cooky and different and everyone's tried to censor it and books allow me to speak my mind. >> larry: thanks as always, doll. so hard to put up with this adoration. the book is "love, lust and faking it" the author is jenny mccarthy. speaking of interesting and talented ladies, liza minnelli and hilary swank next week. right now it's "ac 360" and anderson cooper. thanks for joining us, everyone. tonight, gone but not fired. the michigan law enforcement official and assistant attorney general who for months has singled out a college student for attacks, he's on leave but his boss, michigan's attorney general is on record saying he can't be fired. tonight, new evidence he can be, and new evidence of close political ties between the attorney general and the man he admits is a bully on his staff. we're keeping them honest. we're also keeping them honest in a bitter campaign for the california's governor's office. claims and counterclaims about one of the candidates employing an illegal immigrant.

the candidate says she'll take a lie detector test. we're putting both side's arguments to a fact check. and later, closing arguments in the crime trial that's rev etted the country, the connecticut home invasion horror. a woman and her two daughters held captive and killed at home. two men charged facing death. we'll show you what happened in court today and what happened in the home when the robbery turned deadly. we begin though tonight keeping them honest with new developments in what is the strangest story we've been following in a long, long time, the case of an assistant attorney general in michigan who for a month has singled out a guy college student for attack. andrew shirvell, him on the left, and a college student, chris armstrong, that's him on the right. calls for mr. shirvell to be fired have been growing for days since he appeared on this program. today it was announced mr. shirvell is now on voluntary personal leave. he's not been fired, he still has a job, but he faces a disciplinary hearing when he returns. his boss is the attorney general of michigan, mike cox. that's him. he says he can't fire shirvell because shirvell has the right

of free speech in his spare time. a lot of legal experts disagree, saying his actions go way beyond what's appropriate for a public official and way beyond matters of free speech. so the question is, why hasn't he been fired or at least reprimanded? on this program, the attorney general implied that shirvell was just a minor functionary in his office. tonight we've uncovered evidence shuging shirvell's political ties to the attorney general go way back. we'll get to that in a moment. andrew shirvell launched his bl blog. after months of being attacked and confronted on campus, chris armstrong requested a protection order on the 13th of last month. shirvell has been barred from setting foot on campus in part of things like this, picketing outside a club and armstrong's home with a video camera.

remember, chris armstrong is a college student. mr. shirvell, though off duty, is a public official, also a university of michigan alum. so there's court action pending against shirvell and a no trespass orderner effect. yet today when we contacted the attorney general's office they asked for details from both from us, seemingly unaware of either. we also have questions of the role and connection to shirvell. i first asked him about those ties on wednesday. >> jeffrey toobin last night on this program, cnn legal analyst, said this is more about you than about shirvell. and he said that shirvell's a political ally of yours who worked on your campaign and that, you know, you campaigned on family values and weren't very supportive of, you know, gay rights. and to fire him would be politically difficult for you and that that plays a part in this story. i wanted you to be able to respond to that. >> well, you know, mr. toobin reminds me of the old joke, i'm

not a lawyer but i play one on tv. >> he went on to emphasize it was a free speech issue and his hands were tied. other than attacking toobin, though, he really didn't answer the question about his political ties. here's what we uncovered in michigan campaign finance records. thousands of dollars paid by the cox campaign to andrew shirvell. this goes back to, way back to 2002 to a campaign. consulting fees, pay roll fees and other campaign-related expenses. shirvell it turns out also worked on mr. cox's 2006 campaign. as for his job, attorney general cox described him as a front line grunt assistant prosecutor. he works in the office's appellate division which makes him more than a simple grunt. we invited mr. cox to come back on the program and talk, he declined. he did take a shot at current michigan governor, jennifer granholm, who tweeted yesterday if she were still attorney general she would have fired shirvell by now. cox said i don't know why she's so freaking irresponsible. she went to harvard law school

of the civil service rules are a huge shield for free speech and she knows that. actually we looked it up, section 2-6, says an appointing authority may discipline a classified employee for just cause. just cause includes but is not limited to the following. conduct unbecoming a state emply ee. governor granholm, a democrat who does not share cox's political views, clearly believe's shirvell's conduct is unbecoming and so does her predecessor, attorney general for 37 years. >> when he was barred from the university of michigan because of his actions, that raises the question of sexual harassment and intimidation. right away there's laws against that. i would have my lawyers check into it and if he had done any of those things he violated his agency and should be disciplined immediately. >> joining us now is senior legal analyst and former federal prosecutor jeffrey toobin and

alma wheeler smith. first, what do you make about these ties? clearly cox knows shirvell pretty well, going back to 2002. his campaign was paying money. >> every attorney general's office where the attorney generais elected there's kind of an inner circle of people who are political allies of the attorney general. there's nothing wrong with that. that's just -- you have to get -- >> so attorney general's offices are very political. >> they're political. you don't get to be attorney general in most states unless you are elected. but if you are part of that inner circle, you are a political ally. there are a lot of people in the attorney general's office who are civil service employees who are not particularly political. >> cox says i have 500 employees. >> exactly. and he's right. most of those are not political allies. they stay there through administrations. but clearly shirvell is a political ally. he is a campaign worker. and that puts him not legally but factually in a very different category than the run-of-the-mill assistant attorney general. >> representative wheeler smith

you've had run-ins with andrew shirvell over the years, what is he like? what have your encounters been like? >> well, the encounters have been hostile. they have been rather intimidating, if i were a regular individual i think i would have been very nervous about them. but i'm a politician and i'm used to running across people who disagree with me. so i certainly reached that point with andrew shirvell. but on a couple of occasions, he just got very aggressive in pursuing people that were associated with me. i had been asked to be on the board of bank here in ann arbor and i was challenged in that position, or the president of the bank was challenged because he appointed me to the board because i was pro-choice. >> so shirvell contacted the president of the bank? >> yes. contacted the president of the

bank, challenged him for putting me on the board because the president of the bank was a catholic and he said, she's pro-choice and you really shouldn't be having anyone on your board who is pro-choice. to his credit, the bank president said that's none of your business and i have her on the board because she is a smart head and i'm going to keep her. >> jeffrey, let me ask you, what does -- so he's on leave now, he's going to face a disciplinary hearing when he comes back. why do you think now this has happened? what's going on? >> because mike cox is feeling the heat. this has now become a national story. you had arne duncan, the secretary of education today talking about how dangerous it is when people are intimidated because of their sexuality. this is something that is just so obviously offensive, so wrong, this conduct, that even though mike cox has defended him in the past and raised frankly what i think are phony first

amendment arguments in defense of shirvell, it's just become politically untenable to keep him around. and so they announced that he's leaving voluntarily. but the point is he's out, at least temporarily. >> representative wheeler smith, what do you think should happen in this case? you obviously believe, what, he should lose his job? >> well, i certainly think he should be dismissed. he uses his presence in the attorney general's office as a bullying tactic. a student at michigan state university was in a counterpicture counterpeck et to one of the demonstrations shirvell was attending, and there was a clash of opinions, and andrew used his position as attorney general, deputy attorney general with the university, michigan state university in this case, to get the student dismissed from a course. i think he is beyond the pale, if you will. he should be dismissed from the attorney general's office.

he's using the power of that office, he's using the representation of the office in his encounters in order to intimidate and win favor and points for his cause. >> it's interesting, this has become now involved in politics in michigan the -- there's people now campaigning to be the new attorney general because mike cox is leaving in a few months, the democratic candidate says he should be not only let go but that the republican candidate should also call upon the attorney general. do -- what would happen, when mike cox leaves as attorney general, what happens to those political appointee people? if andrew shirvell had his job at that point, what would happen? >> he's a civil service employee and subject to the rule you just read. so if the new attorney general said this is conduct unbecoming, he could fire him. the first amendment does not protect all words. you know, if i say to you, give me $1 million or i'll kill you,

that's extortion. if someone says to a subordinate, sleep with me, that's sexual harassment. >> that's not free speech. >> none of those things are free speech. just as this kind of conduct targeted at a -- an undergraduate at the university of michigan is not simply free speech. just because it's words doesn't mean you get a free ride, period. >> we'll continue to follow it. jeff toobin, thanks. alma wheeler smith, appreciate your time. thank you. let us know what you think at home. join the live chat now. and charges the republican candidate in california knowingly employed an illegal immigrant. we'll bring you the facts. and later a heart breaking picture of a horror story in progress. a wife, a mom, desperately pulling money out of the bank to the men holding her family captive. she would die soon after these images were taken, her daughters died as well. today, closing arguments in the trial. we'll tell you what went on inside that courtroom.

