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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees
Police Activity in Salem, New Hampshire Amid Intensifying Manhunt; Police Swarm Storage Facility In Brown Univ. Manhunt; Authorities Believe The Brown Univ. Suspect May Be Inside A Specific Storage Unit In Salem, NH. Aired 8-9p ET
Aired December 18, 2025 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MAX ROSE (D) FORMER US REPRESENTATIVE, VOTE VETS SENIOR ADVISER: ...upset because of what they've already done to them keeping these Epstein files away, fighting their own movement. Marjorie Taylor Greene is still a politician. She sees these fissures in this movement and is looking towards a post-Trump era and that's going to be, I think, a dynamic that will continue to see for the rest of this President's term.
ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: All right, we'll, thank you all very much. I'm glad we did get to talk. Of course, you're looking at live pictures of that manhunt as we know that activity by Salem, New Hampshire. Thanks for joining us. Let's hand it off now to AC360.
[20:00:30]
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, "ANDERSON COOPER: 360": Good evening thanks for joining us. Take a look, law enforcement images of activity at a storage facility in Salam, New Hampshire. Now, the latest location and the latest twist that appears in the manhunt for the suspect in the Brown University mass shooting.
So these are obviously video images we're getting from our local affiliate. We have been watching this now for well over an hour. They've been looking into the suspect in the Brown University mass shooting and also into possibly, maybe, they think some sort of linkage possible to the MIT physics professor who was killed a little more than two days later.
Now, just moments ago, law enforcement officials told CNN that some of the activities centered on an abandoned car with a license plate matching one of the plates on a car they believe is being used by the suspect in the Brown shooting.
Again, that's one of the plates. Officials say the suspect used more than a set of tags on the vehicle, which would seem to speak to a certain degree of planning. In any case, a license plate reader flagged one of those plates. We learned earlier today that investigators had identified a suspect and secured a warrant for his arrest. They have not yet named the person or released the person's information. The other major development we learned earlier was that they were investigating possible, and I say possible, ties between the Brown shooting and this week's killing of that MIT professor. Now, we were expecting a press conference on the case today, first scheduled for this afternoon at four, then postponed. Now, it's unclear, but they are setting up. They have a podium set up. A lot of microphones and reporters have gathered. They're going to be watching that spot very carefully over the next hour. We'll obviously bring you any press conference as it happens. That's the scene at the location.
Now, when it happens, well go to it. With us now is CNN chief law enforcement intelligence analyst john miller, CNN's senior law enforcement analyst and former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe, CNN senior National Security analyst, Juliette Kayyem and criminologist, Casey Jordan.
Let's go back to that, that image, because, John, you have been following this now over the last hour. Can you just bring us up to speed on exactly what we are looking at and what the significance of it is?
JOHN MILLER, CNN, CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: So today they were able to identify a suspect, obtain a warrant for that persons arrest. They were able to associate a car with that individual. That's the car you were referring to where he may, as a countermeasure, have switched license plates back and forth between two different sets, maybe to thwart license plate readers or tracking. That is a car that they have been looking for and found with one of the two sets of plates that they have been looking for on it outside of this storage area in Salem, New Hampshire.
So what you see there is they've put up a perimeter. They're focused on processing and dealing with that car to make sure it's safe. But at this point, they are also still heavily engaged in this manhunt because now it is a man by the name of whom they know. And they know what he looks like and they believe that this trail is and this has been in, in, if not hot pursuit today, they have been trying to track this vehicle in its movements. So, locating it after one of the two plates flagged a license plate reader in the area, finding it in this relatively quiet, deserted area around the storage location.
COOPER: So, they found it. It is in the parking area at the store's location?
MILLER: Yes, and the question there is, is the individual in the storage location or is he on the move somewhere else, so.
COOPER: Let's put down the camera that's on the possible live shot interview location so we can get a full view of the surveillance, the image from the helicopter. It's also interesting, you know, Andrew, we are putting up on the left side of your screen there. Those enhanced surveillance videos that authorities released several days ago that gave a much better look at, you know, the gait of the person, what the person was wearing.
We saw more details in that. Unclear how much of any information that came from those images as a resulting in what we are seeing right now.
ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yes, Anderson, that's unclear at this point, although its -- I think it's safe to assume that the emphasis they placed on the video in the last 24 hours, releasing those better, you know, more volume in terms of different screenshots, different walking on different streets, running in different directions, and also better quality images. We know that that provoked a massive number of leads for the law enforcement team to work through. And it's, I think it's a fair assumption that one of those leads is what ultimately brought them to an individual who helped them identify who the person they're looking for now.
So, yes, I mean, it's certainly too soon to kind of you know, start trying to summarize what happened here, but this is what you hope to do by releasing these massive video images and constantly hectoring the public. We need you to look at these videos and tell us if you know this person, you will see that same effort happen here if they have trouble finding the person that who they now have identified.
[20:05:55]
Until they get to the point where they think they've exhausted their effective leads in finding that person, they'd rather find him without the public knowing who he is, because they can work somewhat secretly. They can, if they like, for instance, if they develop a location where they think he is, they don't want the press and the public to go to that location first.
COOPER: And, Andrew, let me just jump in here.
MCCABE: When they run out of the seeds, you'll see --
COOPER: And, Andrew, let me just jump in here because just the image we're showing is a is a wider shot, and it gives our viewers a more of a sense of and I don't know if you can see it, Andrew, this is from earlier. But clearly they have formed a perimeter around this storage facility. I mean, they have vehicles parked all around. They have lines of law enforcement in tactical gear, guns pointed toward this facility, you know, stationed behind vehicles for safety so that they're not, they're not exposed to anybody shooting from or, you know, doing anything from inside the facility.
At what point, Andrew, do they just decide, okay, we have to -- we saw one officer going in one entrance, not sure where in the facility that is or how big this facility is, but at what stage do they then have to just go room by room, you know, storage unit by storage unit?
MCCABE: Yes, I mean, I think it's likely, Anderson, that they have some location inside that building that they think the subject is could be hiding in, because you wouldn't have seen that tactical officer kind of casually going in and out the front door there, which means there's another, essentially another perimeter going on inside the building.
But yes, those tactical agents who are standing behind the pickup truck and the other SUV, they're doing that because just out of a sense of caution, that's a position of cover where they can deliver fire and protect themselves from taking fire. So they're going to do whatever they can to try to figure out, let's say they have one storage locker that is registered to this person, this is a hypothetical, obviously. They're going to use all sorts of technology to see if they can find, if they have -- if there's any sound coming out of that room, if they can get a heat signature on anything behind that, behind those doors, if they can stick a micro camera underneath the door to get a look inside, they might breach the door itself. And then they could send in a robot or, or a dog.
You know, there's all kinds of ways that they'll try to ultimately clear that location if they've been able to narrow it down to one location.
Once that happens, if he's not in there, then they're going to have to go essentially box by box and clear that whole place. And the same way we've seen them do that in the aftermath of, you know, a mass shooting. They have to ultimately go into large buildings and clear room by room by room to see if they have an additional suspect or victims in there. So, it's the same basic approach.
COOPER: Andrew, when you have, I mean, a very fluid situation like this, who is in charge on the scene? Who would be the, you know, the person calling the shots in Salem, New Hampshire on that scene?
MCCABE: Yes, it's a very fluid situation, and it's going to be dependent by which entity that's working this case has the ability to deliver the resources to that scene. It is likely pretty heavy federal agents, likely a very heavy FBI presence because FBI has got people in all kinds of different places and has the ability has the ability to transport tactical teams quite quickly.
There will be a senior leader of the tactical team on site. And that's the person who will decide what techniques they use when teams are sent in and given direction to go, you know, to take whatever particular action. There may also be a senior law enforcement person over, kind of an on-scene there, like an on-scene commander. And that could be someone from any one of these agencies. It's going to be the person kind of with the most seniority and the most connection to the investigation.
I would expect that most of those roles are probably being filled by FBI at this point, because obviously, the Providence Police Department, he's in the lead on this Brown shooting investigation, they likely don't have people up there in Salem, New Hampshire.
[20:10:28]
COOPER: Yes, John Miller, jump in anytime you have something you want to--
MILLER: So, just to pick up where Andrew left off, you know, time is on their side. This is not the time to be kicking in doors. This is the time to be going over the video. What did we see coming into the storage area?
Number two: Did we see anything going out of the storage area? Does that does that heighten our confidence that this person is still there?
