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Survivor Recounts Her Chilling Story; Clinton to Unveil Gun Control Plan in New Hampshire; Historic, Deadly Flooding in South Carolina; Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired October 05, 2015 - 10:30   ET

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

[10:30:05] SARA SIDNER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: When you think about what she went through and the remorselessness of the shooter, it is one of those moments that she thought that this really was it. That this was her last chance, her last breaths. And the only way that she survived is because she happened to be covered with the blood of the victims who were shot around her -- Ana.

ANA CABRERA, CNN ANCHOR: Sara, when we didn't see her face on camera, was it because she's still so fearful to show her face or was there another reason?

SIDNER: She just didn't want to have her full face on television right now. She was willing to tell her story and willing to share it, but she just didn't want people to see the emotion on her face. She was very raw. And I asked her, have you gotten counseling? Maybe you should talk to someone, a professional about this. This is so hard for anybody. And she said, you know, I'm not even ready for that yet. I haven't quite gotten myself to do that. But she did open with us and really brave and remarkable mother of three kids.

CABRERA: Wow. No kidding. So courageous. Thank you so much, Sara, we appreciate it. And stick around with us. We may have some additional questions. But I also want to bring in psychologist and professor Jeff Gardere as well as CNN law enforcement analyst Harry Houck with us.

Jeff, I'll start with you. After hearing that harrowing account, how do survivors who saw such horrific things move on?

JEFF GARDERE, PSYCHOLOGIST: Well, first and foremost, they have to debrief. And so what this victim did with Sara was very healthy. You have to talk about it because you can't let it fester inside. And she's absolutely correct, she will need to be in therapy. This young woman will need years and years and years of therapy because of the post-traumatic stress that she's experiencing. But at some point, she may become a champion. Not just a victim. Not just a survivor, but a victor, someone who's been through something so horrific it allows her to completely redefine her life and find a new mission in life in trying to change the world and make it a better place.

CABRERA: And you hear her account and you're thinking, oh, my gosh, it just seems like it would feel like an eternity if you were in that classroom. But we do have the timeline now that was released by officials from when that first 911 call came in, 10:38. The first police officers arrived on scene at 10:44. 10:46 is when the shots were reported to have been exchanged with the shooter. And by 10:48 the call came out that the suspect was down.

So we're really just talking about 10 minutes from the time that first 911 call came out until that suspect was dead.

Harry, what do you make of that?

HARRY HOUCK, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: I think it's a great response time for a rural area. Usually large areas like that, police take 10, 20 minutes to get to a location depending on how many police vehicles are out there countywide. So I think the police response was excellent. And the police engaging the shooter within 10 minutes they were there, having to find the shooter and go through that building so that they were safe I think that's fantastic. They did a great job.

One big problem I have here is that this is a gun-free zone.

CABRERA: Yes.

HOUCK: All right. And the fact that maybe if security officers were there that were armed they would have been able to engage this guy with their weapons and maybe we could have prevented some of this carnage. But what we've learned and we've learned a lot of people have known throughout the years is gun-free zones, all they do is lead lambs to the slaughter. And that's what happened here. And if I was a parent and my kid went to that school, I'd be talking to that administration and say, what is the problem here? Is this just hatred for no guns why there's no guns here at the school or is this something else? And I want to know why.

CABRERA: That is one side of the debate.

HOUCK: It's the school's responsibility.

CABRERA: But I will say, I spoke with the president or interim president of the community college and asked her a question about that and she said, when you have a person who has four or five guns, now we've learned that they confiscated six guns from campus.

HOUCK: Right.

CABRERA: She said that would one person with one gun have really made a difference? And when you look at the response time, she thought that, you know, maybe they couldn't have gotten there any faster.

But let me follow up with Sara because I'm curious if this is prompting any changes.

SIDNER: Right now all it's prompting is a lot of sorrow in this community. And there are counseling services being offered right now at the college, although it will be closed for the week.

I do want to mention something, because there was someone who was armed with a concealed weapons permit who was on campus during all this. So there were -- there was someone with a gun that we heard from. And that person said the reason why he didn't engage is because he was worried that if the SWAT team showed up or the police showed up, that they would think that he might have been involved in some way.

So there are a lot of debates to have about this. But right now people here don't want to get into the gun debate. They don't to want hear it anymore. What they want to do and try and heal each other -- Ana.

CABRERA: Response is one thing. Prevention is another thing, right?

GARDERE: Right.

[10:35:04] CABRERA: And, Jeff, we've learned a little bit more about this suspect. Apparently he had blogs out there where he talked about other mass shootings. He talked about the notoriety that those mass shooters had received after committing their crimes. So he seemed to identify with the perpetrators in those rampages. He also, we now have learned, was apparently a loner. He had expressed some frustration at having problems with relationships and that he was still a virgin. Does he fit a typical profile?

GARDERE: Well, when you think of Adam Lanza and the Newtown shooting, he was an individual, the same thing, was very much isolated, was seen as a loner, was somewhat very delusional, very eccentric in the thinking, viewed the world as a hostile place against them. And so they started building all this rage and what's really fascinating, what we're learning, is that this particular individual had a similar relationship to his mother as it appears Adam Lanza had to his mother.

