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South Carolina Mass Shooting Details; Friend of the Alleged Gunman Interviewed. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired June 18, 2015 - 15:00   ET

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


[15:00:02]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Tell me about -- I have heard you say that he used drugs in high school. Tell me more about that.

JOHN MULLINS, KNEW ALLEGED SHOOTER: I just -- this is the people that -- I mean, this is the kind of people he would be around, I guess I would see him around.

And I don't know. Just you kind of assume things on people sometimes. And I just felt like -- and I have heard around school, too, that he was doing Xanax and stuff. But none of it was completely confirmed, but it may be -- it just makes sense to me now that maybe he was doing that kind of stuff back in the day and maybe it led up to this.

BERMAN: At this point, CNN cannot independently verity that he was using Xanax of anything else. It will come out in the investigation, but it's still important to hear your perspective about what you thought of him when he was in high school. Was he in trouble at all in high school?

MULLINS: I mean, just kind of like -- I don't think he ever got in like big trouble, but I'm sure he's been to the principal's office for like acting out in the classroom or something like that, maybe something like that. I mean, I never had a class with him, so I don't know.

BERMAN: And tell me now, have you talked to your friends? Have you had a chance to communicate with others who were at this high school with this man who is now basically accused out in public of a heinous crime?

MULLINS: I had to hear you on the TV to hear you better, but no.

(CROSSTALK)

BERMAN: Have you a chance to talk to other classmates?

MULLINS: No, I haven't talked to anybody.

I just -- I just stayed off social media today, and because I have been -- my phone has been constantly blown up by reporters today, so I haven't really had a chance to go talk to any my high school friends that are associated with him as well.

BERMAN: OK. All right.

Has he -- did he have any friends in Charleston? I mean, Lexington is, what, two hours from Charleston? Did he have any reason to be in this area, as far as you know?

MULLINS: No, I don't even know why he was down there, honestly. I just guess he decided to go there. I don't know. I feel like a lot of it was premeditated, but -- because a lot of the details I have read today.

BERMAN: Presumably, he was 21 years old. Do you have any knowledge of what happened to him from the time he graduated high school until now?

MULLINS: I really do not.

I have -- I don't know, like -- whenever I graduated high school, I kind of stuck with different people. And everybody like dispersed everywhere. And I went on to do my own thing, so I didn't really talk to him anymore.

BERMAN: All right. John Mullins, who went to high school with the suspect, Dylann Roof, John Mullins, who just told us that he did Dylann Roof say racist stuff in high school, but at the time did not think it would have ever become something that was violent.

John Mullins, thanks so much -- Ana, let's go back to you in New York.

ANA CABRERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Our coverage continues now in the 3:00 Eastern hour. Thank you for joining us and staying with us.

I'm Ana Cabrera with CNN's special coverage of this massacre at a church in South Carolina. And any minute now, we're awaiting a news conference with the Charleston County Coroner's Office, where we hope to hear about the victims of the senseless tragedy.

The suspected gunman, we can tell you, is now in custody, being questioned by police. Police say 21-year-old Dylann Storm Roof sat for nearly an hour worshipping with the people he was about to slaughter. And he then stood up. He told them apparently he was there to shoot black people, according to officials, and then opened fire with a gun that a source tells us he may have been given by his dad on his birthday just two months ago.

Nine of 13 worshipers were killed in this historic black church. We have some new video you're seeing now that shows one of the shooting victims being taken into an ambulance.

The president, who personally knew at least one of the victims, spoke just a short time ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There is something particularly heartbreaking about a death happening in a place in which we seek solace and we seek peace, in a place of worship. I have had to make statements like this too many times. Communities

like this have had to endure tragedies like this too many times. We don't have all the facts, but we do know that, once again, innocent people were killed, in part because someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting their hands on a gun.

But let's be clear. At some point, we as a country will have to recon with the fact that this type of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Now, among the victims who have been identified so far, speech therapist Sharonda Singleton, the woman on the right in this next picture.

[15:05:05]

She was also a track coach, we're told. There she is. She was also the minister at Emanuel AME Church.

Also a victim, a recent graduate of Allen University, this is Tywanza Sanders. The church's pastor and the state senator, the Reverend Clementa Pinckney, described as a giant and a legend. And we have just learned Myra Thompson is among the victims as well. She was actually teaching that Bible study during the shooting, we're told.

A fifth victim has been identified as Cynthia Hurd, a longtime library manager in Charleston. This senseless crime bringing the South Carolina governor to tears.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. NIKKI HALEY (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: We woke up today and the heart and soul of South Carolina was broken. And so we have some grieving to do. And we have got some pain we have to go through.

Parents are having to explain to their kids how they can go to church and feel safe, and that is not something we ever thought we'd deal with.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: This tragedy moving so many people all around the country.