Getting back to Andy, is there a locker here registered to either this individual or someone of his description using another name? Now, case scenarios one is he, you know, dumped the car, went into a storage area, flipped the garage door open, drove out in another car, and he's made distance. That's the worst case scenario because we're starting from scratch there with an unknown vehicle.
More likely scenarios are, that he has gone into one of these locations, and they're going to want to make a tactical entry. And that may be something where he is holed up in there trying to figure out his next move. That's going to be very dangerous. He's armed he's dangerous. Or it could be, and we've seen this before, a situation where he figures they are right behind me and, you know, may elect to take a different way out.
This is one of those things where they are not going to move this forward until they have everything they need in place.
COOPER: And, Juliette, are you surprised at the possibility of a connection between the mass shooter Brown and the killing of this MIT professor days later?
JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, it seemed improbable a couple days ago and sort of, you know, as someone who lives in New England who works at a university, I was getting a lot of texts from people saying, could these be connected? It seemed improbable just because the M.O.s were so different.
COOPER: We're showing by the way, a picture of this MIT professor.
KAYYEM: Yes, a school shooting -- the other one is essentially looks like an assassination. So I've been thinking about, well, if there is connectivity, maybe our narrative should change a little bit. So we're always looking for consistent motive. What ties these to not regular things.
If we go back a couple decades, you know, the Unabomber had a hit list that made no sense to anyone but him. And so, it may be, if these are related, the connection is nothing that either of these Brown or MIT actually did. It would be, maybe someone said something online and they get on the list. So we, there's going to be a couple a couple of explanations or theories for if these things are connected for how they are connected, but we can't solely look at, well, you know, is there a tie between Brown and the MIT professor?
The tie may simply be some outrage, something he read, something he felt like needed to be stopped or, you know, something Brown engineering or an MIT professor on nuclear. So that's a theory of, based on history that might tie these things, because a lot of viewers are probably thinking, wait a second, how could these things be tied?
We still don't know, but I have to say, like, you know, John and Andy over the last couple hours, what we're hearing is a much more consistent narrative that these things because of the car, because of other evidence, we haven't seen, that these things could be related and that this is someone who performed two heinous acts very, very different in style and technique and was able to evade capture with one of them for five days, another one for two or two plus.
So it's someone that you're looking at who had thought this through, who you know, thought through an exit and, fortunately, one hopes we still don't know, one hopes that the cars are going to lead to him.
Again, we need it -- we need them to find him. I mean, you know, these can still last a long while.
COOPER: Yes, Juliet, stay with us. I want to go to CNN's Danny Freeman. He is in Salem, New Hampshire, near the storage facility at the storage facility that we've been looking at. He joins us now by phone.
Danny, explain where you are, what you are seeing and what we know about and don't know as importantly. What's going on there.
DANNY FREEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You got it, Anderson. So, that's right. I'm here in Salem, New Hampshire right now, and it's really a remarkable scene. I'm standing at the intersection of basically what otherwise would be a normal suburban area, but there is a massive amount of people out here, a massive amount of media and a massive amount of law enforcement as well.
[20:15:00]
All trained in the area around a self-storage building as you've been describing, and part of the reason that we are here according to CNN's John Miller, because people have -- our state law enforcement officials have been focused on a vehicle in this particular area.
I am looking at Salem Police vehicles right here as well. There are helicopters in the sky. It really is the appearance of an intensely active scene right here, and of course, the idea is that people are here because a suspect or person of interest might have some connection to this area after the discovery of an abandoned car here.
Again, it is remarkable because it is pitch black out otherwise, except for a tremendous amount of flashing police lights, and now more and more cameras and lighting equipment from news crews that have just arrived on scene.
COOPER: Danny, we will check in with you coming up. We are going to take a quick break.
Again, we are still waiting to hear from authorities in Providence who may shortly have quite a bit to tell us, that and more from our CNN correspondents and analysts as our coverage of this ongoing manhunt and intensifying manhunt continues.
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[20:20:30]
COOPER: Live pictures from Salem, New Hampshire where law enforcement has converged on a storage facility and a vehicle which may have been used by the Brown University shooting suspect. We are also waiting to hear from authorities in Providence.
CNN's Brian Todd joins us now from there.
Brian, have you heard anything from authorities there in Rhode Island? And what have they said about any possible connection between the Brown shooting and the killing of this MIT professor?
