coming up on r t stopped and interrogated at london's heathrow airport a legal adviser to n.s.a. whistleblower edward snowden who was singled out by a border agent and interview with that attorney from london straight ahead on the sochi winter olympics heat up with another day of competition russia has scored an olympic gold in a two man bobsled race while the u.s. and russia stand neck and neck for total medals the latest on the sochi games coming up. and a mixed verdict in the trial of a florida man who shot and killed an unarmed teen we'll break down the verdict in the case and ask if michael dunn will face a retrial for the death of jordan davis all of that and more later in the show.

it's monday february seventeenth five pm in washington d.c. i know you're a david and you're watching r t america but we begin today with the news that an attorney who represents former government contractor edward snowden says she was detained and questioned by heathrow airport border force in london while going through customs just on radar was traveling along with former n.s.a. whistleblower thomas drake to meet with julian assange at the wood dorrian embassy . yesterday radar tweeted after her experience saying i'm fine he throws border force was just trying to intimidate me who was at work snowden do you know him where is bradley manning to talk about what happened exactly i was joined earlier by just one raid act herself from london and i first asked her to tell me about what that experience was like. yeah i don't i mean everyone has to go through customs i get that and usually you get the same questions about where are you going

where are you staying how many days will you be here and that sort of thing but i was directed to a specific booth at what is called the border force which is i guess the name they use for customs at heathrow and i was initially asked by i was there and i said to see friends and they said no and i said well there are people in sam adams associate which is an american organization which is usually the kind of answer that i give the last fifteen international trips i've been on and then they wanted to know who was in that group so i name some names and they did at one point they did look at the passport enough to see that i had two russian visas in there and wanted to know why a gun to russia twice in the past three months and i said that i had

a client there and they asked who and i said that it was edward snowden and this is where it got really weird even weirder i should say they said who is edward snowden. and that just felt very strange and i want to ask you about whistleblower and. that was extremely peculiar i don't know i mean who on. yes a very peculiar who on the planet doesn't know who edward snowden is but i mean my issue is just very factual he's a whistle blower and he's and i. and then after that they asked me if i represented bradley manning they brought up these names not me they asked if i represented bradley manning. and i said no and then he did that same peculiar question who is bradley manning and i said

a whistleblower which we legally he is. and then the man asked where is bradley manning as if you didn't know and i said in jail and he said yes he's a criminal or something to that effect i mean it was it was to make me feel like ok these people are not whistleblowers they're criminals i don't know it was very. you finally i just said look i'm a human rights attorney. and i was allowed to eventually go through but it was just a very strange line of questioning and completely inappropriate to be asking about privileged attorney client relationships it is public that i am one of the attorneys representing. ed snowden however normally the fact of representation is something that can only be revealed with the client's permission so the fact that he's asking about who my clientele is and about my specific attorney client

privilege to work matters is inappropriate. and although i maintained a calm demeanor during the questioning as soon as i left i mean i was shaking and i cried i was just it was extremely intimidating and i know there are a few trolls on twitter saying it should be intimidating to answer a few questions but believe me when you're in a prolonged situation like that and my goal is trying to get into a country where i'm going to be delivering an award along with others to bradley manning it happen. to be the same award at the sam adams associates for integrity and intelligence award that tom drake and ray mcgovern and myself in calling rally delivered last year to edward snowden you know i didn't want to be belligerent or

talk back or be smart or clever or. argue when in a kind of way again because i depended upon this person to let me into the country but again i feel like this there is a pattern that's developing of interrogating journalists and lawyers at borders and that is unacceptable and jesselyn as i understand it and as a whistleblower thomas drake was traveling with you and was also going to the meeting at the ecuadorian embassy yet he wasn't exactly question in the way that you were any sense as to why you were singled out there i have no idea i mean that i mean it seems like i mean because of the questions i was asked and what was not singled out based on the questions i was asked i can only surmise it is because i am a representative a legal advisor to edward snowden and as i understand it you were on something called or you found out later you were on something called the inhibited persons

