they're performing surgeries on her face and hands and, as you can see, after the horrible things that happened to her, what brings tears to your eyes is her ability to smile, smiling constantly in these pictures. as we think about drone attacks and the cost of the war on terror, sometimes it's important to think about putting a human face on what that war means. tonight that face is shakira's but the miracle is american doctors saved her lives. "anderson cooper" starts now. we begin by keeping them honest. truth be told's a part of the past that we don't know fully about. that's because the congressman who is now leading the polls in iowa is prickly whenever he's asked about this. as we learned tonight, his story appears to have changed as well. that's him taking off his microphone cutting short the questioning from gloria borger. they have to do with racially

inflammatory writings to paid subscribers during the '80s and '90s. they were written in the first person in random publications such as the ron paul political report and the ron paul survival report. now this all flared up about three years ago when the liberal new republic did the story. more recently, though, the same reporter writing are for the conservative weekly standard flushed out even more details as have new york organizations from "the new york times" to cnn. what we've all uncovered are e items like this from a 1992 newsletter shortly after the l.a. riots titled "special issue on racial terrorism." listen to this one line reads, order was only restored in los angeles when it came time for the blacks to pick up their welfare checks. in fact, order was restored when the national guard moved in. two years earlier in another ron paul publication an article criticized president reagan for signing legislation approving the creation of the federal martin luther king jr. holiday complaining, quote, we can thank him for our annual hate whitey

day. again, these newsletters were written in the '80s and '90s while ron paul was out of congress and had several thousand subscribers. a lot of this first came to light in 2008. wolf blitzer asked him about it back then. >> congressman, there's a lot of material there, but let me just try to figure out how did this stuff get in these ron paul newsletters? who wrote it? >> well, well, i have no idea. have you ever heard of a publisher of a magazine not knowing every single thing? the editor is responsible for the daily activities and people came and gone and there were some people that were hired. i don't know any of their names. i do not, absolutely, honestly do not know who wrote those things. >> did you used to read these newsletters? congressman? >> not back then. there might have been times i would at times. i was in a medical practice. i traveled a lot. i was doing speeches around the country. so very frequently, you know, i never did see these. as a matter of fact, soem of the

things you just read, i wouldn't have recognized them. >> again, that was in 2008. but keeping him honest, in 1996 when he was running for congress, democrats dug up other pass amgs from his newsletters that he did not deny writing. one called late texas congressman a half educated victimologist. and talking about crime in washington, given the inn efficiencies of what d.c. laughingly calls the criminal justice system, i think we can safely say 95% of black males in that city are semicriminal or entirely criminal. nor did he deny writing this statement. if you have ever been robbed by a black teenaged male, you know how unbelievably fleet of foot they can be. he was asked about that and the other two statements as well by "the dallas morning news. "writing, quote, dr. paul denied suggestions that he was a racist and said he was not evoking stereotypes when he wrote the columns. they should be read in their entirety to avoid

misrepresentation. at that time he did not deny writing the passages. five years later talking to the texas monthly paul backed away from all of that. he changed his tune. quote, they were never my words, he said. but i had some moral responsibility for them. he said his campaign aides told him, quote, your name was on that letter and, therefore, you have to live with it. so that's ten years ago. he seems to be saying he didn't write the articles but his staff made him take responsibility. ten years later he's blaming the media for bringing it up again. he's not doing so much to clear the air. chief political analyst gloria borger spoke with the candidate. >> let me ask you, you've been answering a lot of questions lately about the newsletters that were published under your name and some of the things contained in them were conspiracy theories, some are considered racist, and you di disavowed them completely. but they were called the ron paul report.

