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Feds Charge Two Men In Alleged $1.3 Million Romance-Investment Scheme; 570-Plus Dead, 1,900-Plus Missing In Catastrophic Nepal-China Floods; Jury Deliberations Underway In Lindsay Clancy Trial; President Trump Speaks To Astronauts On International Space Station; ATC Audio Shows Air Traffic Control Struggling To Reach Marine One Again; Closing Arguments In Tupac Shakur Murder Trial To Begin Monday. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired August 28, 2026 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

ERIC O'NEILL, FORMER FBI COUNTERINTELLIGENCE OPERATIVE: Make sure you verify, and that can just be having a friend come in and look over your shoulder and say, hey, there's no way that guy is reaching out to you. Two, if there is urgency, if someone pushes you with urgency to invest, to give them your money, always take a breath. I call it the 10-second rule, O'Neill's 10-second rule. Take 10 seconds away from that situation to just breathe and think, and you can sometimes spot the scam.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": Quite the off- season for the 49ers. Eric O'Neill, thank you so much. Appreciate the expertise.

A new hour of "CNN News Central" starts right now.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CO-ANCHOR OF "CNN NEWS CENTRAL": Day two of deliberations in the murder trial of Lindsay Clancy, the jurors requesting another look at some key evidence. We'll tell you what they wanted to see.

Plus, a desperate search. Rescue operations underway in Nepal as we're getting more video showing the scope of the devastation from that deadly flood disaster.

And takeoff troubles, a report reveals communications issues occurred between air traffic control and Marine One for the second time this month. We're following these major developing stories and many more, all coming in right here to "CNN News Central."

SANCHEZ: We start this hour with families desperately waiting for answers following that devastating flash flood in Nepal and China. Officials say nearly 600 have been killed. More than 1,900 are still missing two days after the disaster. That number includes 90 missing Americans, according to the U.S. State Department, leaving families back home frustrated, exhausted, and heartbroken while they wait.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SNEHA SUDHIR, HUSBAND MISSING IN NEPAL: I don't know. So it's 48 hours. What are they -- where are they, right? So, of course, you will see that the family is supporting me, but everybody is taking turns and shedding their tears, wiping it off, and getting back to work.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: Rescue teams are plodding through thick mud, which overwhelmed remote villages, in hopes of finding survivors. Authorities are also closely monitoring two newly formed lakes created by the floods, which pose a potential new deluge threat.

Joining us now is Ben Ayers. He's a Journalist with Outside Magazine who's been based in Nepal for more than 20 years. He's also the co- host of the "Everest Live" podcast.

Ben, thanks for being with us. Again, nearly 2,000 people missing right now. What's the latest you're hearing about the effort to locate them?

BEN AYERS, JOURNALIST, OUTSIDE MAGAZINE: Well, it's all hands on deck right now in Nepal. The sort of recovery and rescue operations are all being run through the Nepali government, and they've mobilized the army and the police. There's been some outside assistance in terms of rescue experts coming in to help with the planning.

But right now, there's about 13,000 rescuers that have been mobilized by the government. They're all on location, trying to help, you know, take advantage of this golden hour, these first few days after the accident, when people have the highest chance of survival.

SANCHEZ: I've seen reports that some rescue and relief efforts had to be delayed because there was risk of additional flooding, especially in summertime. It's especially wet there. What challenges are rescuers telling you that they're facing?

AYERS: There's a long list of the challenges. These rescuers are working in truly extraordinary conditions. They're making truly heroic efforts to save lives.

Well, what you mentioned, you know, some of the dangers that people who are in the river corridor are facing is, as you mentioned in the beginning, these lakes that seem to be forming near where the glacier initially fell off the north side of this mountain called Langtang Lirung. Those glaciers, there's unofficial reports that one of those lakes is starting to release the water, which is great news.

But you don't know, there could be another flooding event that happens if the volume of these temporary lakes gets too big for the dirt and mud to hold it in place. That could sweep down the valley, taking the rescuers with it.

The other major challenge is that all communications infrastructure, all electricity, and all actually access to the areas that are affected by the floods have been cut off. This was such a massive event that all the roads, everything is completely gone. So rescuers have to travel in and out by helicopter or on foot.

And these are all just some of the challenges that they face, you know, and everyone's watching the clock. You know, every hour that goes by, unfortunately makes, you know, recovering people alive less and less likely.

SANCHEZ: This is some of the most mountainous terrain on earth and the scale is just impressive. I wonder if you could describe for us, outside of this tragedy, what it's like to be in that area and what draws so many people to it.

[14:05:00]

AYERS: Yeah, the Himalayas have always occupied a big place and, you know, in the imagination of people from around the world. This particular valley is an ancient trading route that goes from Nepal up into the Chinese border into, you know, the area historically known as Tibet. And it's one of the most spectacular places on the planet.

You really can't describe the scale and the height and the size of the mountains until you go there and see it yourself. It's truly something that if you haven't been there, you can't even fathom that the world could look like this. That draws in climbers.