list can you talk about where that designation came from how do you think you ended up on that list. i don't know i i don't even know for sure that i am i mean again it's one of these things jen robinson another human rights attorney was told that she was on the list but she was facing difficulty leaving the country they do have this inhibited persons list but i don't know if that just means kind of like it did in america the equivalent of being on the select deep portion of the no fly list which i also had been for a number of years. because i myself have been a whistleblower but i've done my stint on various watch lists and. in the past it was because i was. i really take umbrage at that because my relationships with my clients are pretty privileged and journalists who are being stopped at the borders their relationships with their sources are privileged and

this kind of behavior coming in the western hemisphere from so-called democracy is is a complete threat to a free and open press as well as a legitimate justice system absolutely very difficult experience to go through indeed just one raid act we appreciate you coming on national security and human rights director at the government accountability project thank you and more now on day ten at the winter olympics in sochi russia this year's olympics marsa largest winter games in history the competition both twenty eight hundred athletes from eighty eight countries let's take a quick look at the medal count until this point russia and the u.s. top the medal count with eighteen netherlands is next with seventeen and norway and can of the canada me are up next with fifteen medals followed by germany sweden and switzerland and for more on the games let's go to our correspondent paul scott who

is in sochi. well russia have added a gold and a bronze medal to that tally on day ten in the two man bobsled event alexander's zuckoff and alexi voyage voda were dominant from start to finish they even set a track record in the first round now it's the first time the russians have won a bobsled gold since the fall of the soviet union and for thirty nine year old zubkov it completes a fairytale and adds a gold medal to the silver he won in cheering in two thousand and six and the bronze he picked up in vancouver four years ago in fact after those winter olympics in vancouver he announced his retirement from the sport but the opportunity to perform at a home olympics games was too much for him to turn down it coaxed him out of retirement and that now looks like an inspired decision elsewhere russia's bronze medal came in the figure skating ice dance competition in the can cut a lot of doing enough to secure a place on the podium the gold medal actually went to the american davis and white

who happened to be coached by a russian in the arena as a waiver elsewhere in the biathlon women's twelve and a half k. in the mass start there the gold medal went to brad bell a russian daddy adama chave and it was her third gold medal of these games and in securing that gold she's become the first female by athlete to win three individual gold medals at a single winter olympics where the female biathlon must start did take place however the men's event was postponed for a second day as well as the men's snowboard cross not because of fog in the mountains of krasnaya polyana many people thought it would be the mild temperatures and the melting snow causing problems however it was the fog but both of those vent events have been resettled for cheese day with the fog now beginning to lift now as a report from artie's pass caught. and of course one of the big events over the weekend was the u.s. russia hockey match the u.s. won in a shootout but the two teams could face each other again before the olympics wrap up r.t. spoke with a russian hockey legend about playing for his home country take

a look we will use a little russian team and still this way there are lots of pressure on the server but it's better we're going to do well. you know but there's going to lots of spirits to play to different kind of levels you're going to get in the first. that was hockey legend pawel. and russia is demanding that u.s. officials allow russian physicians access to a russian national who is serving a twenty year sentence in a u.s. prison in a statement the foreign ministry said a russian doctor should examine constantine yarrow shango because according to his lawyer his health has been worsening artie's honest aasia chirk now has the story in twenty ten detained in liberia in a sting operation brought on to u.s. soil and twenty eleven sentenced to twenty years behind bars for conspiring to internationally smuggle drugs the case of russian pilot constantin your son go stir in relations between moscow and washington returns to the headlines yet again after

the imprisoned pilots numerous cries for medical help remain unanswered in the u.s. his lawyer after visiting the man in jail recent alarm saying his client needs urgent medical care if he is still live singer shango seems to be on the brink of a heart attack you're xango did appear sick to me his face was red he visited li had shortness of breath he would take pauses in our conversation to compose himself he was. confused and generally appeared to be. having difficulty remembering the dates and the chronology of the different events that took place this week prison officials say they will now look into his health with an emergency check up at a hospital but moscow is demanding that the russian citizen being held in a new jersey prison be allowed a proper visit from russian diplomats as well as russian and american doctors for a full examination of his health and a proper professional health assessment little supergirl nobody has confirmed that