did he read them at all when they were published during those years? did you ever sort of take a look at it and say, you know what, this isn't what i stand for? >> not all the time. >> but you did read them? >> not all the time. well on occasion, yes. >> and did you ever object when you read them? >> you know, we talked about this twice yesterday at cnn. why don't you look at what i said yesterday on cnn and what i've said for 20-some years. it was 22 years ago. i didn't write them. i disavow them and that's it. >> but you made money off of them. >> i was still practicing medicine. that's probably why i wasn't a very good publisher because i had to make a living. >> would you give it back -- >> to who? >> well, charity. charity. if you made money off of them, you disavow it -- >> i didn't write them and i don't endorse those views and i've explained it many times. >> so you read them but you didn't do anything about it at the time. >> i never read that stuff. i was probably aware of it ten years after it was written and

it's been going on 20 years that people have pestered me about this and cnn does every single time. when are you going to wear yourself out? >> but is it legitimate? is it a legitimate question to ask? >> and when you get the answer, it's legitimate that you take the answers i give. you know what the answer is? i didn't write them. i didn't read them at the time. and i disavow them. that is the answer. >> well, it's just a question. it's legitimate. it's legitimate. these things are pretty incendiary, you know. >> because of people like you. >> no. no, no, no, no. come on. some of the stuff was very incendiary, you know, say that go in 1993 the israelis were responsible for the bombing of the world trade center and that kind of stuff. all right. >> good-bye. >> all right, all right. thank you, congressman. appreciate your answer, appreciate you answering the question. you understand it's our job. >> joining us now along with ari

fleischer and eric erickson. gloria, looked like quite an interview there. as the congressman said, it's not the first time he's faced questions about all of this, but when you spoke to him today, he still doesn't seem quite ready to answer them obviously, did he? >> well, there seems to be a bit after conflict. on the one hand he says that he read them on occasion. and then on the other hand he said that he did not read the most incendiary ones. so it's really unclear what kind of editorial relationship, if any, ron paul had with this report that beared his name. he says that it's irrelevant. that was 22 years ago. he clearly doesn't want to talk about it. honestly, that's the kind of scrutiny you have to ex inspect if you're the front runner in a presidential race. >> it's politics, no question. eric to that point some people

are hearing about this for the first time, these questions are not new. they don't seem to have much on his presidential hopes until now. why not previously? >> well, because no one took him seriously praefl and now he's in first place in iowa. i have to tell you remember the days in 2008 when his supporters put my home address and phone on a neo-nazi website. we don't have to go back to the letters. we can ask ron paul why four years ago he allowed neo-nazi websites to fundraise for him, why three years ago he went on iranian tv it 0 say that israelis had set up concentration camp. there's a lot we can ask him. a more relevant question is, if we can't go back and ask him these questions from the late '80s and early '90s, why can he go back to the '90s and attack newt gingrich or mitt romney or rick perry? does he believe this is a legitimate double standard? >> what does it all mean? what's the impact? ari, let me ask you that. take a look at this poll of

likely caucus goers. he's the top pick with 28% of the vote. newt gingrich is up there with 25%. romney and perry are the only two who cracked double digits. ron paul has some of the most dedicated supporters out there, and in a caucus state like iowa, that can make a big difference. what do you think it means going forward for the whole field? >> well, i think if he does win iowa, mitt romney is probably cheering tore him to win iowa because it will propel mitt romney forward. no one thinks ron paul can go a anywhere. iowa being a very small caucus state, 110,000 voters, perhaps 120,000 voters, a small energized plurality can make all the difference in the world, and that's what propels ron paul's candidacy. anybody who reads my tweets knows i'm not a supporter or fan of ron paul. ron paul is a fringe candidate and i don't think ron paul represents the republicans' best foot forward. and so i'm beared by all this tremendously on the merits of it and on the impact his image

could have coming out of iowa. also, four years ago, and i just looked this up, you have ten percentage points in iowa, 8% in iowa, 4% in south carolina and 3% in nor floor. iowa his torefully been the strongest state. he ran before. ron paul ran and iowa was his high water mark. he plunged from there on. >> gloria -- go ahea hedahead, . >> one of the things in the writing, the ron paul freedom report that had no bi-line was written in first person as if it was from ron paul that was gay men were trying to intentionally infect the american blood supply by giving blood donations while having aids to infect the heterosexual population. ron paul supporters frequently attacked barack obama for sitting in reverend jeremiah wright's church and he has denied hearing jeremiah wright's sermons.