I want to go back to John Berman.

And as I toss it to you, John, I want to read a tweet we just learned from Eric Holder that reads: "Hate and gun violence, how often, how long? My heartbreaks again. Condolences to victims, survivors and families at Mother Emanuel."

This is actually the first tweet in Eric Holder's new account, he, too, moved in this senseless tragedy -- John.

BERMAN: Yes, Ana, there's a lot of heartbreak to go around in this city today.

And the church is just behind me, Mother Emanuel. You can hear shouting around me. I could say that where I'm standing right now, there have been people walking by, grieving, mourning, talking about their feelings and how, yes, angry they are that something like this happened here, but also thanking the media and thanking law enforcement for helping catch this man, Dylann Roof, who is now in custody in Shelby, North Carolina.

He drove about four hours from here, the Mother Emanuel Church, which is right behind me. He drove to North Carolina, taken into custody at a traffic stop. There was a tip by someone in the public who said there was a suspicious car, the black Hyundai which he was driving.

Dylann Roof was apprehended in that car. He had a gun inside. It's not known whether that gun was used in the shooting again right behind me. And I should say, just a short time ago, this street was opened for the first time since this shooting. There is now traffic by the Mother Emanuel Church. The church itself is not open for some time.

I'm joined now by Don Lemon, who is here with me.

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: And a friend.

BERMAN: Yes.

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: Yes.

But you can understand why people are upset, because this is -- this doesn't happen. This shouldn't happen to anyone.

The whole thing that we have been talking about is whether this is terrorism or not. And I think by -- it is -- it is -- is terrorism, by any stretch of the imagination. And you can understand that people are upset, you know, we're going to continue to talk about that.

BERMAN: The president himself said he's angry today.

LEMON: Right.

BERMAN: And local leaders said they are angry, too, that violence like this can't happen in a church. And everyone I have spoken to as well has also talked about healing.

LEMON: Yes. I just it's really sad that when we have nine people who have lost their lives...

(CROSSTALK)

BERMAN: We're going to take a break. We're going to take a break.

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: And we have to deal with something like this. (CROSSTALK)

LEMON: But I think it's important too that people see the ignorance of it.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:11:16]

CABRERA: Welcome back. I want to take you live now to Charleston, South Carolina.

Let's listen in to this news conference. This is with the coroner, Rae Wooten, speaking about the victims in this case.

(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

RAE WOOTEN, CHARLESTON COUNTY CORONER: ... aggressive and violent the resulted in the deaths of these nine individuals.

I know much has been said about a number of them, and many of you may know some of them, may know all of them. And others, you may not be aware of.

So this -- I want to take this opportunity to formally release the names of these individuals. And I appreciate again your support. I appreciate the support of the employees behind me who worked with these -- a couple of these individuals actually were or had been county employees.

And I appreciate our administrator, Mr. Keith Bustraan, joining us and chairman of the council (INAUDIBLE). We join -- we all join in the sadness reflected in the community and these families.

These names are being released in no specific order. But I will just go through them.

And the first name is Cynthia Hurd. She was a 54-year-old lady who was currently employed in Charleston County as the branch manager for St. Andrews Regional Library. And obviously we're all shattered by that and she will be missed deeply.

The next individual is Susie Jackson, 87 years of age.

Another individual, Ethel Lance, 70 years of age.

Reverend Depayne Middleton-Doctor, 49 years of age. And Reverend Middleton-Doctor retired from Charleston County in 2005, where she was the director of the community development block grant program.

The next individual is Honorable Reverend Clementa Pinckney, 41 years of age. I believe you know he served in the South Carolina Senate.

The next individual is Tywanza Sanders, 26 years of age.

The next is Reverend Daniel Simmons Sr., 74 years of age. Mr. Simmons was the only individual who not die at the church, but was rather transported to (INAUDIBLE) where he later died while he was in the operating room.

The next individual is Reverend Sharonda Singleton, 45 years of age.

And the last name is Myra Thompson, 59 years of age.

Obviously, you have been following the investigation. I'm sure you're aware that the suspect has been arrested and charged. And, of course, the judicial system will move through the normal processes from here forward.

In terms of my end of the investigation, we will be continuing our investigation through many means, to include autopsy. Each one of the individuals will undergo an autopsy, which is important in cases such as this, particularly when we're talking about criminal cases.

And while those autopsies are not expected to provide us any real new information, it's important to the process. It is based on our immediate observation and the report of what happened. It is obvious that these individuals all suffered gunshot wounds and, as a result, those individuals died.

[15:15:01]

I do not have at this time any ideas about how the memorial services and plans by the families will go. As you can imagine, they are still very much in shock and deep grief over these losses. I have spent a great deal of time with them throughout the night, as well as my staff.