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Anderson, some of those questions we hope will be answered in a news conference that has now been delayed for more than four hours, as officials are pretty much, we can surmise, trying to figure out what they're going to tell us.
We do have some great incremental new information from our John Miller, who has reported that they believe they have identified this suspect. He is not in custody, according to John's sources, that they are examining a possible -- a possible common thread between the shooting at Brown University and the shooting of that MIT professor on Monday evening.
They have an arrest warrant for this individual and are currently seeking him. That's John's reporting.
I am reporting that based on my conversation with Major David Lapatin of the Providence Police, that that second person who was captured on camera, who officials said was in proximity to this person of interest before -- possibly before the shooting, that person has been located, has been brought in and been interviewed by the police. But according to Major David Lapatin, that person is "not a suspect."
But they have brought in that second person who they believe was in proximity to the person of interest at some point, possibly on Saturday, and spoken to that person. He is not a suspect.
And then of course, we just found out from John Miller and Holmes Lybrand and Danny Freeman, who is on scene there, that they are swarming this storage facility area in Salem, New Hampshire, where they found an abandoned car with a license plate that matched one of the plates used by -- used on a car that was driven by the suspect.
I think a key question, one of many, many important questions that we are going to try to get answered at this news conference tonight, Anderson, is regarding that abandoned car in Salem. When exactly was it placed there? I think that answer is going to be very important. Was it placed there today? Maybe in the last few hours? That is very significant and that would of course, signify that they are maybe, maybe getting very close to this suspect.
If that car was placed there three, four or five days ago, that's a different situation. So hopefully we will get some of those questions answered -- Anderson.
COOPER: All right, Brian Todd, thanks. We will check back in with you.
Monitoring things with us now is John Miller, Andrew McCabe, Juliette Kayyem and Casey Jordan.
Casey, as somebody who looks into this sort of thing and the personalities of those involved, what do you -- what stands out to you? I mean, this idea of some sort of could there be a link between the Brown shooting and the MIT essentially assassination or killing of a professor?
CASEY JORDAN, CRIMINOLOGIST: Well, yes, Juliette has it right. It is extremely unusual. So if there is a connection, Anderson, it would kind of be one for the textbooks. We haven't seen anything quite like this. It is not consistent with what we know about most campus shootings.
About one third of them are usually committed by current students, another 10 percent by former students, and then between 50 and 60 percent total strangers. Remember, campus shooters very different than school shooters. Campuses don't have the kind of security that a high school would have. They don't have the kind of camera systems, and there is just a lot more freedom to get onto a campus.
But in the second murder, you know, we are not talking about a campus. We are talking about an MIT professor. And I originally thought these two things would be completely unrelated.
Now, we have more evidence. Reports are that a license plate may have been picked up at both the Brown University vicinity and the MIT professor's home vicinity. And that is the kind of evidence that would make you absolutely stop and go, okay, there is a common thread, but what is that thread? Higher education with really elite universities?
My vote is that this shooter, if it is the same suspect in both shootings, has some link to both university, but it might be one that is ten years old, 15 years old. You don't know. Somebody who may have attended or been rejected from these universities felt like they should have been acknowledged in some way.
The physicist disturbs me greatly because that reminds me so much of the 1991 University of Iowa shooting of a team of physics professors by a young man who didn't win the number one physics prize in that department that year.
[20:25:19]
And I know that was a long time ago, but that kind of grudge collector still exists, and they can harbor that grudge for many, many, many years. And then when other things go wrong in their life, something triggers it and they decide to hash up old grudges and go back to the place where they felt or the person that they felt wronged them.
That might be the link that ends up being uncovered once we find this person of interest.
COOPER: Yes, I want to check with Danny Freeman.
Danny, what kind of activity have you been seeing?
FREEMAN: Hey, Anderson. Yes.
So this is exactly the spot where I was speaking to you on the phone earlier. Again, we are in Salem, New Hampshire now. A tremendous amount of police activity. And just as you can see right here, a lot of people also here to look and see what has been going on here in this kind of sleepy area of New Hampshire, otherwise.
So I am going to show you here, this is Salem Police right here. You can see they have closed off this road. A lot of the roads in this particular area have been closed off. You can hear choppers overhead. And then this is really the scene that has had so much attention over the past several hours, Anderson.