It's also Nepal is known for its people and it's very welcoming and open society and community. So a lot of people go there, they go for the mountains, but then they end up making friends and they make a real deep connection with the country and the people there, which is very, you know, akin to my story and why I've spent, you know, my whole adult life living there.

But also, you know, Nepal is known for being a very religious and sort of spiritual place. And a lot of the missing tourists there, I think in the last count, you know, there's something about, you know, there's something around over 700 tourists are missing right now. Many of them were on a religious pilgrimage to a sacred mountain in Tibet. And this is the shortest way to get up into that pilgrimage area that many of them were going for the recent full moon.

So you have a variety of reasons that people travel to Nepal. But it's something that many, many people who go want to go right back.

SANCHEZ: Yeah, no doubt. And certainly can imagine that neither the residents of Nepal nor the people visiting imagine that they would be confronted with something of this magnitude. Ben Ayers, thank you so much for sharing your perspective with us.

AYERS: That's my pleasure. Thanks for the opportunity.

SANCHEZ: Of course. Brianna?

KEILAR: Just hours into deliberations, the jury in the Lindsay Clancy murder trial is asking the judge to see evidence again. Specifically, they want to see Lindsay Clancy's prescription pill bottles and also a knife. During her suicide attempt, Clancy used a kitchen knife to cut herself before jumping out of a second floor window. A jury of nine women and three men are weighing whether postpartum psychosis led Clancy to kill her three young children.

CNN's Jean Casarez is live just outside of court in Plymouth, Massachusetts. And Jean, you just spoke with Lindsay Clancy's defense lawyer. Tell us what he told you.

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, I asked him in regard to these prescription pill bottles, because we do know that Mr. Reddington and Patrick Clancy, about the day after this happened, they were at the house. So she got a criminal attorney very quickly and they went up to the bedroom. And in the nightstand, in the drawer, was a plastic bag filled with pill bottles.

And so the jury requested prescription pill bottles today. But there was another point of time in the trial that the prosecution brought out prescription pill bottles that had been collected after Patrick Clancy took them to officials. But this was a bag. It was a paper bag. It was put on the witness stand. And the prosecutor took the pill bottles out and listed them, what they were.

But Lindsay Clancy had only taken a couple of pills out of each bottle. So the bulk of the prescription was still there. Anyway, Mr. Reddington, when I asked him, you know, did they want those two in the paper bag that Patrick had? He said they wanted all of them.

So that's what he told me. So obviously, these prescription pill bottles, wherever they were, ones that were collected, ones that were not, the jury wants to see them. And you know, it could be -- we have heard about so many medications that were given to her. Some she took, some she didn't. Some she stopped after only a few pills. But the names they're saying, the brand name and the generic name intermittently, and it gets to be very confusing. So that was the one thing they want. We don't know why they wanted that.

But the other is a knife or the knife, because there's only been one knife in this trial. And it is the knife that came from the kitchen on January 24, 2023. It is the knife that Lindsay Clancy took upstairs to the bedroom, conceivably after she killed her children and began her suicide attempt. Now, we know that knife. You've probably seeing pictures of it. It does have some blood on it.

We do know that there was a lot of blood in that bedroom. One point that was made near the end of the trial, that the blood on the knife and the blood on the floor were droplets, not spatter. And if it was spatter, that would be that someone else conceivably could have been involved in a knife with Lindsay Clancy trying to take her life.

But I think it was established in the evidence that this was Lindsay alone that was trying to take her own life.

[14:10:00]

KEILAR: Yeah. You also have some new reporting about a prosecution witness.

CASAREZ: Right. We have just learned -- we have confirmed Dr. Avram Mack, who was a rebuttal witness for the prosecution, took the stand earlier this week, board-certified in forensic psychology, psychiatry. He had taken the stand. He was affiliated with a children's hospital out of Delaware. He has resigned. We do not know why he has resigned, but I can tell you from the evidence, all of the prosecution's expert witnesses believed that Lindsay Clancy had a bipolar 2 disorder that had been undiagnosed. This was the lone physician that did not believe that. He felt it was a major depressive episode that became a major depressive diagnosis. That was his testimony.

Everyone else for the prosecution said bipolar 2, and he was -- it was confrontational on cross-examination, I will say.

KEILAR: Yeah, no doubt. Jean Casarez, we are watching this along with you, waiting. Thank you for the report.

Still to come, another communications problem involving Marine One, the helicopter, of course, the president travels on. And this is coming just weeks after there was a similar incident. We'll tell you what happened this time.

Then later, updated COVID-19 vaccines get FDA approval. What you need to know about the shots, and when they'll be available. We have that and much more coming up on "CNN News Central."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:16:09]

SANCHEZ: Moments ago, President Trump left Texas, but not before making an out-of-this-world call. While visiting the Johnson Space Center, where he earlier announced the creation of a space academy, he spoke by phone to the astronauts on the International Space Station. Here was that moment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Well, this is a great honor. To be with you is a great honor, and I just want to thank Jessica and Neil Jack. Great Americans, great patriots, brave people. I wouldn't do it, I will tell you right now.

