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Police: Six Dead in Munich Shooting Spree; Clinton Set to Announce VP Pick. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired July 22, 2016 - 15:30   ET

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

CEDRIC LEIGHTON, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: -- wrap that up and be able to make sure that they not only capture them but also prevent further attacks.

[15:30:08] That's really the biggest challenge that they have right now, preventing further attacks.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: That's right. That's right. Again, five people dead according to police there in Germany. They are saying they believe to be up to three gunmen, all of whom are still at large.

Colonel Leighton, let me ask you to stand by, because much closer to home, Tampa, Florida, we know that we are in that window on side of politics in which Hillary Clinton was set to announce her choice for VP. Sadly enough, we know it was this time last week when Donald Trump went to announce Governor Mike Pence and had to put that off because of the horrific events in Nice. So we have some news from the Clinton camp.

Let me turn to our senior political correspondent, Brianna Keilar, who is set to cover this event there in Tampa.

What are you hearing about that announcement and how what's happening in Munich could affect that?

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I've been talking to some sources who are familiar with some of the deliberations, Brooke. And it's a conundrum really, certainly that Donald Trump faced last week. If you are supposed to be announcing who your running mate is going to be -- and we thought that could come as soon as this afternoon via text, perhaps even before Hillary Clinton was supposed to be appearing here in Tampa, although her first joint appearance, we believe, with her running mate would have been tomorrow in Miami. The question is how do you do that, how do you balance that in the midst of an attack.

Now the Clinton campaign looking back last week felt that the Trump campaign bungled that a bit, that he showed that he didn't quite understand the significance of what was happening. Now part of it, of course, is just the coincidence of all of this. But she and her aides are trying to figure out exactly how to deal with this situation, this planned announcement in the midst of what is going on in Munich.

That's still really an open question at this point, Brooke. But for Hillary Clinton, what she wants to do especially, as so many people are afraid and they're watching these attacks happen around the world, she wants to communicate to voters that she is the one who should be trusted to deal with this over Donald Trump. So, that is something that is really riding on how the campaign decides to handle this, Brooke.

BALDWIN: So if you can hear me -- I know it is quite a crowd there in Tampa. So do we know -- do we know? Will she send a text out or that's part of your point, that that is what's still being determined as far as when we'll find out who she picks.

KEILAR: Yes. We do not know. We do know that the top contender at this point appears to be Virginia Senator Tim Kaine, someone who is seen as a safe choice, who has a lot of experience, who certainly in a situation like this she can say, look be with I'm picking a steady hand.

But we didn't know exactly when that was going to be happening and we don't know exactly if they're sticking to plan. It's really up in the air at this point.

BALDWIN: Incredible. All right, Brianna Keilar in Tampa, thank you. I know you are keeping your ear to the ground, to the Hillary Clinton campaign and we'll watch and wait just like everyone else to see who she chooses and also the timing of her choice given the situation in Munich.

You see the screen pictures there just after 9:30 at night, police still trying at least one potentially, as many as three gunmen who opened fire on innocent civilians on a beautiful Friday night.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:37:57] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BALDWIN: We are now just past the bottom of the hour on this, Friday afternoon. You're watching CNN breaking news.

Let's get you straight to Munich in Germany. We are covering what appears to be a terror attack, those words from Munich police now as they have now upped the death toll in the shooting to six. Six people dead, obviously that number could change as we are only in the first few hours of this event.

The thing is they are saying could be up to three gunmen, all of whom are at large. Trying to piece all of this together could be multiple locations., we are getting video from a McDonald's which is a piece of this shopping center where the shooting occurred.

Let me just play this for you. I have to warn you, it is disturbing. And also you will see someone in a black T-shirt. We do not know if that is the shooter. Roll it.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYS)

BALDWIN: We have heard from an eyewitness who recounted a frightening scene, talking about a gunman loading his weapon, and then targeting children.

CNN correspondent Brian Todd has spoken to this witness. Brian, what did he or she tell you?

