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New Day

Explosions, Gunfire And Smoke At Kenya Mall; "A Shock To Us All"; Cruise Ship Captain On Trial; Boston Police Commissioner Resigning; Woman Arrested 13 Years After Kidnapping; Massive Foodfight!; iPhone Fingerprint Feature Hacked; Emmy Awards Celebrates TV's Best

Aired September 23, 2013 - 07:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to NEW DAY. You are looking at live pictures out of Kenya. This is that mall that's been under assault since Saturday. Smoke coming out of it, what is it? Explosions were heard. We understand that the terrorists say that they have strapped IEDs to hostages. The government says that is not true. The government says what you are looking at is this smoke resulting from burning mattresses, the situation, obviously, fluid and certainly not over.

We have a correspondent on the ground. We are waiting for her to get back to her camera position. Why? Because there have been a steady flow of gunfire there and that makes everyone scatter. There's a big triage center setup because they are expecting more people to be injured and come out of that mall.

Our correspondent is ready now. Let's get to Zain Verjee. Zain, can you hear us?

ZAIN VERJEE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: This is a really fast moving situation. The police and government officials are giving or making a statement and giving an update to what is going on right there behind me. They said this. The smoke that you saw is from the terrorists that puts mattresses on the fire. They say it was at the grocery store and they lit them up. They also say the Kenyan military forces are in control of West Gate.

They add that almost all the hostages have been evaluated. They insist that Kenya is secure. They claim, too, that two terrorists are dead. Several are injured. Ten to 15 of the gunmen they say are all men. That's important because a lot of the discussions that have been happening around here was that there were several white women that were seen at West Gate Mall.

We also separately received information that one British national is dead. Also, what we have been monitoring, ever since the siege started over the last three days is what al Shabaab is saying about their own siege, what they're saying is and we cannot independently confirm this is that some of the hostages have IEDs strapped to them. That's a big question mark. No one here is commenting about that. There is a lot of confusion about it. Also, that there is a potential of any gunman being out on the loose. There is a lot of fear in Nairobi and al Shabaab is capitalizing on that and telling the Kenyans, be afraid, because they are out there and trying to create as maximum trauma as possible. But again, that is just a report from al Qaeda and al Shabaab has put out on their feed.

CUOMO: Zain, obviously the one thing that is clear here is that the goal of this act was to spread fear and they're doing that rather effectively. Are the sources on the ground giving any sense of timeline as to when they think they can bring the situation truly under control, which is to end it?

VERJEE: The officials that are giving the press conference right now said that this is coming to an end soon. Now, they've said that before and it's been several hours, but there is definitely an extreme amount of activity happening right now. Our sources also say that the thoughts and the cause of the smoke that was rising over West Gate was some Kenyan forces that assaulted the building. I don't have more information on that.

But they are saying that all floors of West Gate Mall are secure. There are four floors and that it's a big mall, in fact, 3,000 people can fit in a mall like that. So it's a large piece of property and real estate and they're saying they're fully in control now. Whether that is the case, we monitor the situation on the ground and continue to talk to people and watch what happens in West Gate.

CUOMO: All right, Zain Verjee on the ground in Nairobi, please stay safe and thank you for the reporting. We'll get back to you soon.

There's a lot of other news here this morning so let's get right to Michaela for the top news -- Mick.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: All right, let's bring you up to date on our headlines. Gun control debate flaring up again, President Obama saying he cannot accept last week's killings at the Washington Navy Yard as inevitable speaking at a memorial for the victims Sunday. The president said the shooting should lead to some sort of transformation on gun violence in the U.S. But in an appearance on NBC's "Meet the Press," one of the NRA's leaders said in his opinion, quote, "There weren't enough good guys with guns."

The manslaughter trial of the "Costa Concordia's" captain resumes today after a two-month long summer recess. The Associated Press reporting the captain is hoping an Italian judge will allow an inspection of the now upright cruise ship. The Concordia as you know hit a reef, took on water and capsized off the coast in Tuscany in January of 2012. Thirty two people died. If convicted, the captain could face 20 years in prison.

