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Boy Taken by Alligator; Florida Mass Shooting Investigation. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired June 15, 2016 - 15:00   ET

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

[15:00:04]

PEDRO JULIO SERRANO, LGBT ACTIVIST: It's the resiliency and the strength of these families and the love that is coming.

And they know that the world is standing in solidarity with them. So, they are comforted by that love and that compassion. But they also lost a love one. Michael, for example, he lost his partner. He saw his partner die. And now he's just recovering. And it's just heartbreaking.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: What about the fear, though? Because we heard from the FBI earlier saying that they're telling all of the gay nightclubs here in Orlando heightened alert, heightened awareness. Would you go this weekend to, let's say, Parliament?

SERRANO: I will go. I will go. And we are frightened, but we will not live in fear. And we will come out. We have been resilient. We have withstood all this discrimination, all this hatred, all this intolerance, all this violence.

And we always keep going, because that's the only way we can live. We have learned to live with this hatred. So we're going to keep going.

BALDWIN: This hatred is unacceptable on every single level.

SERRANO: It is.

BALDWIN: We will talk later. Thank you so much for now, Pedro. I appreciate it.

Top of the hour. I'm Brooke Baldwin. You're watching CNN's special breaking news coverage live here from Orlando, Florida.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Anderson Cooper outside the Orlando Region Medical Center.

Twenty-eight people remained hospitalized at this hour, four of them, we're told, still in critical condition. We're getting breaking news on the investigation into this attack at the Pulse nightclub right near where Brooke is.

Authorities now honing in on the killer's phone damaged in the assault, but still revealing clues about the chilling calls that officials say he made, including to a friend and a TV producer during the attack. The producer at a CNN affiliate giving a chilling account. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was at 2:45 when I had just received the phone call of someone claiming to be the Orlando shooter.

I answered the phone as I always do. "News 13. This is Matt."

And on the other end, I heard, do you know about the shooting?

And I said, "Yes, I'm getting information. I'm receiving some calls right now."

And he cut me off and he said, "I'm the shooter." He sounded really calm on the phone. And he started saying that he did it for the Islamic State, he did it for ISIS, and then he started speaking in a foreign language.

Thinking back now, it was most likely Arabic that he was speaking. And I said, "Sir, sir, can you please speak in English?" And he started saying: "I did it for ISIS. I did it for the Islamic State" again.

And I didn't know what to say to him. I was just blown away. And I asked him, you know: "Who is this? Where are you?" And he told me that's none of my F-ing business.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COOPER: Investigators also still focused in on the killer's wife and exactly what she knew, officials telling CNN she admits to knowing he wanted to carry out a jihadist attack and admits accompanying him to two targets, including the gay club, where he ended up massacring 49 people. But she denies knowing anything about a specific plot on the nightclub -- Brooke.

BALDWIN: We will talk about that in a second, Anderson. Thank you.

We also have new information right now about the killer's connections, use of online gay chat rooms, social media, that kind of thing.

So, with that, Pamela Brown is back. She's our CNN justice correspondent. And also joining her, James Copenhaver, retired major case investigator.

So, welcome back. Nice to see you again.

So, Pamela, first to you on your reporting. We just played the sound when this killer, this TV producer was talking about how he paused to call him. Who else did he call?

PAMELA BROWN, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: He, apparently, according to our sources, called a friend of his to say goodbye during all of this, during the three hours he's in that club conducting a mass shooting. He calls this producer, calls his friend to say goodbye. And so this friend is a crucial part of investigation, because, of

course, investigators want to know if he knew anything about the attack in advance or if he was completely in the dark. We're told that the FBI has interviewed him, but, of course, that continues to be an important line of inquiry for investigators.

And then, of course, these 911 calls were made. And we don't know if other calls were made at this point. You heard the press conference. They weren't very forthcoming with information about that.

But also we know that they're looking not only at his cell phone that was damaged during the attack. We know it was submerged in water and blood. So, they're trying to pull information from it. But his laptops have also been very telling, Brooke, because on there, he was searching gay Web sites and talking...

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Communicating with transgender women and gay men.

BROWN: Right. Right.

