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FBI Studying Clues Inside Club And "Red Flags" From Shooter; Police Brace for Trump Protests; Iraqi PM: Terror Group No Longer Controls Falluja; Medical Examiner: "It Was Like Time Stopped"; Disney Adds New Signs, Barriers at Resort Beaches. Aired 4-5p ET

Aired June 18, 2016 - 16:00   ET

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

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: You are live in the CNN Newsroom. I'm Jim Sciutto in Washington. Heartbroken families and friends are gathering right now in Orlando to say their last good-byes. Five funerals today honoring victims of the bloody rampage just last week at a gay night club there.

This as the FBI reviews a potentially critical clue from inside the nightclub. Our reporter on the ground will get to that in just a moment. But the FBI also questioning a friend of the shooter who called him right in the middle of that rampage. We know that the two discussed medication. But it is not clear whether the friend knew at the time that that massacre was under way as he was speaking with him.

Also, new evidence suggests that the killer made financial provisions for his family in the weeks leading up to the attack. We do want to begin with the FBI analyzing what could be one of the most crucial clues in the Orlando night club massacre. Ed Lavandera is tracking the investigation from Orlando.

Ed, tell us what the FBI is looking at as we speak.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Jim. Well, here in the afternoon here in Orlando, the investigators continue to work the scene at the Pulse nightclub. This is the block of Orange Avenue, just south of downtown Orlando that remains blocked off where investigators continue to do their work.

We are learning that investigators have finally secured surveillance video from inside the nightclub. Obviously, you can imagine just how gruesome and disturbing that video has to be to watch. But it is necessary for investigators to go through that video to piece together those three hours that Omar Mateen was inside of that nightclub and to analyze exactly how the series of events played out inside.

That is something that investigators will be taking a much closer look at if they haven't done so already. It will be a key piece of evidence as they really kind of piece together how all of this came to happen inside the nightclub. Jim.

SCIUTTO: Well, they got to do their job. It has got to be difficult a video to watch. Ed, we now know that the killer was making preparations in the weeks leading up to this attack which looked like he was preparing to die. Is that right?

LAVANDERA: Absolutely. You know, one of the things that investigators have been telling us over the course of the last few days is that everything that they have come across so far, points to the fact that this wasn't some spur of the moment decision that the killer decided to unleash a deadly rampage inside this club. This was a premedicated, well thought out attack. There are a series of clues and evidence over the weeks leading up to the shooting that point to that evidence that suggest that Omar Mateen had come here and essentially cased the Pulse nightclub and checked out the location and also changed bank account information and included his wife's name on that as well as life insurance documents as well as spending large amounts of money. A large gift of jewelry for his wife and spending thousands of dollars on the weaponry used in the attack as well. All of that leading up to last Sunday morning.

SCIUTTO: Ed Lavandera, right there at the scene of the Pulse massacre. Thanks very much.

Well, in the middle of his killing spree, the Orlando shooter stopped to call 911 and pledge allegiance to the terror group, ISIS. He is also said to have posted and ominous warning on Facebook promising more ISIS attacks in the U.S. in the days following the attack.

CIA director John Brennan told Congress this week that the Orlando shooter had no direct link to ISIS but was likely inspired online by the terror group. Let's talk about it with our panel. We have global affairs specialist Kimberly Dozier and former FBI assistant director, Tom Fuentes.

Tom, the more we learn about this killer. It feels like there were a thousand different layers to motivation and background here, clearly anger issues for years. He was a spousal abuser. He had frustrations that he was rejected from a law enforcement academy, possible self loathing for signs that he was a homosexual and something not accepted in his faith. Do you believe the ties to ISIS, even on the night of the attack he says I'm an ISIS killer. Do you think that is somewhat dubious based on what we know now?

TOM FUENTES, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: No, I don't. I think it's a legitimate claim because he's been talking about that for years. You have co-workers saying that as far back as 9/11, he seemed to be celebrating the attack on 9/11 and made comments over the years supporting other jihad groups whether it is Hezbollah or Hamas. He may not be a rocket scientist when it comes to, you know, which group is which, Shia, Sunni or who is in charge or any of that.