And I have to tell you, they're the most gracious group of grieving individuals I have had, I hate to say the pleasure to serve, but it was my pleasure to deal with such strong, wonderful people in the face of such a tragedy.

For each one of them, as is customary following autopsy, each individual family will choose a funeral home or whatever their wishes are in terms of disposition. And they will make the arrangements for their loved one, per their family's decisions.

At this time, I have no information about any plans for anything other than That. That may be forthcoming, but certainly I don't have -- I'm not knowledgeable about that at this time.

Are there any simple questions I can answer? And I say simple, because the investigation is very complex. It involves many, many agencies. Not only does it involve city police department. Sheriff's office, of course, has been a supporting agency there. But a very large portion of the investigation is being conducted by SLED. And FBI's been present since last night and when I left them to come here, all of those entities were still very much involved in the investigation.

QUESTION: Is there any (OFF-MIKE)

WOOTEN: Actually, there's very little to add, other than what I have said.

It's obvious from the initial investigation that the gunman opened fire and all of these individuals suffered wounds that resulted in their deaths. And there's -- I'm not able -- it would be inappropriate at this time to get into any more detail about the investigation.

As that proceeds and as it's deemed appropriate to the process, those -- that information, those details will be made available, as we work together as a team, meaning Charleston City Police, SLED, and my office.

Yes, ma'am?

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

WOOTEN: At this point, that would be a premature conjecture on my part and it would not be appropriate either to try to speculate about something like that.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

WOOTEN: I think it's fair to say that that's true. I mean, I don't -- I really honestly at this time could not tell you who or how many. But I think it's fair to say that that is certainly the case, at least for some.

Any other questions I could...

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)

WOOTEN: At this time, we would be very premature to discuss such detail.

But I understand that people are certainly interested. This being -- involving so many individuals, it's quite complicated to go through the process in a way to deal with each one very individually, and not impact the overall process.

I do ask that you be patient and help those that you know and who are sharing in this grief to understand that this process is going to be fairly lengthy, even from side. We typically -- we're typically -- perhaps deal with one case or maybe even two. But in a case such as this, with not only the numbers, but the complexity, it will not be usual, in the sense that we will not -- it would be unfair to say to you that you should expect that all these individuals will be released to a funeral home by tomorrow, because that's just not -- we can't do the process justice and do it correctly.

JEFFREY LEDFORD, SHELBY, NORTH CAROLINA, POLICE CHIEF: The business had been contacted.

(CROSSTALK)

CABRERA: At this time, one of the investigators talking about how the suspect was apprehended. Let's listen. LEDFORD: He was possibly traveling into Shelby.

At 10:43 a.m., our officers observed the vehicle traveling west on Nixon (ph) Boulevard. The suspect was stopped by officers at 10:44 a.m.

The officers identified the only occupant of the vehicle as Dylann Roof. Mr. Roof was taken into custody at 10:49 a.m. He was transported here to the Shelby Police Department.

Charleston Police Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigations were both notified of Mr. Roof's capture. We currently have representatives from all the agencies that are involved in this investigation here on site to work through the process of getting Mr. Roof back to South Carolina.

[15:20:16]

I would like to add that this has been a great representation of what teamwork can accomplish. Through the cooperation of law enforcement, the community and the media, this suspect was apprehended. We do appreciate the cooperation of our law enforcement partners, especially the community, for calling information in as they have seen it, our local district attorney's office, as well as the U.S. Attorney's Office.

At this time, I want to turn you over to Special Agent in Charge John Strong.

JOHN STRONG, FBI: Good afternoon. My name is John Strong. I'm the special agent in charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in North Carolina.

First, I would like to start off by thanking Chief Ledford and the -- his staff with the Shelby Police Department for their fine efforts and investigative work, which captured this suspect this morning, eliminating a threat to the community, as well as saving the government tens of thousands of dollars it would have taken to track this individual down, if they had not done so.

I would also like to thank the local prosecutor's office here in Cleveland County, as well as the U.S. Attorney's Office, for the work that those -- on this matter.

The FBI has initiated an investigation into this matter, which we are working jointly with our state and local partners to determine if a federal hate crime has been committed. I know that you have lots of questions today that I will not be able to answer because it's an ongoing investigation.

The most important point is the subject is now in custody. The immediate threat to the community no longer exists. And we will let the legal process run its course. There are no longer any lives at risk.

Any other information on this investigation will come from the law enforcement authorities working in Charleston, South Carolina. Thank you.

QUESTION: Chief, is he still here? Chief, will I be able to see him? Will I be able to speak with him?

CABRERA: All right, police with a very brief news conference there.

