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Ten Shot Outside Empire State Building

Aired August 24, 2012 - 10:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking news to tell you about at the top of the hour. It's 10:00 Eastern. I'm Carol Costello. Welcome to NEWSROOM.

This is happening right outside the Empire State Building in New York City at 5th and 34th. It's just a terrible thing. Police now tell CNN 10 people have been shot in front of the Empire State Building. Seven people who were injured are being triaged at the scene right now.

Police do tell us the shooter is dead. His body is lying near the doorway of the Empire State Building. We want to bring in Lou Palumbo. He is a former Nassau County police officer.

Police responded very quickly to this. I was talking to our producer, Rose Arce, in the last few minutes and she told me in a matter of minutes police had surrounded the Empire State Building. What do you make of that?

LOU PALUMBO, DIRECTOR, ELITE AGENCY LTD SECURITY FIRM (via telephone): Well, it's no secret that the Empire State Building from time to time has been identified by the intelligence community as a potential target.

In fact, after Bin Laden had bombed Tanzanian and Chinese Embassy, I was involved in coordinating a security detail of all active and retired law enforcement agents from a private perspective to help secure the Empire State Building.

So there's always focus and concentration on the building, not to mention they're only blocks away literally from many of the commands in the police department, whether it's the south precinct or the task force, but that building gets special attention, that's the reality of the situation.

COSTELLO: So witnesses told our producer, Rose Arce, that this suspect had a very large gun, what looked like a sawed off shotgun. He was chasing a man down the street yet police also tell us that 10 people were shot. What do you make of that?

PALUMBO: Well, if, in fact, he was carrying a sawed off shotgun the type of projectile that that discharges is one in which is shoots multiple pellets that come out of the barrel.

And they don't stay in what we call a tight pattern so the likelihood if he discharged the weapon at one individual and had a particular type of shotgun shell in the firearm that the bullets disperse as they come out, they create a wide pattern and they're capable of hitting more people. It's referred to as double aardvark or inertia. It is reported he did have a shotgun.

COSTELLO: Lou, stand by. I have Rose Arce back on the phone. She is a producer. She is on the screen. Rose, describe to us what that witness told you as the gunman was running down the street.

Rose, can you hear me? She's having trouble with her cell phone connection. So we're going to try to get rose again. Back to you, though, Lou, you say police have confirmed it was indeed a shotgun?

PALUMBO: It appears it was a robbery that went bad and the guy was armed with a shotgun.

COSTELLO: We also have Mike Brooks on the phone. He's a CNN contributor. He is also a former police officer, and you've been talking to New York authorities. What have you found out, Mike?

MIKE BROOKS, CNN CONTRIBUTOR (via telephone): Yes, Carol, apparently the reporting is correct, 10 shot, two dead, including the gunman and apparently a young woman who was an innocent bystander on the scene.

And a lot of those shot were shot in the leg and the buttocks, which would go right into what Lou was talking about with the possible use of a shotgun and pellets flying out of the gun in large pattern.

They're still looking for a motive. There have been a number of different thoughts out there, some people are saying it was two co- workers, somebody else saying it was a robbery gone bad so trying to confirm that right now.

COSTELLO: This young woman was she a tourist standing in line, do we know?

BROOKS: Don't know, apparently just an innocent bystander who happened to be in the area. I talked to my source on the scene, still an active crime scene there at 34th and 5th.

You know, on a Friday afternoon, beautiful Friday afternoon, I guess, it's going to be a lot of people around the Empire State Building so, but apparently this woman was just an innocent bystander.

COSTELLO: Rose Arce, our producer, was telling us this is a busy time for the Empire State Building. So many people want to get in there and see it. They're taking tickets and having to walk away for a few hours and come back.

So that area was so congested not only by tourists, but with people going back and forth to work, going to Penn Station, which is two avenues over.

Lou, I wanted to ask you about this. Rose told us witnesses told her that a security guy guarding the elevator inside the Empire State Building came running out when he heard the gunshots and chased this gunman down. Do police encourage that kind of thing?

PALUMBO: Well, you know, it's not an issue whether they discourage it. I would tell you they wouldn't encourage it unless you were properly armed and trained as we are in law enforcement.

This guy took a huge risk in undertaking that. I would say this guy is a fairly brave individual. I would not encourage someone to do that as well as you were, like I said, properly armed and trained as we are in law enforcement.

The thing that you might find interesting is that every square inch of the Empire State Building including the sidewalks surrounding it are under video surveillance.

That's something I discovered when we were involved in the security detail that I had mentioned earlier back in '98. So this thing has been heavily recorded, even across the street, from the Empire State Building, they tape.

And they're capable of generating Polaroid and we had a couple of incidents back in '98 where we had individuals in the building. That's where I came to learn about the surveillance system, but to go back to your initial question what he did was quite risky for himself.

COSTELLO: Quite heroic. We do have Rose Arce back on the phone. Rose, we were talking about the security guard that witnesses told you ran out and tried to stop the gunman. Tell us more.

ROSE ARCE, CNN SENIOR PRODUCER, NEW YORK (via telephone): Is that me you're talking to?

COSTELLO: It's really difficult to get a cell phone signal out of New York City sometimes, especially when --

ARCE: Can you hear me now, Carol? I'm here now.