Boston's police commissioner is stepping down, just months after leading the response to the Boston marathon bombings. Ed Davis will make it official today though his resignation is not expected to take effect right away. He has been on the job seven years and is set to be pursuing a fellowship at Harvard. No replacement has yet been named.

A 60-year-old woman arrested for a kidnapping that happened 13 years ago. Police say the suspect is related to the child's family and stole the infant from their home in Florida. That case went cold, until she tried to enrol the child, who is now a teenager, in school in Missouri. Apparently, that raised a whole lot of red flags. Police say the child and father have now been reunited.

Students at rival high schools in San Antonio could get suspended because of this they got caught on camera taking part in a Texas size food fight. It happened at "The What A Burger" restaurant after a football game between Grandise and O'Connor high schools. Some of the kids posted pictures and video on Twitter and Instagram.

Now all of that could come back to bite these food fighters. In fact, they could even face criminal charge. Not all of the kids were in support of it. They said, look, they did this nice thing for us and we messed it up by doing this. So some of the kids were having some moral dilemma with what the fun was.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: It's all caught on camera.

PEREIRA: It's different when we were kids.

CUOMO: That's right. All we had was word of mouth. I don't know how loudly to tell them how double it is to put it out there. It's a great parenting tool. You know, their own desire to be relevant gets them caught. So I don't know how loudly to say it. Lucky that they know who it was.

BOLDUAN: There you go.

CUOMO: Coming up on NEW DAY, we are going to go back to Kenya and let you know what happens as we understand it. You are looking at the scene right now. The cause of that smoke is in dispute. What is not in dispute is that situation is far from over, hostages still inside, authorities scrambling to get control. We will take you there.

Also, we will talk about the new Apple iPhone. Am I wrong to say I should not be that excited?

BOLDUAN: I thought you were excited, a bit of history.

CUOMO: What's going on now, though, tell me.

BOLDUAN: Do you think your new iPhone is totally safe and secure because of that fancy new James Bond-like fingerprint scanner? You might want to think again. We have a little troubling news for you on that. We'll be right back after this.

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PEREIRA: Welcome back to NEW DAY. It is time to talk a little tech, some big news in the tech world this morning, a bit of a security headache for Apple. Hackers posted a video showing you how you can bypass the fingerprint feature on the new iPhone 5s. So we are going to bring in the host of "Techbytes" Brett Larson. It almost feels like he's calling you out on this. I don't actually think that. Do you think this was just inevitable? Hackers love to be in new features.

BRETT LARSON, HOST, "TECHBYTES": It's the Monday morning quarterback after the release of the iPhone on Friday. Hackers, you know, they wait in line for like a week and then they spend the entire weekend drinking Red Bull and trying to figure out ways of breaking into the new phone. They did it a combination of they took a picture of someone's fingerprint. They reversed it and put glue over it. It's a lot to go through. They did do it, which is kind of surprising. I think it's the average Joe doesn't really have to worry about something like.

CUOMO: They have to revise because I thought it was just they took a dirty screen and was able to get your print.

LARSON: They took it off that way. They actually took a picture of someone's fingerprint.

CUOMO: I'm back, baby.

LARSON: That was easy. It was the easiest.

PEREIRA: The question that in the rush to get to market, are these companies forgetting about basic -- are they not hiring hackers to sort of troubleshoot these issues before they go to market?

LARSON: It's definitely that. It's also, now it's in the wild. Now it's like everybody. It's not just developers who have it. It's not the handful of people that get them the few weeks before market the people that work at Apple. It's everybody. It's people who will sit around and go, I wonder what happens if I do this.

BOLDUAN: That's what everybody is saying about it.

LARSON: Apple says the one thing they haven't said specifically about this, one thing they did say, it will unlock with a sleeping finger. It won't unlock if you cut someone's finger off. That sounds gross. Like a girlfriend or a boyfriend who is concerned that their other half is cheating, could be like in the middle of the night, here you go. No, it's fine. It's not like putting your hand in a cup of water.

CUOMO: Why not a chopped off finger?