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brooke, a very dramatic account from this witness. It is a woman. We're only calling her Lauretta right now just for her safety.

My producer Duggal McConnell (ph) speaks fluent German and he was able to reach this woman by calling different stores in that area of that mall. He reached her when she was hiding in a windowless store right next door to the McDonald's.

Now, Lauretta told us this -- she was in the McDonald's when a gunman came out after bathroom and started firing. She said she was only two centimeters away from him.

[15:40:01] She said his back was turned to her or she believes she would be dead right now. She says her 8-year-old son was in the bathroom with him and saw him loading his gun.

Here's a little snippet of sound from that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LAURETTA, SHOOTING EYEWITNESS (via telephone): My son saw in the toilet the man loading his gun. It was a pistol. I come out of the toilet and I hear this like an alarm, boom, boom, boom. He's killing the children. They make nothing but was sitting to eat. They can't run.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TODD: Now, Lauretta also told us she heard the man yelling "Allahu Akbar". She took her children away from the store and also took another shooting victim away from the store.

Clearly, Brooke, she was very upset with that scene. She's thankful to be alive, thankful that she and her two children both made it out of there unscathed. But again, she said her son saw the man loading a gun, that this was a pistol. He was a heavy-set man wearing dark clothing.

And she described a little bit of what that video bore out. She describes him going out of the McDonald's, going across the street and to that mall and went inside that mall. That McDonald's, according to what we saw on maps, is just across the street from that mall, but the McDonald's appears to it be at least one spot where the shooting starting, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Targeting children, where has this world come to?

Brian Todd, thank you very much for that.

I was talking to an eyewitness who explained to me, it sounds like there was two malls, one on either side of the street. Obviously, this sounds like from this eyewitness that the person, I don't know, changed clothes but definitely according to the 8-year-old, loaded the weapon and targeting children.

Paul Cruickshank, our CNN terrorism analyst, is joining me now.

I was just standing next to you in Nice, Paul, over the weekend, reporting on the 84 dead there, including so many children. I am sick to my stomach to hear that this terrorist was targeting kids.

PAUL CRUICKSHANK, CNN TERRORISM ANALYST: And why would they want to do it, Brooke? Because they want to maximize the horror. They want to maximize the global media impact and as we see, an attack week after week we're seeing these attacks. They've got to do something, even more gruesome in the next attack to sort of capture the imagination and the horror of the world.

We don't know yet who the perpetrators are but the Germans clearly this hour think this is an ongoing terrorist attack. There's clearly a lot of concern that we could see more violence from these what sounds like three gunmen in the hours ahead, Brooke. I have to tell you, this comes at a time when there were real concerns amongst German intelligence agencies that Germany was next, the next ISIS target.

They received intelligence in the past few months indicating that ISIS is trying to do everything it can to recruit individuals to come back to Germany to launch attacks. They're really trying to recruit. The Germans have joined ISIS to do that. More than 800 Germans have traveled to Syria and Iraq, many of them joining ISIS. More than one- third of those thought to be back already in Germany.

Also just in the last few days, Brooke, German intelligence has received indications that ISIS operatives inside Syria and Iraq have been trying to reach out to supporters directly in Germany, in the west, to try and encourage them to launch attacks. As they lose ground in Syria, Iraq and Libya, they are ratcheting up their attacks, terrorist attacks, in the West and trying to get people who are supportive of them but not necessarily connected to them to launch these attacks.

Just a few days ago, Monday night in southern Germany, we saw a horrific ax attack by an Afghan refugee who, by his own account, was inspired by ISIS to launch an attack on a commuter train, injuring several. The energy in the jihadi system has really been rising in Germany in recent months. There have been more than 1 million refugees that have come into the country and that has created some security concerns.

