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Major Explosion in Manhattan, Chelsea Neighborhood; Authorities: Blast Intentional, No Obvious Nexus to Terrorism; Stabbing Spree in Minnesota Mall. Aired 1-2a ET

Aired September 18, 2016 - 01:00   ET

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

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): This is CNN breaking news

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone, I'm Don Lemon.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Poppy Harlow, we're with you this evening, 1:00 am Eastern following breaking news out of New York City, a major explosion in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan just over four hours ago.

It happened right around 8:40 pm on this busy Saturday night, police now going door to door, trash can to trash can, searching with their flashlights underneath cars in the area, looking for any other potential explosive device.

What we know: officials say this original blast was intentional. That is the wording of New York City's mayor, Bill de Blasio, it was intentional. We do not know much more, though. They say there's no nexus to terrorism.

Police on high alert right now, also gathering at a second scene, that scene just four blocks away from the original blast.

At the second location on 27th Street, authorities have located a pressure cooker with wires coming out of it, duct tape on it and a piece of paper with unknown writing, that duct tape taping a small, dark-colored device to the outside of the pressure cooker.

LEMON: And then earlier this evening, not that long ago, the mayor, Bill de Blasio, held a news conference along with the police commissioner and the fire commissioner. They said they had very little, they knew very little about the second scene.

But now we're finding out new information, that there was a pressure cooker, according to sources, that had wires, and, as Poppy said, some duct tape and a note attached to it.

No explosion, nothing at the second scene, but what they're doing now is they're asking people at the second scene, which is on 27th Street, to stay away from their windows, out of an abundance of caution. There appears to be this suspicious device on the scene. At some

point they're going to have to take it away or detonate that device or at least see if it is something that is indeed an explosive device. The mayor saying there was no evidence of a terror connection. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL DE BLASIO, MAYOR OF NEW YORK: Saying that there is no evidence at this point of a terror connection to this incident. This is our preliminary information. It's something we will be investigating very carefully. But there is no evidence at this point of a terror connection.

I also want to affirm that, based on what we know at this hour, there's no specific connection to the incident in New Jersey. It's, again, too early to say anything definitive on those questions. But there's no specific evidence of a connection at this point.

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HARLOW: If you're just joining us, the event in New Jersey that he's talking about earlier this morning, a pipe bomb was placed in a trash can in Seaside Park, New Jersey. One of the three pipe bombs on a timer did detonate, that was timed with a 5k military run that was happening there. No one was injured because the run started late.

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LEMON: And it's important to say, on this one (INAUDIBLE) there was no credible threat here --

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HARLOW: -- no credible threat in New York City. Very important. And he's saying no connection, Don, to that. But now we have these two devices found here in New York City.

And the blast, let's talk about the victims as well, 29 people we have learned are injured, one possibly critical --

LEMON: No deaths, which is good --

HARLOW: -- condition, no deaths. And a number of them minor injuries and they're in the hospital.

LEMON: Puncture wound they think is the one who is in critical condition. And if indeed what would be interesting, which is according to Juliette Kayyem, who has been keeping me informed via text here, is if in that puncture wound, if they're able to find some sort of shrapnel that is still in the puncture wound, and even from the shape of it how it went in, it will be instructive and instrumental in figuring out what type of device, if the devices that they have found are similar. But I would imagine --

HARLOW: That's a good point. LEMON: -- three or four blocks away, they would have to be the same person or at least connected.

I want to bring in now CNN's Jean Casarez, Jean is at the scene.

Jean, you've been pushed a little bit further back.

What's going on where you are now?

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We havwe. We're not as close as we were. But I can tell you that right behind my right shoulder about one block is where the initial site is, it is a crime scene, an investigation is going on.

This is as ever an active scene as I've seen from the beginning of the evening. A Red Cross disaster truck has pulled in across the street. right on 23rd Street. They're just sitting here but they have positioned themselves, also an EMS activation logistical support unit arrived on the scene some time ago.

Everyone is in place, just waiting right now. We're still hearing helicopters above us, but wherever this Dumpster was about a block away from me, we don't know what was surrounding it. But they did say at the press conference that they searched the buildings that were close to the Dumpster, they did not have to evacuate, so we --

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CASAREZ: -- don't know if people were residing right there, if it's office buildings, it's a mixture of retail shops here, some residential, some businesses, obviously closed tonight.