you're a shrink is experiencing problems with his health or that there's any problem with access to medical treatment moreover it was claimed that he had not requested any medical help or two is not true constantine requested medical assistance a number of times. a man with no previous criminal background anywhere in the world someone who has never even stepped foot on u.s. soil prior to his being snatched up by u.s. officials or shango became the first russian citizen to be sentenced in the us for an intent to participate in a crime that was built by special agents posing as drug dealers arrested in a third country at the time of his sentencing the case was dubbed historic undercover operation by the prosecution and a provocation by the defense the russian man in his forty's repeatedly pled not guilty in this case and claimed he was beaten and tortured following his detention his wife victoria says he had no health problems prior to that. about a month ago he had

a high fever and couldn't get up for days nobody looked after him he was physically unable to walk across the prison to the medical block where he would have queued for our ways because of your constant coughing he was keeping his cellmates awake and they were becoming hostile to him constant and used to be healthy man but his problems started after his detention in africa when he was beaten severely for three days by the people who detained him when constantine your shanker was arrested russian officials were not doing notified in moscow cited a breach of international law and diplomatic misconduct the russian foreign ministry has been urging washington to properly intervene in. this case a handful of times so far to no avail r t has reached out to the u.s. state department the department of justice as well as organizations like the a.c.l.u. human rights watch and amnesty international but we have not received any comment so far the notion the nonchalance surrounding this case in the u.s. was apparent from the early stages u.s. officials said they didn't let russia know about bringing its citizens to u.s. soil because of pressing the wrong button on

a fax machine notifying romania instead of russia and if this is true r.t. new york u.s. and european officials are growing concerns that the security vacuum in syria is supporting a training ground for foreign nationals looking to wreak havoc on their home countries that's all according to information provided by the director of national intelligence james clapper take a look we estimate at this point in excess of seven thousand. foreign fighters have been attracted from some fifty countries many of them in europe in the middle east and this is of great concern not only to us but to those countries . and of course it's not the only the u.s. casting fears british intelligence are now expressing concern that some citizens who joined the opposition in syria have returned home and now pose a serious threat of terrorism sara for it as more. that's causing huge concern

here amongst the security services the police have said that they've made a number of arrests and they're monitoring the situation closely indeed ingenue it's thought that sixteen arrests have been made of people having returned back the irony here of course is that the british government. want the assad regime to go beyond pushing the transition and they've been supplying weeks delayed to the rebels say technically they are on the same side as the jihadists who are fighting the assad regime and the british fighters who have joined those to harvest the concern though is that the supplies terrorists we see this list of the bridges the sensitive joining these the real worry is that obviously was there fighting with the gain the skills they're becoming indoctrinated and the real worry is that once the fights in syria they finish. they could return home and then the target could become. that was artie's sarah ferguson. and we turn to

florida where a verdict was reached in the trial of michael dunn the forty seven year old who shot and killed teenager jordan davis on saturday the jury in jacksonville found michael dunn guilty of attempted second degree murder for opening fire on three teens who were in the same as you vs jordan davis however they could not come to a consensus on whether to convict or acquit dunn of the most serious of charges first degree murder in the two thousand and twelve killing prosecutors argued that dunn recklessly shot at the teens after complaining about the volume of their music in a convenience store parking lot three of his ten shots struck davis one of them cutting through his liver along and his aorta however dunn testified that his actions were all in self-defense that davis threatened him and that he thought he saw a gun sticking out of the vehicle that held davis and his friends dunn was found guilty on four of the five counts he was charged with and now faces up to sixty

years behind bars to discuss this more i was joined earlier by our tease nicholas o'donovan who is in florida and has been following this trial very closely i first asked him to break down the charges that dunn was found guilty of. yes four out of five but probably the most important thing here isn't what he was found guilty of but what the jury couldn't decide on not so much in cent and terms because that's not going to change too much i'll explain that later but more in moral social even legal terms the first degree murder charge for killing seventeen year old jordan davis was a mistrial jurors a simply couldn't reach a very ticked on that but after asking the judge if a mistrial on that one charge would affect the rest of the charges the judge let them know that that wasn't the case the rest of the charges were could simply be trialled as normal and then the jurors proceeded conclusion michael dunn was found guilty on three charges of attempted second degree murder for opening fire on three

