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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Latest on Brussels Terror Attacks Investigation; US Raid Kills ISIS Number Two Man. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired March 25, 2015 - 12:30   ET

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


MASON WELLS, AMERICAN BRUSSELS BURN VICTIM: -- got blasted out of my hands. My watch on my left hand just disappeared. My left shoe just -- was blown off. And a large part of the right side of my body got really hot and then really cold.

[12:30:17] And I was covered in a lot of fluids, a lot of blood. And a lot of that blood wasn't mine. I just feel lost for those who were injured. I feel so bad for because I was so lucky. I was so lucky. Being how close I was.

And I saw a lot of people that were injured worse. I heard a lot of people that were injured badly.

And, you know, my only thoughts, my only feelings are just for the people that are out there, I hope that they're doing OK. I just wanted to pray for them. I've been praying for them since that happened. And that's the only feeling I have is I hope they're OK, because I'm very lucky. And I know that were maybe some that were not as lucky as I was. I'm so close.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Not as lucky as I was, unbelievable to hear him utter those words.

Sister Fanny Clain was with Mason Wells at the airport on her way to a mission assignment in Ohio. She arrived at the checking line when all of the sudden she heard a huge noise.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SISTER FANNY CLAIN, BRUSSELS AIRPORT VICTIM: I was starting to talk to something and it was all black. And I was laying down on the ground. It was all ashes all around. It was all gray. It was really stinky because of the burn. And I was all brown, on my coat it was like a sticky brown thing. And my hands was burned and my head. So I quickly then I realized it was a bomb then I was laying down. Then I opened my eyes, and woke up and go away, so I walked as fast as I can, crying.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: In addition to the survival stories there are hero stories as well. Including a story that Secretary of State John Kerry shared this morning. The story is about a doctor named Dr. Laura Billiet, she's an American doctor. She ran to a nearby police station right after this airport attack on Tuesday. She treated those with shrapnel wounds and other injuries. And she spoke to us this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LAURA BILLIET, HELPED TREAT PEOPLE AFTER ATTACKS: They started moving all of the wounded that could be moved out of the airport to the police station to get them out of harm's way. We didn't know what else was going to happen after that point.

So, you know, it was still frightening to be there because we were kind of waiting to see if there were other bombs or if somebody was going to come along with guns. We weren't really sure. And there were a lot of wounded people up in the second floor of the police station. So then we started going and trying to help the people that were there, since we were able-bodied and most of them weren't that point.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Well, Dr. Billiet's friend Laura Harper also went to help. She wasn't a doctor. She was a lawyer, a mom of three. She simply answered victims' questions, sat with them, sang with them, offered them words of comfort.

Coming up, more terror-busting raids happening by the hour. The question now becomes why Belgium? And why Brussels specifically of all place?

The answer is about many things including location. A few neighborhoods in the major European capital have been a breeding ground for extremism.

[12:34:02] Details next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: The part of Brussels that many of these anti-terror raids have been taking place in recent days is called Molenbeek. It is filled with immigrants from North Africa, the Middle East, really all over the Arabic speaking world. And it is widely regarded as one of Europe's extremist hot beds. The people that live there are angry and they're getting angrier.

Clarissa Ward, takes us there.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLARISSA WARD, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: This is the neighborhood that everybody in the world is now talking about. Molenbeek, home to nearly 100,000 people, it is been described as one of the most dangerous hot beds of radicalization.

On the streets here though, it actually feels like a normal, working class neighborhood with a large immigrant population. But the problems here are beneath the surface largely. The lack of integration here is striking. On the streets, you will hear Arabic much more than you will hear French. And when you talk to people, you will often hear people say, they don't feel fully Belgian. They feel like second class citizens.

Molenbeek, Imam Asad Majiv (ph) says that younger second and third generation immigrants feel particularly marginalized.

[12:40:07] IMAM ASAD MAJIV (PH), MOLENBEEK: There is a big community in Muslim who are feeling now that they're not Belgian citizens.

The reason of that is, first of all, the unemployment of -- in Belgium because they don't feel that they're accepted in this society. So this is why they feel that they're not Belgian.

WARD: most people here don't want to appear on camera because they're very concerned there's a negative image being portrayed of the residents here in the media.

Privately though, many of them will concede that there's a big problem with radicalization in this community. But there just isn't any trust or communication between the local community and between the police. And that is a huge problem for Belgian authority.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: And Clarissa Ward joins me now live from Brussels.