But the people of New York City are still standing here as close as they can get to the scene. They want some answers, too. Everyone is waiting as law enforcement, our federal partners and state partners, continue to be right here, evaluating what happened. And most importantly of all, (INAUDIBLE).

LEMON: Yes, exactly. Thanks, Jean.

HARLOW: Jean, thank you for that.

Let's go to Evan Perez, our Justice correspondent, who's been speaking with his law enforcement sources.

And a major development, Evan, in the last half hour is the fact that you and your team have confirmed that they found this secondary device at West 27th Street. A pressure cooker with colored wiring coming out of it, duct tape, a small dark-colored device attached to the outside, could be a cell phone, could be a timer.

And importantly, a piece of paper with writing on it: any idea what that is?

Is that a note?

What is it telling authorities?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Right. It's not clear.

Certainly authorities aren't telling us yet at this point what the writing is. The reason why I think the authorities are treating this with the seriousness they are, is because it brings us the rminders of what happened in Boston during the Patriot Day, the Boston Marathon bombings that occurred using this same type of device.

A pressure cooker in that case. It was an explosive that was -- and they had rigged the explosive to include nails and other projectiles to carry out more carnage, to do more harm.

We don't know about what's inside this pressure cooker that was found, we've seen an image of it, it appears to be not a very large pressure cooker, it, as Shimon has been describing, on there it appears to have duct tape and wires and what appears a cell phone. Certainly that's what at least one official described it to be.

HARLOW: And, Evan, we have just received an image of that. The image youve seen, let's put up for our viewers so they can see it for the first time there you have it.

Evan, as we're all looking at this together, just walk us through this.

PEREZ: Right, exactly, and what you see there --

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LEMON: -- zoom in on that because it's -- go on, Evan, yes.

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PEREZ: I think the authorities there, the police, the NYPD were trying to put a piece of paper so that they could try to give it some scale. My estimate initially was, from looking at the picture was that the image there -- this is the image we were looking at earlier -- that it was in the neighborhood of 10, you know, quarts or so, but I'm not sure.

It's hard to get a scale from just this image, but you can see there's a garbage bag, a white simple kitchen garbage bag, that it appears to have been found in. And that's what the authorities, why immediately they've cordoned this entire area and as we've shown images on TV there, OK, there you see a little closer.

You see the wires coming from the middle of the device, you see that and the cell phone is sort of attached on the front side there on the side of the device. That's what has been described to us.

And what we're trying to -- I think what the authorities were very mindful of is that this suggests some kind of sophistication if it turns out to be a bomb. It takes a little bit more work than someone who just puts together a pipe bomb.

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PEREZ: -- all day today.

HARLOW: Evan, talk to us about that, the level of sophistication to make one of these devices.

What does it take?

PEREZ: Right. We're talking, especially if they're using a cell phone, it's not clear whether they're using it as a timing device or whether they're using it to try to detonate it with a phone call. Again, these are questions that come immediately to our minds, we don't know the answer to those questions right now.

I think that's what the bomb technicians are going to be examining, to ake sure, to figure out exactly whether this device would have worked if it had detonated, whether or not there was a mistake, something done here.

But it's not exactly the same as putting together just a rudimentary pipe bomb. You're talking about there's different recipes, you can find them on the Internet, some people are better at them. And they certainly worked in the case of the Boston bombings, in other cases, they have not. In other cases people have taken shortcuts and sometimes the timing devices don't turn out to work or the explosives.

So again, we don't know what's inside the pressure cooker but it is something they want to make sure they preserve as much of it as possible so they can see how it was put together and they can try to get fingerprints. They can try to put together where the components came from. The pressure cookers, they do a good job --

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LEMON: Evan, can you stand by, Evan?

Something very important I want to show our viewers. This is an image from the --

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LEMON: -- explosion. Then we'll get back to you. But atain, an image from the explosion.

HARLOW: Wow.

All right. Don and I are watching this on the air with you all for the first time.

LEMON: Can we replay that?