I've been told that there'd been around 30 investigations launched when it comes to refugees coming in to the country, whether it's been indications or signs of radicalization. But, actually, in most of those cases, the radicalization has not been substantiated. German officials tell me they really have not seen that many cases of refugees coming in that are radicalized. But, of course, we know that ISIS is trying to manipulate these migrant flows to try and get operatives back into Europe. But in recent months, Brooke, that's become much more difficult

because that migrant corridor stretching through the Balkans really has been shut down.

[15:45:01] So, not clear who these people are, are they somehow connected to ISIS?

BALDWIN: I have so many more questions for you. But I've just been told, stay with me, Paul. I want to talk to the other side of this.

We've just gotten some video, this is our first look together inside the mall where apparently this shooting took place. Let's watch.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYS)

BALDWIN: Listen, I don't speak German, so we're just going to watch this together. There is a German reporter's voice obviously with his cell phone walking through the different stores. You can see glimpses of some people running. Not a lot of people -- honestly, let's just sit and watch it together.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYS)

BALDWIN: OK. So, clearly, this reporter, as anyone would be, running out of this shopping mall where the shooting has happened.

Paul Cruickshank, here's one of my questions as we've been covering all these different terror attacks. You know, we are talking about this sort of sick ideology, and I don't know, wished martyrdom. The fact that these three gunmen, at least according to authorities, are on the loose, then assuming not among the six dead, what does that tell you?

CRUICKSHANK: Well, it tells you that they're going to try an launch more attacks, if these are ISIS-inspired or ISIS-directed Islamic terrorists, they're going to want to go out, as far as they're concerned, in their twisted view, in a blaze of glory. That they will believe that they are about to go to paradise.

They may have been in a state of real sort of ecstasy and excitement because of that, and want to launch as much carnage as possible. Then, maybe an opportunity in these hours for them to claim this attack for whatever terrorist group they may or may not be linked to, to try and get some kind of message over social media. These days terrorists have smartphones and they are able to get these kinds of messages out.

We've even seen in one recent terrorist attack in France the perpetrator filmed the aftermath of that attack and broadcast it live over Facebook. So, lots of opportunities for gunmen to try and allow to terrorist group to take ownership. Clearly, the number one priority for German investigators now is to figure out where they are, to trap them down before they can kill a lot more people. We've seen that these gun attacks in Europe, in the United States, in recent months, that the death toll can really be truly horrific. BALDWIN: And as we've been pointing out before, this is actually --

where this shopping area is in the northwest part of Munich, and I don't know how many times you've been to this part of the city, Paul, but this is where that initial terror attack at the Olympics in '72 took place. I mean, this is called Olympia Mall. This is near that stadium where that happened some decades ago. And now this.

So, to your point, what are police, SWAT -- I mean, everyone commented on how quick the response has been. But if you have these three gunmen wanting to carry out additional attacks and the city is on lockdown, they've shut down mass transportation. What else can law enforcement do?

CRUICKSHANK: Well, they've got to get lucky. They've got to get smart fast. This is sounding a bit like a Boston type of lockdown in a major western city where it is a race against time between the authorities trying to locate the perpetrators, and then more attacks perhaps being in the works.

We don't know if there are perhaps other teams linked to these individuals still out there. We saw in the Paris attacks that there were three teams of terrorists in total, ten people in all involved in that attack.

Is this part of something bigger that has been launched in Germany? Intelligence has also suggested that ISIS have wanted to launch simultaneous attacks in Europe, that they want to launch an attack not just in one European city but in many European cities all at the same time. In fact, the German ISIS recruit who was arrested on his return recently to Germany provided that intelligence to the German agency.

So, we'll have to see what happens next but this is a state of real emergency now in Munich. German police have been training for exactly this kind of scenario.

[15:50:02] They're very, very professional, but they're going to have to get lucky before there is more bloodshed.

BALDWIN: Six people dead, that number could rise once they get into that shopping mall and clear it out. There could be up to three shooters on the loose. Paul Cruickshank, invaluable perspective from you, from a terrorism expert perspective. Paul Cruickshank, thank you so much.