Stocking guns together, going out and shooting together. So there may have been, I'm not saying for sure, there may have been a lot of enabling going on here.

CABRERA: Accumulating guns as well as the blog posts. Those are out there for anybody to see, Harry. Should those have been red flags for law enforcement or the community as a whole.

(CROSSTALK)

HOUCK: Yes. I mean, you've got -- you've got a sea of information out there. How do you know which information to find? I mean, we're not -- the full law enforcement is not out there reading every blog post, every Facebook post. It's impossible to do.

You know, if I can make one statement about that gentleman who did have a weapon -- a concealed weapon. If he was a security guard with a concealed weapon on that -- at that location, all right, he should have confronted that shooter. All right. At the same time, he should have had -- that school should have had some kind of connection and process with the police department in the event something like this happened so they would know, yes, there was one guy armed on that scene and he's wearing a uniform or whatever, all right. So that's no excuse not to engage that shooter at all if he was security.

CABRERA: Well, there are lots of lessons to be learned and We will continue to try to put pieces together in the days ahead.

Sara, thank you so much. Harry and Jeff, thanks to both of you for being here. We appreciate it.

I'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:41:40] CABRERA: This morning Hillary Clinton's back on the campaign trail in New Hampshire. And these are live pictures right now from her town hall event there. One of two she'll hold today. She's just arriving. It was set to get under way about 9:45. So, as we've seen lately, she's showing up a little bit late. She's set to lay out her plan here about curbing gun violence here in the United States.

Clinton's proposal we now know calls for her to work with Congress on some solutions. But she also says she'll take executive action if Congress won't act.

We will monitor this event. We will bring you updates as she gets going. But let's discuss what we expect. Jason Johnson is joining me, he's a professor of political science at Hiram College and a contributor to the Sirius XM Radio POTUS Channel.

All right, Jason, Clinton rolling out her gun control plan there in New Hampshire. Let me bring up the latest poll there because it's not coincidental she just happens to be there today.

JASON JOHNSON, POLITICAL SCIENCE PROFESSOR, HIRAM COLLEGE: Right.

CABRERA: You can see she is trailing Sanders in this latest poll. She's down about 9 percentage points. And that's basically unchanged from a month ago. The rest of the field there in single digits. But when you add in Joe Biden to the race, well, you can see Clinton's support is even really less.

JOHNSON: Right.

CABRERA: She is only going to get 28 percent. Vice president still stealing some of the votes from her. So do you think that she's hoping her announcement there can boost some support in this critical state?

JOHNSON: Well, I think so. You know, Hillary Clinton has dropped 18, 20 points, depending on what poll that you look at. She certainly doesn't like the idea that she's behind in New Hampshire right now. But I also think this is just practical. I mean, there have been just too many of these mass shootings and one of the things that Hillary Clinton is going to try and sell herself on to the American public is, I'm the politician who can get things done. And so this proposal is really sort of based on practical things, closing loopholes, taking executive action.

And she connects every single one of her policy proposals to a recent shooting. So it's probably one of the most in-depth proposals I've seen from any candidate in the last couple of years.

CABRERA: Let's take a look at her proposals because we know she's going to call for background check loopholes being closed. Also allowing victims to sue the gun manufacturers.

JOHNSON: Right.

CABRERA: She's also expected to say that she would use executive action if Congress won't act. And she will call for legislation to bar domestic abusers from buying weapons. It's a little bit different than some of the other proposals that are out there that are calling for assault weapons bans, for example.

Do you think Congress might be receptive to these plans?

JOHNSON: I think a Congress in 2016, if she wins the presidency, might be receptive. I think if the Senate remains in control of the Republicans and the House remains in control of the Republicans, I don't think she'll have a chance of getting these things done through legislation, but, for example, her proposal, the Charleston loophole, which says that if you don't finish your background check in three days, you can still sell somebody a gun.

By closing something like that, I do think she could get some support. I do think she could get -- you know, Lindsey Graham talk to Nikki Haley, and get some Republicans to be in favor of something like that because it's directly connected to Dylann Roof, who assassinated nine people in Charleston earlier this summer.

CABRERA: The idea of executive action will be taken if you do not follow through on this. I mean, President Obama has already said, you know, he's going to take executive action. He's done what he believes he can do when it comes to that. Is there more from an executive action standpoint that can be done?

[10:45:07] JOHNSON: I think there is. And that's one of the things that Hillary Clinton is bringing to the table.

Look, Hillary Clinton, unlike President Obama, she's not nearly as cautious. She has no problem with putting forth an executive action and then just basically daring Republicans in Congress to come back and sue her if they don't like it. President Obama has been hesitant to do things that he thinks could be knocked down in a court of law. And I don't think Hillary Clinton has those concerns. If she puts her mind to something, she's going to get it done and let the consequences be darn.

CABRERA: Finally, Jason, your reaction to Hillary Clinton on "Saturday Night Live" last night drawing some laughs when she did that Trump imitation which we played here on our show earlier. Is she going to show -- I mean, is that going to be effective in showing another side of her?