And one person we spoke with, that my colleague Brian Todd spoke with, said that he reached out to him repeatedly, this person, and the person blocked him because he was so creepy, and said that this was years ago, and that this person also saw him at the Pulse nightclub.

So, you put all the pieces of the puzzle together, and it's...

[15:05:00]

BALDWIN: It makes zero sense to me.

BROWN: It's not a clear-cut case, to say the least.

BALDWIN: You're shaking your head.

JAMES COPENHAVER, RETIRED MAJOR CASE INVESTIGATOR: It's an anything thought. That actually shows motive, intent, the methodical forethought to say goodbye. So, it's not like he was on an urge to go and kill all these people. He had it planned out, and to the point where he was telling his friends goodbye. So, I think that speaks volumes.

BALDWIN: Right.

BROWN: No one that I have spoken to in law enforcement thinks that this was a spur of the moment, sort of I'm going to wake up and go to the Pulse nightclub and shoot it up. They think that he was casing it weeks before.

We know his wife went with him to these locations. Now, she's claiming she didn't know of his specific plan, but there's a lot to learn about the wife and her knowledge.

BALDWIN: Under intense scrutiny was the way you put it before. COPENHAVER: Yes. Yes.

BALDWIN: And so we know this wife. She is being questioned. We don't know exactly where this wife is.

I'm sure law enforcement knows precisely where she is.

BROWN: Yes.

COPENHAVER: Absolutely.

BALDWIN: What kinds of questions are they getting -- are they asking of her, and how will they know that she tells the truth?

COPENHAVER: Well, with everything that you just covered, they want to build a timeline and literally take one piece of the puzzle at a time and put it together prior to the shooting, but more importantly where have they been and what have they done in terms of casing these places out?

And she's going to be the best to know was he really bent out of shape on the gay community? Had he been rejected from one of these gay bars?

BALDWIN: He was apparently talking to these gay men and curious about the lifestyle, is how it was described.

COPENHAVER: The confusing point of all this is, he gave his alliance to Islam. And it just makes no sense.

(CROSSTALK)

BROWN: We heard the FBI actually say this is a blend of hate crime and terrorism and perhaps other things are at play.

BALDWIN: And terrorism.

COPENHAVER: And terrorism.

BROWN: But what I think sticks out for me covering this is just once again we have someone who was clearly radicalized. All the other stuff aside, with him being on gay Web sites, he was being radicalized online.

He had a ton...

BALDWIN: Self-radicalized.

BROWN: Self-radicalized.

Ton of propaganda on his computer. And I think law enforcement's view is, someone had to have known that he was increasingly becoming radicalized. Why aren't people speaking out more to law enforcement and say, hey, I think there's something's up with this guy? There's always signs before, nine times out of 10.

(CROSSTALK)

COPENHAVER: Well, just like we dealt with in California. A lady literally seen bomb-making materials, but was afraid to report it because of profiling.

BROWN: Right.

COPENHAVER: So, I just can't emphasize enough, if you see something weird, we need to all report it and stop this before it becomes a tragedy.

BALDWIN: And it's the -- being on a terror watch list and not being able to get on a plane, but still being able to buy weapons.

COPENHAVER: Buy weapons.

BALDWIN: There's a lot to talk about here.

James and Pamela, for now, thank you so much -- and, Anderson, to you.

COOPER: Brooke, thanks very much.

Since we have had the privilege of being here, we have been trying as much as possible focus on the victims, the survivors, the community here.

An opinion writer for "The Orlando Sentinel" wants people to know one thing.

He writes -- and I quote -- "We are lots of things, but what happened at that nightclub on that one morning isn't one of them. That is not Orlando."

Joining me now is Scott Maxwell.

Thank you so much for being here. Your column was incredibly powerful. What do you want people to know? What is Orlando?

SCOTT MAXWELL, "THE ORLANDO SENTINEL": Well, I think there's sort of a lot of misconceptions, and not just because of what happened this past weekend.

But when you think of Orlando, you think of $3 T-shirts and princesses. But I think one of the things -- and I have to admit I have learned this in the two decades since I have been here -- is that there's a new culture that comes -- that sprouted up in part because of the theme parks.