Quick break and we're back on more Munich breaking news after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BALDWIN: All right. Six people are dead here in Munich, Germany. Three -- up to three gunmen on the loose.

[15:55:01] We just got some video into CNN. What you'll hear is this verbal altercation between people -- on the roof of what appears to be some sort of parking garage near the shopping mall where the shooting took place. We don't know whether these people witnessed the shooting, or the man walking around on the parking deck across the street is.

What we know is one person off camera shouts in German, "He has a loaded gun".

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

INDIVIDUAL ON ROOF: I'm a German.

SPEAKERS OFF-CAMERA: He has a loaded gun. (To man) you are a jerk- off!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: All right. So, I have Colonel Leighton who's still with me.

Colonel, I understand, you speak German. What did you just hear?

LEIGHTON: Well, in this case, this sounded very much like a typical dispute between people in Munich. Munich people tend to be very vocal when it comes to things when they're dealing with officialdom and don't like what's going on. So, that is what it sounded like.

However, it's very strange because it doesn't conform to some of the other witness testimony that we have heard of people shouting "Allahu Akbar" and things like that. So, this is something that definitely has to be, you know, look at very carefully. But it is clearly, a person, if he has a weapon, he may very well have been involved in this, and that's something that they'll have to examine.

BALDWIN: You know, to your point about the other eyewitness account when we talk a moment ago to our colleague Brian Todd and his producer who speaks German was able to speak to a woman who has an 8-year-old son. They were in the McDonald's. The son was in the McDonald's bathroom, and saw one of the gunman suiting up and loading up the gun before he walked out.

And the most chilling bit of all of this to me, that gives me a pit in my stomach, according to this eyewitness, this gunman was targeting children. You heard Paul Cruickshank when I was asking why. The point here, I just want to hear your opinion on maximizing casualties and maximizing horror.

LEIGHTON: Exactly. I agree with Paul that it is definitely maximizing horror and I also think it's definitely an effort by whoever perpetrated this to kill as many children as possible. If they're related, the attack in Nice and Munich, then you see the effect. You have ten children that were killed in Nice. We don't know how many were possibly killed here in Munich.

And this is one of the worst things indeed. In one the previous video segments, Brooke, that you ran, I think it was very telling when the German reporter said, it is a scene of unbelievable cold-bloodedness. And that I think sums exactly what we see here in Munich tonight. BALDWIN: I don't know where we are in n 2016, that we're reporting

terrorists targeting children, and there could be -- the death toll obviously could rise as it does often times until the early hours of this terror attack. Munich police calling it a terror attack, describing what could be a long gun, up to three different shooters, and they don't know where they are.

And to me, Colonel, that is extraordinarily frightening.

LEIGHTON: It is. The fact that they don't know where they are. That they weren't able to corner them is certainly very troubling, and, you know, clearly, that's the reason that Munich is on lock down tonight, and the police will spare no effort, no expense, in trying to find these perpetrators. And that's going to be the toughest thing.

BALDWIN: I have you for at least 60 more seconds. Can you speak to the response from the Germans, the efficiency, just tremendous effort, it seems, there on the ground?

LEIGHTON: Yes, the Germans are extremely efficient when it comes to their police forces, their military forces, and their anti-terror forces. They have done a fantastic job since the 1972 Munich Olympics and actually organizing for counterterrorism operations. A lot of the things that the Germans learned the hard way had been incorporated in U.S. military training. And along with the British forces, the German forces are among the best in the world, along with the United States when it comes to anti-terror operations. Very efficient, very good.

And one of the things that showed up in some of the videos that you showed earlier was the fact that they had a central command post already on scene and it shows they're very well-organized and they have practiced this a lot

BALDWIN: Colonel Cedric Leighton, thank you so much and thank you for your German as well. I appreciate it very, very much.

I'm Brooke Baldwin here in New York. Thank you for being with me. We are continuing our special coverage here, the breaking story out of Munich.

"THE LEAD WITH JAKE TAPPER" starts right now.