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the charges and countercharges in the race to be california's next governor, the charges are the republican candidate meg whitman employed an illegal immigrant as a housekeeper. ms. whitman says the controversy is being oh, stratded by her opponent, jerry brown. today the former house speaker spoke with her attorney gloria allred. >> until she decided to run for governor in 2009 it appears ms. whitman had no problem or concern about employing an undocumented worker. apparently she knew employing an undocumented worker while running for a high-profile public office was a potential liability. >> i was shocked and hurt that ms. whitman would treat me this

way after nine years. i realized at that moment that she didn't appreciate my work. i felt like she would throw me away like a piece of garbage. >> that's the back drop. tom foreman has been fact checking both side's claims. >> you know, gloria allred clearly intended to drop a bombshell on meg whitman with all of this. her claim as you said is that whitman knowingly employed an illegal immigrant named nicky diaz, exploited her, denied her wages and finally fired her and kept voters in the dark about all of this. whitman says, no. listen. >> attempt to deceive the public and hide the fact that she knew that she was employing an undocumented worker long before she fired nicky in 2009 has

failed. meg whitman is exposed as a liar and a hypocrite. >> make no mistake, these allegations are completely untrue. they lack any merit whatsoever. this is truly a political smear on me, on my family and based on lies. >> tom, what's the truth here? >> well, we know nicky was whitman's housekeeper. we know she provided whitman with social security card, a driver's license and an official federal form that she appears to have signed herself swearing that she's here legally, even put a smiley face on the whole thing. so the simple truth is that the immigration officials say by law that's all that whitman had to check out. she didn't have to follow up on any of that. it appears social security sent a letter to ms. whitman also and her husband saying there might have been a problem with the

woman's social security number. ms. allred says that letter is proof that they were told she was here illegally, but immigration and social security officials said no, lots of these letters go out for lots of reasons. it's not even necessarily a red flag. that's what they told me when i called today. and the candidate has said when she found out about the illegal status she did fire her, which under law she would have to do, and she's even said she'll take a lie detector test about all of this, anderson. >> so what don't we know? >> what we don't know is these accusations that ms. whitman somehow misused nicky, we have no proof of that. ms. whitman's claim that her opponent jerry brown orchestrated this attack, no proof of that, either, although ms. allred is an avid supporter of mr. brown. she said she's had no contact with his campaign in all of this. >> also gloria allred has launched a similar claim late in a political race before, didn't she? >> yeah. just before republican arnold schwarzenegger won the

governor's office, ms. allred went to the media with a woman who claimed he fondled her and took lewd picture of her on a movie set. that case came to nothing, but listen how she reacted when pressed about that on an l.a. radio show. >> you did this to arnold in august of 2003 for rhonda miller. did rhonda ever win a judgment against arnold, making allegations against a gubernatorial candidate? >> i made allegations, that's true. >> did rhonda win a judgment? >> rhonda did not proceed with her case through litigation. >> is that a no? >> she decided not to go -- the case was litigated, and the case basically ended up being dismissed. she decided not to appeal. >> so -- oh, it was dismissed. >> wait a minute. she decided not to appeal. from the dismissal, which she had every right to do. >> we cut that down to give you just the esance of it, but what she kept saying she wants to get the facts out in this new case

she showed no real interest on being cross examined on them. in the tend, she hung up on hug hue et, the talk show host there. so our claims against ms. whitman in this case appear to be a very tall tale. >> indeed. tom, thanks for that. still ahead, just the story that shocked the nation, the connecticut home invasion and murder trial, it is now headed to the jury. the man accused of murdering jennifer hawke-petit and her two daughters along with an alleged accomplice could get the death penalty. did the prosecutors present a strong enough case? and a wild chase in indiana, we'll show you how it all ended. so we're on the serengeti, and seth finds a really big bone. we're talking huge. they dig it up, put it in the natural history museum and we get to name it. sethasauraus. really. your points from chase sapphire preferred are worth 25% more on travel? means better vacations.

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coming up, find out about the u.s. government medical experiment conducted in

guatemala the state department calls reprehensible. deadly flooding along the eastern seaboard from the carolinas to northeast has caused at least eight deaths, including seven in north carolina, which has suffered the worst flooding with many areas submerged. many people there had to be rescued by boat. the town of windsor is said to be condition with six feet deep water. and officials may reach the 33 trapped minors in chile in november, drills are cutting ever closer to those miners who have been stuck in that mine since august 5th. no luck so far in the search for two american balloonists lost off the coast of italy two days ago. they were competitors in an international balloon race and organizers say it looks like the balloon made a rapid decent into the adriatic sea during rough weather. and a guy on a motorcycle

tried to outrun indiana police yesterday bobbing in and out of traffic during a high-speed chase that stretched across three counties. in the end he ditched the bike and apparently tried to run away. as you can see there, he just didn't get very far at all. >> it's so stupid. everyone gets caught in the end. i don't know why people try to do this. >> i don't know. it's amazing. you likely heard about the suicide of rutgers university student tyler clementi. he took his life after a video of him having a sexual encounter with another man was secretly broadcast by his roommate. the president of rutgers today pledged to meet with the school's gay community to explore how he can, quote, better support their needs. that pledge comes a day after tyler's body was pulled from the hudson river. next week we'll look at bullying, why it's happening, and what all of us can do to stop it. we'll hear from experts from educators and kid who's live with the painful taunts and attacks every day.

i came out of the closet as gay in eighth grade. a kid had a knife on school premises and said, i'm going to kill him. i want that faggot dead. >> i've been verbally abused because of my religion. i'm a muslim girl. >> i didn't see him coming. he came out of nowhere and hit me. >> bullying, it follows kids home, online, on their cell phones, nowhere to hide. >> people can just post things anonymously. it's for bully that's are afraid to say it to your face. >> you're fat, you should just kill yourself. we don't need you in our school. the world would go on without you. >> reporter: other kids, bystanders scared into silence. is there a fear talking to teachers or the principal? >> yes. >> yeah. >> reporter: how so? >> you could just get called a snitch. >> reporter: it can make it worse? >> yeah. >> reporter: as for the victims,

a long day at school or back at home. >> you just think, i have to go face them again. i have to spend another eight hours in that prison. and no matter what you do, you can't escape. >> death is the only escape. if you kill yourself, it's done. you don't have to do it anymore. >> bullying, no escape, all next week. up next, closing arguments in the home invasion murder trial in connecticut, a mom and her two daughters killed. how did a robbery turn into murder and what are the chances the two men accused of the crime will get the death penalty? also tonight we've all seen surfers riding big waves but what is it like to ride a monster wave, 80, 90, even 100-foot wave? larry hamilton joins us, taking us inside the waves many thought impossible to ride, but he does.