Someone who played Ariel, the Little Mermaid, by day ends up playing Lady Macbeth by night at the Shakespeare theater. And we have ended up developing a pretty robust cultural scene. I don't know if you have been down to the arts center, but it's one of the most high-tech and biggest in the country off of Broadway. It's actually got some of the highest occupancy rates too, James Beard finalist, a pretty lively culinary scene, and a really rich cultural tapestry that we have got going on. And one of the things that I think struck me was this sort of notion that Pulse may have been a place that the folks who went there liked to hang out, but it wasn't like they had to go there. This is a pretty gay-friendly -- we fly rainbow flags. I mean, the city flies them.

COOPER: Right.

MAXWELL: I have ridden in pride parades. Half the city council has ridden in pride parades with me, so it's a pretty vibrant area.

COOPER: And it's a place with -- there's a lot of young people here, there's a lot of energy here.

MAXWELL: Absolutely.

COOPER: Do you worry that this -- there were attacks in Paris. Paris doesn't get defined by those attacks. Do you worry about Orlando in some way being defined by this, at least in the short term?

MAXWELL: That was the very first question. And it was my 13-year-old son who actually looked me. And he was looking through a list. And he said Sandy Hook, all the other places. Dad, is that going to be us?

And that was my first question. I don't think so. Just like you mentioned Paris, I think if you say Paris today, you don't think of the attacks.

COOPER: Right.

MAXWELL: You think of the Eiffel Tower. You think of cuisine. Orlando had a reputation that was -- that will outlast this. And I don't think we want to be defined by this.

But I also don't think we will forget it, nor should we. Whether it's gun issues or hate issues or mental health issues, there's a lot of things that frankly this state has not been very good at talking about. And you will probably have some of those politicians. You may have had some of those politicians swoop and bow a lot of attention, and then they ignore them.

So, we're going to be here to remind them that these are real.

COOPER: But it is -- I saw the top brass of the LAPD tweeting out a photo I think of the L.A. Gay Pride Parade, if I'm not mistaken, holding signs saying, "We are Orlando."

MAXWELL: Yes.

COOPER: Things are changing. And I don't know how an event like this will change things for gay and lesbian Americans, particularly in this state.

[15:10:05] But the fact that you do have politicians who have not been

supporters, at least publicly mentioning gay people in not a negative way is new.

MAXWELL: Right.

COOPER: And that's sort of interesting to have a politician who has traditionally not been supportive of gay equality suddenly saying they do care about gay citizens.

MAXWELL: And I think a lot of advocates and activists -- and I would count myself among them -- try to walk a fine line with that.

I think our attorney general, Pam Bondi, is a line of that. She absolutely led the crusade against equal rights and gay marriage. There's no amount of post-Pulse spin that's going to change that. But if she's portraying herself as an advocate, well, we may question that, but I think there are a lot of people who say, well, come on over then.

If you're going to -- we will give you a rainbow flag. Just remember that these issues are going to last after you guys leave town.

COOPER: There are some upcoming pride parades she could join.

MAXWELL: Absolutely. Maybe we will get her on a float.

COOPER: Yes.

Listen, it was a really, really powerful article.

MAXWELL: Thank you.

COOPER: And I appreciate all you do.

MAXWELL: My pleasure. Thank you.

COOPER: Thank you so much, Scott Maxwell.

Coming up next, another tragic story unfolding here in Orlando, recovery crews searching for a toddler attacked by an alligator at Disney World Resort, the tragedy prompting Disney to shut down all beaches as a precaution. Expecting a news conference on that shortly. We will bring you a live report on that.

Also, there's breaking news, a filibuster right now on the Senate floor, Democrats speaking for more than three hours right now, vowing to stand as long as they can hoping to force Congress to take some sort of action on gun control legislation. We will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:15:48]

BALDWIN: Just an absolutely tragic week here in Orlando, first this nightclub shooting, and then this alligator at nearby Disney World Resort.

The search for a 2-year-old little boy who was attacked by an alligator in a Disney Resort hotel has now turned into a search-and- recovery mission. In less than an hour, we do expect officials here in Orange County, Florida, to give us an update of the status of that search and recovery. Sheriff's officials say divers have been desperately trying to find this little boy's body.

