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New Day

Ten Killed in Oregon Campus Massacre; Who Was the Oregon Gunman?; President Obama Pushes for Gun Control Legislation; Hurricane Joaquin Poses Serious Flood Threat. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired October 02, 2015 - 06:00   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There's a shooter. There's a shooter.

[05:58:33] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Unconfirmed report that he's got a long gun.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She opened the door, and gunman shot her.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Multiple shots were fired.

The look on her face was horrifying.

STACY BOYLAN, FATHER OF VICTIM: "Because you're a Christian, you're going to see God in just about one second." And then he shot and killed them.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I was terrified. I have never been more terrified for my life ever.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Once we got out of the building, people were running in every direction.

SHERIFF JOHN HANLIN, DOUGLAS COUNTY, OREGON: Let me be very clear. I will not name the shooter.

HARRY HOUCK, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: He's got to have some kind of connection to that school somehow.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Somehow this has become routine. We've become numb to this.

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We have got to get the political will to do everything we can to keep people safe.

OBAMA: Our thoughts and prayers are not enough. It's not enough.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: We want to welcome our viewers in the United States and around the world. This is NEW DAY, but it smacks all too familiar of too many others.

Another school in America victimized by a deranged shooter. This time it's Umpqua Community College in Oregon that's the site of ten murders, at least seven others wounded. An outraged President Obama, you just heard him admonishing the nation for not fighting gun violence. But today, we'll report on how much is involved in these shootings and how little has been done.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Investigators once again trying to figure out why this 26-year-old shooter went on a rampage. Were there warning signs missed? And what about those reports that he targeted Christian students?

We are also learning more about the precious victims' lives taken. We have the story covered as only CNN can. Let's begin with CNN's Ana Cabrera, live for us in Roseburg, Oregon. What have you learned, Ana?

ANA CABRERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Alisyn and Chris.

Right now, there are more than 100 investigators on scene, searching for answers to what happened and why. Now this is a small town. It seems everybody has been touched by this tragedy.

And this morning, we're hearing more from students here at the college, describing that horror that broke through and rocked this normally peaceful rural community.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(MUSIC: "TAPS")

CABRERA (voice-over): Overnight, a massive candlelight vigil for the victims of Umpqua Community College's deadly mass shooting. Disturbing new details coming from a father whose daughter was hit in the back by a bullet, describing how the gunman targeted those who said they were Christian.

BOYLAN: "Are you a Christian?" he would ask them, and "if you're a Christian, stand up." And they would stand up, and he said, "Good, because you're a Christian, you're going to see God in just about one second." And then he shot and killed them. And he kept going down the line doing this to people.

CABRERA: Thursday morning, around 10:38 a.m., 911 dispatch receives the first calls for help.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The active shooter, UCC, 1140 Umpqua College Road.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Somebody is outside one of the doors, shooting through the door.

CABRERA: Oregon police say the 26-year-old gunman was carrying body armor and loads of ammunition, enough for a prolonged gunfight, along with three pistols and one long rifle. Entering a classroom, he opened fire, shooting a teacher at pointblank range, according to witnesses. Students overheard the gunshots.

HANNAH MILES, UCC STUDENT: It was just rapid fire over and over and over again. You could -- you could hear the people -- you could hear them moving and crying.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I said to the teacher, we need to get out of here right now. And then we heard the second and third gunshots.

CABRERA: Within minutes, officers swarmed the campus.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Exchanging shots with him. He's in a classroom.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Copy, Rezik (ph) 17, exchanging gunshots right now with the male. He's in a classroom on the southeast side of Snyder Hall.

CABRERA: The shooting began in Snyder Hall, but it didn't end there. The shooter continuing his rampage into the science building, casualties found in at least two different classrooms.

HANLIN: I will not name the shooter. I will not give him the credit he probably sought prior to this horrific and cowardly act.

CABRERA: The gunman shot dead at the scene.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA: And the sheriff praising the heroic actions of two officers who arrived here at the scene within minutes of that first 911 call. Keep in mind, this is a normally gun-free zone here at the college. There are no armed security guards or armed officers normally here on campus. And so, given the amount of ammunition, the number of weapons this shooter had, it's likely those responding officers may have prevented this tragedy from becoming even more deadly -- Chris.

CUOMO: How to stop a shooting once it happens; how to stop them before they start; how to assess people as risk; how to decide who gets weapons? All of these issues present themselves every time. We'll unpack them one by one. Ana, thank you very much.