Clarissa, few things, first of, when you speak to family members there and people who are going to the authorities and saying, look my son, my brother, my cousin, I think they've been radicalized. We need to do something. Is anything happening?

WARD: Well this is what's really interesting Poppy, the assumption always is that nobody in these communities comes forward and talks to police or authorities when they know someone who has become radicalized. But actually we've been hearing more and more that a lot of people have gone to the police. We heard from the family of one of the airport bombers, the top bomb makers so-called Najim Laachraoui. His family said that they went to authorities. And told them that their son had become radicalized that he had gone to Syria.

And again and again, what we're hearing is that the authorities aren't necessarily doing anything with that information.

And what see in Brussels is essentially a pretty dysfunctional system when it comes to sharing information within law enforcement. You have 19 different mayors in Brussels. You have six different police district and two official languages. We also heard one reporter telling us that there were just two Arabic-speaking police officers working in Molenbeek just several months ago.

So it gives you an idea of the some of the factors that are contributed to this lack of communication. Poppy. HARLOW: And also, Clarissa, one of the things we spoke while in the wake of the Paris attack. And I'm wondering to what extent you think is the case. Is this sort of the impoverished nature of many the people there. Not as any sort of excuse but as a sort of a driver of looking for some meaning.

There was a fascinating political article that compared this week to the U.S.-Muslim population with the European and talked about how many of these Muslims in Europe are in this sort of concentration of very poor neighborhoods with little upward trajectory. Does that play in at all?

WARD: I think it does. I think it's less an issue of poverty than it is an issue of integration. Over and over and over again, when we went and talked to people in Molenbeek. We would hear the same thing which is that we're not considered to be real Belgian. We're considered to be Moroccan-Belgian or Algerian-Belgian even though we're third generation immigrants.

So there's a sense somehow that these communities have been allowed to kind of muddle along completely on their own without having any real sense of participating in society at large.

We also heard some interesting reports about a number of mosques that are unofficially -- they're unofficial mosques. So they're unregistered. Of course the concern there is that authorities don't know what kind of rhetoric is being preached at mosques like that.

And then beyond that, I think you have to take into account the criminal element, which we have seen playing such a growing role in these terror attacks. And certainly, neighborhoods like Molenbeek have a strong criminal underground world. And we're seeing these terrorists now learning their skills as criminals when they're younger which makes them all the more deadly when they become radicalized when they're older, Poppy.

HARLOW: No question about it. Clarissa Ward, live from Brussels for us, thank you so much Clarissa.

Coming up next a team of elite police officers is getting ready for the next time the terrorists try to strike on American soil.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... two, one.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: They are tracking home made bombs very easy to make, even at home and hard to trace.

[12:44:27] A look inside their training facility. Next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: All right. Breaking news right now out of the Pentagon. We have just learned some significant new details of the raid that left the man that many analysts call the number two in command of ISIS dead. We now know that U.S. Special Forces were actually trying to take him alive.

Barbara Starr with me from the Pentagon. We've just learned this in the last few moments, so what happened?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, Poppy, some of the details are still sketchy. But things are beginning to be filled in.

Sources are telling us that in fact they were trying to capture this man, Qaduli alive. That U.S. Special Operations Forces swooped in on helicopters at this location in Syria trying to take him alive. They wanted to interrogate him for everything he knows and he may well have known quite a bit, being the so-called finance minister of ISIS.

And as you say, many people saying second in command to the leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Now, by all accounts, what happened is as the special operations forces moved in on their helicopters, on the target, it was a vehicle he was riding in, something happened. And we don't know what it was. That made it not possible for them to get him alive. That is when the gunfire erupted and as he was killed. We don't, in all candor, we don't have all the details. But we do know they were trying to get him alive. Bring him back to Iraq, interrogate him for everything he knows. They were not able to finish that part of the mission. And they now believe he is dead.

[12:50:00] But, what should really be underscored here, you have U.S. Special Operations troops moving into Syria. There are no friendly forces on the ground for those troops. It was one of the most dangerous missions there can be. And we are learning that thankfully, no U.S. troops killed or wounded in the mission. Poppy?

HARLOW: Wow. That's incredible. And our thanks to all those men and women putting their lives on the line in this mission.

Barbara Starr, thank you so much, from the Pentagon.

Up next, a team of elite police officers getting ready for the next time the terrorists try to take this country. They are tracking homemade bombs. We will show you how they train to do that next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: An update now to one of the many angles that we are following in a crackdown on suspected terror cells in Europe. A source telling CNN that french authorities recovered 2 kilos that is almost 4.5 pounds of the explosive TATP. They also recovered a Kalashnikov rifle in a raid last night near Paris.