You can see police officers in this area. There are a couple of self- storage and extra storage spaces in this particular road in this vicinity. And as you can see, there has just been a tremendous amount of focus out here.
Anderson, it has really become quite a spectacle as well. A lot of people out here, not just media, not just press, just a lot of people who are so curious as to what is happening here, and is this the spot where this search, this intense manhunt, really two man hunts potentially combining into one will come to an end?
As John Miller reported, Anderson, it is a car that's down there that has really been the focus of attention of law enforcement for much of the afternoon. And again, we are waiting here for an update in what is otherwise a normal suburban street.
There is a Pep Boys, an IHOP, and right down here, an intense amount of police activity -- Anderson.
COOPER: Danny, we will come back to you.
I want to read part of a Facebook post from the police department in Methuen, Massachusetts, which is directly across the state border adjacent to Salem, New Hampshire: "At this time, there is no information indicating an imminent risk to the public or residents of Methuen. However, we encourage everyone to remain vigilant and exercise heightened caution. In particular, if you observe any individuals on foot who appear out of place, unfamiliar to the area, or behaving in a manner that seems unusual or suspicious, please report it immediately to the Methuen Police Department."
I want to go back to our John Miller, who has been monitoring events. Just let's recap what we know, what we don't know.
MILLER: So they have found a car that they were looking for in connection with these two crimes. It is at a storage area, and they've been there --
COOPER: By the way, they would have found that vehicle only once they felt that they had the suspect or obviously, they wouldn't have been able to figure out a vehicle unless they had the name of the suspect.
MILLER: That's right. It was -- the vehicle was actually the first clue. Tracing the vehicle is what led them to the named person who that vehicle was with and then they began to learn other things that linked them to these other crimes.
COOPER: Was this vehicle spotted in the area of the Brown shooting?
MILLER: His vehicle was the vehicle that was spotted in the area at the Brown shooting is connected to the person that they have the warrant for the arrest for.
COOPER: Okay.
MILLER: And it was spotted with different license plates, they believe in the area of the Boston shooting. So, there are a couple of threads that connect these two cases, but the vehicle is one of those threads, which is the same make year and model, but with different license plates. So one set of license plates in Providence, a different set of license plates in Boston.
But the vehicle that they're focused on here in New Hampshire had the license plates on it that were connected to the Boston crime scene. So both set of license plates were put into license plate readers to alert. Both set of license plates came with an alert that would notify law enforcement in the area that had just been flagged by an LPR. That's what started the search in this area, which located the vehicle.
Now, what they're looking for is the driver of that vehicle who they believe went into this storage area.
COOPER: They believe the driver went into the storage area.
MILLER: Yes, and they have focused on a particular storage location. Now, we don't know how they got to that among all the other storage locations. But our understanding --
COOPER: This looks like a pretty big facility.
MILLER: Yes, but I mean, you would then either use the video from the facility to say, where did this person go? Did they go into a particular place or you would use the registration records to see, is there something that matches this person or another name that they've used that we can focus on? But they seem to be focused on a limited area.
And, you know, when they obtain a warrant, you know, they'll make entry.
COOPER: It's interesting because a lot of people who do shootings in schools, I'm not as familiar with campus shootings, but, you know, have -- don't have an exit strategy. This person clearly did and clearly wanted to stay on the -- I mean if -- not that it's a criminal mastermind to have two license plates, but it does show a certain level of planning and a desire to remain at large.
MILLER: And, I mean, if you look at how he dressed, assuming that he is the same person that we've been looking at in the videos who, you know, is moving around the area before and after the shooting, he's taken reasonable steps to try and be as as concealed or disguised as he could be.
The switching of the license plate is the understanding of the license plate, you know, reader technology. There, I am told, have been other counter measures likely involving, you know, how or when he used cell phones and things that would be tracked. The good news about telling these stories is, in court and in these coverages, we reveal a lot about the technology that law enforcement uses. The bad news is we are seeing offenders in these things learn and adjust from that on a regular basis.
COOPER: And also now, I mean, it's all available online. I mean this information is all out there. There's manuals of it, which is alarming.
We're going to take a -- yet to hear from authorities in Providence. We may not until some sort of resolution with what we are watching in this storage facility. We're going to bring it all up to you. We're going to stay with this throughout this hour.