how is his defensemen of knowing these things any different from going after barack obama for the reverend wright matter? there is none. they can't defend that. >> and, again, to be clear, the congressman has disavowed all of these remarks. i read some of the same remarks as well. gloria, you talked to him today. let me ask you this. if you can comment on what erick said, but what does this mean for the iowa caucus in general? he's at the top despite all of this news that's most recent? >> well, you know, i spoke with the governor of the state of iowa, governor branson, yesterday about this. and i said what if ron paul wins because lots of establishment republicans are saying if ron paul wins the iowa caucus is completely irrelevant. he doesn't want that to be the case. so he says what's important is who comes in second and who comes in third. of course that's important. but as ari fleischer says, this is not the message the republ republican party wants to be

sending. but i'll tell you this. i was at a ron paul event earlier in the day. it was a full house, and the message that resonates here is the message of anti-washington, anti-big government, anti-debt, anti-deficit, antiestablishment, and it works with voters who are angry about the economy. so there is a real connection here with the voters in iowa. >> it will be interesting where the ads go from here and what happens over the next several days. i wish we had more time to talk about it. thanks so much. and let us know what you think at home as well. we're on facebook, on google. add us to your circle so you can follow me on twitter. i'll be tweeting tonight. up next, though, ten days until your taxes go up and this guy here and his house republicans are getting thrown under the bus by other republicans. we have the inside scoop on this and what the politics could mean for your paycheck. and later, a deadly discovery.

how to turn bird flu into a potential terrorist people killer. why that has the scientific, the medical and the national security community on edge. first, though -- a 20-month-old baby girl. ayla reynolds last seen friday night in her bed in waterville, maine. her father is speaking out. we'll have much more when "360" continues. that's flobot. she's this new robot we're trying out, mostly for, like, small stuff. wow! look at her go! she's pretty good. she's pretty good. hey, flobot, great job. oops. [ powers down ] uh-oh, flobot is broken. the "name your price" tool, only from progressive. call or click today. so i used my citi thank you card to pick up some accessories. a new belt. some nylons. and what girl wouldn't need new shoes? we talked about getting a diamond. but with all the thank you points i've been earning...

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time is running out to find a plan that could save the payroll jobs cuts. there was meanty of talk but no action. president obama made a phone call to house speaker john boehner and senate majority leader harry reid in an effort to end the standoff. house republicans are feeling the heat for blocking legislation and it's coming from an unexpected source, their fellow republicans in the senate. much more of the raw politics in a moment. first john king joins us from washington with a look at what failing to stop this stalemate might mean for you. john? sanjay, if you're watching this, you might think that, it's about politics, another childish showdown. maybe you have holiday shopping to do. guess what? you're going to pay for that out of your wall net a week oregon two, the next paycheck, maybe the one after that. if nothing is done, if you make $35,000 a year, your taxes are

going to go up $700 a year. that's about $27 a paycheck. if you make $50,000 a year, you're going to pay $1,000 more in taxes next year if they don't do anything. that means $38 a paycheck come middle of january. $75,000 a year, you'll pay $1,500 more. that means $58 a paycheck. if you make $100,000, you'll lose more than $2,000, $2,182. that mat fers you're on a family budget f. you're way up in the top percent above $110,000, $2,300 more. maybe people think it's politicians in washington fighting but if they don't figure this out and figure it out soon, ten days and a few hours this will come out of the paycheck at a time people put a lot of money on the credit cards for the holidays and have extra bills to pay. >> such important context because people are talking about this but this gives them a picture what's at stake. if you could stay with us, we do want to talk more about the politics. i want to bring in dana bash and

david gergen. you and i talked about this last night. i know you've been reporting the story all day. what are you hearing on the hill right now? >> well, the betting is if anybody is going to cave, give in, on this standoff, it's the house republicans because they have just been -- the pressure has been mounting on them in an unbelievable way, sanjay, especially today even more so from their fellow republicans in the senate. it's actually been stunning the conversationses that i've been having again with republicans about their fellow republicans in the house really upset about the fact that they, the senate republicans feel that republicans have now given up ground on the basic issue, the fundamental credo, cutting taxes. and they feel that republicans who have really been hellbent on saying, no, we're only going to stand up for a one-year extension in the payroll tax cut, they've given ground on their number one issue which is cutting taxes to democrats. and democrats look like they're the ones who want tax relief.

