New Outrage; Caught on Camera.
BANFIELD: For two weeks, sheriff`s deputies in the Ozarks of Missouri didn`t know what happened to a very sweet 16-year-old girl. Happy-go-lucky, that`s how Savannah Leckie was described. Her mom reported her missing, but the investigators say that mom was acting rather strange. Volunteers spent days searching for this teenager, but her mom, Rebecca Ruud, she just told everybody Savannah probably ran away. She wouldn`t let the investigators search her property. Sheriff says she and the family weren`t cooperating with the law much, so they did what they usually do in that circumstance, they go and get a warrant. And when they did, they found Savannah. Her charred bones and a couple of her teeth in a burn pit close to her home. That mom, Rebecca Ruud, was arrested trying to leave town, bags packed. So you`ve got to wonder what she would have to say to the judge when she made the first court appearance today.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You understand that you have a right to a preliminary hearing. The court has already made a probable cause determination.</s>REBECCA RUUD, MOTHER OF SAVANNAH LECKIE: Yes, your honor.</s>BANFIELD: Rebecca Ruud is super soft-spoken, but wearing a bulletproof vest and handcuffs, wanted to know about her money, her bank accounts. Why are they frozen? She also wanted to know if she could get some skin cream. She did not utter a word, soft- spoken or otherwise, about Savannah Leckie, her 16-year-old dead, burned daughter. Linda Russell is a reporter for CNN affiliate KYTV, and she joins me live from Springfield, Missouri. Linda --</s>LINDA RUSSELL, KYTV REPORTER (via telephone): Hi, Ashleigh.</s>BANFIELD: -- take me inside that courtroom. You were in there. We could barely hear, because she was so soft-spoken and the microphone couldn`t even catch what she was saying, but you heard. What did she say?</s>RUSSELL (via telephone): Yes. One thing that she said was that she wanted to get to her preliminary hearing as soon as possible. And just with that. Then when the judge asked her if she had any questions, she was asking why her bank account was frozen. Also asked about getting some skin cream for eczema. Those are the things that I heard from her.</s>BANFIELD: So when I look at the video, first, we`re looking at adorable Savannah who apparently loved animals, had been living on this farm with her -- that`s her birth mom, by the way. Rebecca Ruud is her birth mom. Savannah had been brought up by adoptive parents, but, you know, things weren`t going well with those adoptive parents. The mom divorced and had a new boyfriend Savannah didn`t like, so she asked if she can sort of come back and stay with her birth mom, Rebecca, and she was on this farm, and Rebecca had lots of complaints about Savannah`s behavior and said it was costing her lots of money. When I looked at that video of her in court, Linda, I didn`t see any tears. I didn`t see a mom who`s devastated that her daughter was found in a charred mess in a burn pit. Did I miss anything? Let`s show that video again of her in court. I don`t know if we can loop it again.</s>RUSSELL (via telephone): She seemed very calm, very comfortable. Wasn`t shy at all about asking the judge about her concerns. Yes, I didn`t see much emotion.</s>BANFIELD: So her brand-new husband who incidentally she married on the day the remains of her daughter were found, he was in the courtroom, wasn`t he?</s>RUSSELL (via telephone): Yes. He and a few other people were in the seats right behind the media. He was there. And afterwards, I caught him outside and he said, I have no comment for you.</s>BANFIELD: He said, I have no comment. Robert Peat Jr. said, I have no comment for you. Let`s be real clear to our audience. Robert Peat Jr., brand-new husband of this woman, has not been charged in this crime. And, you know, when it comes to crimes like this, there are loads of people under suspicion. We have no reason to believe he isn`t also under suspicion. But he hasn`t been charged yet. The authorities have said that they certainly could see more charges coming down the line, or more people coming down the line being charged with this. Why was she in a bulletproof vest? Is there like an incredible outrage in this community? Have there been threats made against her life or her safety?</s>RUSSELL (via telephone): You know, I actually don`t know that. The sheriff might know. My only thought was, well, perhaps that. I`m sure there are many, many people who are angered, so it might have been for that reason or it may have been just because the jail is a separate building from the courthouse.</s>BANFIELD: We see it. We see it a lot. It can be standard as well. I want to bring in Michael Williams. He is a firefighter with Theodosia Area Volunteer Fire Department. He not only worked with Rebecca Ruud, because she was with the Volunteer Fire Department, but he also knew and worked with Savannah Leckie, because as a 16-year-old, she also volunteered with the Fire Department. Michael, thanks for being with us. I want to ask you about a very strange occurrence that happened before Savannah disappeared or at least before we knew she disappeared. You were called out to her property, to Rebecca and Savannah`s home, and mom was saying, oh, geez, we`ve had a fire, and I got burned trying to move my chainsaw and my log splitter and my daughter got burned, too. But when you got there, what did you see?</s>MICHAEL WILLIAMS, FIREFIGHTER, THEODOSIA AREA VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT (via telephone): We just seen a small brush fire. Never seen Savannah. She was pointing everybody to where the fire was. And then that`s where I stayed. Until we got the fire out. We came down off the hill, me and a couple of other firefighters, asked if we could get some cold water. And her new husband went to take us down to the house and she is sure upset about it. She said Savannah was in their camper that they had there and taking a shower, cooling off. And there was no curtains. And at that time we thought nothing of it.</s>BANFIELD: And even though she said Savannah got burned, too, she did not offer to get her daughter out of that cool shower to get treatment and she sure wouldn`t let you guys see Savannah?</s>WILLIAMS (via telephone): Right.</s>BANFIELD: Did you suspect once you heard all of this, that that fire might have been the fire that killed Savannah?</s>WILLIAMS (via telephone): At the time, no.</s>BANFIELD: What about now?</s>WILLIAMS (via telephone): Honestly, I still don`t know. I mean, not being able to say we seen her, makes it kind of hard to say if she was even there alive then or not.</s>BANFIELD: Michael, I know that you were close to her. I know that your kids played with Savannah. I am so sorry for your loss. And I am so sorry you`re embroiled in all of this. I am thankful that you spoke with us, and I hope we get some justice for this 16-year-old beautiful child. No one deserves this. No one.</s>WILLIAMS (via telephone): No, they don`t.</s>BANFIELD: I want to take you to southeast Texas if I can tonight. There are hundreds of thousands of people who are -- they need your help. They are coping with catastrophic flooding from hurricane Harvey. There is an urgent need not only for these rescues, but for blood donations and tangible items like food and clothing. So please help out your fellow citizens. Go to cnn.com/impact and you can impact your world. You can change things. You can help. They need you big. They need all of us. I also want to tell you about a Houston police officer. That officer ended up trapped in a flood zone when he was on his way to help others. His trip to helping those others ended in tragedy because he drowned on his way to serve the people of Houston.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Once they got there, it was too treacherous to go under and look for him. So we made a decision to leave officers there waiting until the morning, because as much as we wanted to recover him last night, we could not put more officers at risk. It will be a recovery mission.