This is a surveillance camera, I would imagine; there's no sound. But let's look at that and you can see people outside running.

HARLOW: All right. This is the first video, it's very significant because this is the first video we've seen of the explosion at West 23rd Street today at 8:40 pm.

We have --

LEMON: And then there's outside.

HARLOW: -- right, there's outside. Look at that, you see people running obviously terrified, we heard this explosion was so loud, some people heard it across the river in Hoboken.

We have full team coverage. Our Shimon Prokupecz, our CNN Justice --

LEMON: Let's describe some of this video first. And so, again, this is from Orange Fitness in Chelsea. This is, again, what we have here it's about five to 10 seconds of this video. There are two different surveillance videos from this Orange Therapy Fitness.

One explosion shows the explosion outside. As we said, that is the one from inside. The other one shows the explosion outside. It is not only surveillance video from the fitness center but it also comes from MSNBC, so, again, we need to make that very clear here -- so this is surveillance video, which is very useful because this is going to be useful in the investigation as well. Again, this video coming from Orange Therapy Fitness from Chelsea.

They're used also from news, another news affiliate, MSNBC. Again, this shows the inside and then it shows the outside. And you can see it there. It appears to shadow the window, and as you look from the inside out, you can see people running and trying to figure out exactly what's happening.

And then as it goes -- as we go to the outside video, people are scattering.

It goes to the outside video, there you can see it.

HARLOW: And as we look at this, let's bring in Matthew Horace. He's with us here on set in New York, law enforcement analyst for us.

Also, you're a retired ATF agent. You specialized in managing firearms and also explosives investigations.

As you watch this video with us, for the first time, what do you see, what does it tell you?

MATTHEW HORACE, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, there's always going to be a certain measure of chaos, whenever these things happen. As you see what happened tonight, you had that one incident and our major concern, when things like this happen, is if there's a secondary or tertiary incident. And it would appear at the very least we have a secondary incident.

We won't be able to tell for some time the types of explosives that may have been used, if there's shrapnel or not and sort of get a sense of what kind of device it was. But this is a good early start. And investigators will be working with CCTV camera as evidence in this case. LEMON: All right. I want you to stand by, Matthew, stand by, everyone, again, as we look at this video, this is a surveillance video that we have from Orange Therapy -- Orange Theory, I should say, Fitness in Chelsea.

The outside after the explosion happened and the inside, as the explosion happened. Again, this is it from them, and it's also -- we're fair using from MSNBC because no doubt this is part of the story and part of the investigation. We'll be back in just moments with our live coverage of the explosion in Manhattan.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is CNN breaking news.

HARLOW: All right. Welcome back. Poppy Harlow here with Don Lemon. We're continuing to follow the breaking news out of New York, where an explosion has taken place, 29 people injured now in the last hour, a secondary device has been located.

Let's go through the explosion first. You're looking at the first video we've all seen, coming to us from MSNBC of the explosion at 8:40 pm tonight. This video coming from across the street from where the explosion took place.

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LEMON: It's a reverberation of the explosion.

HARLOW: Exactly, and the people running from it. Let's also show you the secondary device that was just found, not detonated, a pressure cooker, there you have it, found just four blocks away at West 27th Street by the authorities. We have a lot to get through, let's bring in our crime and justice --

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LEMON: Let's just describe this as they're looking, so this is up on the screen. So the first explosion that you saw, at least the reverberation from the explosion, that was the one that was on 23rd Street and 6th Avenue that happened at 8:40.

So this device you're looking at now, was found about four blocks away at 27th Street, between 6th and 7th. Since they found this particular device, our Richard Quest has told us that they have moved people back, they started moving people out of the neighborhood.

They even moved Richard back live on the air. Also got an alert telling people who live in the neighborhood on 27th Street and in the surrounding area to stay away from their windows and that this suspicious device, until the suspicious device was moved, it has to be removed from the neighborhood.

So the device that they found here appears to be a pressure cooker, if you look at it, it pretty much looks like a pressure cooker to me, dark-colored wiring coming out of the top center of the device and connected by silver duct tape to a small, dark-colored device attached to the outside of the pressure cooker. And that's according to multiple local and federal law enforcement officials.