>> that seems to be the message a lot of people are hearing. david, you say that what's going on here is very significant in terms of the republican party's chances of taking the bhous as well. is it because of the reasons dana has outlined? >> it goes beyond. a senior conservative, sanjay, believes that there's a real danger the public will now blame the house republicans for breaking down in washington and they are being held hostage by the tea party. all of that from the point of view of senior republicans is -- raises the dang they're it enhances president obama's chances for re-election. it diminishes the chances of republicans taking the senate and they may lose more house seats. so people are looking for a way out. and frankly there are two ways potenti potentially out of this. one is what "the wall street journal" is calling for, newt gingrich has called for today, karl rogue has called for today and that is house republicans just to cave in.

move on. there's another way out if they don't want to do that, they can say, look, when the senate comes back, we want to sit down in january and will work out a one-year extension retroactive to january 1 on everything whether it's tax cuts or unemployment benefits. it will be retroactive. no one is going to get hurt. we want a one year extension. i think they could possibly make that work, too. >> john king, to summarize, there seems to be this real sense the g 0 op leaders have made a mistake when it comes to this payroll tax. republicans have spent, as dana bash outlined, the leaders allowed the democrats to look like they're the ones for tax relief while the republicans look like they're against it. how big a fiasco is this then for the republicans in the house right now? >> well, right now it's a big deal. as dana notes when you have your own party, the editorial "wall

street journal," saying they're trying to overregulate. the problem is the republicans. that's a problem. next october when people are getting ready to cast their votes whether it's for house or senate for president, they may not remember the specifics for this. there is a narrative emerging. the reason the president is coming in, he's trying to say, i'm on the side of the middle class. the republic wrans who won't raise taxes on millionaires want to raise taxes on the middle class. president obama is not a natural populist. sometimes he's aloof. he has to seize the issue, say i'm on your side. the details of this will likely be forgotten as another washington dustup. however, it does give the democrats control of the message at the moment, a long way to go, but the democrats are liking this. >> dana, david gergen brought this idea of possibly in january hammering out a deal and making it retroactive to january 1st

that would buy some time as we look at the calendar now, december 21st. are people talking about that? have your sources mentioned that as an option to you as well? >> that's one idea i've heard floating around. other ideas are basically just to get the president and democrats to say, look, we promise that we are going to appoint a compromise or negotiator to talk about a one-year extension as soon as possible and we promise this is important that will somehow get done before the president's state of the union because a big dynamic is republicans are very concerned that the president is going to use that big platform, the state of the union address in january to really hammer republicans on this issue in general. but the thing to keep in mind and i've been told by several very smart republicans here on capitol hill, you have to watch john boehner. people can have all the ideas in the world. he is the one who has to make the decision. he is the one who has to navigate the unruly conference, republican caucus, that he is trying to navigate and this has been a pattern. it's been very hard for him to

do it. maybe he misread it. he can't misread it again. >> everyone is talking about the presidential race obviously for good reason, john king. what about the impact of this on the senate or house races especially in more moderate or democratic leaning states? >> one race, scott brown was the surprise of last year. he won ted kennedy's liberal democratic seat in massachusetts as a republican. the massachusetts version of the tea party backed him. he has a very tough re-election campaign. 2012 president obama will carry massachusetts. i don't think any republican thinks they have a chance. elizabeth warren was the president's consumer finance adviser. a lot of people want her to be the new watchdog. she is the ultimate i'm on your side candidate. i fight the big bang, i fight for you, the little guy. scott brown is appalled at this. now would he like a one-year extension as opposed to a two-month extension? does he think washington is playing silly games, yes. he's on the ballot. it will be a tough enough election anyway. if he can't go home and say i'm mr. bipartisan, i'm on your

side, he's in more trouble, sanjay. there are many races i would watch. >> ten days until the new year. we'll stay on it. thanks so much. and up next, a bioterrorism fear. scientists in a lab created a strain of a bird flu virus both deadly and easily spread. now the question is this. should the research stay under lock and key or published and risk potentially getting in the hands of the bad guys? also later, the case of the snaggletoothed killer. a man wrongly convicted of killing a woman with bite mouth technology. the right relief for nasal congestion...in a pill. ♪ new from robitussin®. relief made simple. did i'm good about washing my face.