LARSON: It's cold. That's the excuse I came up with.

PEREIRA: You keep worrying me you would know that and you who you would ask that --

LARSON: You put over his finger so the print would have been warm. They will more than likely release a security update. Please don't cut off your finger to get into someone else's phone. They will more than likely release a security update that will fix most of these little problems.

There is always going to be little bugs every time they release a new one. There is another security flaw if you push the buttons in the right order. It's like playing Nintendo, up, right, left, right, av. It's one of those sorts of situations.

BOLDUAN: You get a free life.

CUOMO: More people are getting it. They were sticking them in my face all week. You haven't gotten it. It takes like an hour plus you have to wait?

BOLDUAN: The security update there, yes.

LARSON: It does take a bit of time. In my, in total, just looking at people over the weekend, I was kind of surprised to see most people that I know who have iPhones have updated to IOS 7, which is --

BOLDUAN: I haven't yet because you told me that it was going to delete everything on my 4s so I panicked.

LARSON: Yes. You are planning to wait until maybe next week?

BOLDUAN: Maybe.

LARSON: If are you not on the bleeding edge, it's good to wait a week.

PEREIRA: Let them work out the bugs. Brett Larson, no bugs here.

BOLDUAN: Don't cut off your finger and wait a week. There we go. I can't get it out of my head. Strangest tech news I've ever heard.

PEREIRA: Really?

CUOMO: We'll settle this in the break.

Coming up on NEW DAY, we are going to keep taking you back to Kenya because it's a developing situation. Hostages are inside. You are looking at the smoke. Undiscovered what its source is right now. We will give you the latest as soon as we get it right here on NEW DAY.

BOLDUAN: Also ahead, in her own words, Hillary Clinton offering up confirmation she could seek the White House in 2016. She is talking about it. Everybody can dissect it. So what's the takeaway from this big interview, we are going to talk to two former advisers to President Clinton.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: Welcome back to NEW DAY. The glitz, the glamour and the surprises, there was plenty to go around at last night's Emmy Awards. The top overall awards went to the favorites, but it was also a night full of upsets. Nischelle Turner is in Los Angeles this morning, this evening with the recap of all the big hits last night. Good morning. NISCHELLE TURNER, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT: Yes. The time to start to kind of all blurred together after a while but I'm here, and yes, we're talking about upsets because those upsets began in the very first award of the night, best supporting actress in a comedy. You know, the smart money was on Sofia Vergara or maybe even Julie Bowen from "Modern Family." But it was Merritt Weaver from "Nurse Jackie" who won and in that win she had one of the show's best moments. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Twerk it!

TURNER (voice-over): A playful combination of front row banter.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm not twerking. I'm not going to do that. That would be degrading.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We would be degrateful.

TURNER: Neil Patrick Harris kick off the 65th primetime Emmy awards. A night of songs -- dance in celebration, left some Emmy winners like the "Newsroom's" Jeff Daniels --

JEFF DANIELS, ACTOR: I usually don't win anything.

TURNER: And "Nurse Jackie's" Merritt Weaver noticeably surprised.

MERRITT WEAVER, ACTRESS: I got to go. Bye.

TURNER: While "Veep" winner Tony Hail and Julia Louis-Dreyfus had fun in character.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'd like to thank our -- my family.

TURNER: "Homeland's" repeat winner Claire Danes and three-time "Big Bang" series winner Jim Parsons were visibly moved.

JIM PARSONS: So silly to be emotional, isn't it?

TURNER: TV icon, Bob Newhart's first ever win for guest starring on the "Big Bang Theory" brought the Nokia theatre's 6,000 guests to their feet. The show singled out five heartfelt memorials including "Sopranos" star James Gandolfini.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's Jim, the man, the very dear man that I will miss most of all.

TURNER: Corey Monteith, who drew some controversy in the days before the show due to his smaller body of work.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: His death is a tragic reminder of the rapacious, senseless, destruction that has brought on by addiction.

TURNER: And Gary David Goldberg who produced both "Family Ties" and "Spin City." MICHAEL J. FOX, ACTOR: I wish it wasn't necessary. I wish Gary was still with us but -- sorry.