But here's what matters most in every one of these situations. Those who were victimized. And right now we know at least seven were wounded at this mass shooting in Umpqua Community College, in addition to those who lost their lives. Those who are still alive and fighting for their lives, let's get to CNN's chief medical correspondent, Sanjay Gupta, live at Mercy Hospital in Roseburg, Oregon, with more.

Sanjay, what are they telling you?

SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, with this particular hospital, it's about five miles away from the scene. This is a small town, Chris. Just about 21,000 people live here. So just five miles away from the scene.

What we know now from talking to people inside the hospital, that ten people, ten people who are injured were brought to this hospital after the -- after the incident occurred. We know that one of those people died in the emergency room here behind me. Three people were transferred to another hospital, and the others were getting operations and treatment here.

So it was ten injured, originally, Chris, that were brought here. But one did not survive after making it to the emergency room.

We know that this is a level three trauma center, Chris. This is -- this is a hospital that is not used to seeing this sort of thing, but remarkably, back several years ago, they actually took care of a similar sort of incident, where 23 people were actually injured in a mass shooting. So these are -- these are seasoned doctors, seasoned professionals in here who, tragically, have seen this sort of thing before.

I can tell you, Chris, just being here for a little bit now, everybody in this town seemingly has been affected by this. They either knew somebody; they've been somehow directly impacted by what happened here. That's really the feel, the vibe that you get when you -- when you walk around this town today.

[06:05:06] MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Sanjay, I'll take it here. Yes, and that's the thing: a small community like that will be rocked to its core. We'll check back with you on the status of those victims that are being treated in the hospital.

Meanwhile, federal and local investigators are chasing every lead to learn more about that 26-year-old gunman and his motives. Was the mass shooting a possible hate crime? Were warning signs missed?

Our Deborah Feyerick next joins us with that part of the story. Deb, what are we knowing?

DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We do know that investigators that investigators are looking at all of that. But here's what we know so far.

First of all, he's 26 years old. His name is Christopher Harper- Mercer. He wore, apparently, according to reports, a military-style garb almost every day, and he had a very, very close relationship with his mother. "The New York Times" quoting her, saying that she had to insulate her son from various things that he found annoying, including sort of bugs and animals and children.

What we also know about him is that his father is in Southern California. His father actually spoke and confirmed the identity of his son.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So many questions right now. Any questions right now? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Obviously, it's been a devastating day,

devastating for me and my family. All I ask is, I know you guys are here to do your job. All I ask is please respect our privacy. And so far you've done that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Any surprise at all?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shocked. Shocked is all I can say.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FEYERICK: The father lives in Southern California. The mother, it appears, had moved to Oregon.

What we do know is that very little is known about this individual. But investigators telling us that when he was shot, he was carrying a long gun, three handguns, which he was able to reload.

He was also in possession of body armor, and he had a lot of ammunition.

Police now crediting other officers for responding so quickly that they were, in their words, able to neutralize the gunman. But he did appear to be armed for a long fight.

Last thing: he was also on social media but he doesn't have a very prolific profile as others that we've investigated normally do. He was on a site. He said, "I've noticed that so many people like this gunman in Virginia, who killed the two reporters, are all alone and unknown. Yet when they spill a little blood, the whole world knows who they are. A man who is known by no one is now known by everyone, his face splashed across every screen, his name across the lips of every person on the planet, all in the course of one day. Seems the more people you kill, the more you're in the limelight."

And investigators are really looking at the motive to understand what was going on in his head. There are eyewitnesses who are now telling investigators that he did ask people their religions. And so they're looking as to why that may have played a role -- Chris, Alisyn, Michaela.

CAMEROTA: Deb, thanks so much.

I mean, reading that blog post, it just spells out part of his motive that he liked the limelight that that other murderer from Roanoke had received. We will explore that on the program.

Meanwhile, President Obama outrage by yet another mass shooting. The president admonishing the country for not fighting gun violence, saying somehow these massacres have become routine in America.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

OBAMA: But we are not the only country on earth that has people with mental illnesses or want to do harm to other people. We are the only advanced country on earth that sees these kinds of mass shootings every few months. Somehow this has become routine. The reporting is routine. My response here at this podium ends up being routine. The conversation in the aftermath of it, we've become numb to this.

We talked about this after Columbine and Blacksburg, after Tucson, after Newtown, after Aurora, after Charleston. It cannot be this easy for somebody who wants to inflict harm on other people to get his or her hands on a gun.