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crime and punishment,

tonight the home invasion and murder trial in connecticut. the jury could begin deliberating on monday. steven hayes is accused of murdering jennifer hawke-petit and her two daughters in 2007. during the trial police testified that hayes drove her to a bank and demanded she withdraw $15,000 while his alleged accomplice stayed back at the householding her family hod hostage. she hoped the money would buy their freedom. it was not to be. hayes could face the death penalty in a minute. in a moment we'll talk to jeff toobin and sunny hostin about what happened in court today. but first randi kaye looks at the crime. >> reporter: a quiet house became a house of terror and horror. that's how the prosecutor described it in today's closing arguments against steven hayes. he is accused of raping and strangling jennifer hawke-petit. police say he and accomplice joshua komisarjevsky broke into

the family home in 2007. komisarjevsky, they say, sexually assaulted 11-year-old michaela petit and then left her and her sister haley to die in a fire they allegedly set. only dr. william petit escaped, though he was brutally beaten. in court today the prosecutor said it all began on a classic july summer day. the petit family went to church. dr. petit played golf and picked up corn to have with dinner on his way home. his wife and daughters went to the super market. the defense closed by suggesting it was komisarjevsky who goes on trial later, not steven hayes, who is to blame. hayes' defense attorney admitted, quote, he's guilty of sexual assault of mrs. petit. there isn't any question about it. but he added he kills jennifer petit at the request of joshua komisarjevsky. the defense told the jury hayes is no angel but said it was komisarjevsky who controlled the situation and that things just got out of control. the prosecution fired back

saying he said things got out of control. it wasn't things, it was them. they were out of control. this is the moment jurors may never forget. that's mrs. hawke-petit at her bank, 9:17 a.m. surveillance video shows her desperate attempt to save her family. withdrawing $15,000 from her bank. she hoped that money would be enough to convince the two suspects to spare her family's lives. at the bank she reaches out for help but has to be discrete because steven hayes was allegedly outside. the bank manager quietly calls 911. >> we have a lady who is in our bank right now who says that her husband and children are being held at their house. the people are in a car outside the bank. she is getting $15,000, that if the police are told they will kill her children and the

husband. she is petrified. >> reporter: minutes later, she leaves the bank with the ransom money and within hours she is murdered. during the trial, the details of the attack and the sheer bree tallty of it brought jurors to tears. they were forced to look at pictures of the victims' burned bodies and hear how the girls were allegedly tied to their beds before bleach and gasoline were poured over them. husband and father william petit sat through all of it, stoic at times, crying during others. he would leave the room when the evidence was too graphic for him to bear. but mostly he gripped the courtroom ban isster. they are being tried separately, but prosecutors say they are both equally guilty, that they acted together to rape, rob and kill. randi kaye, cnn, miami.

unbelievable. digging deeper now, jeffrey toobin is back, and sunny hostin, also a former federal prosecutor. did the defense do everything they could to pawn responsibility on to the other co-defendant, away from hayes and portray the other guy as the ring leader. did it work? >> i don't think it worked. it certainly was their strategy throughout this trial and what they started with their closing was we have all been affected by this gruesome evidence. that is how the defense started their closing argument. but it was clear when you saw the reactions of the jury and two of the jurors were crying, there were reporters in the courtroom that were crying during the prosecution's rebuttal, it was pretty clear they may not have bought this argument that komisarjevsky was the ring leader and hayes was just sort of along for the ride and had no responsibility. i will say, though, that the defense did admit to jennifer

hawke-petit's murder, they did admit to her sexual assault. they admitted the burglary, they admitted the arson. they did not concede that hayes was responsible for the deaths of the two girls. i think that was what they were most concerned about, because they died so horrifically. >> in capital cases it's common for the defense to plant seeds in this phase of a trial that they have an impact later on. did that happen? >> that's clearly been the strategy from day one. look, they're saying we don't want to convince 12 people that he's not guilty, we want to persuade one person that he doesn't deserve the death penalty. that's all it takes. and frankly, i think that's all the defense could do here. in the end, the defense -- the evidence is far too overwhelming to contest whether he was in fact guilty. and, you know, when you are conceding rape and murder just for starters, i mean, gives you an idea how bad this crime is and how bad the case is.

i don't know how the jury will react. remember, this is connecticut, not a state that has many death penalty cases. you don't have patterns for knowing what jurors react to in death penalty cases and not, but the jurors -- one thing prosecutors always can say in a case like this is, if not the death penalty for this case, then for what? >> sunny, we've seen the pictures of this guy buying, i guess it was hayes, buying gasoline before they even did this job. you know, did the robbery that then turned into the murder. that seems to show premeditation to at least want to burn down the house, which seems to indicate they maybe were planning to kill these people. >> well, certainly, and i think that's been the question all along. did he have the intent to kill? because in his statement to the detective that interviewed him right afterwards, he said i was just in this for the money. the plan changed. things got out of control. but the fact that he was caught as we're showing on tape buying gasoline and he also admitted to pouring gasoline on the

staircase which was the only exit for the petit girls, i think it's very difficult to believe that he was just in it for the money and had no intent to kill them. it just really doesn't make sense. and i'm sure this is something that the jury is going to have to grapple with. but bottom line is, does it make sense? >> the rape also hurts him on the just in it for the money defense. >> right. there was also accelerant used around the bed of the girls. >> right. that's what they were contesting at summation today. it's not very -- it's sort of not very credible to think he poured the gasoline on the stairs but not by the girls, but that's the defense. >> right. sunny, how long do you think it would take for a jury to come back with a verdict? >> it's interesting, it's something we've been talking about sort of behind the scenes, how long is this going to take. i don't know what jeff thinks, but i would say this case is going to the jury midafternoon monday and i think we'll have a verdict by monday. one thing that i did notice in the courtroom and i've tried, you know, sex crime cases,

juries usually don't want to look at the defendant was it's hard to pass judgment on a person. this jury looked at pictures and glared at this defendant. they were certainly ready to pass judgment on this defendant. so i think we'll have a verdict by monday. >> i don't know what it will be but i know what the verdict will be. i think this trial will really begin in the penalty phase. >> how long until we find out about whether or not it's a death penalty? >> well, they usually move right into the penalty phase, if not that day. >> so they're not going to wait for the trial of another guy. >> no, no, no, same trial. >> appreciate it. it's a tough case to cover, appreciate you talking to us about it. still ahead, the california couple accused of holding jaycee dugard captive, they faced the judge and charges against them. and giant waves and the surfers who dare to ride them. we talked to a prosurfer about what it's like riding 100-foot waves. >> you've got to feel

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tonight, a look at a little

known monster, the kind that can swallow ships whole but can also be a beauty to behold. rogue waves, hundreds of feet high. for years scientists denied they even existed but now author susan casey has written the book "the wave" a book that reveals the monstrous waves and the surfers who search the world for them to ride them. he's toed wed on to them, and it down for the interview. >> when you started surfing, what was the biggest wave that people thought you could -- that one could surf? >> you know, probably in the 20 to 25-foot range which would mean the front would be 30 or 40 feet which had be the biggest waves anyone had ridden and was the limit of your capability. >> what's your biggest wave now? >> eight to ten storys? >> how many feet is that?

