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CNN Live Today

Ohio Shootings Case

Aired December 04, 2003 - 10:14   ET

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


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


DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: I want to get back now to the interstate shootings in Columbus, Ohio. Police can link four of the 12 shootings to the same weapon. So far, they are not revealing what they know about the weapon. The first known incident along the stretch of Interstate 270 was last May. But it was the death of a woman last week that suddenly pushed the case into the national spotlight. Our firearms expert Eric Haney joins us now to discuss the investigation.
Good morning, thanks for being here, with your expertise.

So they know four of the shootings are from the same gun, and yet they think 12 of the shootings are related. How do they make that distinction?

ERIC HANEY, CNN FIREARMS EXPERT: Well, what they have on the four is forensic evidence from the -- the spent round, the bullet itself, the cartridge case, Scientific hard evidence. So the rest of those probably has to do with the patterns with which the shootings take place, the location the shots are fired from, just how this person is going about doing this.

KAGAN: What type of weapon do you think we're dealing with here?

HANEY: Probably a rifle, probably a high-powered rifle.

KAGAN: And what makes you think that? Just because of how far away the person would have to be.

HANEY: Just how it's taking place, and then also, probably the forensic evidence that the police do have.

KAGAN: We were having a chance to visit in the commercial break, we were talking about how it's deer hunting season, the gun part of that season is open. But you say deer hunters legally aren't using rifles, and that would make the person who would be doing these shootings stand out a little bit.

HANEY: If it is using a rifle, yes. My understanding is rifles are not legal for deer hunting in the state of Ohio.

KAGAN: Authorities here are reluctant to use the word "sniper." Why is that?

HANEY: I don't know. Professional people in this, police and military sniper, sniper has a very specific meaning to those people and to myself. And then the rest of them just shooters, a person who just stands up and shoots. A single rifleman in our society, we tend to call that person a sniper.

KAGAN: And of course, when we think sniper now, you tend to think what happened in Washington D.C. What lessons do you think were learned in cracking that case?

HANEY: I think the biggest one the police came to in that the forensic evidence is great, but that's for prosecuting the case. What you have to do is find that person and you stop the killing, whatever that takes.

KAGAN: We talked to a lot of profilers and thinking about what kind of person that was. Boy, were the profilers off in Washington. Talking about a white man, talking about one person working by himself. It apparently looks like it was two, one now being convicted, the other now being on trial. What kind of lesson is learned from that when you try to figure out what kind of person might be doing this?

HANEY: Well, the psychological profiles, probably the central thing that you can say about a person that is doing this, absent the fact of them being crazy, granted that's not a clinical term. You think of a juvenile mentality. It's a person who has created a fantasy and they're acting out this fantasy for some sort of achievement of personal power. It's a person who feels himself powerless in life. That's usually the case in these types of things.

KAGAN: You've had a chance to talk with some of the investigators up there to get a little bit of information just in that -- they are taking this very seriously, obviously, in Ohio.

HANEY: They're pulling out all the stops. They are going to find this person, get him out of society just as quickly they can, before more damage and more death comes about.

KAGAN: I'm remembering also back to Washington D.C. You get in the cycle of a problem of you need the person to strike again in order to try to find who he is.

HANEY: Well, perhaps. But in this case they do have some good evidence, forensic evidence. They are not releasing that, because they don't want the general population to have a feel that they are looking for and in this case the equivalent of a white van.

KAGAN: Like they did previously.

HANEY: But they're going to haul this person in.

KAGAN: One person already lost their lives. Let's hope they find the person soon.

Eric Haney, thank you. Appreciate your expertise, as always.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired December 4, 2003 - 10:14   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: I want to get back now to the interstate shootings in Columbus, Ohio. Police can link four of the 12 shootings to the same weapon. So far, they are not revealing what they know about the weapon. The first known incident along the stretch of Interstate 270 was last May. But it was the death of a woman last week that suddenly pushed the case into the national spotlight. Our firearms expert Eric Haney joins us now to discuss the investigation.
Good morning, thanks for being here, with your expertise.

So they know four of the shootings are from the same gun, and yet they think 12 of the shootings are related. How do they make that distinction?

ERIC HANEY, CNN FIREARMS EXPERT: Well, what they have on the four is forensic evidence from the -- the spent round, the bullet itself, the cartridge case, Scientific hard evidence. So the rest of those probably has to do with the patterns with which the shootings take place, the location the shots are fired from, just how this person is going about doing this.

KAGAN: What type of weapon do you think we're dealing with here?

HANEY: Probably a rifle, probably a high-powered rifle.

KAGAN: And what makes you think that? Just because of how far away the person would have to be.

HANEY: Just how it's taking place, and then also, probably the forensic evidence that the police do have.

KAGAN: We were having a chance to visit in the commercial break, we were talking about how it's deer hunting season, the gun part of that season is open. But you say deer hunters legally aren't using rifles, and that would make the person who would be doing these shootings stand out a little bit.

HANEY: If it is using a rifle, yes. My understanding is rifles are not legal for deer hunting in the state of Ohio.

KAGAN: Authorities here are reluctant to use the word "sniper." Why is that?

HANEY: I don't know. Professional people in this, police and military sniper, sniper has a very specific meaning to those people and to myself. And then the rest of them just shooters, a person who just stands up and shoots. A single rifleman in our society, we tend to call that person a sniper.

KAGAN: And of course, when we think sniper now, you tend to think what happened in Washington D.C. What lessons do you think were learned in cracking that case?

HANEY: I think the biggest one the police came to in that the forensic evidence is great, but that's for prosecuting the case. What you have to do is find that person and you stop the killing, whatever that takes.

KAGAN: We talked to a lot of profilers and thinking about what kind of person that was. Boy, were the profilers off in Washington. Talking about a white man, talking about one person working by himself. It apparently looks like it was two, one now being convicted, the other now being on trial. What kind of lesson is learned from that when you try to figure out what kind of person might be doing this?

HANEY: Well, the psychological profiles, probably the central thing that you can say about a person that is doing this, absent the fact of them being crazy, granted that's not a clinical term. You think of a juvenile mentality. It's a person who has created a fantasy and they're acting out this fantasy for some sort of achievement of personal power. It's a person who feels himself powerless in life. That's usually the case in these types of things.

KAGAN: You've had a chance to talk with some of the investigators up there to get a little bit of information just in that -- they are taking this very seriously, obviously, in Ohio.

HANEY: They're pulling out all the stops. They are going to find this person, get him out of society just as quickly they can, before more damage and more death comes about.

KAGAN: I'm remembering also back to Washington D.C. You get in the cycle of a problem of you need the person to strike again in order to try to find who he is.

HANEY: Well, perhaps. But in this case they do have some good evidence, forensic evidence. They are not releasing that, because they don't want the general population to have a feel that they are looking for and in this case the equivalent of a white van.

KAGAN: Like they did previously.

HANEY: But they're going to haul this person in.

KAGAN: One person already lost their lives. Let's hope they find the person soon.

Eric Haney, thank you. Appreciate your expertise, as always.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com