And what's become routine, of course, is the response of those who oppose any kind of common-sense gun legislation. Right now, I can imagine the press releases being cranked out. We need more guns, they'll argue. Fewer gun safety laws. Does anybody really believe that?

[06:10:00] There are scores of responsible gun owners in this country. They know that's not true. We know because of the polling that says the majority of Americans understand we should be changing these laws, including the majority of responsible law-abiding gun owners.

There is a gun for roughly every man, woman and child in America. So how can you, with a straight face, make the argument that more guns will make us safer? We know that states with the most gun laws tend to have the fewest gun deaths. So the notion that gun laws don't work or just will make it harder for law-abiding citizens, and criminals will still get their guns, it's not borne out by the evidence.

We know that other countries in response to one mass shooting have been able to craft laws that almost eliminate mass shootings.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CUOMO: Guns are certainly always an issue in these shootings, but they're just one issue. There's a combination of things that goes into almost every one of these as we know, all too well, those who cover them.

Let's bring back Dr. Sanjay Gupta and let's bring in former ATF executive Matthew Horace.

Fellows, I want to unpack the boxes we need to check when assessing these situations.

Matthew, let me start with you. The first thing we'll hear is, if they had had armed security on campus, if they had allowed kids to carry weapons, teachers, authorized personnel, this guy wouldn't have had the ability to inflict this kind of damage. What is your take?

MATTHEW HORACE, FORMER ATF EXECUTIVE: Well, my take is every time we have one of these incidents, that question comes up. But then, when you get right down to the core, the people who are responsible for schoolings always say, "We don't want more guns on campuses. We don't want more guns at elementary schools, or middle schools or high schools." And the dialogue discontinues, and the narrative stays the same. CUOMO: But what does that mean in terms of your insight into all

the different shootings that you've covered, and when having weapon- on-weapon is an advantage, would security in the school make a difference? What can you speak to on that?

HORACE: Well, I can say several things. No. 1, the president makes a very good point. In no other situation in society would we allow this to happen without bringing the people to the table to come up with a coherent solution. And we haven't done that.

No. 2, no matter what side of the fence you sit on, no one can argue the facts. Almost every week since Sandy Hook, there's been another school shooting in almost every state of the United States, with the exception of five. Too much, too little, too late, it continues to happen. Chris, you and I are having this discussion far too many times every two weeks.

CUOMO: Sanjay, we're going to get these stats of different shootings and things. We'll put them up there for the audience to see.

Mental health winds up rearing its head in mass shootings. Not in all gun violence. There are plenty of reasons that people can just be bad. You don't have to be mentally ill to be bad. Most mentally ill are not violent people.

But when you find someone who is said to be suffering from mental-health issues, how big a gap is there in the ability to get someone help if they don't want it?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Tremendous gap, Chris. Really at all levels, from the time that someone is actually able to be recognized as having some sort of mental illness to having a formal diagnosis to get outpatient treatment and most difficult of all, to get inpatient treatment. It has gotten challenging, more so. It's going in the wrong direction, really, in terms of actually getting these people help.

You're actually right, though, Chris. The tendency always seems to be to only talk about mental illness in the wake of one of these tragedies. People with mental illness are more likely to be victims of violent crime as opposed to perpetrators of them. But it does come up.

And I think you have the situation where because the system is so broken, family members, friends, people who might otherwise help refer somebody, get somebody help, it doesn't even happen. That process doesn't even start. Because there's nowhere to go with it, Chris.

CUOMO: Two aspects I want your opinion on, Sanjay. One, we have Representative Tim Murphy from Pennsylvania coming on. He's been pushing a little in the House that's been kind of smothered for a long time to allow families the ability, one, know what doctors say about family members who have mental issues who aren't getting the help and, two, to help coerce treatment, at least for a limited time. Do you believe that that would be helpful? GUPTA: I do. I think that, ultimately, family members and close

friends, probably, as well, but family members certainly are often the front line here. This is one of those things where it can be difficult to detect. Certainly early on. So I think being able to have family members empowered, enabled in this way and also to be part of that process, I think, is important.

[06:15:05] CUOMO: Because you know what the other side is. I used that word "coerced" on purpose, because you know what the other side is, Sanjay. Let me just tee it up for you, because I think you're about to go there anyway.

You have the HIPAA laws on privacy, and you have the mental health advocates who say you can't force people to get help. You can't do that to them. You're compromising their individual rights. How do you balance the two?