We're going to take a quick break. More on the Brown University manhunt seemingly at a possible turning point right now. We'll be right back.
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[20:35:54]
COOPER: Two locations and two different facets of the Brown University manhunt. On the left, Salem, New Hampshire, where police have swarmed a storage facility. On the right, Providence, Rhode Island, where we're still expecting to hear from authorities about all of this.
Back now with our panel, John Miller, Andrew McCabe, Juliette Kayyem, and Casey Jordan. Andrew McCabe, what are your thoughts? You know, this has now been going on for quite some time, several hours. Obviously, there's no rush, it would seem, for authorities. They have a perimeter secured, it would appear.
What would they be doing in this time? I assume trying to look at as much surveillance footage or anything that they have access to in that building.
ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yes, that's right. This is clearly -- well, it does not have any of the indicators of kind of an intense pre-tactical assault moment, right? You have operators walking in and out of the building. The door, you can see, there's left open. It's like kind of at the top of the screen.
They also have, if you look to the right of the screen, you'd see that roadway or that entryway that goes off to the right there. That's where you see those other vehicles kind of stacked up. Those are larger trucks, and they are likely the teams of specialists who will come in and do the search in the event that they get a warrant. That's probably -- if it's FBI, it's the evidence response team. If it's, you know, local police officers, they're a variant of that. That's where they have all the equipment necessary for evidence collection in the most kind of forensically pristine way.
So I would guess that what they're doing inside right now is really trying to maximize the intelligence collection opportunity here. Did this person have a storage unit in this building? If so, where is it? How big is it?
What's the other information you could get from that account? You might get an address. You might get a phone number. You might get email. You might get a credit card number that the unit is billed to each month. These are all things that the investigators can use to continue to try to track this person, either by use of the credit card or you could get electronic surveillance on the email account, that sort of thing.
So that's probably what they're doing in addition to, as John said, looking at the surveillance video capture to see, did this guy come in here earlier today? Did he leave? What was he wearing? Which direction did he walk when he left the building? Can we see him getting into another car? So all that sort of stuff probably is what's happening in there right now.
COOPER: Yes. Juliette Kayyem, how much time do you think was lost with the first person of interest who they had identified photo -- you know, had a photo out there of? Does that take away? I mean, are there -- even if they have a person of interest, are the leads that have come in about any other people, are those still being looked at?
JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Yes, I mean, they -- look, there's no doubt that the 12-plus hours of focus on a person of interest would take resources away because they want to determine whether it was him. And we've talked about the sort of unfortunate nature of the tweets and other law enforcement sort of getting ahead of where the evidence is and the impact that had on that individual.
I would measure the harm, though, less in time and that -- but in confidence. I mean, in other words, what I think --
COOPER: We're seeing a number -- sorry, we're seeing a number of --
KAYYEM: Yes.
COOPER: -- law enforcement personnel coming out of one of the doors.
KAYYEM: Yes.
COOPER: And that's a -- it's actually quite a large number. I mean, what --
KAYYEM: Yes, they don't -- I mean, they don't look like they're in a hurry. And, I mean, this is the point I was raising just in terms of confidence was lost in that. And it may not be fair to law enforcement because they kept saying it was a person of interest. But certainly you started to see the commentaries that people nervous, that they sort of lost focus. So obviously catching this person or at least getting a break like we're seeing is important.
I'm a big proponent that at some stage, relatively soon, I'd be curious what Andy and John think about this, that they know who it is and they have a picture of him. If this goes cold for the next hour, hour and a half, it's it's really important that they get this name and picture out.
[20:40:15]
You have two communities now, Salem, New Hampshire, where they think he last was. And -- I'm sorry, three communities, Providence and Boston, all of them slightly stressed out by what -- by this manhunt. And if it's gone colder, they --- if he's not where they think he is, relatively soon, I'm a big proponent of engaging these communities.
He has family. He has friends. He's going to have to get something to eat. And as long as it doesn't disrupt hunt right now, because it's -- he -- unless he's committed suicide or self-inflicted, you know, self- inflicted harm, he's on the run now. And we don't know what he's going to do. I mean --
COOPER: Yes.
KAYYEM: -- it's just the honest truth. So, I hope in the next couple of hours, they do come out with the visuals --
COOPER: Yes.