[16:05:04]

But the most recent pledges of ISIS, I think, are just on the continuum of the extreme Islam radical thought that he espoused to. So I don't think it's a sudden switch to that. Yes, he had other issues but that doesn't preclude that and I would submit that the ISIS fighters overseas that are beheading people and drowning them and setting them on fire and throwing them off buildings, I would think they might have a few mental health issues before they joined up also. SCIUTTO: To say the least. Kimberly, we heard the CIA director, John

Brennan, making a grim assessment this week, he said "ISIS, as strong as a terror group even as it is losing on the battleground, battlefields in Iraq and Syria," I'm curious about this. This was, if it was an ISIS attack, it was a lone wolf attack, a guy inspired by it, claims to attack in their name.

No evidence that he contacted ISIS or had any sort of support from overseas. What's the level of concern among counter terror officials, not just about the lone wolf attack but that ISIS has the capability to do a planned, coordinated attack here in the U.S., infiltrate some people from Europe or the battle fields of Iraq and Syria, get them on U.S. soil to carry out something more complicated?

KIMBERLY DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, there is a concern, specially with Europe, because of the proximity of places like Libya and Syria, where the CIA says there are active cells who are training people and sending them forth, using refugee streams and other ways to get them to vulnerable countries.

John Brennan actually brought up in testimony this week that Libya has areas that could become just that. Training grounds on for future attacks on Europe and other countries. As for getting those cells into the U.S,, that's tougher but he also warned that inspiring lone wolves is one of the main issues that counter terrorism officials have been watching for years since Al Qaeda times when they were in the ascendant over ISIS.

So one of the problems is, it is very easy to carry out terrorist attacks. One intelligence official I spoke to said, look, is ISIS as strong militarily on the battlefield? No. They've lost territory but it only takes about one or two people and $500 to carry out deadly violence. They are just not there clipping ISIS' ability to do that yet.

SCIUTTO: And they can get the weapons here, right? I mean, that's certainly not a challenge.

DOZIER: Exactly.

SCIUTTO: Tom, is there evidence? I supposed as I'm thinking about this we saw this in Garland Texas, the attack there, where they attacked a convention center in Garland. Is there evidence of self- radicalized folks hooking up with each other so that they become in effect more than a lone wolf? Sort of an instant terror cell in the U.S.? In other words, ISIS wouldn't have to infiltrate it to the U.S. but if a couple of these guys link up online, they cooperate, they have greater potential for carrying out something complicated. Do we see that? Is that a concern?

FUENTES: Absolutely, Jim. I think that, you know, really, in a way, it is a misnomer to call any of these guys lone wolves. They are actually the last wolf on a daisy chain of thousands of people starting with the individuals generating the e-mails, the twitter messages, the Facebook messages, whether it is coming from Raqqah or Libya or any of their strongholds. They send that out worldwide, several thousands per day. And that goes to just thousands, tens of thousands of zombie-like people around the world who that may be enough to trick them into taking action. To say this is strictly a lone wolf who thought this all by himself, he's self radicalized. No. He had help. That help starts with these messages that go out. Until we stop the flow of those messages, we are not going to reduce the flow of terrorists.

SCIUTTO: It is a hard thing to stop though. The internet is a big damn thing. Tom Fuentes and Kim Dozier, thanks very much.

Donald Trump's rally in Phoenix is not set to start in another three hours. But police are already preparing for major protest there. Protesters have already started gathering. Several streets shut down around the event site. You can see some of them there.

To get a sense of what the climate is like, I want to show you this inflatable Donald Trump that's been erected there. You might notice that it shows Donald Trump wearing what appears to be KKK style robes featuring a swastika.

CNN's Ana Cabrera is in Phoenix, at that site, at this event. So, Ana, do we know who put up this sign? This inflatable Donald Trump with that KKK connection?

