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Ex-Prince Andrew Arrested Amid Epstein Files Revelations; Colin Gray in Trial for Georgia Shooting; Fulton Co: DOJ Misled Judge Before Elections Office Search. Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired February 19, 2026 - 10:30   ET

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

[10:30:00]

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: We've seen more fallout abroad over these Epstein-related revelations compared to here in the United States. Do you expect that to change?

ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST AND FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTOR: That's a wonderful question. It's hard to know, Wolf. It's -- you know, what I find fascinating there in the U.K. is that he, at least as being investigated, not for any sex crimes, right? It's crimes that are connected to his relationship, or at least supposed relationship, with Jeffrey Epstein.

It's interesting that this comes the day after all these revelations about Les Wexner, the billionaire in the United States, because of the fact that so much there was about his personal contact with Jeffrey Epstein, the financial entanglements, and so on. I would think that before anyone starts going down the road of prosecuting sex crimes, it's these other personal relationships that are going to come to light, because you begin to see just how broad Jeffrey Epstein's contacts were with people, the financial entanglements and so on.

But it's a remarkable question. Why is it that we have not seen more investigations now? To some extent, there are statute of limitations questions in the United States that may not apply overseas. It's just simply hard to prosecute things that happened 10 or 15 years ago.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: And remind us how we got here.

SALLY BEDELL SMITH, CNN ROYAL COMMENTATOR: We got here. Well, it's been a long road. But I think Andrew has just -- it's just become more and more clear that Andrew is deeply entangled with Epstein. And I think what got everybody -- the women were obviously, I mean, it was an egregious thing. He denies it. But we've had photographs. We've had Ghislaine Maxwell evidently confirming that the photograph of him with Virginia was real, when he's been saying it for years that it isn't. We don't know if she's a reliable narrator.

But I think it's -- this is a very focused investigation at the moment. It is focused on his allegedly passing confidential information to Jeffrey Epstein, which in fact is a crime. And, you know, and it carries a heavy sentence. So, he's being questioned. Whether they will prosecute him, whether he will end up in jail, I mean, it would be an astonishing development. And it would -- I mean, it would definitely have an impact on the royal family, certainly on his older brother, who I'm sure has tried to do the best he could with him over the years.

But then he realized the magnitude of what Andrew evidently has done. And I think, I mean, one thing he might have to do right now is give a national address. You know, I think the queen has done this a few times. And I'm not sure if it's premature to do that if you don't know what all the evidence is. But he, you know, I think that could maybe calm people down. But in the end, I think, well, we don't know.

I mean, it may just so cast a shadow over his reign. I mean, there are mechanisms like a regency where he could step aside, basically, and William could become the regent. William is completely clear he doesn't like his uncle. He hasn't had much to do with him.

BROWN: Right.

SMITH: And I think he's been very tough behind the scenes in pushing his father to do something. And Charles made a very strong statement saying he supported the investigation. Nobody's above the law. William said something very similar.

BROWN: Right. We'll see how this unfolds. Thank you so much, Sally and Elliot. We appreciate it. Wolf.

BLITZER: And just ahead, more testimony in the trial of a father whose son opened fire inside a Georgia high school. The haunting new images from that truly terrifying day.

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[10:35:00]

BLITZER: Happening now. Jurors in the Colin Gray trial are listening to testimony now for the fourth day. Colin Gray is the man charged with murder and manslaughter after his teen son, Colt, carried out a mass shooting back in 2024 inside his Georgia high school. We've heard hours of incredibly graphic testimony, including from the officer who came face-to-face with Colt Gray only moments after he opened fire.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SGT. DONOVAN BOYD, BARROW COUNTY, GEORGIA SHERIFF'S OFFICE: Once we got pretty close to Colt, we were able to see that he was a student. The AR was down in front of him. He was compliant. We were able to get him down while Deputy King covered him with lethal cover. I proceeded to handcuff him and do a search and pat down for weapons and anything else. While doing that, I was able to take multiple full magazines for the AR-15 out of his pockets and kind of secure those out of the way.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: And we want to warn our viewers, some of the images you're about to see are very disturbing. Jurors were shown images of the AR- 15 style rifle used in the shooting and the magazines full of ammunition the shooter had on him. [10:40:00]

Jurors also saw a 3D scan of the hallways and the classrooms, which appears to show the path Colt Gray took during his rampage. It shows classrooms in disarray with desks and chairs overturned.

Let's go to CNN's Jean Casares right now. Jean, incredible evidence presented at the trial yesterday. We'll get to see those pictures in just a moment. But there were also some truly shocking revelations in court this morning, right?

