Lots more to report on this breaking weather news. But we also have some other news to tell you about here. It is developing news as well. And it's coming to us from San Angelo, Texas. Those children that were taken away from that polygamist ranch, a state appeals court has ruled that the state had no right to take those children. Joining us now on the ground from KXAN is our reporter Jenny Hoff from our affiliate there. Jenny, what are you hearing on the ground?</s>JENNY HOFF, KXAN REPORTER: Don, just a few minutes ago, we had representatives with Texas RioGrande Legal Aid. And they are the ones that filed this mandamus on behalf of 38 women from the FLDS sect. And they said -- the first thing they said out here is this is a great day for Texas families. That's because they were a little shocked to find out that the court ruled so quickly on this case. And what the court said essentially is what was written in this mandamus. And that is, CPS had no evidence and had no right to hurriedly take more than 460 children off that Yearning For Zion ranch. So, obviously, those women that were represented in that mandamus were very happy out here today. Meanwhile, I just got word from inside that the hearings -- the status hearings that were scheduled today, tomorrow and the next two weeks for these children have been canceled, at least until the end of this week. I guess, right now, the judges and Companies, they are talking together to decide what they're going to do next. I just spoke with Marleigh Meisner, who is the spokeswoman for the CPS, and she told me on the phone they just got this information. They're now assessing to see how this information would apply to their investigation. And they're going to decide in a timely manner if they're going to appeal this. And if they do appeal this, it would go to the Texas Supreme Court.</s>LEMON: OK, Jenny Hoff from our affiliate there on the ground in San Angelo, Texas. Jenny, we appreciate your reporting on this. Thank you very much for that. We also want to tell our jurors that Larry King tonight, Larry interviewing two parents. It's an exclusive with the YFZ ranch. They're talking about getting their children back. And that was an exclusive interview that he had planned for tonight. And now, with this new ruling, it changes everything in this interview. You don't want to miss that, "LARRY KING" tonight, 9:00 p.m. Eastern, on here on</s>CNN. KEILAR: And joining us now from Phoenix, former polygamist sect member Flora Jessop. She was raised as member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints Thanks so much for being with us, Flora.</s>FLORA JESSOP, FORMER FUNDAMENTALIST CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER DAY SAINTS MEMBER: Thank you.</s>KEILAR: And I'm wondering, what is your reaction to this court's decision today?</s>JESSOP: Well, my initial reaction was anger at the -- that, once again, the system was going to fail these children. But I have got to keep an open mind. I have got to keep hope alive that the system will prevail and protect these children from the long-term and systemic abuses that they have been suffering for 100 years. One of the things that I want the American people to understand is inside the FLDS right now, with these storms, the tornadoes and all of that that's occurring, they are claiming that God is punishing the wicked outsiders for taking their children away, by sending these horrible storms and the destructions are happening. And, so, they're very much playing with the ideology that the prophet controls the weather and is punishing all of us wicked outsiders.</s>KEILAR: Well, Flora, you -- you were talking about systematic child abuse that these kids are suffering, systematic child abuse. But this court said that there's really no proof of that, that really all there may have been -- that no proof was even supplied, or that just to say that they were at risk of being abused isn't enough of an accusation, I guess. Do you feel that these kids and these parents are hiding any abuse?</s>JESSOP: Well, of course they are. They are taught -- we were taught in the FLDS that we had to suffer in this life in order to reach heaven in the next. And they -- it's interesting to me because the dynamics of the abuses in the FLDS, they don't beat their children with a belt and whip them with a belt, they encourage them with a belt to obey. They don't -- if you don't have the best table manners, they don't send you away from the table. They take you and starve you and encourage you by starving you to have good table manners.</s>KEILAR: You deal with child abuse cases through your foundation, reaching out to kids who are in communities like this who have suffered abuse. What would you have needed to remove these kids? Do you feel that perhaps Texas Child Services didn't go about this the right way?</s>JESSOP: Absolutely not. I think Texas authorities, the child protection authorities, went about this absolutely the right way. And they do it every day. And it's fascinating to me that the appellate court has ruled so swiftly in this. Whenever have you ever heard of the appellate court ruling in a case so fast? And I would like really seriously to see the evidence presented to the appellate court on this, in fact -- who testified and what the testimony was, because there have been long-term systemic abuses that have been documented that come out of this group: the underage marriages, the sexual abuse of the boys and the girls.</s>KEILAR: Well in this case, Flora, then why do you feel as though the court thinks that there wasn't any proof found?</s>JESSOP: Well, and that's my question, too -- what evidence did the court base its ruling on? Was it just the testimony of the mothers? Or -- because I don't have enough information on the appellate hearing to understand that.</s>KEILAR: Well let me ask you this, Flora, because there have been many custody hearings just over recent days especially. And time after time it seems there has been indications, social workers saying that they have not found evidence of abuse.</s>JESSOP: You have to keep in mind that you have almost 500 children in custody. How many of these children have actually been seen by a child psychologist or a forensic therapist? I would bet that a lot of these children haven't been.</s>KEILAR: Flora -- and Flora, I am -- thank you so much for joining us. Sorry for interrupting you. We've got a report of a tornado on the ground. We'll let you go and toss it over to Don Lemon.</s>LEMON: Yes, we're going to take you to Chad Myers who is going to take you to Laramie, Wyoming -- Chad.</s>CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Laramie, you are really in the gun right now, right under this tornado warning here. Just 22 minutes ago, a tornado on the ground there near the interstate, that's I-80. And -- I'm going over the interstate now, but that's not what I'm worried about. I'm worried about the tornado as it moves into Laramie proper. You've got the University of Wyoming there. You have an awful lot of things along -- I know you've heard of Cheyenne, but Laramie a bigger town. Coming up now -- I-80 at mile-marker 323 on the ground moving northwest at 40. You have no time. You need to take cover right now, Laramie, Wyoming -- Don.</s>LEMON: All right. Chad Myers with the very latest on this weather system that is sweeping across the middle part of the country here. A tornado has left a trail of destruction in Colorado, including one death. We're going to update you on that after the break. But you see that is that tornado there, video of it, as it happened in Weld County, Colorado.</s>KEILAR: Karl Rove has a date with the House Judiciary Committee to talk about alleged White House meddling at the Justice Department. After months of negotiations aimed at persuading Rove to appear voluntarily, the panel served a subpoena on the former top White House adviser. This hearing scheduled for July 10. The committee is looking into the White House role in the firing of nine U.S. attorneys in 2006, as well as the prosecution of Alabama's Democratic governor, Don Siegelman.</s>LEMON: Hillary Clinton has been clamoring for Florida's primary delegates to get counted. Today, the controversy arrived in a federal court. We'll go to Miami for a live update on the intraparty dispute.