ANA CABRERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, we do. These are people who are demonstrating and are representing immigrants rights groups, civil rights group. They are residents here in Phoenix area and do not like Donald Trump.

[16:10:00]

Clearly, they want to send a powerful message to him and the rest of America. So they have put up this big, inflatable Donald Trump. Dressed in a KKK costume with a big, inflatable sign that says, "Trump, make America hate again." Tying the presumptive Republican presidential candidate to images of hate from the past.

Now I spoke with the organizer here who is from Somos America, it's an immigrant rights, civil rights also with us, and Puente, another group based here in Arizona. In fact, this is of the groups that shut down a major roadway during an earlier Trump event back in March. Because they are angry about what they are hearing from Donald Trump when it comes to him calling Mexican immigrants, criminals and rapists, what he said about Judge Curiel not being able to be fair because of his Mexican heritage.

They are angry about the rhetoric they are hearing not just about Mexicans or immigrants but about Muslims, about women. Donald Trump, on his part, has not backed down. In fact, listen to what he said at a rally earlier today in Las Vegas.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We are letting people pour into our country. We have no idea who the hell they are, where they come from, there is no documentation, no paper. They come from hostile countries, they come from countries that are tremendous in terms of terrorism. We are going to have big problems. If you think Orlando was the end of it with this weak attitude and this pathetic president that we have, it wasn't, folks. It wasn't.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Back live. Donald trump expected to speak here in Phoenix at 4:00 local time, 7:00 Eastern, three hours from now.

I want to show you a little more of the lay of the land. You can see some of those demonstrators gathering behind me. You can see, it's just a few dozen people here right now and everything has been peaceful. IN fact some of the demonstrators we talked to, they are planning to shut everything down here around 2:00 local because it is hot. It is supposed to be about 110 degrees here in Phoenix today. There is an extreme heat advisory.

The organizers telling me they don't want any confrontations with Donald Trump supporters. But they do want to send a powerful message. There are police on scene here, plain clothes officers as well as officers who are just hanging around with their uniforms and their badge.

I want to mention as well that this venue that they have selected for the Donald Trump event is very fortified. It is a fairgrounds coliseum that has a concrete wall all around it that will really prevent protesters and Donald Trump supporters who are attending that rally from even being able to confront each other.

Again, that event starting in a few hours. We'll stay on the scene and let you know what happens, Jim.

SCIUTTO: Please do, Ana. I'm sure we will come back to you. Thanks very much.

Russian president, Vladmir Putin is now weighing in on the 2016 presidential election and in particular, the presumptive Republican nominee, Donald Trump. Here is what he told CNN's Fareed Zakaria.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VLADIMIR PUTIN, RUSSIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): What are you juggling with what I said? I only said that he was a bright person. Isn't he bright? He is. I did not say anything else about him.

But there is one thing that I paid attention to and that I definitely welcome is that Mr. Trump said he is ready to restore full-fledged Russian-American relations. What can be bad about it? Don't you welcome it?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: You can see Fareed's full interview with Vladmir Putin tomorrow morning at 10:00 Eastern right here on CNN. "Fareed Zakaria GPS." Coming up, we'll get reaction to the Orlando shooting from the first openly gay Muslim imam here in the United States. Plus, the medical examiner called to that awful scene at Pulse nightclub, speaks to CNN with an exclusive interview.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFED MALE: You can prepare and be ready but it will never completely prepare you for the actual incident.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:17:20]

SCIUTTO: Today, investigators are still examining several theories to discover why a gunman targeted a gay nightclub in Orlando. But this is what we know now. Sources tell CNN that he used gay dating apps and visited gay chat rooms. Witnesses say the shooter often visited the club multiple times for years. But still not clear whether he went there only to case the nightclub as a possible target or he was going there to socialize.

Either way, this crime is raising questions about being both gay and Muslim. Imam Daayiee Abdullah is the only openly gay imam here in the U.S.. He joins me now from Washington. Imam Dai, thanks very much for joining us today.

IMAM DAAYIEE ABDULLAH, ONLY OPENLY GAY IMAM IN U.S.: You're welcome, Jim. Thank you for having me.