JOHNSON: You know, I think if she does it consistently -- look, we've known Hillary Clinton anywhere from 15 to 20 years depending how old you are. She cannot change who she is. But if she can show us that she can laugh at herself and have a good time with how we perceive her, that's never hurt any candidate out there who has a reputation of being a little too stiff.

CABRERA: All right. Jason Johnson, thanks so much for joining us.

JOHNSON: Thanks, Ana.

CABRERA: Still to come, trapped by floodwaters. Historic South Carolina rainfall making traveling extremely dangerous. Look at these pictures. We'll talk to a woman who says she can't get out of her own neighborhood.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:50:51] CABRERA: Water rescues happening as I speak in South Carolina where entire neighborhoods are swamped. Historic flooding devastating both North and South Carolina. And you can see this truck simply gets swept away. These images are more the rule than the exception this morning. This driver was rescued. But so far at least seven deaths have been blamed on the weather.

We're just getting stunning rain totals. Two feet falling in Mt. Pleasant. 17 inches in Charleston, near Columbia, the state capital, 20-plus inches of rain recorded. These all happening in 24 to 48 hours. And the pictures you see now coming from a town hit by over 24 inches of rain.

Joining me on the phone, the woman who took these photos, Sarah Shinners.

Sarah, thanks for joining us. First, our best to you and your family. Tell us what's going on outside your window right now.

SARAH SHINNERS, RESIDENT OF MOUNT PLEASANT, SOUTH CAROLINA: It's a little cloudy this morning. We're drying up slowly. I'm praying that we don't get any more rain.

CABRERA: Yes. No kidding. We're seeing really just a ton of water sitting on ground there. Are you able to get out of your home?

SHINNERS: We couldn't for about two days. We only have one way in and out of our neighborhood and the road was pretty much impassable. We were able to get out this morning, but once the tide comes in, it's going to flood the road again.

CABRERA: So you're preparing for more flooding. What did you do to get ready and to be prepared knowing that rain was forecasted?

SHINNERS: Well, I made sure that I had my shopping done and we had plenty of stuff in the house for, you know, a bunch of teenagers. Made sure that I didn't have anything outside that I needed to be worried about. You know, just hunkered down. That's all we could do.

CABRERA: How's everybody holding up? Have you had a chance to check on any neighbors? SHINNERS: My neighborhood is doing pretty good. A lot of them --

like my husband, we couldn't get the car into the neighborhood because couldn't drive through the water. Nobody's homes were flooded, fortunately, but a lot of us have, you know, a lot of water on our lawns and the roads were covered with water. You know, it's just kind of shut everything down. And a lot of tree limbs down. And we're starting to get wind this morning so that has me worried with the ground being so saturated, the trees could start falling.

CABRERA: Right. Right. That could be a secondary issue. Have you ever seen anything like this before?

SHINNERS: No. I've lived in South Carolina for 15 years and I've never seen -- I've been through hurricanes and tropical storms, but I've never seen it like this, ever.

CABRERA: Unbelievable. Well, thank you for sharing everything with us. Your thoughts and your pictures and being our eyes and ears on the ground. We appreciate it. And we do wish you and your family and your neighbors there the very best. We're with you there in spirit. And just hoping for everything to be OK. Thank you.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:58:09] CABRERA: Checking your top stories this morning, more destruction at the hands of ISIS. The militant group blowing up the iconic Arch of Triumph in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra. Now this is an 1800-year-old arch and it joins a growing list of cultural treasures now destroyed by ISIS since they took over the world heritage site last May. The United Nations Cultural Organization calls the destruction of Palmyra's monument a war crime.

An NYU student from South Korea who has been detained in North Korea since April is now free. Woo Moon Joo was handed over to South Korean officials at the border earlier today. Joo told CNN back in May that he had entered North Korea illegally, he admitted, from China. He said he hoped to help mend relations between the North and South. South Korea now says it will investigate whether he violated national security laws.

Are tweens addicted to their phones? How does social media intensify the emotional rollercoaster of junior high? And most importantly, how is plugging in changing growing up?

These are just some of the questions Anderson Cooper tackles in CNN's groundbreaking investigation and scientific pilot study "BEING 13: INSIDE THE SECRET WORLD OF TEENS".

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think I've checked it about 100 times at school before. Like, I'll just whip it out in the middle of the class and I'm like, wonder what everybody else is up to. ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Why check over 100 times a day, even

during school? They're really worried about fitting in. 21 percent say --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to make sure no one is saying mean things about me.

COOPER: Thirty-six percent say --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I want to see if my friends are doing things without me.

COOPER: And 61 percent say --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I want to see if my posts are getting likes and comments.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: All right. Be sure to watch CNN Special Report "BEING 13: INSIDE THE SECRET WORLD OF TEENS" airing tonight at 9:00 p.m. Eastern.

That's going to do it for me this morning. Thanks for being here. I'm Ana Cabrera. "AT THIS HOUR WITH BERMAN AND BOLDUAN" starts now.

(END)