GUPTA: We think of mental illness as totally separate from physical illness. If I substituted the word "diabetes" or something else, instead of schizophrenia or some other mental illness, we wouldn't be having this discussion at all. And it's sort of one of these self-fulfilling things, Chris, because it becomes so stigmatized that people don't even want to talk about it. They don't want to admit, potentially, that they're getting treatment for this sort of thing. So it becomes a real challenge.

We talked about parity with regard to mental illness for a long time. Parity means that it gets treated the same, not just financially, but in terms of erasing that stigma. We are nowhere close to that right now.

So because of that, to your point, Chris, I think it's difficult to coerce people into this. Because they -- people are legitimately and understandably worried about what the ramifications may be if their treatment, their diagnosis becomes public.

CUOMO: Matthew Horace, right now there's no law on the books or in conception on the books that would stop someone who doesn't have a record of being adjudicated mentally ill or in somehow incarcerated from being stopped by a background check. So what law could be designed that would have stopped someone like this from getting a gun? If you don't have a criminal record, if you haven't been adjudicated mentally ill, how would you flag someone like this?

HORACE: That's a tough call, Chris. Because like you just said a couple moments ago, you have the people that have been diagnosed. You have the people that have been adjudicated. But then there are hundreds of thousands of people that haven't even gotten to that stage yet that are still powder kegs waiting to explode. And too often, we see this come up time and time again. And that's our challenge here, Chris.

CUOMO: What's your gut on it. Is the answer more guns or less guns?

HORACE: I think the answer is less guns in the hands of people that shouldn't have them. That clearly is the answer.

CUOMO: How do we do that, right? That's the plague. That's the plague. Matthew Horace, I know we have a conversation too often, but it's the only way to get to a conclusion, is to keep having it. Just have to keep having it after the moment of crisis. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, we'll check back with you very quickly, as well -- Mick.

PEREIRA: We will have more on the breaking coverage of shooting in Oregon ahead.

But we are also keeping a keen eye on this powerful Hurricane Joaquin. The Category 4 storm is battering the Bahamas with 130 mile- an-hour winds and heavy, heavy rain. It is barreling now toward the East Coast of the United States. We're following Joaquin's every move with CNN meteorologist Chad Myers at CNN Center in Atlanta. And of course, this is the question: Is it headed towards the East Coast? Is it going to veer east? What do we know at this hour?

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: The cone from the National Hurricane Center says this does not touch America. The center of the eye does not touch America.

Now, that does not mean that there won't be influences on America, because there will be significant flooding from the tropical moisture just in the nature of the storm itself. A hundred and thirty miles per hour per hour, wind gusts of 160. This has been battering the Bahamas for 48 hours. A major hurricane, Category 4, down in the Bahamas now.

It is going to turn to the north. It is going to try to turn back to the left a little bit, but I don't believe it's going to get there. There are still models out there that say, yes, it may get there. And so I'm not telling you that the chance of a landfall is zero. It is not zero. It may be five; it may be ten.

But even the hurricane center itself will tell you the cone only is supposed to catch hurricanes in that cone 65 to about 70 percent of the time. There could be a left lier or a right lier. There's a lot of the moisture anyway. This is what we're worrying about, whether there's landfall or not. It's all of the moisture coming up from the tropics and into the Carolinas, Georgia, Virginia, maybe even D.C. Could you imagine D.C. With 5 inches of rain in 24 hours? That is possible with any one of these cells, because there's so much moisture.

You walk outside, and it is just muggy. You look at this map right here, it is -- it's clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right. There's so many ingredients here. The big ingredient is the tropical moisture heading right into the southeast.

CUOMO: Finish the line, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Here I am stuck in the middle again?

CUOMO: No. With you.

CAMEROTA: With you.

PEREIRA: With you, with you.

CAMEROTA: Thank you for making us smile, Chad. We appreciate that.

More news to tell you about. This one also tragic. Overnight, 11 people killed, including six U.S. service members and five civilian contractors when their military transport plane crashed at Jalalabad Airport in Afghanistan. This, of course, is near the Pakistani border. While the Taliban claimed responsibility on Twitter. The U.S. military denies hostile fire was involved. They are continuing to -- continuing to investigate the cause of the crash, and we, of course, will follow all of those developments.

CUOMO: House Speaker hopeful Kevin McCarthy did what many expected him to do. He is backpedaling on his recent controversial comments crediting the Benghazi committee for Hillary Clinton's sinking poll numbers. Speaking to FOX News, McCarthy claimed to have unintentionally misstated his position, saying he did not mean to imply the investigation was political. Instead, he said it was about finding the truth for the families of the four Americans killed in the Benghazi attacks. However, that is not what he said.