>> i always have a hard time saying it but i know wave that's were like 100 feet. i could say 100 feet, maybe less, but at that point it doesn't really matter, it's giant. >> what is it -- it's eight to ten stories, but it's moving and, i mean, explain what that really means, eight to ten stories. >> well, it is, it's an apartment building that's moving. when they get above 60 feet they start to do something different. they get more vertical and they actually advance as a vertical wall. with feathering happening before all the energy can gather itself up in order to break, is that land, is that the moon doing something, and in fact it's, you know, there's a moment of recognition where it's like, oh, no, that's a wave. >> when you're riding that, you obviously don't -- do you have a sense of how big -- >> you don't -- >> you don't look back, do you? >> if you have the time to look back then you're in a really luxurious position at that point. but, yeah, no, normally you can

feel it. >> you feel it. >> you feel it. you know where it is. >> you must hear it. >> hear, it but it's one of the few things you're actually able to do where you're looking ahead to see what's behind you and you can know what the water is doing in front of you, and that will tell you what the wave is doing behind you. >> you've got to feel extraordinarily alive in that moment. >> absolutely. nothing like it. >> right. >> i mean, it's -- >> every molecule has got to be sort of trained. >> everything's turned on, your hearing is as good as it ever is going to be, your vision is as strong as it's ever going to be. your decisionmaking is as acute as it's ever going to be, and you really are -- you have no exterior, you know, cluster. there's no, there's nothing coming in. you're not thinking, i've got to be somewhere. >> i've got to take the garbage out, nothing. >> no taxes, nothing. zero. you've got one thing which is to make it, and when you ever get in a position where you feel like you're not, you know right away and you're like, okay, here

we go. >> you know you're going to fall. >> yeah. >> i think what a lot of people don't realize is in some of these places, tahiti and other places, if you fall off an eight to ten-story wave, you're hitting coral in many cases. >> absolutely. of course live coral bottoms in places where you're surfing, barrier reefs. >> the coral is only a few feet from maybe the surface of the water. >> sometimes, it can be as shallow as six to eight feet. could be even shallower depending on the wave and the position. i mean, we have other issues on deeper water wades where it's breaking in 50 or 60 feet of water, where to 80 you have the issue of hitting the bottom. in another place in hawaii like king's reef or jaws you have the issue of being held down. >> jaws is a big wave in hawaii. >> right of the notion of being like pinned under water on a 60-foot wave with your head coming up against a cave, it just was so terrifying that i wanted to see it. so we swam out and looked around and there were these crevices and like little gullies and

overhangs and you could easily see how a body would just get pinned in there. >> are you scared, though? >> yeah. you want to be scared f you're not scared you're not assessing what's happening. >> so fear is a good thing. >> absolutely. it's a fair assessment of what's occurring. if you're out and it's 80 feet or 60 feet and you're being held down, you want to be scared. i mean, that's only good math. you know? >> i read in the book you say, if i scare myself once every day i'm a better person, it helps to have that jolt of perspective that life is fragile. >> absolutely. critical. that's really the truth of how it s our existence is -- you know, dying is easy. it happens in two seconds. living is a tricky game. so to think it's not ever present to be in denial of death's presence is like -- is not a fair assessment of living. >> are there more big waves than there used to be? is something changing in the ocean? >> this is one of the main questions i set out to answer. i asked every scientist i came

into contact with this exact question. and to a person they said yes there. were varying degrees of how they said it. occasionally they would say, yes, because they're scientists and climate change is such a complicated and, you know, big thing. and we don't fully understand it. but the things they do know are that the sea levels are rising which of course means, you know, higher water, and that there is -- the extremes are getting more extremes. >> what do the giant waves tell us? >> i think that nature is a lot more powerful than we are. insofar as we want to live next to the ocean and 60% of the global population lives within 30 miles of a coastline, we need to spend more time understanding it. >> the ocean is really not well known. >> not at all. >> it's our life support system. that's what people don't realize. it's our life support system for our planet. >> the book is "the wave." it's really cool and larry hamilton is an incredible,

incredible surfer. an apology for an unthinkable experiment, intentionally infecting people with sexually transmitted diseases in guatemala. and anderson cooper arrested. what? we'll tell what you really happened, next. was gathered together in one place. [ printer whirs ] done. ♪ thanks. do you work here? not yet. from tax info to debunking myths, the field guide to evolving your workforce has everything you need. download it now at thinkbeyondthelabel.com. the power and versatility of six tools packed into one. more innovation. more great values. craftsman.

trust. in your h in 2008 i quit venture capital to follow my passion for food. i saw a gap in the market for a fresh culinary brand and launched behindtheburner.com. we create and broadcast content and then distribute it across tv, the web, and via mobile. i even use the web to get paid. with acceptpay from american express open, we now invoice advertisers and receive payments digitally. and i get paid on average three weeks faster. booming is never looking for a check in the mail. because it's already in my email.

all right, so a headline caught my eye today. once you see it you can guess why. take a look, the headline says anderson cooper and one arrested for an internet scam. i was worried when i read this, but i realized i wasn't arres d arrested. but two men were arrested in the philippines today, a filipino businesswoman got an e-mail from

anderson cooper, was waiting in the airport with $1 million, which makes no sense either. she was told she'd have to pay $500 to get the suitcase with $10 million out of customs. so she met with anderson cooper, who's this guy, and he is from africa, that didn't raise suspicion with her either, she later realized her mistake, and the police nabbed the man playing me. the quote in the article, one of the law enforcement officers, let's put it on the screen. yeah. i don't know what it says. i don't read that, but it was kind of funny. there's another page to it. oh, that's the whole quote. all right. no idea what it means but i like the looks of it. anyway, so if you get an e-mail saying i've arrived in your town

with a suitcase full of $10 million, probably not true. i'm not oprah. following several other important stories tonight, joe johns is back with the 360 news and business bulletin. >> that's inkrepdible anderson. new charges today in the jaycee dugard kidnapping case. phillip and nancy garrido, the california couple accused of holding dugard captive for decades face kidnapping and rape charges. they've previously pled not guilty to 29 felony counts. and president obama offered his profound apology to the president of guatemala for a study that infected hundreds in that country with sexually transmitted diseases. the 1940s experiments were similar to those conducted in tuskegee, alabama, some 40 years ago. president obama today announced rahm emanuel has stepped down as white house chief of staff. the president praised emanuel for his, quote, unmatched level

of energy and enthusiasm. emanuel, who is expected to run for mayor of chicago, has been temporarily replaced by his deputy, pete rouse. remember in may when the stock market took a sudden nose dive and no one knew why? federal regulators say it was sparked by a large investor using automatic trading software to sell futures contracts. the name of the investor was not released. and how's this for a mixup? football star chad owe chchocin being recalled after a phone number on the boxes is a sex line. it should have been for a children's charity. ochocinco has apologized. as for the sex line, it has been disconnected. that is incredible. how do you mess that up? >> that is some mistake. so, joe, i've got to admit. i'm not a fan of people trying to be funny on airplanes or

pilots talking when people want to sleep. i don't tell the pilots my troubles at work, i'd rather they not accident plain the route in excruciating detail. but this video shows flight attend and thes who just wanted to dance. >> when outside the aircraft, manual inflation tubes are on both sides. push and release air. it will illuminate once the tab is immersed in water. please be reminded that an -- ♪ just dance >> we found this video on youtube, i've got to say this is the point where i would have demanded to get off the airplane. it was shot aboard a flight on a philippine carrier. the flight attend and thts danc

and later getting a round of applause. >> somebody's got to file a complaint, they're having too much fun. >> joe, have a great weekend. a special report, dr. sanjay gupta, i'll see you monday. hosi really save you 15% or more car insurance? a bd in the hd worth 2 inhe bush? praiser: well you rarely see them in this good of shape. appraiser: for example the fingers are perfect. appraiser: the bird is in mint condition. appraiser: and i would say if this were to go to auction today, woman: really? appraiser: conrvativy it would be worth 2 in the bush. praiser: it's just biful, thank u so much for brinit i woman: unbelievable appraiser: conrvativy it would be worth 2 in the bush. anncr: geico. 15 minutes could save you 15% or more.