None of them would say at this point what was inside the pressure cooker. Before we get to our Evan Perez and whatever, I want Juliette Kayyem to look at this and Matthew Hoarace to look at this, this is their expertise. This is what they do.

So as you were looking, we saw the percussion of the explosion or the reverberation. As you look at this, first to Juliette Kayyem, you are looking at this device, it's got wires coming out of it, what does this say to you about who may have done this, how it was done, the sophistication of it and how this all was put together?

Juliette first and then Matthew.

JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Just to repeat, actually what Evan already reported this device is somewhere in between some explosive device that people put together in their kitchen and an IED.

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KAYYEM: It's not unsophisticated, but it's not something that would narrow down for me, as someone worried about homeland security, it's not going to narrow down the pool of people who could make this, it's going to be still a large group of people.

So, without pictures, physical evidence as I was saying earlier, it's -- is there evidence on the bodies of those now in jail?

And I mean, in the hospitals in terms of shrapnel, all of those are going to have to be investigated, so unfortunately, this does not -- this image alone tells me two things: this is purposeful. These things don't just get made. There's some discussion about writing. Obviously everyone is curious about that.

What does it say?

What language is it in?

And other issues that we'll focus on and reporters will be looking into. But there it doesn't -- unfortunately, it doesn't narrow down anything. And that's the challenge that the NYPD is facing today, is, in a world of soft targets and the capacity to build makeshift weaponry, let alone weaponry that already exists, they have to go on other types of evidence.

I want to add one more thing quickly, you're looking also, because it was not detonated, there might be fingerprints, there might be proof of purchase. There might be other things that could lead the investigation.

And the NYPD is a very sophisticated police department with a strong counterterrorism unit. I have high confidence that that's being done now.

HARLOW: So Matthew Horace, join us here because you are not only a law enforcement analyst for us, but you were formally with the ATF, explosives is your expertise.

Talk to us about the level of sophistication it takes to build something like this pressure cooker and make it into what appears to be something that was meant to detonate.

Let's show it again and talk about what it takes to make this.

HORACE: Several things come into mind, number one. Investigators don't take anything for granted when it comes to investigating devices like this. And the sophistication and complexity of improvised explosive devices are only as complicated as the imagination of the bomber.

The oher thing that comes to mind is this device actually could very well be a hoax device and we really can't say it's an explosive device until we've taken it apart, identified an explosive element and classified it as an explosive device.

LEMON: So here's what I'm hearing from one of my sources, who does pretty close to what you just said. They can narrow down the bombmaker by pulling latent fingerprints and any serialized components can be tracked back to the manufacturers and who purchased this.

HORACE: Well, let me tell you what I've seen throughout my career, Don. Things like fingerprints can be drawn from inside of the pressure cooker or inside of a pipe bomb. The type of wire that's used, the type of explosive powder that may be used, we can trace that right back to the purchasing store, to the selling store and, in many cases, use CCTV camera and receipts to drill down as to who may have purchased those materials.

HARLOW: All right, Matthew Horace, stay with us.

Juliette Kayyem as well. We have full team coverage of this. We're going to get a quick break in. Much more on our breaking news of this explosion in the middle of New York City on a busy Saturday night. Don and I will be right back.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is CNN breaking news. LEMON: You are watching CNN's live coverage of the explosion in Manhattan happening at 8:40 this evening in Chelsea on 23rd Street, 29 people are injured, we're told one of those persons in serious condition because of a puncture wound. An explosion going off from outside of a building there, for the blind, again, officials updating us just a short time ago, a couple hours ago from Manhattan, but also, now, this was the first scene at 23rd Street and 6th Avenue.

Now a second scene to report to you, where a suspicious package has been found, which appears to be a pressure cooker. Police in the area, authorities in the area are telling people to be safe and stay away from their windows and clearing some people out of the area -- Poppy.

HARLOW: I do want to give you an update on the victims because that is critical in the midst of all of this. We do finally have an update on some of the victims, on how they're doing. Our Rachel Crane is outside of Bellevue Hospital on the east side of Manhattan, where a number of those victims were taken.

I know you've been able to speak with some people inside the hospital as well as some family members.

What do we know about the condition of the victims?