KAYYEM: -- if they don't catch him.
COOPER: We're going to get another quick break in as we wait to hear from authorities and we wait for any activity here. We'll be right back with more.
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[20:45:25]
COOPER: Live images of the storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire, which just a few moments ago saw another burst of police activity. They've been there for several hours now as this location became the focus, the Brown University manhunt.
I'm joined by John Miller. As we watch, we saw some activity along the line of law enforcement moving from one location inside the facility to another.
MILLER: So you saw elements of a tactical team. You saw others with them moving in a line when inside another part of the facility. Now, that could be that they are on the way to a particular storage location to start to consider how to make entry, or that could be that they're simply going to a place where they can get together with others and lay out a plan. We can't really tell from those pictures, but the object of the game is they are focused on a particular location within that facility and they're going to want to get in.
COOPER: I mean, given the amount of time that they have been there, they would have been able to get the owners of the facility, get the employees of the facility, get layouts, get surveillance images. They would have examined every, you know, architect's proof of the place, I would assume.
MILLER: Well, that's right. And if you're operating on the belief that your potential subject is locked in behind, you know, one of these storage locations within this myriad of storage locations, that gives you something that, you know, you want to have. It gives you containment. You know, that person is boxed in by those four walls.
What it doesn't necessarily give you is a view into what's going on inside there. But there is, as Andy McCabe hinted, you know, other technical measures that may be able to help in that. But the key is, and I know we covered this a minute ago, is time is on their side. Moving slowly, moving cautiously and using all the tools you have. And, you know, the distance that you can operate at is going to be their goal.
COOPER: Andrew, I -- I mean, what -- in the time that we have been watching this and now we're not in control of this camera, by the way, this camera from an affiliate in a helicopter, obviously, so we're taking the shots as we get them. To John's point, I mean, time is on law enforcement side here. The place is contained. They can take their time and choose when and if they move.
MCCABE: That's absolutely right. They -- I mean, if they have it narrowed down to a particular unit, you would station -- you know, you put a couple of guys in front of that unit in a position to cover, like, down the hallway behind a wall. But with a clear visual on the only entrance to that unit to just to make sure that nobody comes out of there and surprises you.
So while that's held, the other operators would be in a different part of the building looking at an identical unit. And there are things they want to know, like, for instance, the breachers on a tactical team. It's their job to basically help the team gain entry into the space. And they have many tools and explosives and all kinds of things that help them do that.
So they're going to want to see an identical unit. They want to know what the door is made of. Is it a door that swings out or in? Is it a roll up door? Is it made of steel? Is it made of wood? Is it connected to rails or supports inside the space that you may not be able to see? They want to know all the mechanics of that so they can select the right tools and game out the correct, most effective breaching entry.
Your tactical operators, same thing. They want to know how big is the space. Are there corners that they have to duck into? Are there lights inside? Are those lights on? Are they off? So all of that very careful work, as John has said, they have the advantage of time.
They can do the planning they need to -- if they have to go in there, they want to do it as safely and effectively as possible. And if I could just touch on one thing that Juliette said --
COOPER: Yes.
MCCABE: -- before, I think this is really important. It is to the advantage of law enforcement to find this person when they're not expecting to be found. And that is why they'll continue. As long as they have leads to follow, they will continue pursuing this person without sharing his identity with the public.
Once they have no more really effective leads, that's when we'll get the identity and a photograph and some description, and they'll go to the crowdsourcing effect. So this is exactly how we work the Boston Marathon bombing. So we spent days after the bombing at the race running down one lead after another trying to identify who these people were.
[20:50:02]
Remember, we had video, but we didn't know who they were. And while that was happening, we were exhausting all the good leads. At the same time, the media and just groups of citizens were going out and doing their own investigation and often focusing on people who had nothing to do with it, and people got hurt. It was spinning a bit out of control.
So it was at the end of that week, on that Thursday afternoon, I remember sitting in the office with Director Mueller and the Deputy Director Sean Joyce and others, and we had a meeting to decide. Is it time to start crowdsourcing this identification? And ultimately, that was the decision we made because we had lost the advantage of continuing a covert investigation, and we really needed the public's help.
John Miller, just quickly because -- what are you going to be looking for over the next 10 minutes?
MILLER: I'm going to be looking for those people who walked in, walking out, and, you know, what they came up with. It's --
COOPER: Do you think this is going to resolve tonight?