i'm dr. sanjay gupta. over the next hour, i'm going to be taking you inside a truly amazing place, where some of the most baffling medical mysteries on the planet are being put under the microscope. mysteries like amanda young's. as a toddler, amanda began developing life-threatening

infections but her doctors didn't know why. when she was 8 years old a simple scratch led to gangrene and her leg had to be amputated. no one could figure out why her body was so vulnerable. why was his body producing a freakish amount of kidney stones, an extremely painful condition. until recently, medical mysteries as tough as these usually ended up as cold cases. unsolved. patients simply had to live. even die, without a diagnosidia. but now there's a place to go. the undiagnosed diseases program at the national institutes of health. for patients who are accepted, it's a chance, how ever slim, to finally get a diagnosis, possibly even a cure. we've been working on this report for more than a year. as a doctor, i've got to tell you what we found was fascinati fascinating. at the udp, the doctors pool their expertise as they search for clues to help them crack

these mind bending cases. they know the odds of solving any of these mysteries are long, but they hope to chart new science and discover new diseases along the way. patients' costs? they're covered. no promises are made, and sometimes, just sometimes, lives are transformed. tonight you'll meet two patients, 6-year-old kylie and sally, a mother of five. both were running out of time when they came to the udp. they were desperate for answers. would they find them? you're watching "doctor detectives." >> reporter: bethesda, maryland. deep inside the sprawling complex, dr. william gall leads an elite team of doctors, specialists and researchers. they are the best in the world. >> she often turns this foot in. >> reporter: together they focus their vast expertise to try to save patient's lives. >> looser. >> reporter: they are detectives in search of clues to solve mysteries no other doctors could solve.

>> you're talking about patients who have been seen by some of the best in the country here. they're very good clinicians and diagnostic doctors everywhere. so you're taking the hardest of the -- the most challenging cases of all. >> we expect a high failure rate. we expect a success rate of 10%, 15% or so. >> reporter: but 10% or 15% is a bright ray of hope for some patients. >> how much more you can do physically really speaks volumes. >> yeah. >> reporter: sally massagee had all but given up. take a look at her back. it was as if muscle mass was consuming her body. sally was transforming into the incredible hulk. so this is sally's mri of the brain. that's incredible. >> even the muscles that govern the movements of the eye, which are really small muscles, are huge. the knew row radiologist saw this and sort of went wild over this. look at the size of those. they're three to four times

bigger. >> they probably really had never seen anything quite like this. >> right. because there's no way to make those muscles big by moving your eyes a lot. it's not like lifting weights, so why would they be that big? >> reporter: it was a mystery. no doctors, no specialists, no one could diagnose what was happening to sally. which is why she was selected to come here. it's called the udp. the undiagnosed diseases program. it's a medical mystery ward. kylie mcpeak is 6. she was also selected to come to the udp. >> she knows she's different, but it doesn't seem to faze her. she kind of seems like she's just like a normal kid. >> reporter: how serious is kylie? >> well, she's, i would say real serious. i think that she has a disorder that will threaten her life. it is essentially the issue here. we're sort of racing against time.

>> reporter: the undiagnosed diseases program was launched only two years ago at nih. it accepts only the rarest of medical cases. >> this is saying, when you hear hoof beats, think of horses not zebras and i say but if you hear horse beats in africa or the nih, it's probably a zebra. >> reporter: it's not only about saving lives. here they're also hoping to discover new diseases and create new science. >> it's really sort of the inspiration that we all have as clinical researchers. >> reporter: in two years, the udp has had more than 3,000 inquire ei inquiries. >> this is an accept ansz letter. >> reporter: udp has accepted a little over 300 patients. >> you have to tell a lot of people no. >> we do. yes. >> reporter: seems like that would be hard. >> it is hard. it's very hard. i have to take some solace in the fact that even though we're turning down a lot of people, we're still helping a chosen

few. >> reporter: the few, with mysterious conditions no one can diagnose. kylie dawn mcpeak was born in may of 2004. the picture of a perfect baby girl. she developed like a precocious, healthy toddler. >> she was above average on everything. i mean, she could say her abcs when she was like 18 months old. >> reporter: then at 3 1/2, kylie was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. shortly after that, her mom and dad, gina and steven, noticed something wasn't right. it began with the voice tremor. >> i have to eat. i have to do shots. >> reporter: then kylie had a seizure. by the time she turned four, her face started to twitch. >> does your face feel funny? >> no. >> reporter: the first day you sort of realized there was something that was not right

with her, because she was this precocious child, zooming past all the milestones and everything, because you're a parent now and trying to figure out, is this just me being overly sensitive -- >> i was told that. i was looking for things that weren't there. it's just really hard. it's -- i don't know. >> we actually spent a lot of time videotaping her when we saw the little things that started happening because no one believed us. >> do you know when your birthday is? >> the 1st. >> good girl. >> reporter: the twitching soon spread down the entire right side of her body. her head began to tilt right. eating became a struggle. by then, all the doctors agreed something was wrong. but what was it? the little girl was deteriorating. >> at this point, i didn't know if i should plan for her to go to kindergarten or if we should plan a funeral. >> reporter: sally massagee's

mystery did not begin until later in life. she was in her late 40s when her muscles began to grow out of control. >> do you remember looking at her chart for the first time? >> yes, i do. this was referred by an end dough corinne not at duke. and the endocrinologist said in my 38 years i've never seen a case like this. something like that. okay? that's sort of impressive. what does that mean? well, when you see a picture, then, that's pretty impressive. >> reporter: like all the patients selected for the undiagnosed diseases program, sally and her husband and kylie and her mom and dad would come to the nih for a week of exhaustive and complex tests. where i medical strike force was trying to save their lives. >> i went in there in hopes of finding an answer. >> this is our last hope but at the same time, we finally made it to the people that are going to find out what's wrong.

>> the mcpeak family will travel more than 2,000 miles to the national institutes of health. after their cross country journey, they're going to endure one of the most gruelling weeks of their lives, physically and emotionally. as the doctor detectives at the udp go to work. just ahead, we're going to show you what it was like for kylie and her parents. >> it's hard. it's really hard. but hopefully it's for a good cause. [ male announcer ] the financial headlines

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it is. in 2008 i quit venture capital to follow my passion for food. i saw a gap in the market for a fresh culinary brand and launched behindtheburner.com.

we create and broadcast content and then distribute it across tv, the web, and via mobile. i even use the web to get paid. with acceptpay from american express open, we now invoice advertisers and receive payments digitally. and i get paid on average three weeks faster. booming is never looking for a check in the mail. because it's already in my email. kylie mcpeak was sick and getting sicker. her parents had spent nearly two years with specialists. >> perfect. >> reporter: no one could diagnose what was happening to kylie. her voice tremored the twitch that's were convulsing the entire right side of her body. >> i'm a bad parent. i feel like, why can't i help my

kid? so -- >> can't really put it into words. just helpless. >> reporter: dr. william gall is chief investigator at udp, the undiagnosed diseases program at the national institutes of health. >> i remember vividly the first time i met her by video. it was at one of our udp board meetings. >> can you smile for me? >> you could have heard a pin drop in that room. there were 60, 65 people in it, and they're all essentially emoting over this, you know, terrible occurrence. >> reporter: last year, kylie was accepted into the program. >> anywhere is going to find answers, it will be here. these are the best of the best. >> reporter: a mysterious force was also assaulting sally massagee's body. at 53, a wife and a mother of five, her muscles were growing out of control. she was in excruciating pain. she, too, was accepted to the

undiagnosed diseases program. >> i felt certain that if there wasn't a diagnosis, i felt like it was pretty certain that it would kill me. >> reporter: sally's husband, buddy. >> oh, it was scary. you just waiting to find out what's next. what normal, functional thing people have to do to get through the day was she not going to be able to do next. >> reporter: no one could offer an explanation for what was happening to sally. the medical s.w.a.t. team of doctors and specialists as the undiagnosed diseases program quickly ruled out one possibility. >> bottom line, bones are not involved, it's not acromegaly, it's just confined to the muscle. what in the world could this be? >> reporter: that's always the question here. kylie and her parents made their way from reno, nevada, to bethesda, maryland, and the nih in hopes of finding out what in the world could be wrong with kylie. do you want to know what's going on with kylie if the next sentence was, but there's nothing we can do about it?

