More Charges In Adam Mayes Kidnapping; John Edwards Trial
KAYE: Welcome back, everyone. Two young girls are back with their dad this morning following a terrifying ordeal. Two weeks after Alexandria and Kyliyah Bain disappeared from their Tennessee home, police found them in Mississippi where their kidnapper had them hiding in the woods. Their rescue ended the nationwide manhunt for Adam Mayes. He's also blamed for killing the girls' mother and older sister. Mayes took his life as police closed in.</s>AARON FORD, FBI SPECIAL AGENT: Mayes pulled a semiautomatic pistol from his waist band and shot himself in the head and was later pronounced dead at a local hospital. Other agents moved in to rescue Kyliyah and Alexandria who were lying on the ground nearby. The girls were hungry, thirsty and dehydrated.</s>KAYE: And criminal defense attorney and former prosecutor, Holly Hughes is here with us. So let's talk about this case. I want to talk about the John Edwards case with you too in a moment. But you have Mayes dead. You have his wife charged with two counts of first degree murder. His mother also charged in this case, conspiracy to commit especially aggravated kidnapping. Where does this go from here? Does this even get to trial?</s>HOLLY HUGHES, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I think we'll probably see that the wife, Teresa, will take a plea and the mother may force it all the way to trial. That's Mary, the mother of the dead fellow here, because we know for a fact that the wife, Teresa, is the one who gave statements to the police. Now that she's hired a lawyer, it's after the fact. She's already said what she said, so they're stuck with this confession, as it were, where she admits to participating in these crimes.</s>KAYE: She said she was actually in the garage when Mayes killed Mrs. Bain and her oldest daughter.</s>HUGHES: Exactly. And then, not only that, but then where you get the additional charges is she transports these dead bodies and the two little live girls who are still, thank God, we found alive. They all ride together in that vehicle. And it's important to note, too, I think a lot of people think how do you kidnap a dead body? But interestingly enough, if you force the mother and the older daughter from the kitchen into the garage, that's where the kidnapping lies. If you move anybody the slightest distance against their will, that's the kidnapping. So that's why four kidnapping charges.</s>KAYE: So what would be her defense, though? If she goes on trial, the wife in this case, because she has admitted to all of this.</s>HUGHES: She has.</s>KAYE: She said she was there and she helped.</s>HUGHES: What she has said also is that she was scared. She was in fear for her life, that Adam Mayes threatened her, threatened to kill her.</s>KAYE: He can't defend that, obviously.</s>HUGHES: That's exactly right. We've also heard her sister, Bobbi, had done an interview and said that perhaps intimated maybe she's a little mentally challenged, maybe she suffers from some type of disability, so we might see like a diminished capacity defense as well as a fear. I was in fear, I was under duress because he threatened to kill me if I didn't help him.</s>KAYE: Let's talk about John Edwards, that's also getting a lot of attention this week. The prosecution rested. The defense is picking it up. Edwards' team is now asking the judge to dismiss the case against him, saying that the prosecution didn't prove anything.</s>HUGHES: Right.</s>KAYE: Is that common?</s>HUGHES: Absolutely.</s>KAYE: Will they have any luck with that?</s>HUGHES: No. That's the bottom line right now. It happens in every criminal trial. Basically what you're saying to the judge is the prosecution always has the burden, proof beyond a reasonable doubt. So at that halfway point when the state says, OK, that's all we have, the state rests. That's when you go to the judge and say they didn't give enough to the jury to even have a question about reasonable doubt. So we're saying, judge, you just need to direct a verdict. You need to say not enough evidence. Reasonable minds couldn't even differ about this, happens in every trial. It's also denied in almost every trial.</s>KAYE: Rielle Hunter, we've talked about her, the mistress in this case.</s>HUGHES: Yes.</s>KAYE: There was a lot being made that she was going to take the stand. The prosecution never called her. Do you think that was a mistake?</s>HUGHES: No, they don't need her. Basically what they're alleging is that John Edwards did something illegal with the campaign contributions that were given to him, i.e. instead of using them to finance his campaign, he used them to hide his pregnant mistress. They don't need her to testify to anything, because at this point, it's all about the money trail. And quite frankly, based on what we've seen and some of her behaviors of the past, she's a bit of a loose cannon and I don't think the prosecution wanted to take a chance.</s>KAYE: It might have been risky.</s>HUGHES: It would have definitely been risky.</s>KAYE: So if you were heading up his defense team, come Monday what is the top priority? What is the best thing, strongest thing they can come out of the gate with?</s>HUGHES: There's two things they're going to need to do. They're going to need to acknowledge that my client might be a cad. He might have cheated on his wife when she was terminally ill. However, he did not knowingly participate in this scheme to defraud his investors, so to speak. So they're going to have to bring up witnesses who will say I -- you know, John Edwards didn't know, he didn't participate and that may be Edwards himself. He might take the stand and say, hey, you know what, I didn't deal with the money. I'm the guy in front of the cameras. I hire other people to do that. If they did something with it --</s>KAYE: It's going to be a tough challenge because the prosecution had all those people saying that he did know, that he was in the room and he heard these conversations.</s>HUGHES: That's exactly right. Yes, exactly.</s>KAYE: So it's going to be really interesting to see who the jury believes.</s>HUGHES: A fine line about knowingly participating.</s>KAYE: All right. Holly, thank you.</s>HUGHES: Great, thanks, Randi.</s>KAYE: Mitt Romney takes his bid for president to one of the nation's largest Christian universities this morning and it is causing some controversy. Will students welcome him or will they walk out? We'll have a live report from the campus of Liberty University.