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Suspect in the Emanuel AME Church Shooting in Charleston Captured; New Details in Dylann Roof's Arrest. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired June 19, 2015 - 15:30   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And I would just thank you on behalf of my family for not allowing hate to win. For me, I'm a work in progress. And I acknowledge that I am very angry.

But one thing Depayne has always joined in, in our family with is that she taught me that we are the families that love built. We have no room for hate. So, we have to forgive.

[15:30:00] And I pray God on your soul and I also thank God that I won't be around when your judgment day comes with him. May God bless you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANA CABRERA, CNN HOST: So we just finished listening to the emotional sound from victims' family members at that first hearing for the suspect in this case, 21-year-old Dylann Roof.

We're also learning some new information from the search warrants that were just released from police. We learned that this young man entered through a side entrance to the church where he had to go in order to get to that bible study on Wednesday night with his victims, where he sat for an hour before opening fire. This new document also revealing that the victims were hit multiple times and there had to have been some serious preparation, it says, going in there.

He carried a fanny pack, presumably with some of the ammunition. We heard from some of the victims' friends and family members saying that they learned that he had to reload several times. And we now know a little bit more about the gun used in this case, a 45-caliber gun, a glock 41 which holds 13 rounds firearms. Experts tell that it would take some practice in order to control the kickback from this gun.

So as we continue to learn more on the investigation side of all of this, I want to go back to my colleague, Don Lemon, who's joining me now from Charleston, South Carolina, where I know you've said, Don, that the emotions, as you said, are up to, you know, neck-high. People are just trying to keep their heads above water. But at the same time, it seems like those emotions and people are contained in a very peaceful way.

DON LEMON, CNN HOST, CNN TONIGHT: They are containing them in a peaceful way. And I think you really see the sentiment of the broader community here when you look at how the family members conducted themselves in court today. And I can't help -- I have to say it every time, the first person to speak, the first family member to speak said, I forgive him. I forgive him. That's foreign to a lot of people except for people who are believers and who have faith. As someone of faith - listen, if my family member was killed two days ago, I don't know if I would be ready to forgive someone that quickly. Maybe over time but in two days, that's very big of them. I respect that they are able to do that. But boy, that's a big thing here.

Speaking of the community here, I've been talking to lots of people here as we were out and about and one of those people is Shari Ramsey.

And Shari, you're from Mt. Hollywood, which is near Charlotte?

SHARI RAMSEY, CHARLOTTE RESIDENT: Charlotte.

LEMON: You came all the way down. How long is the drive?

RAMSEY: Maybe three-and-a-half hours.

RAMSEY: You came here this morning? Why?

RAMSEY: I felt a sense of urgency to get here and show my support and just be here to maybe sympathize and have a voice and tell people, you know, we love you and we're supposed to love each other and just bring the sign to show that, you know. Love thy neighbor.

LEMON: This is a place that is hot and muggy in the summer, right?

RAMSEY: Very hot.

LEMON: There is lots of water here. People are out on their boats or out swimming. You're here with your sweet tea. This is - I grew up in the south so I know that. And you said love thy neighbor, why the sign?

RAMSEY: Love thy neighbor. Well, unfortunately so much so many of our kids now are youth and even adults (INAUDIBLE) are filled with hate, you know. They grow up with little direction in their household and they don't get it anywhere and they grow up harboring bitterness and just have hate in their heart. And it's just unfortunate that, you know, and I just wanted to share the little bit of lightness, you know. Love thy neighbor city to make somebody think.

LEMON: You worked for the school system?

RAMSEY: I did years ago for five years.

LEMON: How does a student like Dylann Roof get by someone who has said, you know, quiet, kept himself somewhat isolated. What happened?

RAMSEY: Right. Well, this is a very passionate subject for me because I saw it firsthand. I don't know if he was a loner. I have no idea of his situation at home. But in the school system, I witnessed different loners. And, unfortunately, the kids would single them out and they would be playing by themselves and constantly or not playing. And unfortunately, the teachers would allow it. And also, the teachers not only allow it, they also contributed to it. They also would single out a kid.

LEMON: So they really need to be more careful and we need more -- teachers need to be instructed as educators on that.

We have to go. I want to thank you for coming. And thank you for spreading love and peace and togetherness.

RAMSEY: Thank you.

LEMON: Thank you very much. You have a safe trip home. Appreciate it. Thank you very much.