>> yeah. >> reporter: why? >> just it's -- i think it would be nice to have a prognosis, to know -- i mean, even if it's not treatable, if it is terminal, then how much time we have left as opposed to not knowing. you know, it could all end tomorrow. >> reporter: kylie will undergo a weekong series of complex tests and evaluations by top medical specialists at nih. ♪ twinkle, twinkle, little star ♪ >> reporter: it's physically draining for everyone. and for kylie's mom and dad, emotionally wrenching. the week is intense. >> i don't think anybody's seen anything quite like kylie. this is a very complex case, and could be difficult to solve. >> clearly on the right leg, see a lot of movement here. the right foot sort of the foot is turned inward. they call that dystonia, or

abnormal tone. a lot of tone in these muscle groups over here. left side has it a little bit as well, but not, not quite as bad, although there's that constant moving going on. can you see it in the feet, you can see it in the hands, you can see it in her eyelids and clearly in her voice. >> reporter: dr. gall and his team look at everything for clues. >> something curious about, what happens with sleep? >> oh, it stops when she sleeps. >> reporter: it stops when she sleeps. that's a really important clue. >> very important. yes. >> reporter: kylie's tests begin in early morning. >> beautiful. can i tell you something? you are all done. >> good job. >> reporter: and go late into the night. >> say baby boy. okay. kitty cat. >> it's hard. it's really hard. but hopefully it's for a good cause. >> reporter: in the hallways, specialists hold meetings on the

fly, throwing out new theories, hoping something they've learned fits into the bigger puzzle. and a single diagnosis. >> a lot of unanswered questions. absolutely. >> reporter: this idea that so many of the patient that's come here are, you're not going to figure it out. that's not like television. people, whether it be a show like "house" or a lot of other medically-based shows, they expect you're going to get the answer. >> that's right. >> reporter: are the expectations pretty high? >> the expectations are high until i reiterate what their expectations should be. but on the other hand, we don't want to take all hope away. so there really is a balance there. i think of this as in part like the dating services of the '80s where they call it, you know, lowered expectations. it's part of our job to make sure that expectations are appropriate, aproper ritly lowered compared to what most of the patients come in with on mondays. >> reporter: sally massagee knew

what she was doing there. >> i took that disclaimer and i heard it, and i still clutched a strong dose of hope. >> reporter: but will sally's hopes for a diagnosis actually pan out or will they be crushed? coming up, we'll show you the exhausting week of testing she went through, and some important clues doctor detectives uncovered. as for kylie, will the clues she gave up be enough to identify the disease that's killing her? it's a difficult and emotional week that wraps up for the mcpeak family. >> it was just, i think, too much for me at that exact moment. >> it scared me because i didn't want it to be the end. makes me . ♪ to know, know, know you grandma is the bestest. the total package. grandpa's cooooooooool. way cool. ♪ grandpa spoils me rotten. ♪ to know, know, know you

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at 53 years old, sally massagee was physically ripped. >> everybody assumed i spent a whole lot of time in the gym. >> reporter: but sally didn't lift weights. in fact, whatever was causing her body to bulk up uncontrollably was also taking away her ability to live her life. >> it was very frustrating. i was losing the ability to do the things i loved to do. it became increasingly difficult just to walk. at some point i knew if it continued it would kill me. >> reporter: she'd seen countless medical specialists. no one had an explanation. that's why dr. william gahl and his team of specialists at the undiagnosed diseases program was trying to solve the mystery.

this is super impressive. >> look at these things. >> reporter: you literally see a cleavage right in the middle of her back because those muscles are so big. dr. william gahl is the program's lead investigator. when you see these pictures, they are pretty incredible. did you think steroids? >> sure. we pretty much all saw it except the letter said she's not taking steroids, she's not taking anything anabolic, and she did weight lift a little bit but many years before. so there's no possible effect of that. so the endocrinologist had eliminated all those things we would naturally think about. >> reporter: during a week of intense tests, there are scans. blood work. an examination of everything going on inside sally's body. >> so this is sally's mri of the brain. that's pretty incredible. >> reporter: when the images were found, it was seen that the muscles, even the muscles that govern the movements of the eye, which are really small muscles, are huge.

the radiologist saw this and sort of went wild over this. look at the size of this, they're three to four times bigger. >> reporter: they've probably never seen anything like this. >> right. because there's no way to make those muscles big by moving your eyes a lot. it's not like lifting weights. so why would they be that big? >> reporter: it's a clue. it suggests something inside the muscle itself. so the udp team took a sample. you took some muscle from her arm. >> right. and really, this was one of those sort of judgment decisions. because she had had a muscle biopsy one year before that was read as normal. so we weren't like 99% sure we should do this. we were like 70%, 80% sure. >> reporter: in five days the tests are complete. sally is sent home to north carolina, but no diagnosis. not yet. in fact, gahl and his team treat their patients like a crime scene. they collect all the evidence they can find and then try to make sense of it. in medicine, it's striking that

it's almost kind of rote most of medicine. it's literally a, b, c. we do the same thing, the same way, every single time. here it's totally different. >> it's true. this is a different paradigm. so this to me is the perfect amalgam of the training in knowledge, you know, having acquired a certain fund of knowledge and applying it to cases that are not yet solved. so i find that extremely stimulating. >> reporter: but that decision, to take the sample of muscle tissue from sally's bicep, in time, that will prove to be a key part of this busle. at midweek for 5-year-old kylie, her body has only given up a few small clues. but the specialists are eliminating possible causes by finding what is working normally. so this is the right side of her brain and this is the left side of her brain. it's the right side of her body that's affected, so you would expect to see changes on the left side of her brain. >> i think things are

structurally pretty normal, so it's some sort of wiring problem that's not visible. >> reporter: an elect throw ensef low gram, or eeg, shows kylie's brain is symmetrical, which is positive news. but there are these spikes of activity. >> very symmetrical. >> reporter: they could point to epilepsy partiala continuea. >> we don't have an understanding of the underlying mechanism that's brought it on. >> yeah. this will help it not hurt. >> reporter: by friday, the tests are complete. dr. gahl and his team are planning what they're going to tell kylie's parents. waiting in another room, kylie's mom and dad are anxious. hopeful. >> they might have some things back from that. so it's exciting and i'm nervous. >> so we want to document that for her. >> reporter: but the doctors have no diagnosis.

>> working all sorts of things that have yet to come back for us to consider. >> reporter: instead they explain how the results will guide their investigation. >> we continue to work together on this. >> reporter: for kylie's mom and dad, gina and steven, the emotional toll of the week is just so overwhelming. >> we don't consider this to be a final diagnosis. the parents are really having sort of a tough time. and this is quite typical of this program. >> it was just i think too much for me at that exact moment. >> it scared me, because i didn't want it to be the end. >> reporter: for the next several months, the udp team will chase every clue, hoping it leads them to a prime suspect. what is killing kylie? and how to stop it. >> maybe some day we'll get that phone call, hey, we think we might know what it is.