[06:20:18] PEREIRA: More clarification, this time from the Vatican, clarifying this morning, explaining the circumstances behind the pope's meeting with Kentucky clerk Kim Davis during his U.S. visit.

A deputy Vatican spokesman says she was one of several people, several dozen people, in fact, that Pope Francis met with briefly at the Vatican embassy in Washington. And that the only real audience he granted was with one of his former students and his family. The Vatican's statement ends by saying, quote, "His meeting with Davis should not be considered a form of support f her position in all of its particular and complex aspects."

As you'll recall, Davis spent six days in jail for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

CAMEROTA: All right. Well, an outraged President Obama says mass shootings have become routine in this country. The father of reporter Alison Parker, who, of course, was gunned down on live television, has made gun control his mission. He joins us, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:25:3] CAMEROTA: An emotional President Obama expressing outrage after the mass shooting at that Oregon community college, clearly frustrated that more has not been done on gun control.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: Our thoughts and prayers are not enough. It's not enough. It does not capture the heartache and grief and anger that we should feel. (END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Well, our next guest is one of those families who has lost a loved one to gun violence. Andy Parker, you'll remember his daughter, Alison Parker, was killed in sawing while she was broadcasting on live television. And Andy Parker joins us now.

Mr. Parker, it is so tragic that we need to talk to you again about something like this, but here we are. I can't believe it's only been a month, actually, since your daughter was so brutally killed, something that the whole country was shaken by. And you said then that you would make it your life's mission to try to fight gun violence. So what was yesterday like for you as you heard the news of what happened at this school?

ANDY PARKER, FATHER OF ALISON PARKER: Well, Alisyn, it was -- it was like a gut punch, again. And my heart broke for the families out there. And it quickly then turned to just absolute rage, because I can't believe that this is continuing. And the -- I think the president pretty much nailed it yesterday by saying that we have to politicize this.

Certainly there are -- there's the mental-health component. There's the HIPAA and the purple (ph) laws that are blocking efforts to -- to identify people that are mentally disturbed, but the common denominator here is the too easy access to guns. And that has got to change. And we've got to -- you know, we've got to call these politicians out that are taking blood money from the gun lobby.

CAMEROTA: Mr. Parker, you have just written an op-ed for "USA Today" in which you say we are engaged in a war in this country. It is a war between rational, responsible people and self-interested zealots. A war between good and evil. You know, at first blush, you could think that you're talking about terrorism there. But of course, we know that you're talking about gun violence.

PARKER: Alisyn, we are talking about domestic terrorism. And frankly, the people, the fringe groups that are -- that are immediately the knee-jerk reaction is where you're going to take away our guns. That's absolutely not the case. But any effort you make to try and make meaningful change, that's what they're going to say.

But, you know, these -- the politicians and these fringe groups are aiding and abetting domestic terrorism. That's -- that's the simplest way that we could -- that I could put it. We are at war.

CAMEROTA: CNN has put together some striking numbers that I want to show you and our viewers. Because it compares how many Americans have been killed by domestic terrorism or any terrorism, frankly, just Americans killed on U.S. soil since 2004, versus U.S. deaths by firearms.

Look at these numbers: 313 by terrorism, and by the way, CNN used a broad definition of terrorism here. They included Ft. Hood, included the man who flew the plane into the IRS building and then look at U.S. deaths by firearms, 316,000. OK? So exponentially more. You have regrettably become an expert in the past month in this.

What gun law could have prevented what happened yesterday?

PARKER: Well, you know, that's hard to say, because you don't know, but anything that you do -- any closing of a loophole can make a difference. And I wanted to go back to your terrorism comment, Alisyn, because one of the -- one of the nuggets that I learned was that there are a thousand people, a thousand people on the FBI's no- fly list. And yet the NRA successfully backed efforts to allow them to have -- to purchase firearms, to obtain firearms. So they can't fly, but they can -- but they can buy weapons. But that is what we're talking about.

The politicians that allow that to happen are aiding and abetting terrorism. They have blood -- they have blood on their hands. And I'm going to be going through Virginia, because we have every state official is -- every state office is up for election in November. It's one of the unique states. And Terry McAuliffe, our governor, and I are going to be going across the state to identify these cowards that aren't going -- that are not doing anything about it, and we're going to call them out.

CAMEROTA: You know, you know the argument on the other side, which is that if you have stricter gun laws or you have more gun laws, and it's only the bad guys who will get their hands on guns. You say that's a fallacy. In fact, you cite what happened in California recently as a kind of example...