RACHEL CRANE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Poppy, a hospital official is telling us that nine victims of the blast have been treated here at Bellevue, that none of them have life-threatening injuries. I actually had a chance to speak with one of those victims of the blast.

She was escorted out of the hospital as she had just been discharged by officers; she said that she was shaken. She just wanted to go home, she did not talk too much about what had occurred.

She said that it had all happened so fast it was hard to make sense of everything. Now we are still seeing that increased security presence here outside of the hospital, those armed guards still around the scene.

Clearly they're taking extra security precautions, they've actually checked every ambulance by armed guard that has come into the hospital as we've been standing out here and there's been a steady stream of those ambulances -- Poppy.

HARLOW: And we're also seeing this update, that Bellevue is treating nine patients from the explosion.

Is that correct?

Do we know if some are still being treated?

Have they all been treated and released?

CRANE: Well, Poppy, as I said, yes, hospital officials did tell us that nine of the victims of the blast were treated here at Bellevue Hospital. We do know that one of those victims has been released, as that was the young woman that I spoke to, she said that she was physically fine, she was just mentally shaken.

HARLOW: Rachel Crane, joining us from outside Bellevue, thank you so much for the update. Again, 29 injured, gooness, thank goodness more were not seriously injured but one is in critical condition.

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LEMON: And it's important to say we're using that video, the video is from Orange Theory Fitness Center, which is at 124 West 23rd Street across the street. And what you're not seeing, the exact explosion, just sort of the reverberation and people running after the explosion happened. And, again, this is from MSNBC as well because we're fair using it from them and it's important to give them their credit for this as well.

Let's go to one of the eyewitnesses in the area. Aidan Leslie lives just two blocks away from where the explosion happened.

Aidan, where were you, what did you see, what did you hear?

AIDAN LESLIE, EYEWITNESS: So I live on 21st Street between 7th and 8th Avenue. I was doing some work at my desk. And I heard the loud explosion. It literally shook the walls of my apartment. So I knew in that moment that it was abnormal. This is not something -- this was not right. Something was terribly wrong.

At that moment, I looked out my window, just to see if I could see anything, there were other neighbors looking out of their windows, asking me if I was OK. At that moment, I don't know, went with my gut, grabbed my keys, ran downstairs and headed toward the scene on 23rd Street, which was just a couple blocks, just ran there.

LEMON: And what did you see once you got there, Aidan?

LESLIE: So it was a chaotic situation, you really couldn't see much. There was some smoke. There was a fire smell, there was, I thought, maybe a gassy smell, I just couldn't exactly tell what it was but there were people just running from the scene toward the west side. And I was running toward the east.

And so it was just a very chaotic situation as you can imagine, lots of fire engines, lots of policemen. I did run into an elderly man. He had blood on the side of his face, blood in his arm, it looked like maybe he was with a female companion, it was heartwrenching.

And obviously we didn't know the scope of the situation but it's scary, obviously we just live a couple blocks away and, you know, it's just very terrible.

HARLOW: And Aidan, now, since then, obviously we've subsequently learned that there has been this second device found, a pressure cooker?

LESLIE: Yes.

HARLOW: Device with wires, just four blocks away, as someone who lives in the neighborhood, they found a second device, I mean, what are your thoughts?

The feeling that you have, I mean, New Yorkers, we're all incredibly resilient but when you have two devices like this found in one night, it's unnerving.

LESLIE: It's completely unnerving. I was here during 9/11. So I understand that, living in this state that we live in, you know, we go about our lives, we do the best we can. We see news from all over the world and, you know, we just do what we can.

But when I was sitting at my desk and I heard that explosion, I just can't tell you, the hairs on my arm went up. It was bone-chilling. I knew that, in my heart, in my gut, something was terribly wrong.

And I didn't know about the second device just until recently, just because I've been in the moment of seeing everything that's been going on.

But, yes, to think that there is another device and you wonder, what else is going on?

We are obviously in the heart of it all, this is New York City, some people would say this is the center of the universe and it's very, very scary.

LEMON: Aidan Leslie, thank you, we are glad you're OK, and we appreciate you joining us on CNN.

Let's get to Matthew Horace right now.