other teens that we we remember were in the same s.u.v. it was jordan davis he was also found guilty of one count of shooting throw in deadly missiles the shooting in the red dodge durango car in the tains but there was a deadlock on the murder charge against him in the jordan davis case and nicholas going off of what you were just saying at the mistrial the jury couldn't come to a decision on that i know they deliberated for a very long time what were the points of contention and this case that the jury really had to weigh. a very long time indeed after thirty hours of deliberation the jury couldn't decide it michael dunn was guilty or innocent of that first degree murder there was obviously a lot of discussion they were very very hard thirty hours as as we say and they had to take into consideration many many facts but once again the basic question here is how can a juror another human being well know when an individual fails for his life or

feels that his life is actually threatened therefore if a defendant comes up with what we can say are more or less credible story the bottom line is he's the only one that knows if his life was an immediate threat because the other person obviously is not there to tell their side of the story in some cases where we can see how a defendant says that he mistakes a candy bar or a kind of i stay for a weapon or you can just simply say that he saw something that looked like a gun even if they swears in a stand your ground case the jurors were instructed about this law and they could have just reached the conclusion that you know if the law says that when somebody is threatened you can simply just use that force then they could have just reached the conclusion that michael dunn did the right thing according to the law right well let's talk about some of the reaction after the verdict was read do you think people who are seeking justice for jordan davis are satisfied satisfied with this

outcome. well obviously there has been well an enormous reaction to this case into the mistrial we haven't seen though the outrage that followed the zimmerman trial but the truth is that george zimmerman walked away and that michael dunn was not only convicted of those three charges of attempted second degree murder but he could still face a retrial of that first degree murder charge so george jordan davis' mother for instance said that she was happy that there was some sort of closure but others were will are simply just frustrated know that michael dunn will not pay for the moment for that for what they think is a clear case of first degree murder we have seen a very strong online support group demanding justice for jordan davis we now know there's also a web site and a facebook page demanding justice for michael dunn so once again case involving the killing of a young african-american is starting to be polarized both sides of the story

obviously worlds just simply represent two very different ways know looking at the justice system here in america and nicholas what's next at this point for michael dunn there's a trial that can be coming do we know when that's going to happen. well that's a very good question the first thing we have to do is you know let's start with what we do know that's going to happen to him now he's going to spend a long long time in prison that's for sure each attempted second degree murder conviction carries a minimum sentence of least twenty years that's sixty years or so then what we still don't know is if you will eventually be you know face in a new trial for the murder of jordan davis if finally he's convicted for that charge he could obviously spend life in prison without parole but as i say we still don't exactly know if and when that second trial could happen although prosecutors have already said that it's a very very possible scenario all right well we'll have to weigh in see if he is

indeed convicted on that last murder charge appreciate your reporting artie's nichols o'donovan and us foreign policy circles are complaining about the record number of big donors to president obama that are getting plum postings at embassies around the world while the practice of placing big presidential campaign donors and posts abroad is common in the united states the obama administration is putting that practice into use now more than ever according to the american foreign service association obama's number of political appointees serving ambassadorships has broken all records at thirty seven percent and so far the rate for his second term is even greater now standing at the fifty three percent but it's not just staggering numbers that are calling attention to the issue it's the obama point he's themselves in a recent hearing senators have a chance to ask some of obama's nominees some very simple questions take a look just barbara i take it you've been to actually. tour of not have not

had the privilege yet i look forward to going to sort of you've been to norway. i guess and develop you've been to hungary yes senator i have missed them and have you been targeting. center i haven't had the opportunity yet to be there i've traveled pretty extensively around the world but i haven't yet had a chance said i am. the real expert on china. and some of those nominees are big donors indeed robert c. barber the nominee for iceland raise more than one point six million dollars for obama in two thousand and twelve colleen belle nominated as ambassador to hungary contributed about eight hundred thousand dollars to obama's reelection and no love bryson i'm a potential ambassador to argentina raised more than five hundred thousand dollars for obama's re-election to look more into obama's political picks for ambassadors i was joined earlier by r t political commentator sam sax and comedian b camp first asked sam what he thought about the situation look at all the administrations have