I hate to admit it, I would not want to do it. But some people love it more than anything, and you have amazing courage.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: Pretty easy to communicate with the International Space Station, not so much with the president's chopper.

KEILAR: Yeah, that's right. Another communications incident with the president's helicopter, Marine One, and it's prompting questions about the changes made since a similar episode happened just a few weeks ago. So once again, Air Traffic Control at Reagan National Airport, which is just down the Potomac River from -- not too far from the White House, it struggled to reach the pilot of Marine One.

And this happened yesterday as the helicopter was preparing to depart. SANCHEZ: Controllers had to use other pilots to reach the helicopter. As CNN Aviation Correspondent, Pete Muntean reports, Air Traffic Control audio captured all of this confusion.

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: That Air Traffic Control audio lays out the communication problems between the tower at Reagan National Airport and the president's helicopter have not been fixed. The very same scenario on August 4 triggered Marine One getting too close to a departing commercial flight and led to an investigation by the NTSB.

Good radio communication is key. Ever since last year's tragic midair collision of an Army helicopter and landing commercial flight that killed 67 people, Marine One usually radios the control tower at Reagan National Airport to stop departing flights just before lifting off from the White House. And here's more of that new Air Traffic Control audio in which the pilots of Marine One spend about four minutes trying to reach the tower to no avail and the Air Traffic Controller in the tower must ultimately rely on other helicopters flying nearby to relay the message. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOWER: Do me a favor, I can't hear Marine One. If you hear Marine One, can you let me know?

AIRCRAFT: Affirm, we have positive comms with Marine One.

TOWER: Marine One, are you trying to reach me?

MARINE ONE: Affirm, national tower, Marine One, proceeding as briefed with momentary delay.

TOWER: Marine One, roger, there's helicopter traffic.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MUNTEAN: The FAA in a new statement clearly referring to that relay maneuver, saying the usual three minutes to lift off notification was, quote, "communicated by alternate means." The FAA also insists it responded to the previous incident by relocating radio antennas, but this is maybe the most interesting part.

The National Transportation Safety Board said during the first incident, Marine One was lifting off from a different location at the White House due to the construction taking place there and that may have hampered radio reception. Now, following this new incident, the White House released a statement saying it will work with all agencies to make sure the president is safe. Back to you.

KEILAR: All right, thanks to Pete for that report.

Still to come, it's the final stretch in the 2pac murder trial after the defense rests its case. What to expect during closing arguments next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:24:02]

SANCHEZ: After nine days of testimony, attorneys in the Tupac Shakur murder trial have finalized jury instructions after the defense for Duane Davis rested its case on Thursday. The defense's case consisted of just three witnesses, lasting fewer than 90 minutes. Closing arguments are set to begin on Monday.

Let's get the latest from CNN National Correspondent, Nick Watt. Nick, the case seemed to move much faster than expected. Take us through how yesterday's testimony went and how it ended.

NICK WATT, CNN U.S. NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Much faster, Boris. As you said, about 90 minutes for the entire defense presentation. Three witnesses, all ex-cops, two of whom were working at Suge Knight's house the night that 2pac was killed, or outside Suge Knight's house.

And the third was this guy, Dan Long, who was a former homicide detective. Now, he was involved in interviewing "Keffe D" Duane Davis, back in 2009, and he thought that he should be charged with 2pac's murder back then, but the D.A. said, no, we don't have enough.

[14:25:00]

So take a quick listen to one of the exchanges that Dan Long, this former homicide detective, had in court yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JUDGE CARLI KIERNY, CLARK COUNTY DISTRICT JUDGE: Were you able to verify and confirm Mr. Davis was actually in the white Cadillac the night of 2pac's murder?

DAN LONG, FORMER HOMICIDE DETECTIVE: By Mr. Davis telling me that he was in the white Cadillac on the night of the murder, and that the shooting came from that same white Cadillac.

KIERNY: Any follow-up based on that, Mr. Sanft?

MICHAEL SANFT, DUANE DAVIS' ATTORNEY: But no actual facts outside of what Mr. Davis told you?

LONG: No.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WATT: So, what you saw there, the judge was asking the question. In Nevada, they have this system where the jury can ask questions of witnesses while they're on the stand. They get asked through the judge, so that's what's happening there. And it also encapsulates the main issue with this case.

So, the prosecution is using Keffe D's own words in books and media appearances in which he lays out his involvement in the killing of Tupac Shakur. But nobody can really corroborate what he's saying. And the main central plank of his defense is that Keffe D was making it up. He was exaggerating, boasting, maybe trying to earn some money from books.

So that is what this boils down to. We're going to have closing arguments Monday, then the jury gets this, and the jury will have to decide. Was Keffe D telling the truth when he said he was the shot caller who called the shot on Tupac Shakur? Boris?

SANCHEZ: Quite an interesting case from a legal perspective, aside from --

WATT: Yeah.

SANCHEZ: -- all the history that's involved. Nick Watt, thank you so much for bringing us that report.

Still to come, troubled waters. President Trump's move to rename Lake Ontario "Lake America" could create some political headwinds ahead of the midterms. We'll explain why in just moments.

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