[12:55:12] One suspect was arrested, a convicted Jihadi with known tie for the ringleader of the Paris attack last fall.

Here in the United States, top level police and security professionals are preparing for a day they hope never comes. A day when terrorists try to bomb targets here in the U.S.

Our Nick Valencia went to the training site where those officers prepare.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Fire in the hole.

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Here in rural Alabama, elite members of law enforcement agencies from around the world prepare for the worst case scenario. It's state of the art training against global terrorism.

JORIS KERCKHOFF, BRUSSELS FEDERAL POLICE: It's all about saving lives.

VALENCIA: For Joris Kerckhoff. This all hits close to home. He's a Brussels police officer and K-9 handler. Ironically sent to the U.S. for training as his city was hit. Had he been in Belgium, he says, he would have likely been guarding the subway during the attacks.

KERCKHOFF: If the knowledge that we have here. We can share that with the rest of the world who also wants to make it a better world. I think that's one step in a good direction.

RYAN MORRIS, FOUNDER OF TRIPWIRE OPERATIONS GROUP: This is what we know that they're using all over the world.

VALENCIA: Ryan Morris founded the training company Tripwire in 2005. He says the lessons he teaches are critical in the fight against Isis and beyond.

MORRIS: Personally, the conventional explosive side, like det cords and dynamites and C4 and things of that nature. That doesn't bother me. The things that bother me are the stuff you can make in your house, you can make in your garage, you can make it anywhere.

VALENCIA: And we found out first-hand what he meant.

MORRIS: So go ahead, grab some ammonium nitrate.

VALENCIA: All right, how much? This whole cup here?

Morris shows us how, in a matter of minutes, anyone can make this kind of explosive.

So I'm holding two very volatile bombs in my hands. This one has three components to it. This one has two components to it

MORRIS: An d we're going to take that and put it on the ground just so you can see what that does.

VALENCIA: Three, two, one. Fire in the hole.

What I found just absolutely terrifying about this entire experience is just how simple and easy it is to make an explosive using ordinary household products, products capable of inflicting massive causalities.

It's these explosives training courses that are crucial to stopping those who want to inflict chaos. For Morris and the team around him, their success is a matter of life and death.

Nick Valencia, CNN, Lanett, Alabama.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Jeff Parks is with me. He's a retired army explosives expert, a security consultant.

So let's talk more about that because it's frightening what Nick just showed us, I mean how easy is it to make TATP. And also, Jeff, what kind of facility do you need to manufacture sort of mass quantities of this can you say, do it in an apartment?

JEFF PARKS, SECURITY CONSULTANT: I won't want to give anyone any suggestions. But it's possible to do in an apartment. One of the things would be ventilation because of the chemicals involved. When we talk about TATP, I think its Tripwire was explaining, it's still a very volatile product. The finished product itself is still very volatile.

So all of these things have inherent dangers but they can be made into highly explosives device or a high explosive. And the U.S. government has a lot of experience with this from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

HARLOW: And the availability of the chemicals needed to pull this off. I mean any difference between the availability in Europe as we saw in Brussels or here in the United States?

PARKS: Well, in my opinion, one of the reasons you're seeing TATP is because those chemicals are highly available. They are not even commercial grade but they are -- based on the reports, it sounds like they did had some commercial grade materials. But that is the key for home made explosives, is they're using things that they can procure locally.

HARLOW: Right. And you have said that the smoke that you've seen from these images of the take is an indicator of the type of bomb.

PARKS: Well, I said that referenced to previous attacks, attacks for instance, in Boston. The signature was a black powder. Not really a high explosive. It's not as efficient a device, I think, whereas, with TATP, it is a more efficient explosive.

HARLOW: Jeff Parks, thank you so much for your insight. We appreciate it very much. Pretty scary to think how they could pull it off and it can be so easily manufactured. Thank you. And thank you all for joining us. Appreciate it. Have a great weekend. I will see you back here in for Ashleigh on Monday. Thank you for watching.

Wolf takes over from here.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello. I'm Pamela Brown. Wolf Blitzer is on assignment.

[13:00:02] It's 1:00 p.m. here in Washington and 6:00 p.m. in Brussels, Belgium, wherever you're watching from around the world. Thank you so much for joining us.

And we begin with the breaking news. Fast moving developments in the Brussels terror attack investigation --