Again, that's the sentiment that is coming from the folks here in Charleston, South Carolina, as we're on the ground here. We are going to continue the breaking news coverage here, speaking to the people, keep you up to date on the investigation as Ana is back in New York talking about the gun, talking about new details of what happened inside of the church.

We're back with our breaking news coverage right after this quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:39:52] CABRERA: Back now with our breaking news coverage of the massacre at the Charleston, South Carolina church. And we just got our hands on a stack of arrest affidavits where we are learning a few new details about what happened in that horrific scene inside that church on Wednesday night. And what we've learned through these arrest warrants has to do with just details, like the fact that the suspect entered through a side door to go to that bible study.

I want to bring in Danny Cevallos who is here with me to talk about kind of the legal implications and some of the details that we are learning.

Danny, this 21-year-old who admitted to the crime, apparently as confessed to the police that he indeed did do this. Enter through a side door, he was not somebody who with a local in the community. He was rom Lexington, South Carolina, couple of hours away from Charleston. So does this show that he may have this case, this place, knew where the bible study was going to be, perhaps planning and went through all of this?

[15:40:52] DANNY CEVALLOS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: You don't really see that from the affidavit. The affidavit itself is not going to be a complete narrative of the theory of the case. It's going to be very bare bones. And we see that right here. In fact, you can see that for each different victim, there's a lot of cutting and pasting. There is nothing wrong with that. This is a document that the police have had to prepare and law enforcement have had to prepare very, very quickly. So these documents are not going to read like very long narratives with each piece of evidence referenced. It's only going to be the bare bones and that's exactly what we're getting, enough to make out its initial case, to establish probable cause and enough probable cause to support holding this defendant without bond, without bail.

CABRERA: When we learned in these arrest affidavits that says all of the victims were hit multiple times. They also mentioned with malice and aforethought. Why are some of those words used, do you think?

CEVALLOS: Those are threshold - those are the magic words that you need to establish probable cause in a case like this. And again, the affidavit itself is not going to be considered absolute evidence later on. It just makes out the initial case. And from that you can see -- even though there's a substantial amount of cutting and pasting and repeating, you do get a lot of the facts, some of which we've heard and some that seem somewhat new. At some point, they say that the father, family members of the suspect contacted the police and recognized the photograph. But again, that's for each and every victim.

And they don't need to give us the specifics of each bullet wound, of each manner of death, where, location, things like that, not at this stage. The investigation continues. This is just a very minimal approach to laying out the probable cause, enough to hold this defendant.

CABRERA: And let me ask you about what you just mentioned, which is that the father apparently did contact police after seeing the photographs, it says, and the video that was released to the media nationwide and that was prior to then actually identifying this person as the suspect before we learned the name. But apparently, he was recognized by family members. And those family members, according to this arrest affidavit, also told police that they knew that the son owned a .45-caliber handgun and they had already collected .45-caliber casings at the scene. I mean, the fact that the parents knew he has the gun, is there any kind of responsibility on the parents' part? Could they be brought into this in some way?

CEVALLOS: At this point, it's too early to say. As a very general proposition, parents and other third parties, especially when someone is an adult child - no longer a child, but instead an adult, even if they do live in your basement or whatever the case maybe, parents are not typically not responsible for the crimes or other civil wrongs of their children. Instead of looking at it as a parent, it's more of, is there somebody out there that unlawfully facilitated this defendant acquiring a gun? And there are many, many criminal statutes that address exactly this behavior.

If you unlawfully permit somebody else to have a gun knowingly, then there are a number of - there is federal and state law that likely applies. And I handled cases like this where, sadly, somebody handed off a gun, sold it under the table to somebody and then that somebody went out and did something really bad with it and that came back to haunt the seller.

CABRERA: And that is what we are trying to really get to.

Danny Cevallos, thank you so much.

Because we do know, Don, there are questions about this gun and whether he should have had it in the first place given that he did have a little bit of criminal history, had he been arrested for trespassing, was facing drug charges. So that is something we are going to hear - talk more about in the next few days, I'm sure, Don.

LEMON: Yes, absolutely. And you know, as far as entering through the side door, that maybe a detail that we see written - but was the very first picture that we saw of him. We saw in entering the door. And that's how police caught hem and realized who he was, was because of the pictures that they enhanced, him with the bowl haircut, what have you. And that's how the woman who actually helped police track him down yesterday, that's how she recognized him from that first picture of him entering that side door.