Yes, of course.

I'm going to get to Matthew Horace now, CNN law enforcement analyst and senior vice president of FJC Security Services. He's also a former ATF executive. Perfect person to have with us this evening.

As you've been looking -- you've seen devices like the one, right, very similar?

Does this appear to be an active device?

Or can you tell from a picture if it's...?

HORACE: No, from a picture, just as we talked about before, it very well could be a hoax device, it's not an explosive device, until we declare it an explosive device.

The only way we're going to know that is to get this device taken apart, determine if there are explosives inside of the device and what else may be inside of the device.

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HARLOW: So walk us through quickly how they would do that right because Don and I saw the robot that can detonate these devices and be sent in without putting any people in harm's way and that big sort of capture mechanism on the back of a truck going into this area.

What would they do now, given this device, not knowing if it's a hoax or real?

HORACE: Well, the first thing they'd do is make sure that the perimeter and the area is safe. Make sure that everyone is out of the area. They'll take the robot in, they'll take a hovering device put it over the device and try to detonate the --

[01:35:00]

HORACE: -- device in some way that doesn't create too much more havoc.

When that happens, they'll be able to do exactly what we do at the scene of explosions. They'll be able to dissect the device, determine what type of explosive if any is inside of the device and what other types of materials like shrapnel or nails or glass.

LEMON: A device like this, how much damage can a device like -- of that size, because I imagine the different types of pressure cookers, probably the bigger, does the size of the pressure cooker matter when it comes to --?

(CROSSTALK)

HORACE: The size doesn't matter, the amount of the explosive that's inside, whether it couples the explosive inside.

If you look at what happened at the Boston Marathon bombing and how many people were killed and injured there, imagine if that device gets exploded into let's just say 300 pieces of shrapnel. And imagine if that happens in the middle of a busy area and what happens to the people when they're injured by the shrapnel.

HARLOW: Absolutely, we saw what it did in Boston. No question.

Matthew Horace, stay with us. Thank you so much. We're going to get a quick break and much more of our continuing breaking news coverage of this explosion in the middle of New York City on a busy Saturday night is straight ahead.

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HARLOW: We are continuing to follow the breaking news for you out of that explosion in Manhattan tonight --

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HARLOW: -- at 8:40 pm at 23rd Street. An explosion that injured 29 people. You're looking at live pictures of the scene. Many dozens of emergency response vehicles still there, we know that some of the victims are being treated at the hospital. One in critical condition.

Subsequent to this, a secondary device found four blocks away, a pressure cooker with wires coming out of it and duct tape with a black device taped to it, possibly a cell phone or a timer. All of this unnerving, happening in the middle of New York City on a very busy Saturday evening.

Let's bring in Shimon Prokupecz, our CNN crime and justice producer. He's in Washington, D.C., with us, along with his colleague, Evan Perez, our crime and justice reporter.

Look, you guys have been breaking news on this all night long. You received that photo, let's pull that up and talk about the sophistication of this device and if we know, Evan, where it is right now, morning have the authorities removed it yet?

PEREZ: We don't know at this point, Poppy, whether it's been moved to a location where the technicians can get to it and start getting to see what exactly is in it, how it was made and then try to do the investigative work.

Look, with pressure cookers in particular, there's often serial numbers, there's information that they can use to try to figure out where it was bought. That's the way they were able to solve and find the bombing, the suspects in the Boston bombing.

And that is what exactly what is the top priority here for the investigators in this case, because, look, you want to know and find as quickly as possible where this device was bought and try to get -- see if you can connect that with anybody who may have been near the scene tonight there in Chelsea, where the first explosion happened and then this device was found three or four blocks away.

Now the picture they were showing, we're seeing, it was apparently placed in this garbage bag. So someone appears to have seen it. I don't know if it was police or if it's somebody who was walking by. But certainly it's triggered a lot of concern for authorities, that's the reason why we've -- as you've seen, all over New York, people are certainly now on guard for other suspicious devices.

Police are looking under park benches, are checking garbage cans. They're trying to make sure that there's nothing else out there that might cause harm tonight to the people of New York City.

LEMON: Shimon, you're the first to get this information and to report it for us here on CNN and describing the pressure cooker for us. Let's go through some of your reporting here as to what you found.