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as a doctor, nothing quite shakes you like encountering an epidemic. something drags you straight back to your roots as a profession, back to small flocks, influenza, the plague, at a time doctors could offer little more than comforting words in the face of killers

they could barely understand let alone treat. we're learning how many of these bugs kill and also how they spread. if ignorance was the old nightmare, knowledge could be the new one. when i was in southeast asia during the bird flu outbreak, hundreds of people died. we knew it could have been much worse as well. we knew what made bird flu so de deadly but weigh knew it didn't spread well person to person. that was an important fact. now we know how to change that. scientists have unlocked the recipe for bird flu that spreads like wildfire and they're being asked to keep kwai bet it in the name of global security. dr. nathan wolf, founder and ceo of the forecasting initiative, also author of "the viral storm -- the dawn of a new p pandemic age" and fran townsend, former homeland security adviser in the bush administration. nathan, you and i have talked about this, traveled around the world talking about this for some time. it's pretty frighten iing to re about, talk about a virus that could kill a lot of people and

also spread easily. how dangerous is this virus? >> from my perspective, one of the most interesting aspects for this research, we're waiting to see. now what we know it can be transmitted in at least one mammal. it is ferrets and ferrets generally are a very good model for understanding both disease and transmission in humans, but this doesn't necessarily tell us exactly how effective this virus would be at transmitting in humans. >> people are putting this in a national security sense as well, fran. this is one of those things where you think about viruses and national security, it doesn't come up that often. what is your assessment of what this advisory panel is claiming, and do you think this could be a national security threat? >> i absolutely think it could be a national security threat, sanjay. let's remember recently secretary of state clinton was over in geneva at the world

health organization and talked about in her remarks the ease with which because of public information now that someone with some science background can take public information, get basic genetic material and make a bio weapon. this really is a threat. now we've to balance that, of course, against the need for academic and scientific freedoms but i think there are ways doing that. if goes back to the bush administration. i remember talking to dr. tony fouchy of nih and getting his advice of that balancing. >> because we are talking again about a virus, nathan, that potentially kills people and spreads through the air more quickly, something that the h5n1, something we studied in the past could not do, at the heart of that, do you believe whether it's in the lab documents or published studies, whatever, does it need to be out there? do labs like yours need to be able to see this to help combat a potential pandemic? >> look, what we do with

forecasting, a number of our partners do, we do surveillance. biological surveillance around the world trying to detect pandemics before they occur. clearly understanding what particular elements of a virus can cause it to spread, cause it to be pdeadly are pivotal to us. part of our challenge, how do we go through the specimens when we see an outbreak occurring in the field, how do we know it's going to spread? and there is a very important element. you are talking about really sort of this careful balance between risk and benefit and i think there's clear agreement with everyone that we completely underestimate the importance of purposeful biological attacks. bioterror is something that we haven't seen huge examples in the last five years or so we tend to sort of people don't pay attention to it. these are huge risks. there's a lot of agents out there that could be used in a very, very negative way and we

need to sort of balance the risk and reward of this research but from our perspective the kind of data that lets us know which specimens are important and key for the kind of surveillance we do around the world. >> and we talked about this theoretically so much over the last couple of years. when you listen to nathan, a scientist out in the field who says i need the information because i'm the guy who is tracking this potential pathogen spreading around the world. if i don't know what it is exactly, i haven't seen the published studies on it, it makes it harder for me to do this job. how do you balance nathan's desires with some sort of national security policy? >> sanjay, nathan and i agree. nathan and people like nathan need access to these sorts of reports. but what you need to do is make sure people with a legitimate reason and a legitimate use do get the access while not making it widely and publicly available in the way that the internet permits to you do if you merely allow it to be published. i do think it requires stewardship on the part of