He was at the hotel's private lagoon when an alligator suddenly grabbed him and dragged him into the water. And then there's the father. The father jumped in, tried with his own bare hands to wrestle with this animal, trying to free his son. Sadly, he was not successful.

The child's parents watched helplessly as the alligator and their son disappeared. And now all of these Disney Resort beaches have been closed as a precautionary pressure.

CNN executive Ramon Escobar was actually at that Disney Resort, saw a lot of the aftermath when police and other hotel guests began to descend upon this lagoon after this alligator attack. And also back with me, Tim Williams, director of media relations at Gatorland here in Orlando.

Ramon, to you first. You were there. What did you see right after this happened?

RAMON ESCOBAR, CNN EXECUTIVE: Well, you know, Carol -- Brooke, when I got there, it was interesting. It was just after they were having movie night.

You know, when you arrive here at the Disney Resort and you check into the resorts, they give you a recreation calendar. And on the recreation calendar, it says movie under the stars, and that night it was "Zootopia" was the movie that they would be showing right there close to the beach area.

So, remember, at this time, which when it happened just after 9:00, this was when all the parks, many of the parks let out, and people are coming from the parks back to their resorts. The buses are arriving and of course what did they arrive to? They arrived to just a whole row of emergency vehicles as you arrive at the Grand Floridian, which is really the most spectacular of all the resorts here.

And as you go into the big courtyard, the Grand Floridian surrounds the pool and the big courtyard and then you have the beach. It was all cordoned off with yellow tape. There were several Disney folks standing there and people began to amass.

Everyone was beginning to amass. They were all talking about it. They had social media information. Disney wasn't saying anything. But as soon as there were too many people, kids -- and there were kids coming back in their strollers with the Disney balloons tied to them, everyone was talking about it, Disney started to ask people to please move away, to go back to their rooms. As I walked to the back of the hotel to observe the search that was

going on, you had a helicopter that for about two hours just circled the Seven Seas Lagoon, the manmade lagoon that is just to the south of the Magic Kingdom. When you come out of the Magic Kingdom, you can see that big lagoon.

So, the Grand Floridian looks at that. So, you could see these two search boats going throughout the lagoon. They would kind of go up to the shore in the middle of the lagoon, go up to the shore behind the actual hotel. I could see the beach. It was completely closed off. It's not a big area.

I could also see a small sign where we were, which was right against the hotel that said please no swimming. There was no sign that said alligator or beware of alligators or beware of wildlife. All we saw was a sign that said no swimming.

The one other thing we saw that was quite difficult was what we believe to be the mom. Several people pointed her out to me. She was doubled over. It was not -- it's -- you can imagine how horrendous it was. She was doubled over. She was crying. She was inconsolable. She was surrounded by Disney staff, including a police officer, and kept bending over and trying to catch her breath, and then stand up, and then she would cry again. And it was a really shocking scene.

BALDWIN: I cannot imagine, cannot imagine. No parent ever wants to imagine.

Tim, you're a gator expert, but also you're a dad, a grand-dad. You blink and a toddler -- the toddler apparently was on the edge of this lagoon. It was a huge lagoon. And how long have you been dealing with gators? Decades.

[15:20:05]

TIM WILLIAMS, ALLIGATOR RESCUE EXPERT, GATORLAND: Over 40 years.

BALDWIN: And something like this happens like...

WILLIAMS: In an instant. In an instant.

I actually had one of my children, when they very young, about this age, wandered off at Disney. And they were incredible. They found the child. But we were panic-stricken. It wasn't anywhere near a lake or a lagoon. It was just right there by the teacups.

So, they do a great job. They're very diligent at Disney. And it's just one of these unfortunate situations.

BALDWIN: There were signs, no swimming. I don't know if there were no wildlife signs. I realize that when you come to Florida, Florida has a lot of gators.

What do you think? If the child was walking around the periphery of this lagoon, it was nighttime, what would the gator be thinking?

WILLIAMS: Well, here, splashing is a big attraction for these animals. They be a sign of some animal struggling in the water.

They come over to see what it is. If they think they have a chance to take that animal, they will. So, there's a lot of things that play in on this, nighttime, splashing in the water.

BALDWIN: Is it impossible to keep gators out of lagoons?

WILLIAMS: No.

BALDWIN: Think of all the kids.