SCIUTTO: I want to ask you first. Take yourself first back to early Sunday morning and tell us what your initial reaction was when you heard about the attack in Orlando but also as we learned who it was who carried out the killing.

ABDULLAH: Well, it was sort of a three-step process the week before we celebrated Muhammad Ali, which I thought was going to make a significant change in how Americans understood being an American Muslim. Then on Saturday, I did a wedding for a Muslim woman and a non-Muslim man, which is something that is not always done.

And then on Sunday morning, to get a phone call, someone saying, have you seen the news. I turn on the news to see this even happened. Of course, your stomach drops and you go, I hope the guy is not Muslim who did this. Then the name came down Omar and then it fell off from there.

So allowing that emotional rush to flush through me, the immediate thing was, what are the steps that are going to move us into a better understanding? So as I read and watched more on television and read things online, I was happy to see that the Muslim and the LGBT community in Orlando as well as other communities had built these coalitions in the past and that was seen as nothing was going to tear them apart or have them attack each other. That, to me was a really good feeling about although it was a tragedy, there will be some good that will come out of this over time.

SCIUTTO: You make a great point. How short was that brief moment of just thinking about this whole thing differently at Muhammad Ali's funeral to hear Arabic spoken and the Koran quoted from in such a peaceful setting.

Let me ask you this, so we don't know hard answers to many of these questions. But we do have a lot of information about what seemed to be overlapping motivations for the shooter, using the gay dating app to meet people, visiting this nightclub multiple times for years, which seems to stretch the imagination that that was purely to case it out. He already knew where it was and what it looked like, why did he visit so many times. There were even people who knew him and said that he might have been gay.

[16:20:10]

In terms of what that is and we know that's a difficult thing to be in the Muslim faith today and in other faiths, frankly. Does it stand to reason to you that that could have been a possible motivation for him. That there was discomfort, personal discomfort with it. He couldn't handle it, he wanted to lash out. Does that make sense to you?

ABDULLAH: Well, yes. In many years I have been doing pastoral counseling for young Muslims, older Muslims, adults, parents, families, this nature, this has come up several times. And some of these behavior, such as spousal abuse and sometimes that erratic behavior does exist, because people have been unable to fully express themselves because of the culture in which they are in, some of the cultures and not only just Muslim but also in western cultures as well that people are not accepted if they don't follow the traditional ideas of what marriage is supposed to be and what sexuality is supposed to be.

So I am certain that that did influence him in some ways. I don't know. I'm not a psychiatrist. But really the process is that I've seen this exhibited before. I am certain it did have a role or play into the overall process.

SCIUTTO: Is it essential to understanding this story? Because we have had a lot of talk in this country about, just in the last week about this as a terrorist attack but also as a hate crime, which it was. No matter how you slice it, it was also a hate crime in light of the target. And then, you have his own personal motivation here, is that essential not just in understanding this attack but to preventing future attacks?

ABDULLAH: Well, I think and this is - I am no surveillance or anything expert in that regard but I think one of the issues that is very important is that we have to look in the way in which Islam as a religious belief and its culture and how it manifests itself in the American milieu.

I think that part of this is that some people are bringing with them some standards from the older country or from theocratic country and want to apply it here when it is inappropriate for this area. It is important that not only the religious institutions but also the secular institutions starts stressing the importance that if you are living in a non-Muslim country, then there has to be a paradigm shift so that what you may hold personally as your personal ethics does not mean it has to apply to everyone that's here.

Because what it does is it puts you in a position of wanting to be in authority and dictating what other people should live in a system that's very different from what you might have come from.

SCIUTTO: Imam Daayiee Abdullah, thank you for joining us and also thank you for what you do.

ABDULLAH: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: As the investigation continues into the Orlando terror attack, we want to pay tribute to the victims and the heroes as well.

CNN's Anderson Cooper has the story of just one officer's emotional reunion with one of the men he saved.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFED MALE: I need a big hug.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It was an emotional reunion for survivor Angel Colon and Officer Omar Delgado.