But beyond the investigation here, because I think, you know, most of the people here, including Lonnie Randolph, who is the president of the South Carolina NAACP, will be making -- watching the investigation very closely, but that will take care of itself.

You're going to have to deal with the community here. So, now what? Mr. Randolph, now what?

[15:45:17] LONNIE RANDOLPH, PRESIDENT, SOUTH CAROLINA NAACP: Well, I hope this is not the usual -- I hope they'll make an exception in this case.

LEMON: Can I challenge you and say, I was at Newtown when it happened. I was at Aurora when it happened. So those were just mass shootings. This has an element of race involved in it. And a number of - sometimes, you know, you say, wait a minute, which shooting was that that I went to? You have to really go back to recall it and nothing happened.

RANDOLPH: Well, unfortunately, you're accurate and you're correct. I'm also frustrated with the fact that America does not respond well to doing what is right. America responds when they do the feel-good response.

LEMON: Which is?

RANDOLPH: The microwave response. Quick and get it over with and go somewhere else. These things will continue to happen unless we put some things in place as human beings. And I can go through a list of things that we can do better from the social issues, from educational issues, from health care issues.

There's just things that we brag about in this country about, how great it is and the years that we spent making America the number one country in the world. Says who? People around the world don't think we're that way and it's not that I don't think we're that way. We talk about being that way but we don't act that way. We don't live the lives of people who are serious about the equal opportunity and justice for all people.

LEMON: Now, I have to tell you, America is not perfect, by far. No country is perfect.

RANDOLPH: I didn't say perfect.

LEMON: But --

RANDOLPH: I didn't say perfect.

LEMON: But if you ask people from other places, they would much rather live in America if they could afford to live here.

RANDOLPH: Well, again, they've never lived here so that's why they say it. I like it here, too. My daddy was a World War II veteran, second-class citizen in World War II, came back from south pacific and could not vote in America.

LEMON: Fighting the war became boat?

RANDOLPH: Fighting the war for America. Not just fighting the war. So we need to -- veterans right now are suffering in this country.

LEMON: Right.

RANDOLPH: Why do we have so many -- why do we have so many homeless veterans, people who sacrifice their lives for this country. Everybody should be treated with dignity and respect but the people who laid the groundwork and foundation for the freedoms that we have, you should always do everything possible and by any means necessary to make life good for those people.

LEMON: So Mr. Randolph, we heard the president -- he gave the race speech before he even became president, right? He's been talking about race. We've had these conversations when it comes to police shootings and all those things. We have these conversations when it comes to crime in certain neighborhoods. We talk a lot about race. You may not think that we have enough conversations but we don't actually do anything about it. We always say we need to have a conversation but nothing ever happens.

RANDOLPH: Well, that was my next statement. Talk is cheap. Actions speak a lot louder than words. I would much rather persons who take this on show me -- speaking of our Senator Clementa Pinckney, when I heard him giving the history of the church the other night, I thought about a comment that he made and his life was the epitome of what he exhibits and what he's about because he was a good pastor. He gave a message. He was beyond the church in that he didn't have all the shouting and all of that. Not saying that there is anything wrong with that. But he also talked about the issues of life, the issues of a community, things that you can do for people by strictly doing them and we don't do that. One of the persons that I spoke with -- I spoke with him several years ago, he is a student at Allen University.

LEMON: One of the victims?

RANDOLPH: Yes. He was a student at Allen University. And an nice men Involved with the NAACP as a college student.

LEMON: I've got to get to a break.

RANDOLPH: But very quickly, we talked about one of the sermons Edgar Guest has a poem entitled "sermons we seek." Too many people tell you what they do but Edgar Guest's poem said, don't tell me your sermon. Show me your sermon. People need to stop showing people sermon and stop telling people sermon, then show them.

LEMON: Thank you.

RANDOLPH: Thank you.

LEMON: I have a bit of news for you and our audience. You know, we were talking about what the justice department does after these situations. There has been a lot of talk about whether this is terrorism or not. The justice department is considering adding domestic -- investigating this as a domestic terrorist act. We're going to talk about that when we come back.

[15:50:07] RANDOLPH: And I think that's a good idea.

LEMON: Thank you, sir.

RANDOLPH: Thank you.

LEMON: Appreciate it.