JEAN CASARES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. It was just a short time ago. And the Barrow County sheriff deputy took the stand. And on that day, after the shooting had taken place, his assignment was to go to the home of Colt Gray. So, he and another deputy went out to the home. And there was the father, now defendant, Colin Gray. And they approached him. And it's from a body cam.

But I listened very closely to what the father was saying. And I did not hear them say there'd been a shooting, but I heard him say, my daughter contacted me. She said there's a lockdown at the school and then something to the point of, oh, my God. And then he said, I'm trying to get him into counseling. He didn't fit in last year at high school. So, I was trying to do online school. We brought him back into normal school this year. It was going OK. I reached out. Hey, have you got counselors at that school? We want him to check in. Asked the other day for a third-party counselor to get involved and basically to give him permission to intervene in all this.

This is prosecution evidence because it is the state of mind of the father that there was a known risk that his son could execute a shooting like this. This right here helps the prosecution because it shows he knew there was an issue, knew there was an issue to the point that he was asking for counselors to intervene. Defense can use that, too, although there was no cross-examination. They can use it by saying he was trying to do what he could do.

But what you're looking at right there, that video, never seen anything like it. It was a laser made video from digital technology, but showing the actual classroom and the desk turned over and turned around in the barricades of the desk. And this goes toward the child cruelty counts because prosecutors must show beyond a reasonable doubt with those elements that there was extreme physical pain and mental pain and have to tell you very quickly, 36 shots at a minimum were fired that day. There were unused cartridges of 67 unused cartridges. And Colt Gray, according to testimony, brought 103 bullets to school that morning.

BLITZER: So, eerie, that video that we've been showing. Jean Casares, thank you very, very much, Pamela.

BROWN: All right. Wolf, happening now, investigators are reviewing, quote, "thousands of hours" of video from the greater Tucson area in an effort to find 84-year-old Nancy Guthrie, the missing mother of NBC Today show host Savannah Guthrie. The Pima County Sheriff's Office recently announced none of the DNA samples tested in the case so far have flagged any matches in the FBI's criminal database. CNN's Randi Kaye takes us inside a lab to show us how DNA is analyzed.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I brought with me this t-shirt so you could show us how you would extract a sample if there is some DNA on here. So, what would you do?

NATHAN LENTS, PROFESSOR OF BIOLOGY, JOHN JAY COLLEGE OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND FORENSIC DNA EXPERT: We would want only the DNA from that blood if possible, not contaminated with DNA around it. And then we would also do a separate swab around it so that if there is DNA from the victim, we have a nice clean profile that we can subtract if we have a mixed sample.

We open it like this, and we're careful. You see, I'm opening it away from myself.

KAYE: With gloves on.

LENTS: With gloves, always with gloves. And you would take this out. And you see there's a cotton swab inside that tube. So, that cotton swab is extra protected, just like this. And that would be all you need. You do not need to collect very much.

KAYE: So, this is what's called the biological safety cabinet. What goes on in here?

LENTS: I will open this back up. And I'll expose. And just the tip is all we need because if you remember, we only touch the tip to the evidence. We would open up our tube here and just simply cut off the extreme end. And if I did my job well, this will be right there in the bottom. You see that little cotton swab?

KAYE: Yes.

LENTS: And the DNA of interest will be there. Now, we need to extract that DNA.

KAYE (voice-over): After the extraction, the sample is heated up in what's called a heated shaker.

LENTS: What we collect is actually cells, intact cells. And they could be blood cells, skin cells, whatever it is, the DNA is still in there. So, we need to release it so that we can then extract it and analyze it. You can see that this will circulate the solution to help release the DNA.

[10:45:00]

KAYE (voice-over): Next up, this thermal cycler, which makes billions of copies of the DNA sample in order to analyze very specific regions.

LENTS: The clone PCR test will hit start.

KAYE: How much do you need? LENTS: We can get a full profile from, you know, sub-nanograms, so picogram amounts. I think the smallest I've ever seen a full profile come from is about 100 picograms. And that represents about four human cells.

KAYE: Wow.

LENTS: Very, very little. So, we can get a full profile.

KAYE (voice-over): Then finally, answers from this genetic analyzer, which examines and sequences fragments of the DNA.

LENTS: Put the samples into this plate. And what this is going to do is a small capillary will come in and suck out the sample one at a time and send it through a matrix that is designed to separate the pieces based on their size. It's so accurate that a single nucleotide, a single base pair difference can be easily discriminated by this machine.