scientists and researchers to make sure that there's a process in place that allows them to disseminate it and get the value to folks like nathan without putting it in the hands and making it available to bad guys who would use it against us. >> it's one of those things. >> go ahead, nathan. >> one thing i was going to add, i do think to a certain extent what you're looking sat a bunch of folks that are doing their jobs very well. you've got individuals who are doing this pivotal science to help us understand the factors that lead to transmissions of a potentially deadly virus. you have editors who are taking very seriously the important recommendations of the basically redo have to consider exactly what the nature of this information is and i think to a certain extent these are all obviously important features. >> and talk about a real life -- this has been theoretical for so long, now this is the real world now. i appreciate dr. nathan wolf and

fran townsend, thanks a lot. they call him the snaggletooth killer, convicted of murder by bite mark analysis. after he spent more than ten years in prison that science was proved wrong. we'll tell you a story and how an amazing forensic breakthrough turned out to be nothing more than junk science. also the mystery of missing baby ayla. her dad said he put her to bed last friday night and never saw her again. the latest on that investigation. ♪

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they call it the forensic science that seems to solve every crime in television dramas and prosecutors and juries use them more and more to convict in the real world. in "crime & punishment" we've been putting those methods to the test. we're finding out they're not always as reliable as on tv. the we look at something called bite mark analysis and the case of ray krone. he was once dubbed the snaggletooth killer because of his bad teeth.

krone was accused of the murder of a bartender and convicted on the basis of bite marks left on her body. he spent more than ten years in prison before they found out the science in the case was just plain wrong. here is gary tuchman. >> reporter: ray krone lives on a farm in pennsylvania. he has lots of space, 27 acres. a far cry from where he used to live. on arizona's death row. >> ken was a good bartender, publy, enjez it. >> reporter: kim and kcona was sexually assaulted and stabbed to death in a bathroom in this phoenix bar back in 1991. ray krone was a customer at the bar. some people thought he was kim's boyfriend. so detectives talked to him and asked him to participate in a strange procedure. >> they put a plastic and rat us in my mouth, spread my lips back and took pictures of my teeth and had me snarl and grin taking pictures for about two hours. >> reporter: what krone didn't

know was bite marks had been found on the victim's breast and neck. a day after his teeth were compared to the marks -- >> i heard the screech of brakes, the sounds of people yelling, freeze, don't move. you're under arrest. there was a van load of police officers in riot gear and guns drawn, threw me on the ground for murder and sexual assault. >> reporter: prosecutors hired a so-called bite mark expert for the trial. the primary evidence, his testimony which led to a murder conviction. because of his bad teeth at the time, krone became known as the snaggletooth killer. >> i basically told the judge you have the wrong person. i was called a monster, a killer, and sentenced to death, shackled and taken straight to death row in arizona. >> reporter: for three years he sat on death row. >> i made plans for my last meal, whatever i was going to have. in order to survive on death row you have to survive with being executed. >> reporter: but then to his elation he won a new trial on appeal. however, with the same bite mark

expert testifying, he was convicted again. >> it was way more painful than the first time. >> reporter: this time the judge said he had doubts about the conviction. he gave krone 25 years to life, but took him off death row. as it turns out the judge was right to be queasy. years later dna evidence from the crime scene matched someone else, the real killer of kim ancona was this man, ken phillips, who accepted a plea-bargain in her in order. after more than a decade the one time snaggletooth killer was now a free man. he was reunited with his family who never stopped believing in him and always doubted the validity of bite analysis. the national academy of sciences now publicly agrees. seven years after his release the nas released a critical report which says in part the scientific basis insufficient to con clawed that bite mark comparisons can result in a conclusive match. someone would say this is junk science, your answer to that would be.