MILLER: I believe it is, but, you know, this is not the first time when they've had every belief that somebody went into a place and then they execute a careful plan, and they get in there and they find out they're back to square one, they're not in there. But we've also seen equal a number of times where that result is they're in there, they're taken into custody, or they've taken their own life. So they have to actually be prepared for any of those possibilities.
COOPER: We're going to take another quick break. More from our team here. As we do a reminder, law enforcement in Providence is still expected to brief the press tonight. We'll bring that to you when they do, along with all that our CNN correspondents are still learning as their live coverage of the Brown University manhunt continues.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [20:55:58]
COOPER: Coming up on the top of the hour now, just a quick recap. Officers investigating a storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire, searching for a suspect inside after finding an abandoned car with a license plate that matched one of the plates in the car that investigators believe was used by the suspect in the deadly mass shooting at Brown University.
Now, officials say a license plate reader flagged one of the plates that matched the car that the suspect was driving. That he used more than one set of plates. A source also says investigators are looking to a possible link between the Brown University killer and the shooting death of a professor at MIT in Boston on Monday.
Back with Andrew McCabe, Juliette Kayyem, and Casey Jordan. Casey, the fact that this Brown shooter is believed to have two license plates, you know, a lot of school shooters, and, again, I'm not that familiar with college campus shooters, but school shooters don't have an exit plan. They plan to die in the attack either by suicide, by cop, or by themselves. What does it tell you that this person had -- has two license plates?
CASEY JORDAN, CRIMINOLOGIST: Well, again, if they are going to kill themselves on the scene or suicide by cop, usually that is somebody who is a current or former student of the university. But more than half of these campus shootings are by strangers where the university campus is a venue for their anger, but not the actual target.
What's so confusing in this is that this is highly inconsistent with what we know about campus shooters. And it's not just a generic beef with higher ed because the shooting of the MIT professor is so personal, he killed him in his home. Not at MIT, not in the quad, not on the street, not in the classroom. He went to his home.
So I think that we're going to eventually find out he has some very personal grudge with that particular professor. But that raises the question, why start with Brown? Why do the switching of the license plates, especially if this car is a rental? I mean, this is a very convoluted plan.
It makes you wonder if the Brown shooting was maybe even a red herring, something that would --
COOPER: Yes.
JORDAN: -- focus all of our attention while he went to get his true target.
COOPER: Casey, I'm getting some new information to this from our John Miller just now and Holmes Lybrand. Authorities believe the suspect may be inside a specific storage unit in Salem, New Hampshire. So they believe that they have a specific unit. Andrew McCabe, that certainly allows -- I mean, that focuses everything, obviously.
MCCABE: Yes, it really does. And it, you know, it basically kind of confirms what we were speculating about a minute ago. That they're probably going through a preparation to get into whatever unit that is. Now, it's worth mentioning that part of that preparation is getting a warrant.
And so that could be responsible for a lot of this delay as well. At this time of night in Salem, New Hampshire, you know, you have to get -- you could do it through federal resources. That's probably the easiest way to do it. And but you'd have to get a judge to listen to the affidavit from a case agent.
And, you know, obviously go through that process, make the probable cause determination that there's evidence or individual in this -- in the storage location. And then you would do the tactical entry after that.
COOPER: And Juliette Kayyem, the idea that this person may be isolated in one storage unit. What does that show to you?
KAYYEM: I mean, it would explain why we've been watching this for four hours and why we've heard nothing in terms of a press conference. That this is literally -- this -- if the reporting is accurate, that this is the end, there's no point in getting ahead of it in terms of a communication strategy. They can wait an hour to the public officials.
The better story and the safer story and the story that every community wants to hear is that he is captured. We'll figure out the why. And, you know, were the two killings -- or the two incidents related later on. So we might, you know, and we might be here a while. And as they make sure they get him safely and that he does no harm, obviously, to anyone there --
COOPER: Yes.
KAYYEM: -- and to himself, and to himself, I mean, you know, that the goal here is to have a prosecution and make him face justice.
COOPER: Thanks, everyone. Appreciate it.
I hope you join me in 15 minutes for my live show at CNN.com/AllThereIs. The news continues right now. The Source with Kaitlan Collins starts now.