KAYE (voice-over): After all that, this is what the DNA profile looks like.

LENTS: If they match every single position, the search would come up positive and it would say, here's where your hit was, contact this crime lab and ask them for more information. Because the database does not contain identifying information.

KAYE: So, they would have to match all of these genes, this entire profile?

LENTS: All of them. Even one being different is enough to eliminate a suspect.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: And our thanks to Randi Kaye for that report. Wolf.

BLITZER: Also coming up, serious omissions. Weeks after election ballots were seized from a Georgia office, local officials accused the U.S. Justice Department of misleading the judge who approved the search warrant. We'll talk with one of the people trying to get those ballots back. That's next.

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[10:50:00]

BROWN: The Georgia State Election Board has reconvened this morning after holding its first meeting since the FBI search and seizure of 2020 election ballots. This comes as officials in Fulton County say the Justice Department made, quote, "serious omissions" and misled the judge who approved that search warrant. In a court filing, officials say the FBI's application, quote, "does nothing more than describe the types of human errors that its own sources confirm occur in almost every election without any intentional wrongdoing whatsoever." With us now is Damon Hewitt. He is the president and executive director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. And he's been fighting to get those ballots back. Good morning to you. So, these filing claims that the Justice Department made these serious omissions of the application the FBI filed to obtain a search warrant. What are those omissions?

DAMON HEWITT, PRESIDENT, LAWYERS' COMMITTEE FOR CIVIL RIGHTS UNDER LAW: Well, it seems like this affidavit was based upon the same type of baseless allegations, the conjecture, the speculation, the kind of things that have been debunked time and time again.

You know, we at the Lawyers' Committee represented groups in about 15 actions after the 2020 election and a few days and weeks after where we beat back these efforts to try to overturn legitimate election results based upon these allegations of fraud. There's really no evidence that we're aware of any fraud. So, it seems like a recycle and a retread.

BROWN: So, if this is just a recycle of claims that have been debunked, why do you think the magistrate judge signed off on it?

HEWITT: Well, you know, we're not in the magistrate's chair, but what Fulton County seems to be alleging is that somehow this magistrate has been misled. And so, when you take a look at the affidavit on its face, it's short on specifics, quite frankly. It's big on hyperbole from what we can see. And so, it's difficult to understand exactly why.

But look, here's the thing. We're not here necessarily to second guess the magistrate. What we're more concerned about is DOJ and FBI's motivations, given that DOJ has sued 24 states and the District of Columbia seeking access to voter rolls. It seems like a way to circumvent that civil process and try to use its criminal investigatory authority to try to get the same information for what purposes we don't know.

BROWN: A federal judge will hold a hearing next week on the county's request that those materials be returned. What is your biggest concern when it comes to the handling of those materials?

HEWITT: Our biggest concern is that information that includes addresses, social security numbers, even information about how individual people voted. It's almost like it's in this information. It's almost as if DOJ is stepping into the voting booth with people and taking notes on everything about them after the fact. Nobody wants that. Frankly, nobody trusts that, Trump administration or not, but especially with this administration.

That's why our emergency petition has requested the return of the data, but also a protective provision, a protective order to make sure the data can't be used for all kinds of other purposes of this administration. Immigration enforcement, voter purges, calling into question voter eligibility, what have you.

BROWN: Are you concerned all of this could have a chilling effect on voters come the midterms?

HEWITT: We are very concerned, you know, whether it be deployment of ICE and CBP in people's communities, whether it be these rampant efforts to suppress the vote before election day or efforts to challenge votes after election day is designed, frankly, to frustrate people, to make it less likely that they will cast a ballot and certainly more less likely that the ballots will be counted after they are cast. So, we're very much worried. We saw that in 2024. We may see it again.

[10:55:00]

BROWN: When you say rampant efforts to suppress the vote before, what do you mean specifically by that?

HEWITT: Well, we mean a combination of state action and private activity. Voter suppression bills that have swept all over the country, efforts by political parties, including the RNC, to purge voters even close to the election day, federal election day, which is prohibited by federal law. This kind of efforts, which we believe are coordinated, are designed to ensure that fewer people vote or at least fewer people of a certain kind vote so that certain candidates can win.

BROWN: Damon Hewitt, thank you for coming on. We appreciate you coming on to share your perspective. Wolf.

HEWITT: Thank you.

BLITZER: And, Pamela, coming up, Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear joins us in the Situation Room as dozens of his fellow governors gather here in Washington this week. Why he says he's not, repeat, not going to their meeting.

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