>> it's not junk science. >> reporter: is it insulting to you? >> i think so. >> reporter: dr. lowell levine is a renowned forensic analyst and has utilized bite evidence. he was not involved in the krone case. >> we actually make a bite mark in wax. and this will give you all the unique individual characteristics of these teeth. >> reporter: he says by comparing bite wounds of the victim to the molds taken of a suspect's teeth, he has convict suspects and helped to free the innoce innocent. he believes the expert messed up in the ray krone case. more work needs to be done with the science. so you're saying although you believe it's a reliable and important science there's really not a way to do kind of the standard scientific research in this field? >> i sure can't think of it. >> reporter: ray krone says he's never received apologies from prosecutors or prosecution witnesses. he does say that two detectives involved in the case said they were sorry but asked him why he

didn't tell the truth from the beginning. krone says he told them, i did. without the impassioned support of his family and friends, krone believes he would have lingered longer in prison and possibly been executed. this article is where you came home, more than 100 people attend a party for freed man. >> this was one of the best days of my life. >> reporter: ray krone lives with his girlfriend, cheryl, and works as an advocate against the death penalty. and what did he name his pennsylvania farm? freebird. gary tuchman, cnn, york, pennsylvania. >> absolutely fascinating stuff. so bite mark analysis, is it a valuable crime fighting tool or junk science? i spoke with jeffrey toobin and a professor of criminal justice. ray krone's story is absolutely heartbreaking. i think what most people see and worry about is there could be others like him that were

convicted on this sort of science that got it wrong and those people are still sitting in jail. so how much faith specifically do you have in bite mark analysis? >> bite mark is very difficult to understand because a bite on human skin -- skin is elastic. it goes through a movement when you try to bite. you have trauma to the skin and it changes color over time. what you're doing is comparing one's dentician to a cellulos acetate over the skin and try to determine a common origin. it's a very difficult area. it's impression evidence. there are problems with it. it's much, much too subjective. it needs to be computerized into a more objective way of looking at things and also, remember, there's no database. there are no national standards, and the big problem is you have an individual that goes to court and says i looked at that bite

mark. i looked at the suspect's dentician and there's a common origin and i'm sure of it, 99.99%. what a terrible statement when you don't have databases and there are no statistics. >> i'm amazed by that part. there are hardly any national standards for most of the things we're discussing and, jeff, as dr. k. pointed out, the evidence of the bite mark itself on someone's skin is changing. as a lawyer, what is the faith people put on bite mark analysis and evidence? >> well, it's supposed to be up to the judge. the judge is supposed to exercise a screening function and examine the science and determine whether it's worthy of being presented to the jury. a lot of judges don't do this. they pass -- let the jury decide. and there's one word that leads to a lot of injustice in these cases and that's match. you have an expert get up there and say this bite mark matches

the suspect's teeth. that word match can be so misleading because we don't know how many matches there are. we don't know if bite marks are unique. we don't know what the standards are. but jurors who watch "csi" or are impressed by the credentials of an expert think match and guilty and that has led to injustice. >> sanjay, it could be used perhaps for exclusionary purposes but to include a suspect as the biter, that's dangerous. >> jeff, so there is no board certification to this or governing body that oversees this. you said it relies sort of on the discretion of the judge but the judge is not often a forensic expert. how are they to decide by looking at something like this if the forensic experts can't agree? >> well, that's the problem and judges operate by, you know, different jurisdictions, have different traditions and i think in fairness, i've been critical of the science but i think there was a lot of good faith here.

you have terrible crimes. you have victims with -- who have been left unconscious and all they have is a bite mark on their arm and you can see, well, why don't you look into it and see if you can draw some forensic guidance? but the problem is when prosecutors and police officers sort of fall in love with this evidence, you can have too much trust in it and innocent people go to prison. >> the nice thing about a bite mark, jeff, you can actually swab the area of the bite and hopefully there's dna there. >> if you can, then everybody's happen. >> there was a case like that, and the person who said that you have the biter, the dentician proves the suspect is the biter. when you do dna they get exonerated so we know which of the two is more reasonable and reliable. >> jeff toobin, dr. kobilinski,

thank you so much. a 2-year-old who vanished from her crib. plus, president obama takes a break to do a little holiday shopping. we'll tell you what's on his list. as you know by now, we're cutting down the best ridiculous of 2011. ♪