UNIDENTIFED MALE: So glad you're alive, man.

COOPER: The first time the two have seen each other since their encounter last weekend at Pulse nightclub, where we now know was the worst mass shooting on U.S. soil?

OFFICER OMAR DELGADO, EATONVILLE, FLORIDA: When I arrived, all the chaos, the people running,screaming, crying, yelling.

COOPER: Officer Delgado entered the club along with the other officers shortly after he arrived on scene. Inside, the gunman was holed up elsewhere in the club.

Gunshots were ringing out and Officer Delgato's instinct to protect kicked in.

DELGADO: Seconds later, we hear more gunshots.

COOPER (on camera): You could actually hear them from outside.

DELGADO: Yes. I don't know what happened but I followed them. It was three of us. We just jetted right inside.

COOPER (voice-over): Officer Delgado was able to remove some of the wounded amidst the darkness and disco lights.

DELGADO: A lot of bodies all over the floor. Somebody yelled out, this person is moving. Another person I saw was moving so I went and another officer grabbed him. I just don't recall if that was Angel or not. We pulled like three or four people out.

ANGEL: When he was dragging me out, I could look up and tell him to just hurry, please hurry.

COOPER: The gunman had shot a woman next to Angel and he shot Angel in the hand and hip. Angel pretended to be dead as the gunman kept firing.

ANGEL: When I first saw him, I was face down laying down on the floor. I could only move my arms and my head up. I just saw him. Help me, please.

COOPER: A nine year veteran of the Eatonville Police Department, nothing could have prepared him for what he saw that night. 49 innocent people dead, dozens of others injured. Knowing he saved some lives brings some comfort in the midst of tragedy.

[16:25:05]

(on camera): What was it like to actually see him today?

DELGADO: It was a feeling you just can't describe, you can't put in words, knowing that you helped save someone.

COOPER: Anderson Cooper, CNN, Orlando.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO: One happy moment in the midst of all this.

Coming up, the fight for Fallujah. Iraqi forces claim they have dealt a major blow to ISIS forces in the city. What's the reality on the ground? We'll get a live report.

Disney World taking new precautions after a little boy is dragged away and killed by an alligator. That two year old's family now speaking out for the first time.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: In Iraq this weekend where American war planes have been pounding ISIS targets for nearly a month, local officials say the terror group has been mostly or completely pushed out of the key city of Fallujah. That would mark enormous progress in the effort to wipe out ISIS, which has controlled that city for more than two years, just 40 miles from the capital, Baghdad.

And if Fallujah is indeed liberated and if it lasts, it sets up Iraqi forces to retake a much bigger Iraqi city, Mosul, also under ISIS control today.

Back with me now is global affairs analyst, Kim Dozier, and contributor Michael Weiss as well. [16:30:02] So, Kim, Iraqi officials declaring Fallujah free of ISIS

fighters. But we had our own Ben Wedeman on the ground there. He said that as he was in the center of the city today, there were fire fights to his left, to his right, in front of him, behind him. Is it jumping the gun a bit to say that Fallujah has been liberated?

KIMBERLY DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, there are reports from other news agencies as well that is ISIS is still in the northern part of the city, just four districts, but they are fighting hard to maintain control of those areas. It also doesn't mean that the thousands of Iraqis who fled the city can come back yet. In other places that the Iraqi government has retaken like Ramadi, which was taken months ago, people returning have been killed, according to the U.N. refugee agency, by the dozens, by improvised explosive devices that ISIS left behind. So, it's part of their scorched earth strategy. They may get beating out of a city, but they're going to leave it practically uninhabitable for those trying to return to it.

SCIUTTO: True. And they can always sneak back in. I mean, we saw that with the U.S. military's experience there for years.

Michael, talking about Fallujah, both I suppose operationally and symbolically, how important is it for Iraqi forces to retake it?