WILLIAMS: No, it's not.

The name alligator came from Christopher Columbus calling them el lagarto, the lizard. And that became al lagarto and the Europeans -- that's how far back we could trace the name of the animal, back to Christopher Columbus.

So, it's been around a long time, 20 million years. They're part of what Florida is about.

BALDWIN: Tim Williams, thank you so much.

WILLIAMS: A lot of prayers.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: A lot of prayers all around in this city.

WILLIAMS: A lot of prayers, Brooke. A lot of prayers tonight.

BALDWIN: Ramon, thank you so much as well.

Can't imagine seeing that mother. Again, we are expecting hopefully some more information, sheriff's news conference coming up at top of the hour, so we will keep a close eye out for that.

Also ahead here on CNN, on Capitol Hill right this very moment, a filibuster is still under way, as Democrats are demanding Congress take action to ban anyone on the terror watch list like the killer here in Orlando from buying guns.

Plus, he was on duty the night Orlando was forever changed. He was the supervisor at the next-door firehouse. My exclusive conversation with this Orlando fire lieutenant feet from the Pulse nightclub.

Stay here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:27:00]

COOPER: Well, the senator who started a filibuster over guns started it by saying -- and I quote -- "I live every single day with the memory of Sandy Hook." He is Connecticut Democrat Chris Murphy. He's now in his fourth hour of speaking on the Senate floor, trying to get Congress to take action to ban people on the terror watch list from buying guns, this as Donald Trump is also making a similar demand of the NRA.

Tweeting this morning, Trump said: "I will be meeting with the NRA, who has endorsed me, about not allowing people on the terror watch list or the no-fly list to buy guns."

Now, the NRA responded, saying in part -- and I quote -- "We are happy to meet with Donald Trump. Anyone on a terror watch list who tries to bun a gun should be thoroughly investigated by the FBI and the sale delayed while the investigation is ongoing. At the same time, due process protections should be in place to allow law-abiding Americans who are wrongly put on a watch list to be removed."

Joining me now to talk more about this, senior media correspondent and host of "RELIABLE SOURCES," Brian Stelter, and CNN chief political analyst Gloria Borger.

So, Gloria, if he sticks by this, pressuring the NRA, it's a major break from traditional conservative positions.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Totally.

And he's been out there saying that Hillary Clinton is going to revoke the Second Amendment. And you heard that from the NRA. And I talked to a couple of conservatives today who say, we were suspect of him all along, and now his doing this is effectively saying you would revoke the constitutional right of a citizen without any kind of due process.

And that's how conservatives feel. And they feel betrayed that Donald Trump would actually go to the NRA and say, this is what I support.

COOPER: Brian, you spoke with Trump on the phone last night. Did he talk much about Orlando and the specifics of what he actually plans to do to fight this type of violence?

BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: Yes. And his main talking point, which we have heard again today, is that he felt like President Obama is angrier at him than he is at the terrorist who took this action on Sunday morning.

I was struck by something I asked him. I said, what did you mean when you said something is going on with the president? That was widely interpreted on Monday to be sinister, even suggesting that maybe the president is sympathetic towards terrorists.

He said to me -- quote -- "I'm just asking, why doesn't he get tougher on the terrorists?"

Now, I think, Anderson, a lot of people would look at -- hear that quote and say, what about the hundreds of drone strikes that the administration has ordered over the years? What about the many actions that the administration has taken against ISIS? But that is Trump's position, that he wants to see tougher action

against these terrorists. I was also struck by his focusing on the president, making this very personal. And we saw that again today at his rally in Atlanta.

COOPER: But it's easy to say tougher action. Does he have specifics?

STELTER: No specifics that I heard. And, frankly, I haven't heard a lot of specifics at his rallies either.

I said to him, what are your sources of information about radical Islamic terrorism? Where do you get your information? Because, sometimes, he retweets and shares conspiracy theories. Today, he retweeted a very badly sourced article from a right-wing Web site.

He said to me: "I have lots of sources, but I also get information from the feel of the people at my rallies. I take their temperature and I interpret that."

And I thought that was an interesting sentiment, that he's trying to rely the fear and anxiety he feels from his supporters when it comes to this issue of terrorism.