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we're following several other stories tonight. the "360 news and business bulletin." isha? the father of ayla is speaking out tonight. justin dipietro says he has no idea what happened to 209-month-old girl after he put her to bed in his home in waterville, maine. that's when she disappeared. local police say they are following up more than 165 leads. the fbi and locals have all joined in the search for little ay ayla. eight soldiers are facing a variety it have charges including bullying and hazing in connection with the apparent suicide of 19-year-old private

d danny chen in afghanistan. chen's family says he complained about being harassed by soldiers. he had a self-inflicted gunshot wound in october. bank of america will pay $335 million to settle a discrimination lawsuit. the suit charged that countrywide financial bought by bank of america in 2008 discriminated against black and hispanic mortgage customers steering them towards taking out high-risk subprime mart gajs even though they qualified for lessries can can i prime loans. president obama had personal business to attend to today. he did some shopping for his daughters in nearby alexandria, virginia. >> in case you were wondering, just dance for the wii. the girls beat me every time on these various dance games.

you guys will never get a picture of me doing it. because i get graded "f" every time. >> well, the president also stopped at a pet store with beau, the first family's dog. tell me you've done all your christmas shopping and europe not like the president. >> well, i'm not going to answer that question. >> that means no. >> the president said he's never going to be caught getting a picture taken of him dancing. as a father of daughters, i assure you they can make you do some pretty embarrassing things. we'll see about that. isha, stick around for this, our top ten ry didiculous countdown. tonight number eight. a flashback to the third eagle of the apocalypse and hisser think obsession. we'll explain.

we're counting down the top at the point ridiculous of 2011 based on your votes indentally. tonight in at number eight one of our staff favorites featuring the guy who calls him seven the third eagle of the apocalypse. here is anderson. tonight we have what i believe is the first ever

ridiculous three-peat and who better to make ridiculous history than william at that pointly tapley better known as -- >> the third eagle of the apocalypse and the co-prophet of the end times. >> it's such a sought after position they had to divide it up? as any fan of the third eagles youtube videos knows he is for some inexplicable reason obsessed with hidden fallacies he sees all over the denver international airport. >> they are evil. they are signs of satanism. and on this program i will found out that many of them are symbols. >> a prominent penguin penis he has highlighted for your enjoyment. now i put him on the ridiculist and now he responded. like manna, if by that you mean

man parts, he responded again. >> this is the rubber match. maybe that's not quite the correct term. >> saucy. who knew the co-prophet of the end times would have such a naughty sense of humor. i'm start to go see how he got to be the co-prophet after all. i think his presentation was a little stiff and perhaps premature. >> i honestly believe that mr. cooper is beginning to agree with me. >> not so fast, third eagle. do you mind? i try to keep an open mind. you lose me when you claim there is a horse at the airport covered covered. >> let's take a closer look at the mane on this blue demon horse. this looks like phalax symbols to me. what do you think, mr. cooper? maybe you think they're ice cream cones. >> don't go to baskin robbins with the third eagle of the

apocalypse. now loppingtime prophets will k it is not just the horse and the penguin that is the problem but the entire outdoor baggage handling area. >> the outdoor baggage handling area is in. let's take a closer look. >> and that is what he does. mr. tapley has taken his fill 0 os if i to a whole new level. it's not just the low hanging baggage area that now concerns him, it's also salacious surrounding street names. >> what do you suppose this street name is that runs right down the center? you guess ed it. that's pena boulevard. >> i'm sorry. actually i did not guess had a. i was hoping for urethra boulevard. pena is named for frederico

pena, the former mayor of denver. anyway, that's one street. it's not like there's others. >> i guess you could call this the pubic hair area. so what do you suppose the name of this street here is? this is the harry b. combs parkway. >> harry b. combs was an aviator and a writer -- who cares? it doesn't matter. >> this street right here, this is shady grove street. i guess that's because that's where the sun don't shine. >> the sun don't -- i think he's getting his anatomical references confused now. >> if they ever cut the flow of traffic on this little street leading down to pena boulevard, i bet they will call that a vasectomy. >> that is just a fallacy. say what you will about the co-prophet, he cares about people almost as much as he cares about fallacies. >> as for you, mr. cooper, do you want to be