We heard from both the police chief, Jeffrey Ledford from Shelby, North Carolina. That's where the suspect in this case, Dylann Roof, was apprehended, taken into custody at 10:49 this morning Eastern time and was taken back to that police department there locally, where all the agencies involved in this investigation have now converged.

We just heard there from the FBI special agent in charge of North Carolina.

And I want to bring in our Evan Perez, who has been learning more about the federal investigative piece of all of this.

Evan, what more can you tell us?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Ana, what the FBI is focused on and certainly the Justice Department Civil Rights Division and the U.S. there in South Carolina is whether or not there's enough evidence to bring a hate crime charge against the suspect.

We should also note that the South Carolina authorities have plans to charge him with nine counts of murder. This is a state that has a death penalty. So, the federal investigation is separate and parallel, but that is probably the first place that he might face justice, is in state court.

That said, it's very important for the federal government to pursue this part of the investigation, simply because some of the statements that investigators say, according to witnesses, that Dylann Roof said as he stood up after sitting there for an hour in that Bible study, stood up and said that he was there simply to shoot black people.

And that is something that is obviously going to bring the interest of the federal government, simply because there is a federal hate crime law which protects groups such as African-Americans and others that have historically faced discrimination in this country.

That's what they are pursing. They are still in North Carolina. There's a procedure for him to be sent back to South Carolina, to be extradited back to South Carolina to face these murder charges. And then the question begins as to whether or not he will face the federal hate crime charges.

CABRERA: Evan, let me ask you this question, because we have heard a number of our guests on CNN today also reference terrorism. Why is this being called a hate crime possibly or being investigated as a hate crime vs. domestic terrorist act?

PEREZ: That's a great question. And it's actually one that I have been talking to folks at the Justice Department about. At this point, they are looking at it simply because of the statements

that he made and some of the pictures that were shown, the phone we have shown on our air which is him wearing a jacket with a couple of apartheid era symbols, the flag of South Africa before -- before the end of apartheid and also the flag of Rhodesia, which also practiced the same policies.

[15:25:08]

So, it's clear that this -- this was his intent, was that he had an intent perhaps white supremacy, and that's why they are pursing that angle. But you're raising a great point, which is that, according to the witnesses, people who survived this massacre, he was making a political point here about shooting black people, about attacking a black and African-American church, a church that was important in the history of the fight against slavery and in the civil rights period.

So that is certainly not a question that is beyond discussion for the Justice Department. And it's not over, certainly, because I think that you raise it and I think a lot of other people are going to raise this question of whether or not this is something that should be classified as domestic terrorism.

CABRERA: Well, Evan Perez, thanks for your great reporting and staying on top of this story for us.

I also want to bring in right now Matthew Fogg. He's a retired U.S. Marshal to help shed some light on the ongoing investigation.

Thank you so much for joining us, Matthew.

We are learning just a little bit more about this suspect, Dylann Roof. We have learned that he was arrested earlier this year for trespassing, which seems like a very small crime, and he was found with some pills, perhaps some painkillers.

But we haven't found anything about any kind of violent criminal history. This guy would, I imagine, not be necessarily on the radar of law enforcement.

MATT FOGG, FORMER CHIEF DEPUTY U.S. MARSHAL: That's right, maybe not.

But the fact that he got arrested, at least he's in our system, so I think that made things a lot easier for law enforcement to be able to determine first and identify him, who he was.

But I guess, looking at the past here, they are going to look at everything. They're going to look at who this guy has been talking to. But that's the thing about him. When you have got young minds, a lot of times, young minds can be easily influenced.

When he hear the fact that he said, he made the comment about African- Americans and taking back the country, or when you start hearing some of our politicians use those type of words, take back the country, people are beginning to -- young people especially are beginning to think somehow this country isn't right or we're doing something wrong, so how can they go out and correct it, and then he uses an act of terrorism, which is -- a hate attributed, that is terrorism.

And so the bottom line is to try to carry it out. And I think that's what he was doing.

CABRERA: Well, we want to find out more and we will continue to talk with you. So do stand by.

We have to take a quick break. Thank you so much, Matthew Fogg, retired U.S. Marshal, for joining us.

Also want to make note of that other press conference we were listening on before we had to pivot, where we heard from the coroner now identifying all nine of the victims, ranging in age from as young as 26 years old, a recent college graduate, up to an 87-year-old woman.

Many of the victims were prominent figures in that community, particularly in the church community, many of them with the titles of reverend.

And she also really pinpointed the fact that they still have the autopsies and the investigation is very early, and so we will have more and more information that we will continue to learn about the victims throughout today and certainly in the next several days.

Stay with us. When we come back, we will go back live to the scene in Charleston, South Carolina, where we will be joined by John Berman and Don Lemon once again.

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