>> reporter: so no diagnosis yet for kylie. it's a crushing blow for her parents, but the investigation isn't over. coming up, a crucial clue surfaces deep within kylie's dna. will it be a key to this puzzle? also sally gets the best possible news ever. a diagnosis. her medical cold case is solved. >> it was exciting and wonderful for me to have this diagnosis because they weren't going to be trying to figure out what it was at the autopsy, you know? so i was thrilled. it may be a tough diagnosis but it is a wonderful one for me. good at something but wants to be great. welcome to kaplan university. the university that's changing the face of education... to undergraduate degrees, graduate degrees... degrees that can give you a leg up... in a tough job market... in any job market... welcome. welcome to kaplan university. call kaplan university now or visit us on-line to take our free learning assessment.

i'm joe johns. sanjay gupta reports "doctor detectives" continues in a moment, but first this 360 bulletin. the michigan assistant attorney general who is under fire about his blog post on an openly gay student has taken a leave of

absence and andrew shirvell faces a disciplinary hearing when he returns. he sharply attacked the president of the student assembly calling him a radical, racist and liar. armstrong is pursuing legal action against shirvell. president obama has lost his right hand man rahm emanuel, he stepped down as white house chief of staff. >> the last 20 months, rahm has exceeded all my expectations. it's fair to say we could not have accomplished what we've accomplished without rahm's leadership. from preventing a second depression, to passing historic health care and financial reform legislation to restoring america's leadership in the world. >> rahm emanuel is expected to run for mayor of chicago. he's being replaced temporarily by pete rouse. closing arguments today in the murder trial of steven hayes, the first of two to be

tried for a home invasion in connecticut, accused of killing jennifer hawke-petit and her daughters in 2007. hayes could face the death penalty in convicted. his accused accomplice will be tried separately. deadly flooding from the carolinas to the northeast has caused at least eight deaths, includi including six in south carolina. many people had to be rescued from their homes in boats. water is six or seven feet deep in many homes and businesses. rescuers in chile believe they may reach the 33 trapped miners later this month, rather than in november. that's because they've successfully tested a rescue caps skpl drills are cutting ever closer to the miners who have been stuck in the mine since august 5th. i'm joe johns. sanjay gupta reports continues

in a moment.

tonight we're bringing you a special report. "doctor detectives." we spent more than a year following the stories of two patients, 6-year-old kylie, and sally, a mom. they were both very sick and getting worse. their symptoms were completely different but they had something in common. whatever was making them so sick was a mystery. both kylie and sally had seen dozens of doctors but no one had been able to figure out what was wrong with them. so they'd come to the undiagnosed diseases program at the national institutes of health hoping to get some answers. and possibly a chance for a cure. the udp is sort of like a

medical version of csi. patients are literally scoured for clues during a week of intensive tests and exams. no test result is left unturned. if you've got to crack a case that has stumped every doctor before you, you need to think outside the box. you need to work together. that's the premise of udp. would it all work for kylie and sally? no one, no doctors, no specialists, no researchers could explain what was happening to sally massagee. her muscles had grown grotesquely large and hard, like rocks underneath her skin. >> it became increasingly difficult just to walk. at some point i knew if it continued it would kill me. >> reporter: for one week, dr. gahl's team of world class medical experts probed and collect exhaustive scans, blood work, and a tissue sample from sally's bicep. >> we do liken it to detective work, but remember, a lot of the detective work takes place after the patients have gone. >> reporter: after five days,

the patients go home. and despite the odds against success, they are less desperate. >> i took that disclaimer and i heard it and i still clutched a strong dose of hope. >> reporter: what would be months of an exhaustive search for clues to solve sally's mystery was just now beginning. >> bones are not involved, it's not acromegaly, it's just confined to the muscle. what in the world could this be? >> reporter: it's also what everyone is asking about 6-year-old kylie mcpeak. >> how are you doing today? >> reporter: shortly before her fourth birthday, the mystery began. something was attacking her body. >> i have to eat, i have to do a shot. >> reporter: how serious is kylie? >> well, she's, i would say, real serious. i think that she has a disorder that will threaten her life is essentially the issue here. we're sort of racing against

time. >> reporter: kylie has already been at the udp for a week. dr. gahl and his team have been sifting through all the data they've amassed on her. do you have a diagnosis for kylie? >> no, but we have a few good leads. >> for a while they suspected a rare disorder that affects the brain's motor strip. but tests came back, clues showed the electrical charges in kylie's brain were not coming from just one area but in fact from all over. so they were back to square one. >> well, you try to differentiate whether this is something that was genetic or something environmental, in other words, what happened to her. really that's the dichotomy here. >> reporter: that's sort of the first step for everybody. genes or the environment. >> pretty much. and sometimes you can get at one or the other of those more easily. >> reporter: in time, an analysis of kylie's dna revealed the genetic clue. they found a mutation in a

particular gene that makes a protein called laforin. >> is it possible it's truly something that's never been described before? >> it's very possible. >> reporter: brand-new. >> brand-new mutation and maybe identifying a gene that is not known previously to cause a human disease. >> reporter: gahl isn't sure if this mutation is causing kylie's disease or if she has some sort of autoimmune disorder that affects both her pancreas and brain tissue. questions that may be impossible to answer. at the very least, they're going to require more time. back home in reno, nevada, gina and steven are trying to focus on enjoying the time they have as a family. although kylie is deteriorating, she's happy. >> i'm scared that they might not find something in time and the reality is, they might not find anything, but if they're still looking and they haven't given up, that's kind of like

someone's on your side. >> maybe some day we'll get that phone call, hey, we think we might know what it is. >> reporter: in bethesda, maryland, the doctors at the undiagnosed diseases program are digging deeper into that genetic clue. they're doing a dna analysis of kylie's parents and sisters. they know it is now a race. >> every new case that comes to us brings with it a human story. i think the important thing is for us as professionals to look at the successes that we have. and to try to not dwell on the -- on the failures, because we fail so often. >> reporter: but not always. luckily for sally massagee, the experts at the udp solved her mystery. >> i expected miracles from them and they gave them to me. >> reporter: the tissue sample they took from sally's muscle hit the jackpot. in the red staining of the

biopsy, scientists at the udp found the presence of amyloid, abnormal protein that's cool from cells in the bone marrow. >> that was a huge hit for us. >> reporter: mystery solved. the diagnosis? amyloidosis, a rare disease in which proteins deposit themselves in a patient's organs or tissues. an estimated 2,000 people in the united states are diagnosed with the disease every year. sally's was a mystery because the proteins manifested in her skeletal muscles. >> you get mysteries you don't solve and you get mysteries that you solve. this is one that you get to put a check in the solved column? >> yeah. yeah, it is. >> reporter: that's got to be a pretty good feeling. >> oh, it was the best. basically it's sort of justifies our existence. >> reporter: but for sally, a diagnosis meant only that now she had a chance for survival. there is no cure for this disease. >> it was exciting and wonderful

for me to have this diagnosis because they weren't going to be trying to figure out what it was at the autopsy. you know? and so i was thrilled. it may be a tough diagnosis but it was a wonderful one for me. just to have one. >> reporter: in june of last year at the mayo clinic, she underwent kpeem chemotherapy and a stem cell transplant in the fight of her life. >> there were times in the process where i thought it was real possible i would die. >> reporter: today, sally massagee is far from 100%. >> every day she's a little bit stronger, and every day she walks a little bit further. you just sort of have to smile, because these are things that were inconceivable a year ago. >> reporter: sally and her husband, buddy, recently returned to the mayo clinic for her yearly checkup. >> so it doesn't get much better than this, really. ♪ i see trees of green

>> reporter: doctors don't know if sally's body will ever return to what it was like before the disease struck. but for sally, that's not what's important. >> i was cooking last week one night in the kitchen and everybody was around you, and lewis armstrong came on the radio singing, "what a wonderful world" and i just started to cry. because those routine, ordinary moments of life are so wonderful and they're so precious, and i have them. and i'm so grateful to nih. they not only found it, but they found it just in time. ♪ and i think to myself what a wonderful world ♪ >> reporter: she was dead and now she's alive. that's what sally told us back in may, nearly a year after her stem cell transplant. she's continued to get stronger. just ahead, you're going to be

able to see for yourself how she's doing today. sally's going to join me here in the studio. we'll also tell you how kylie is doing now that she's back home. she's marked some big personal milestones and the doctor detectives haven't given up on her case. not by a long shot. their investigation continues. we'll tell you have the latest just ahead. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 are still talking about retirement tdd# 1-800-345-2550 like it's some kind of dream. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 it's either this magic number i'm supposed to reach, or... tdd# 1-800-345-2550 it's beach homes or it's starting a vineyard. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 come on! tdd# 1-800-345-2550 just help me figure it out in a practical, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 let's-make-this-happen kind of way. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 a vineyard? give me a break. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 [ male announcer ] looking for real-life answers tdd# 1-800-345-2550 to your retirement questions? tdd# 1-800-345-2550 get real. get started. talk to chuck. tdd# 1-800-345-2550