They said that it's dark-colored wiring, as you can see, it's exactly as you said it and you said that officials had seen it, and then they described it to you, wiring coming out of the top center of the device, connected by silver duct tape to a small dark-colored device attached to the outside of the pressure cooker.

Again, you said that was according to multiple local and federal law enforcement officials. They wouldn't say at this point what was inside the pressure cooker, and I imagine that's going to be the thing that hopefully gives them a lot of information as to the intensity and just how strong this particular device is.

And then more information about them asking people to stay away from windows as well -- Shimon.

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE PRODUCER: Yes, so that's right. So the device itself, I don't think they were certain as to what was inside it, I think the plan was to take it to where the bomb squad detonates these types of things in the Bronx.

They were going to see what's in there at that point. I think they were concerned that it might be explosive, they were treating it as a bomb. Because I mean, as of even about 30 minutes ago or so, no one could tell us whether this thing was a hoax, whether it was inert, what was in there.

So I think they were still trying to figure that out. But it caused a lot of concern, because it did -- it reminded people of the Boston bombings, so it certainly has raised a lot of concern in New York City.

The bomb squad, this NYPD bomb squad is the bomb squad that dealt with the Times Square situation, where a man loaded a bunch of explosives in a car that didn't go off. So they know what they're doing, they're pretty good at this and they're going to do everything they can to sort of help this investigation, make sure they don't screw this investigation up.

And the FBI is working with them. So right now they're treating this as a bomb. There's no other way to explain this. And they need to figure out how this was made and what was the purpose of it.

Right now, also important, there's nothing to say definitively that the two are linked, so they're still trying to work through that and figure out -- also much like they found surveillance video at the 23rd Street location, they're probably looking for surveillance video on 27th Street and to see how this got there and we still don't know how, who found it and how they found it.

The police did go out and they searched the entire area and they may have stumbled upon it --

[01:45:00]

PROKUPECZ: -- but we haven't been told how they found it.

LEMON: Thank you, Shimon.

Thank you, Evan. Appreciate that.

HARLOW: All right. We're going to get a quick break in. On the other side, much more of our breaking news. These two devices in New York City, one explosion, 29 injured, more right after this.

[01:45:00] (MUSIC PLAYING)

LEMON: We're back now with our breaking news, the explosion in Manhattan, you're looking at a live picture now, this is from our affiliate, New York 1, and you may see people pop in and out of there, maybe some -- one of the correspondents there because they are working this story as we are, late into the evening.

But that is a scene pretty close to where this all happened earlier, where 29 people were injured at 23rd Street and 6th Avenue here in Manhattan.

HARLOW: Let's bring in our Jean Casarez, she's on the scene of that explosion, has been covering it since the moments after it happened at 8:40 pm tonight.

Jean, this has quickly evolved into a very big situation, with that secondary device found four blocks away.

What are you hearing on the ground, what are authorities saying in terms of whether they're looking for other devices, what they're doing at this point in time to try to find --

[01:50:00]

HARLOW: -- who is responsible for an intentional incident?

CASAREZ: And a very serious incident, Poppy, as you said, you know, Poppy, I'd like to tell you exactly the changes that I'm seeing, and it just drove by us, three different very large vehicles.

They were black, they had flashing lights, the first one was a large vehicle with a trailer hitch and then a trailer attached to it, the second vehicle had a transportation or a transmission type of device on top, completely unmarked except for the flashing lights, but the license plate said U.S. government.

So that's federal right there and that's the first time that I can specifically tell you I saw federal vehicles come into this area. The crime scene is one block behind my right shoulder right here. It's being actively processed and it's where about 8:30 tonight, there was an explosion, in-out of the Dumpster.

And they said to us in the press conference, they were still trying to see where that explosion emanated from but we do know 29 people were injured from that explosion.

We were also told that, here in New York City, police officers from the 10th Precinct were driving by and actually witnessed the explosion as it happened. They immediately called all forces in. So in a matter of minutes or right at the scene were law enforcement from the beginning.

We also know there is a secondary site. A secondary device is what was specifically said in the press conference, at 27th Street between 6th and 7th. Everything is between 6th and 7th, and they are investigating that at this point and asking all people to stay away from windows -- Poppy.