MICHAEL WEISS, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, let's take the operational side of things. The importance for Fallujah is that this is quite within striking distance of Baghdad. And we've noted over the last several months, as ISIS has steadily been rolled back and lost ground, you mentioned Ramadi, I can mention Tikrit, Baiji, other places. They have increased their suicide and car bombings inside the capital.

So, Fallujah has been a staging ground for them. This is where they are manufacturing their EIDs and their car bombs and so on. So, flushing them out was important on an operational basis.

On the symbolic level, I would note two things. First and foremost, this has always been the hornets nest of the Sunni insurgency going back to 2004 where they waged two devastating campaigns to liberate Fallujah and the second battle of Fallujah. I forget how many hundreds of tons of ordinances were dropped on that city. It's a pocked moonscape for a long time.

The second symbolic victory here is for Prime Minister Haider al- Abadi, who needed something to really boost his esteem. Right now, there is a political crisis occurring in Iraq within the Shia political establishment. You have forces that are very much beholden to Iran and its revolutionary guard corps, essentially try to Hezbollize the country, created some political bloc at deep state more loyal to Tehran than to Baghdad.

Prime Minister Abadi backed by Ayatollah Ali Sistani, backed even by Muqtada al Sadr who I never in a million years would have thought would become an Iraqi nationalist, but that's ow he seems to have come out of the closet so to speak, are trying to arrest control away from his fifth column. So, for Prime Minister Abadi to declare victory, it's very good for his political cache. SCIUTTO: Kim, I have to ask you and we heard this from the president,

commenting on the Orlando shooting. If the administration claimed that Fallujah is on its back foot in Iraq, they are losing ground, U.S. forces supporting Iraqi forces are squeezing them both in Syria and in Iraq, and really it's a matter of time before they are out. Do you think that's an accurate assessment?

DOZIER: It is a matter of time probably before they are out of Iraq or Syria as a traditional military force. But we are already seeing the transition into a gorilla force where they sink back into the population, just as they did when U.S. forces were inside of Iraq. That's what the CIA director predicted. John Brennan said they would turn into a terrorist group in order to maintain influence, funding and recruits. And they would just move their base of operations to places where we can already see them building up, something like 5,000 to 8,000 fighters inside Libya, where there's a much better chance of taking advantage of that unstable government there and continuing to train fighters who would then try to attack in Europe and beyond.

SCIUTTO: Michael Weiss, does it matter if they don't have their punitive Islamic State and they go back to being old school insurgency terror groups. Does it matter?

WEISS: I think it matters in the sense they will have lost the mantle of being this world historical movement. I mean, tantamount to Marxism, Leninism or fascism, something that aspires to conquer the globe, this is the importance of them creating a nation state. Their slogan, remaining and expanding is all about defunct now. They are remaining, sure, but they're not really expanding unless you count the colonial outpost that they're establishing elsewhere such as Libya, Afghanistan, the Sinai Peninsula.

But look, the CIA Director John Brennan was very, very clear and explicit and undercut what President Barack Obama was saying. He said that despite two years of attritional warfare, battering the ISIS finances, taking away their terrain in Iraq and Syria, they have not lost the capability or the will to commit terrorist attacks abroad. This is not a new strategy for them.

Go back to 2005, Abu Musab al Zarqawi, the founder of al Qaeda in Iraq waged devastating hotel bombings in Amman, Jordan.

[16:35:05] And it tried to do a chemical weapons attack in Amman, which was fortunately aborted. But this has always been the long-term goal for them. First, take over terrain in the Middle East and then export your jihad internationally. That's what they're doing now.

(CROSSTALK)

DOZIER: In a sense, it becomes a virtual caliphate. They move in time and space and maintain influence in people's minds.

SCIUTTO: Yes, that's the thing. Terrorist groups don't necessarily get crushed. They disappear over time, extinguish over time.

Michael Weiss, Kim Dozier, thanks very much. Coming up next, food half eaten, drinks at the bar, checks waiting to

be paid. In his first interview since the attack, the Orlando medical examiner tells CNN what he saw the moment he walked into the horrible aftermath of that Pulse nightclub shooting.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: The grim task of identifying those lost in the Orlando shooting rampage fell on the shoulders of the local medical examiner. But nothing prepared him for what he encountered inside the pulse nightclub.