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but the doctor detectives say they're not giving up, they're still exploring every option. remember that crucial mutation in kylie's dna? it can still help solve her mystery some day. she graduated kinder gart and not started first grade this fall. she's also once again a big sister. her parents gina and steven are enjoying being home together as a family. they haven't given up hope that kylie one day will get a diagnosis. as for sally massagee, she's one of the big udp success stories. against pretty steep odds she left the udp with the holy grail, a diagnosis. there's no cure for her condition but she was able to get treatments which have made a huge difference in her health. her muscles are not growing out of control, in fact they're getting smaller. slowly she's getting back to her old life. i spoke to her earlier, and first thing i noeltsed, she's literally glowing.

it's remarkable to see. since we last saw you, how are you doing now? >> i feel greeat. i'm feeling really strong, really good, and i continue to feel better every several days. >> people saw those images and how big the muscles had become, but what did it -- what did it feel like? was it painful and were you able to do the things you wanted to do in terms of movement? >> no, i was very impaired and increasingly impaired. walking was very, very difficult. and i think that that was a mechanical thing, the muscles were so big and they scrunched up so hard it became very painful to walk. i couldn't adjust a turtleneck on my sweater. i couldn't reach up. i was so muscle bound and so weak i couldn't put on earrings, because i couldn't reach up that high to -- and hold my hands up there that long. i couldn't -- it was difficult to stand, to fix dinner. >> just everything.

>> everything was increasingly difficult. >> was it worse during the day or night? trying to sleep? >> you know, i wasn't able to function normally at any time. >> how about pain? were you having pain -- how did you control it? >> it was very painful. i don't know the condition itself was so painful but i think mechanically what it did to my body, being so heavy, the muscles were so heavy and they were so very tight and they would just cinch up tighter and tighter that there would be a lot of pain, and the muscles were so weak they would fatigue very, very quickly. >> that's a misconception. people thought you were actually stronger but you were in fact weaker and less mobile. >> the muscles would fatigue very quickly. >> when dr. gahl told you when you came in the chances were remote that they were going to figure this out, 85% to 90% chance they wouldn't figure it out, what did you think when you

heard that? >> i heard it and i understood it. and my memory was that what they said was they were very unlikely to have a diagnosis. but i still felt that it was very likely that they might figure out what was going on in my body and might be able to find sort of a workaround, you know? maybe not this is this disease, but your body is doing these things, and we can try blocking this or facilitating this to make it function okay. >> so might be able to offer treatment even without a diagnosis. >> right. >> this was going on for a long time. >> yes. >> you look at yourself in the mirror, you'd see the physical changes. >> yes. >> we talked about that. emotionally, how are doing? i mean, let me just add, was there a vanity part to this? you're changing -- >> oh, yes. it was very difficult. all of it was very difficult. and it ended up being an

experience that grew me a lot. the experience was almost a weight room for me emotionally and mentally and spiritually in coming to deal with things differently. because it was very difficult to see myself get heavier and heavier and bigger and bigger. it was difficult when i looked just like a compulsive weight lifter because that wasn't who i was. but it was also very difficult to lose the ability to do all the things i had been accustomed to doing. i couldn't christmas shop, you know, i christmas shopped online one year because i just couldn't. >> really, couldn't even leave the house. >> walk through the malls. i couldn't get in from the parking lot and walk through the store. >> as a doctor, just watching sally go through her ordeal has been a real education for me. in our interview the other day, i asked sally what she would tell other patients who are waiting for a diagnosis and they're race on the clock. she had some great advice. that's just ahead.

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as a doctor, i can tell you that medical mysteries are frankly fascinating. a chance to discover something new to break scientific ground, but it's also incredibly frustrating when you can't help a patient because you just don't know what's wrong. for the patient of course it's terrifying. before sally massagee got her life-saving diagnosis, she spent a decade watching her health fail as her muscles grew out of control. when we talked earlier, she described the fear she lived with. here's part two of our interview. we know that if this had gone untreated, undiagnosed and untreated, it's a fatal problem. >> yes. >> it would have killed you. >> yes. >> did you ever think about that?

>> oh, yes, i was sure it would kill me. at some point i really put off acknowledging that to myself, but i remember -- i know i had come to believe that it would kill me, and i remember one time specifically driving in the car by myself down the highway and realizing how quickly the process was accelerating. it wasn't just that things were getting worse and worse, it was that they were doing so more and more quickly. and it sort of flashing back on the changes and the times of the changes and thinking, it's not going to take as long as i had thought, you know? it's going to be quicker than i had thought that it might be. and it was sad and frightening and it was very -- it was the hardest was knowing the pain i was giving my kids and husband because they love me so much. and they had those same fears, you know? >> i can't imagine, you know it's happening and there's

nothing can you do about it. >> nothing. >> and you went to the best places. >> yes. >> and you kept hearing the same thing. >> yes. >> we don't know. >> right. >> at some point you must have just wanted to scream. i mean, you have certain expectations i guess as a patient. >> it was frustrating. at the same time, there was no question in my mind that those doctors were doing everything they could do. you know, i was very grateful to them for keeping trying and it certainly wasn't that they weren't trying with every ounce of energy and ability that they had. >> right. the, you know, when you finally ended up at the nih and they did this biopsy again, which ended up being it. that ended up being the moment. >> yes. yes. >> but they'd done a biopsy before. >> yes. >> it's almost as if they said, we did the biopsy, we're not going to go down that path, they needed to do it again. what's the lessen in there for patients who may be in a similar situation? >> to have the tenacity and endurance to keep trying and looking and listen to the

doctors and do what they said, i remember one of the doctors coming in and saying i had a patient who was diagnosed on his fifth muscle biopsy. i think what he was saying to me was, we have to look different places at different times. and i trusted him. so there's several lessons there. one is, you know, to keep trying and keep looking, and one is to listen to the doctors and do what they suggest. >> and you are real proof of that. i should point out as well, you look great. you had another big moment today. >> yes. i was able to put my wedding ring on for the first time since january of 2008. things continue to get better. >> because there's just a muscle so swollen. it's a beautiful ring, by the way. >> thank you. thank you. >> buddy did a good job. >> he did. he did, in many, many ways. >> so great to see you in person. >> thank you. >> and you look great, and. >> thank you. >> i'm so glad. hopefully things will continue to go well and a lot of patients will benefit from what you have been through. >> i would be very happy for that to be true. it would be so nice for this experience to benefit other

people. >> thanks, sally and thanks for being here. >> thanks. >> you know, there's a couple things i want to say. first off, this has been an incredible story to report. it's been amazing to see sally get the answers she so desperate will he hoped for and to get her so much better over the last year. but as a father of three young daughters, i have to tell you, it was really hard to watch kylie and her parents go through the agony of not going through what's making kylie so sick. and after all they'd been through, they still don't know. it's an important point. what you've seen this hour has never been seen before. kylie's disease is a true mystery. so i think it's safe to say that the doctor detectives at the udp have a long ways to go still in terms of exploring what might be causing these problems with kylie. some of that's going to be looking at that dna evidence and everyone in her family seeing if they find some anomalies. that mutation they found was an amazing discovery. it could be describing an entirely new disease. a few years from now we could be talking about kylie's diseas