RANDOLPH: OK.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:54:36] CABRERA: Welcome back to our breaking coverage of the developments surrounding the tragic shooting at that historic church in Charleston, South Carolina. We are just getting some new comments from the White House regarding the confederate flag, which still flies there at the statehouse in South Carolina, as you see in video here.

White house spokesperson Eric Shultz was asked about the ongoing debate about flying this flag at the South Carolina statehouse, and he responded with it. He says quote "the president said before he believes the confederate flag belonged in a museum, that's still his position," end quote. And again, that was from White House spokesperson Eric Shultz.

Now, the justice department, also with new developments this afternoon, now saying it will consider domestic terrorism charges in the mass shooting in Charleston.

I want to bring in CNN's justice correspond Evan Perez. Also with us, Anthea Butler, she is an associate professor or religious studies at the University of Pennsylvania. And you wrote an opinion piece about the seemingly unwillingness up until now to call this massacre an act of terror. We'll talk about you with you in a moment, Anthea.

But first to Evan, what is the justice department saying now regarding possible terrorism charges? EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Ana, you know, there's

no doubt that if he if he had entered this church with a little a black flag with Arabic writing, no doubt someone would be calling it terrorism. And so, there have been little of debate here just because of the circumstances. And the justice department issued a statement, we have it up from the screen. They say that the investigation is ongoing. They say this heartbreaking episode was undoubtedly designed to strike fear and terror into this community and the department is looking at this crime from all angles, including a hate crime and as an act of domestic terrorism.

The definition in the federal law of what terrific is requires the prosecutors to look at whether or not the crime was designed to intimidate the civilian population, whether it was designed to force the government to do something. And those are the things that they have to take into account. That's the reason why at first they just focused on mate crimes, simply because we know the suspect said the words, he was there to shoot black people when he entered the church.

One thing I would like to quickly note is that one of the earliest laws against counterterrorism was an 1871 law, which was passed to counter the intimidation of the Ku Klux Klan against black people in the south. That's something to remember. This suspect, Dylann Roof, was actually espousing some of those same beliefs that the Ku Klux Klan believed.

CABRERA: Thank you for all of that, Evan Perez.

I want to bring in Anthea Butler. You just wrote a very poignant article in "the Washington Post," titled "shooters of terror are called terrorists and thugs. Why are white shooters called mentally ill?" What's your reaction to the announcement from the justice department?

ANTHEA BUTLER, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA: I'm very happy to hear that the justice department is considering this as domestic terrorism. The trial in Boston, only three people died in that terrorist bombing in Boston and that was heinous. How much more heinous is it to kill nine people in cold blood after going to a bible study to a historic black church, in a town where you know that the birth of this church and to the members and to the general public is an important place for black people to gather and worship. So I'm very happy to have -- to see this happen. I hope that it goes through.

CABRERA: Let me read you some of the words we have heard from officials over the last couple of days. Even the president using some of these words -- senseless murders, unspeakable tragedy, hate crime, but we have not heard that world terrorism. Why do you think?

BUTLER: Well, I think because it's easy, part of the media's issue with this and why I wrote the article is because we tend to make shooters like this to say they're ill, or they are fragile. I was just listening a little bit before I came out to how people have been referring to Dylann Roof as a young man and all these other things. I think we want to soft pedal the gravity of the situation. He is a terrorist. He thought about it. He planned it. He talked to friends about it. He has been thinking about it for a long time. Clearly, he's connected to white supremacist groups. He has been wearing the flag of Rhodesia of apartheid South Africa. And all of that when you start to put it together, really, is terroristic activities, as far as I'm concerned.

CABRERA: Where does this hate come from?

BUTLER: Well, it comes from a lot of places. I'm glad you asked me that question, because what we haven't talked about in this country is the uptick in racial hate groups since 2008 and President Obama taking office. Guns went up over 90 percent in sales that first week after the election. The southern poverty law center has chronicled how many more hate groups and hate speech has risen since 2008.

America's been like this. And when your previous guest said about the KKK in 1870, 1871, this kind of racial terroristic activity is part of what America is all about. And until we begin its history, we are not going to be healed from this history.

CABRERA: Well, Anthea Butler, thank you so much for your thoughtful comments.

Evan Perez, we appreciate the update on the justice department investigation.

And that is going to do it for me. Happy Friday. Brianna Keilar is in for Jake Tapper. And "The LEAD" starts now.