He shared his story with CNN chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. JOSHUA STEPHANY, CHIEF MEDICAL EXAMINER, ORANGE COUNTY, FLORIDA: It's almost like time stopped. There were still things back on TV playing. Lights blinking, drinks, checks about to be paid, food half eaten. And that's not even thinking about the bodies on the ground.

But when you actually see everybody lying down in one place or their final positions, you can feel it.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In addition to police, fire, EMS, there is always another thing that responds to tragedies, the medical examiners, like Dr. Joshua Stephany. He is speaking about this for the first time.

[16:40:00] STEPHANY: When I heard the number of 11 or 12 people deceased at the hospital from one shooting, I said, it's a lot. But our normal staff could handle it.

As the morning went on, I started getting more texts, more calls and I realized the scope of the disaster or the event that numbers are start to come in, 20 at the nightclub, 30 at the nightclub.

GUPTA: For all of the victims, figure out cause and manner of death. That's his job. Surprisingly, the answers aren't always obvious.

STEPHANY: So law enforcement can recreate what happened. So we need to get the projectiles. We need to tell them the injury pattern, entrances, exits, what they --

(CROSSTALK)

GUPTA (on camera): Can't say for sure. Full metal jacket, hollow tip --

STEPHANY: Not from the fragments I recovered, no.

GUPTA (voice-over): Dr. Stephany is still piecing together the fragments from this tragedy, but he made a point to tell me no one died from trampling or other causes.

STEPHANY: No secret that all the causes have been the same. We all know what happened there.

GUPTA: By Monday, he wanted all the victims identified.

STEPHANY: A lot of people had identification on them. So, we'll take that I.D. and look at it, compare it, and if we can make a positive I.D. off that, we'll use that, if we need other information, if the way to the person's cleanup and re-compare, that's one thing. We can do what's called quick prints. We can take a thumbprint, hook up to a laptop computer, run their print and see what their photos come up and see if that can compare. Wing it, the family information personal effects, tattoos.

GUPTA: But Tuesday, he wanted all the autopsies completed.

STEPHANY: I wanted to improve our process as quickly and efficiently as we could so we can get that back to our staff. That's very important to me and my staff. We're a public office. We serve the public. And that is, I think, a public mission to reunite those family with their families.

GUPTA: Another sign of respect that you won't find in had any rule book.

(on camera): It was important for you to separate the shooter from the other victims.

STEPHANY: Myself and my staff, we just felt it was only right. There was no legal reason for it, no protocol for it. We felt in our minds it was probably best ethically, morally, to keep them separate. So the shooter was kept -- was transported by himself. He was kept in the other building by himself. I autopsied him, I myself, in the building away from the victims, out of respect from the victims and their families.

GUPTA (voice-over): As of tonight, no one has claimed the shooter's body.

(on camera): You mentioned earlier that families can call you, they can call you, you make yours available to them. I'm just wondering, what do you say to them?

STEPHANY: The most common question is, did my loved one suffer? In honestly, 99 of 100 times, that is the question they asked. In cases such as this, I will tell them, I don't think they suffered one bit.

I don't see any -- I didn't see any evidence of movement or trying to struggle. Like I said, beginning when I got in there at the scene, it's almost like everyone just stopped and laid down where they were.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO: What a difficult, difficult job. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thanks very much.

We're going to take a quick break now. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:46:46] SCIUTTO: Brand new precautions at Disney World are now in place just days after an alligator dragged a toddler to his death in a lagoon at one of the theme park resorts. Crews are installing barriers now and new warning signs at nine beaches on Disney properties. This comes as we hear from the grieving parents of 2- year-old Lane Graves. That's him right there. We hear from them for the first time.

Brynn Gingras joins me from Lake Buena Vista, Florida.

So, Brynn, what does the Graves family said?

BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I can't imagine what they are going through at this point, Jim. They have now returned home to Nebraska, welcomed by neighbors with blue ribbons on their house. Certainly, they are getting an outpouring of support for going through an unimaginable terrible time at this moment.

And in a statement, they did want to express their thank yous to the people that have reached out to them. And so, they released this statement in part which said, "Melissa and I continue to deal with the loss of our beloved boy, Lane, and are overwhelmed with the support and love we have received from family and friends in our community as well as from around the country."

In that statement, they also asked for some privacy, Jim, of course, as they continue this process and having to bury their son later in the week.

At the same time, here in Orlando, Walt Disney is making reforms to their waterfront properties. They have surveyed everywhere and realize there's about two dozen areas that they want to fix, improve that signage. We heard they have gotten through about nine properties as of today. They are continuing that process.

And some of the changes they are making are adding more signs, different signs, some that say "danger, alligators and snakes in the area", "stay away from the water" or "do not feed the wildlife". In some areas as well, they have put up fencing around those waters.

We are also told by Disney spokespeople that the employees are talking to not only the people who are visiting the reports but also fellow employees about what sort of measures they need to take when interacting with wildlife so this never happens again -- Jim.

SCIUTTO: I just cannot imagine what that family is going through.

Brynn Gingras, thanks very much for covering it for us.

Coming up less than a week after the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history, gun enthusiasts gather for a firearms festival. How will they respond in the wake of the Orlando tragedy? That's right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [16:52:55] SCIUTTO: Welcome back live to the CNN NEWSROOM.

Hunters, hobbyists and other firearm enthusiasts are gathering at an annual NRA day festival in Illinois today. The even comes as the debate on gun control is reignited following yet another deadly shooting here in the U.S.

CNN's Ryan Young is at the festival now in its 14th year, and he talked to people there about what they think should be done or shouldn't be done.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RYAN YOUNG, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: We are just about an hour south of Chicago. You can see the fence line over here, where everybody is lining up. They're getting registered to go inside and be able to have a chance to shoot weapons. In fact, this is one f the fence over here. People are lining up all day long to grab a pistol, go out and take a shot at targets.

We have been talking about families and people who believe in gun safety but they also say they understand there is a lot of conversation in this country right now about changing laws. And we asked them a few questions about what's going on in this country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We insist on enforcing the laws that are presently there. In the case of what happened in Orlando, there are so many failures there that you would take a closer (INAUDIBLE) to handle all of it. We don't want bad people to have firearms any more than anyone else does.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Freedom to have your own gun, to be able to protect yourself, stricter laws aren't going to prevent people from obtaining handguns illegally. So, at that point, you are only restricting what the people that can defend themselves are going to be doing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No matter what the case is, you are not going to entirely stop this, because the folks that want to get this stuff illegally will continue to do so.

YOUNG: Look, some of the people here were skeptical about us being here because they didn't want this to turn into a gun rights conversation. They said they understand the conversation going on in the country, but they want to make sure the laws on the books actually get enforced.

Reporting in Bonfield, Illinois, Ryan Young, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO: Ryan Young, thanks very much.

Coming up live from the CNN NEWSROOM, hear from the man hijacking this replacing terrorist propaganda with gay pornography. Why he says it is worth breaking the law to take on the terrorists. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:58:42] SCIUTTO: "THE HUNT WITH JOHN WALSH" returns to CNN tomorrow night. On the season premier, a seemingly generous man charmed his girlfriend's family. It soon became clear that he had a dark side.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Tammy met William Greer in a strip club. And he wooed her and gave her money. He moved her into a nice house. He seemed very nice. He invited us to the house for a couple of beers and to go four-wheeling.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: William Greer was actually pretty good with us. The only thing I didn't like about him, I feel like he was always trying to buy us, because he had a bunch of money. Every time we went over there, we was always doing something.

On the weekend, there would be his two sons. When all the kids that were there together, we always had fun. We always got along.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When I went over there to stay with William and my mom we had a good time. You could never tell he was a bad person. He got angry but he never took it to extremes in front of us.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Shortly after that, it all turned tragic.