LEMON: All right, Jean, thank you very much, appreciate that, we want to get to Juliette Kayyem, our national security analyst, and also Matthew Horace, who is a CNN law enforcement analyst and a former ATF executive.

Before the top of the hour, I just want to get your quick assessments on what you know now.

First you, Juliette.

KAYYEM: So all we know is essentially what actually happened, which the incident is in Chelsea and then the finding of a bomb that was not detonated.

We don't know if it was active, we don't know if it has connections to the first. So this is why people like your analysts stay tuned to determine what in fact is reality and what is sort of a lot of the circus that goes on in cases like this.

I'll tell you what I'm waiting for.

What I want to know is how did they find the pressure cooker device?

Was it a call-in?

Was it a search?

Was it an individual pedestrian saying there's something funky a couple blocks away?

Was it any number of ways?

The reason why I want to know that is because then it will help all of us determine linkages between the first and the second and whether the NYPD has some suspicion or at least some focus on who the culprit or culprits could be.

Nothing we have seen today is going to narrow down the group of people that this could possibly be. That's where I stand, going to bed, I'll be on at 7:00 in the morning.

LEMON: All right.

Matthew, what do you think?

HORACE: Well, investigators are going to treat this as two separate crime scenes, because that's all we have right now. They're going to develop intelligence, the JTTF, the FBI, the NYPD are going to be running down those leads, comparing information and trying to determine, number one, what the motive is; number two, what explosive, if any, was used in the first device and if, in fact, the second device is an IED.

HARLOW: Matthew, what do you think it is that led Mayor de Blasio to say more than two hours ago now in a press conference that this early indication, though, that this was a, quote, "intentional attack," but also saying, there is, quote, "no evidence of a terror connection"?

HORACE: Well, remember, the NYPD reports to the mayor; the mayor's being briefed by them presumably, and he was told in some measure that they couldn't validate that this was terrorism, they couldn't validate that it wasn't an accident. It didn't happen as the result of a gas explosion. So someone did something to cause it.

LEMON: As you look at this device, the lights are on, right?

Don't you see lights at the top of that device?

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: I would imagine that's some indication of something. We don't know if it's a hoax device.

Why would the lights be on?

Is that a --

(CROSSTALK)

HORACE: No, for us as investigators, it means nothing; we have to use intelligence and information and evidence to --

(CROSSTALK)

HARLOW: So what will the -- you know, the question becomes, will they very quickly detonate that?

Would they detonate it, a controlled detonation, or take it in and try to disassemble it?

HORACE: They're going to try to do a combination of both. But whatever it is, it's going to be as safely as they can.

HARLOW: OK. All right.

LEMON: Thank you, Matthew. Appreciate that.

HARLOW: And we're also following tonight a breaking story out of Minnesota --

[01:55:00]

HARLOW: -- where at least eight people were stabbed at a shopping mall, this happened just after 8:00 pm local time in St. Cloud, Minnesota, just about an hour outside the Twin Cities area.

According to police, a witness said the suspect made a reference to Allah and asked at least one person if they were Muslim before attacking them. Again, eight people stabbed, treated for non-life- threatening injuries; seven were released, and we know the suspect was shot and killed by an off-duty police officer.

(CROSSTALK) LEMON: -- by an off-duty officer, not from St. Cloud and was shot and killed. There's no imminent threat, they said, to the citizens of St. Cloud. The Crossroads Mall will be closed until further notice. And due to the active nature of this active crime scene, no investigation, no additional information is going to be released at this time.

But again, an armed suspect entered the Crossroads Mall, and, based on one witness account, made references to Allah and asked at least one person if they were Muslim before assaulting them. There are eight victims now transported to the hospital.

We want to thank you for sticking with us this evening. It's certainly been a very interesting one from the CBC in Washington with the president speaking and Hillary Clinton and now to this, an explosion in New York City, with 29 people dead.

I'm Don Lemon. Thanks for watching.

HARLOW: I'm Poppy Harlow. Much more of our breaking news coverage, all night live on CNN. Stay with us right after this.

LEMON: Good night.