done this and usually. somewhere around thirty percent of their search ships have gone to political allies the obama administration in the first of the first term it was something like thirty eight percent second term and served often it's fifty three percent so it looks like this administration is doing it more than previous ones but there is a sort of quid pro quo here if you help me get elected will be a pretty nice gig for you down the road in ships are usually pretty nice drops and i think jay carney said well it's just because there's so much turnover right now in his second term but that's supposed to go down so that's their response but lee we saw from how all of those those appointees or those nominees responded that they couldn't you know answer a simple question or they could answer it but they haven't been to the countries that they're going to be appointed to do you find that problematic at all. probably a little problematic but we're not new to putting the horrible people in important

positions i mean this good news for you as with as it is reason it's good there will be well in a lot of positions it would you know that he wanted larry summers who was basically responsible for the regulating derivatives and the two thousand and eight collapse and by as i was using it want to be chairman of the federal reserve i mean it's it's were put in george zimmerman's head of the n.w. superior lance armstrong as head of the dea or the. the man in charge of underbred security it's a terrible idea we do this all the time but horrible people in important positions that's just what we do here take on a job brownie yeah yeah that makes a whole lot of sense but sam how much of an investor really know about the country they're going into. located on the map form of government. ideally i'd say only these sort of things the language they speak they're what the ruling party the ideals of the ruling party and it seems like these nominees don't have that basic knowledge and the state department don't doesn't have any guidelines on what to embassador should know apparently they're going to release

some at the end of this month but up until now they haven't had the need and we when you're chosen as an investor you go to ambassador school for a bit it's kind of surprise that everything's ok as long as they go to an bassett or a school and learn it's just like window dressing and you know the real things that need to be done with these countries being done with like economic hitman and the military and of it a lot of these are pretty symbolic jobs i mean the ambassador to the bahamas or a ambassador in this case norway if he screws up and if he doesn't know that much about the country there's not so much damage he can do but when you start saying ambassadors to china who don't know anything about china or hungary or somebody. here a small country here we're talking about problems there you can contract for which we have very strategic ties to you so what do you think the implications of this are you know having all of these bastards all around the world that may not know a whole lot about the countries there i don't think it'll change things in my job because like i was saying i think the important things and perhaps the scarier

things are done in other levels but i mean you know did it did it affect our country that we had a big cowboy who couldn't ride a horse and had been a cheerleader boy did that now and it didn't even matter at all you know we had a vice presidential candidate who couldn't list some things he'd read so point these ambassadors not being and having been to the countries and what role or. supposed to play you might remember when wiki leaks released the state department cables ambassadors and diplomats were encouraged to spy on the countries of the to collect information about foreign diplomats so maybe it's not career foreign service people that you want but people who you can do these covert operators and or him and do you think now that the administration is getting some flack for this they're going to you know i mean i guess initiation said that this uptick is an anomaly and so maybe the next few ambassadorships that are open are going to go to career people rather than political allies but i don't see this is being much of a change and as i said if it's an ambassadorship to the bahamas then maybe that's

where a political ally should be and not a career foreign service where we need the people there at the the big things right or decorative jobs for the most part while it seems like the state department may not be very patient with the obama administration going forward sam sax political commentator and leak camp are comedian thank you so much. and it seems some new yorkers made great use of their snow day after winter storm hit the northeast last week of course i'm talking about the central park snow structure that takes the form of male genitalia yes apparently plain old snowmen are overrated these days but perhaps most interesting is the fact that this particular snow creation was constructed in east green east green is one of eight designated quiet zones in central park which means many passers by have most likely had the opportunity to silently look at the art and perhaps even reflect on its phallic symbolism and that does it for now for more on the stove or stories we covered go to youtube dot com

slash r.t. america check out our website r t dot com slash usa and follow me on twitter at amir david. and. i would rather ask questions to people in positions of power instead of speaking on their behalf and that's why you can find my show larry king now right here on our t.v. question for.