TURNER: "Modern Family" won its fourth straight in the year's best comedy series while "Breaking Bad" won its first. Michael Douglas' starring role as Liberace may have earned him Emmy gold over co-star Matt Damon.

MICHAEL DOUGLAS, ACTOR: This is a two-hander. You're only as good --

TURNER: But in the end, the HBO biopic was second to none -- winning 11 statues in all.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TURNER: All right, so I was back stage during the show talking to the winners the minute they walked off the stage and I'll tell you this. Claire Danes was euphoric. Jeff Daniels was still in disbelief. Tony Hail from "Veep" said that he and Julia Louis-Dreyfus kind of talked about maybe doing a bit if they ever won something, but they never thought they would. So when they did win, they thought, gosh, I really have to do this now.

And Michael Douglas, he was like the dapper fellow at the ball last night. He told me that playing Liberace in "Behind the Candelabra" is one of the top two or three roles that he's ever done. Think about his body of bourque, that's saying a lot.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely right. You wonder they either play it off really well or they truly are surprised and aren't prepared when they walk on stage. I love those acceptance speeches.

TURNER: Well, I can tell you Merritt Weaver was truly surprised. She looked like she was about to break into the ugly cry and she didn't know what to do or where to go or what to say. She just said "I got to go." It was hilarious.

BOLDUAN: We've all done the ugly cry. All right, Nischelle, get some rest. Great work, great fun.

CUOMO: Nischelle has so much energy when she was clearly partying all night long.

BOLDUAN: That woman always has energy.

CUOMO: It's code for, "I was back stage interviewing." I know what's going on. I know what's going pop.

PEREIRA: The after parties are epic, you know that.

CUOMO: I don't know. I've never been invited.

BOLDUAN: She's all work, guys.

CUOMO: Or working it at these parties and she might as well. We're going to take a break here on NEW DAY, when we come back, everyone says Hillary Clinton is the Democrats' choice for president in 2016, but it doesn't matter until the former secretary of state says she wants in. Is that what she just said in an interview? We'll tell you.

BOLDUAN: We're also following the breaking news straight out of Kenya, smoke pouring out of the Nairobi mall where militants are holding hostages there still. How much longer can al Shabaab terrorists hold out? A lot of developing news coming out there, we're going to go live to the scene.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He shot at my head, but luckily it hit the wall behind me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: Breaking news, happening right now, gunfire, smoke and explosions at that mall in Kenya. There are still hostages inside. And a new twist, are Americans involved in the attack? We're live with unfolding drama.

BOLDUAN: Will President Obama meet with Iran's new president in New York this week? The overture from Iran that may provide the opening, but it's a big gamble.

PEREIRA: Cute, cuddly and illegal, pop star, Rihanna snaps this photo with a slow Loris in Thailand, turned out it's an endangered species. Two men are now arrested. We have details.

CUOMO: Your NEW DAY continues right now.

Welcome back to NEW DAY. There is breaking news. We want to take you back to Kenya. We've been monitoring the situation all morning long. You're looking at live picture. That smoke is one of the concerns in this situation mainly because its source still unaccounted for. Different stories coming from the terrorists inside and the government, questions about the control, how many hostages are still inside, how many terrorists are still inside, the composition of the terrorists so there's a lot unknown.

When you see people scrambling in the pictures, remember these are all the support groups. There are a lot of resources on the ground because they don't know what they're dealing with inside the mall. So those aren't hostages escaping or terrorists running out, those are people on the ground in positions of assistance. So a lot of questions if you're monitoring online the reporting is all over the place.

So let's get down on the ground. CNN has a person in Nairobi. Zain Verjee is there with the latest. Zain, what do we know now? VERJEE: In the last 48 hours, there's been a pattern of calm, a lull before total chaos, and that's the situation that we're in right now. Hopefully everything is OK at Westgate Mall. We're hearing from government officials now that everything is OK and they are in control. The smoke that we saw earlier they are saying was actually from the terrorists putting mattresses on --