Court Halts Key Civil Rights Law
BURNETT: Our second story, OUTFRONT, quote, "our country has changed" with those four words, Chief Justice John Roberts and four other Supreme Court justices struck down a key part of the voting rights act of 1965. Roberts cited census data that show this. The data showed that black voter turnout now exceeds white voter turnout in five of the six states that were originally covered by the voting rights act. The Obama administration quickly expressed its disappointment with the ruling.</s>ERIC HOLDER, U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: I am deeply disappointed, deeply disappointed with the court's decision in this matter. This decision represents a serious setback for voting rights and has the potential to negatively affect millions of Americans across the country.</s>BURNETT: All right, what does this ruling mean for the civil rights movement? Our senior legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin is here. All right, Jeff, so they cite the census data, saying look, essentially the Voting Rights Act worked. We've got voter turnout</s>JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Well, I think they're very different. I do think they really kind of punted on affirmative action case. They didn't really want to deal with it. They're leaving the status quo more or less intact for the short term. The Voting Rights Act is very different. That is a very big deal. The Voting Rights Act changed America like almost no law in history. And one of the key parts of it was, they said, look, this part of the country, essentially, the South can not be trusted to enforce the law. So we are essentially going to -- we are going to make you come to Washington when you want to do anything, any sort of change, and we are going to have to approve it first. That process is called pre- clearance. That is now over. They say they kicked it back to Congress. But this Congress, Republican House, is never going pass the Voting Rights Act again. So this is now over.</s>BURNETT: But when they say the country has changed, obviously some things about it, abhorrently, have not. But some things have. It looks like voter turnout in the South is among them. So why should they have to get pre-clearance?</s>TOOBIN: Hovering over this whole case is an African-American president of the United States. Something that was so unthinkable in 1965 that it wasn't even something that people contemplated. So that is a big part of this case. But if you look at the statistics of who actually runs these states, and who makes the decisions about voting, and especially in recent years, you've seen so many efforts at voter suppression aimed largely at African-Americans and low income people that's what the civil rights community is so worried about about the fallout of what this may be. And you have already seen in Mississippi, in Alabama, in Texas, local officials saying we are changing the laws, and they're all in a direction to make it harder to vote.</s>BURNETT: Fascinating. And of course, gerrymandering happens.</s>TOOBIN: Yes indeed.</s>BURNETT: All over the country.</s>TOOBIN: All over the country. And that's -- and that now, the Justice Department will have to step in aggressively instead of having it come to them as a matter of course.</s>BURNETT: All right. Well thank you very much, Jeffrey Toobin. Of course, let us know what you think about this hugely significant move out of the Supreme Court. Well now to the trial of accused Boston mob boss Whitey Bulger. Today it took a personal turn. There was testimony from relatives of some of his alleged murder victims. One widow giving testimony about the last time she saw her husband. He was headed to meet up with Winter Hill, which was Bulger's alleged criminal gang. But he never came home. Deb Feyerick is OUTFRONT. As you know, she has been in the courtroom covering this trial. Deb, this victim also had ties to showbiz royalty. I mean, this case just gets stranger and stranger.</s>DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, you know, it really is, Erin. And what is a mob trial without at least one reference to mafia darling Frank Sinatra? Today, one of the 19 victims Bulger allegedly killed was the nightclub owner Richard Castucci. Castucci was golf buddies with Sammy Davis Jr. And when Sammy got married, Castucci met Frank Sinatra, who was also at the wedding. Now, the photo was introduced to day in court. And the widow of the nightclub owner sobbed audibly and there was a huge, pregnant pause in the courtroom today. She testified, as you mentioned, that the last time she saw her husband alive, he told her he was on his way to meet with the Bulger gang. She never saw him again. It is important because a couple years ago, she filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the FBI and was awarded $2 million because she was able to show the FBI -- a crooked agent provided Bulger information that her husband was informing. And that's when Bulger allegedly had husband killed. So that was a key piece of testimony that the jury heard today, Erin.</s>BURNETT: And Deb, before you go, yesterday you were talking about how Bulger was muttering under his breath with the f word, I'm not an f informant. I'm not - he was very agitated about the government's witnesses saying he was. Did he have reaction today?</s>FEYERICK: He was much less agitated today. One of the reasons is because his defense lawyer was the one in charge of the questioning. Part of their strategy is to basically look at his 700-page FBI informant file and try to convince the jury that in fact all of it was fabricated. That it was this crooked FBI agent who was basically taking bits and pieces of information and basically putting it into a file that was supposed to be Bulger's. Well, there's a lot of evidence to the contrary. A lot of information that Bulger indeed was an informant. But what they're really trying to do is they did get a federal investigator today to acknowledge that he did not verify each piece of information individually. But also they got him to acknowledge that in fact parts of the file were likely falsified. Not the parts when Bulger is talking about other people's criminal activity, simply when he is talking about his own criminal activity and that involved his relationship with this crooked FBI agent, Erin.</s>BURNETT: All right. Thank you very much. Deb Feyerick, covering that trial. And still to come, the latest developments from the George Zimmerman trial tonight. This afternoon, the jury saw some very graphic photos of Trayvon's body. Plus, a flight from Zurich was - well, had $1.2 million on it, they say. But when the flight landed in New York, the money was gone. Clues next. And your digital life may be killing you. Proof of what your cell phone is doing to your brain right now.