April 17, 2006 – CBS Weekend Roundup – Gordon Skene Sound Collection –
April 17, 2006 – A Sunday 11 years ago. And a day to look back at the events of the week. On this particular week it was the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui, accused conspirator in the deadly attacks on the World Trade Center as well as The Pentagon on September 11, 2001. The trial, which was dragged out and a roller-coaster of accusations, claims, denials and guilt turned emotional this week as Moussaoui once again confounded his defense attorneys. As photos of the 9/11 victims were being shown in the courtroom, Moussaoui jumped up and yelled at the jurors “go ahead, make my day!”. When asked if he had any remorse for the attacks, he countered that he had none whatsoever and had wished there were more. The Defense argument that Moussaoui was in jail during the 9/11 attacks and was a paranoid schizophrenic to boot, evaporated as the accused did his level best to destroy his own credibility. Compounding the emotional atmosphere, the prosecution played tapes in the courtroom of 9/11 calls from people trapped inside the World Trade Center. For many in the courtroom, it was a painful retelling of a monstrous event. For Moussaoui, it was a grotesque display of arrogant boast from a runaway defendant.
Elsewhere: from Tehran came word that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejadh announced Iran was getting ready to join the Nuclear Club; that it now had managed to enrich uranium and was well on its way to producing Nuclear Weapons with a chain of 164 working centrifuges, even though making a bomb required making a few thousand more. Nonetheless, Iran had now crossed a bridge toward producing a Nuclear Weapon, and the ball for a solution to this potential problem was now sitting in Americas court with many looking at a possible military strike to neutralize the threat.
Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, there were calls from several retired Generals that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld resign for his mishandling of the Iraq War – that he was clearly unqualified to make an accurate decision over our seemingly endless involvement.
And members of the Duke University LaCrosse team were accused of raping an exotic dancer. Defense attorneys argued the dancer was passed out drunk. They were also arguing that Durham North Carolina District Attorney Mike Nifong was in the midst of a re-election campaign was pushing the case more as a politician than as prosecutor.
And that’s a small sample of how the world rolled 11 years ago on April 17, 2006 as reported by the CBS Weekend Roundup.