COSTELLO: Great, Rose, you're back. OK, tell us about the security guard, the elevator guy who tried to help.

ARCE: Yes, I talked to three different people who describe a scene where as soon as the shooting occurred and there were the multiple gunshots, one of the men who was operating the elevator, security guard that screens who is getting in and out of the elevators.

Ran out from a side entrance of the Empire State Building and actually pursued this guy, as he was simultaneously calling out to police, he had a phone in his hands, believe he was maybe dialling 911.

The guy was in hot pursuit of this guy, chased him up 5th Avenue, which is where the main entrance of the Empire State Building is where police appeared and shot the man, witnesses counted three times.

And I can tell you right now that the body of this guy, the gunman, is still lying outside the entrance of the Empire State Building.

COSTELLO: You say it was covered with a white sheet. Mike Brooks is reporting, Rose, that a young woman was also killed, an innocent bystander. Do you see evidence of that?

ARCE: I don't. There is so much police activity, of course, it looks like a lot went on but it's very hard to tell. I can tell you there are no visible ambulances around the scene of the shooting.

They may have already taken off. The FBI, however, has just arrived. The emergency service unit is here. There's a very big investigation, I'd say easily nearly 100 law enforcement officials of various types.

That are around basically the entire building and there's also some heavy construction going on from above so they've extended a lot of that and put police officers on a perch looking down.

COSTELLO: OK, stay right there, Rose. Mike, I want to ask you this question. The FBI is on the scene, but we understand authorities have ruled out terrorism as a motive.

BROOKS: Yes, what you're going to see now just like the shooting the other day and last week in Washington, D.C., on G Street Northwest. Carol, you're going to see members of the FBI, Joint Terrorism Task Force that are going to show up on the scene just to assist NYPD, if it's needed.

Until they find out what the true motive is, and they also can assist in finding out who the gunman is because they do have large tentacles that reach out across the country. But they're just there to assist the NYPD. NYPD is the lead investigative unit for this particular case.

COSTELLO: And Lou, I wanted to ask you about this as Rose has been reporting, the shooter's body is still lying there near the entrance to the Empire State Building. You have all of these tourists around. The streets are blocked off. This has to be a nightmare scenario for police.

PALUMBO: Well, you know what they do is we would go in and create like an area of containment or what's more commonly known as a crime scene and that's what this is right now. That's why nothing's been disturbed, in other words, including the body of the alleged shooter.

To go back and just address the FBI involvement, the FBI is looking at this, any possibility this might be something other than just a conventional robbery. This entire process, they're satisfied, if they're satisfied that's what it is, they will continue to investigate this with the police department.

If it turned out to be something terrorist related, the emphasis or control of the crime scene would shift to the FBI, but as far as the body and the crime scene, which is I would suspect rather large.

It's going to remain like that until the police are satisfied collecting evidence, interviewing witnesses, doing a complete canvas of the area, and reviewing the tapes that exist in the Empire State Building. They've got a lot of work to do on this thing. It's going to be disruptive for quite some time.

COSTELLO: I'd like to tell people who are just joining us what has happened. Ten people shot outside the Empire State Building. We understand one young woman.

An innocent bystander was killed in the crossfire. Police did shoot the shooter dead. His body is lying at the entrance of the Empire State Building. Our producer, Rose Arce -- we have a witness on the line, Rebecca Fox?

REBECCA FOX, WITNESSED SHOOTING (via telephone): Hello?

COSTELLO: Rebecca, can you hear me?

FOX: Yes, I can.

COSTELLO: Rebecca, you're a witness to this terrible thing. Tell us what you saw.

FOX: I was basically getting my coffee walking on the street toward 5th Avenue and 34th Street and I saw people running and I didn't know what happened. I thought actually there was a celebrity sighting, but pretty far from it.

And I continued to walk down. I didn't actually hear any gunshots. I had headphones in, but somebody had said that there was a shooting, and there were several shots fired.

So I walked across the street and this is before they blocked off the crime scene, and I saw a woman had been shot on the corner next to the Hartland Brewery in the foot and she seemed in shock, you know, that she had just been shot.

I looked in the middle of the street, right at the Empire State Building in front of the doors, where you enter and there was a man lying on the ground, there was police all around him, like they had shot him down.

And a lot of this I heard just from the aftermath that this man had been in pursuit of another man running down the street and he had shot the other man next to the Starbucks on 33rd Street toward 6th Avenue, shot him in the head, and someone had shown me a picture of him and it was very gruesome.

Another man across the street at the Empire State Building, I saw the police flip him over and saw his head move up, like he was alive but people tell me he's dead and that's basically what I saw. It's a crazy scene. It wasn't that long ago that 9/11 happened, so I really had no idea. That's it.

COSTELLO: So you were just going to get your morning coffee and you had your headphones on.

FOX: You can say that again?

COSTELLO: You were just getting coffee this morning. You had your headphones on?

FOX: Yes. Like another normal day, and now not normal.

COSTELLO: Now tell us about this area and I mean, normally it's a safe place, isn't it?

FOX: Yes, normally it is. You know, it's funny because my parents said I was crazy for moving up here after 9/11, but I worked across the street from the Empire State Building for about five years now and nothing like this has ever happened.

It's mayhem and there are detectives everywhere, trying to map out the crime scene as we speak. I had pictures of -- something's beeping. OK. I saw blood on the sidewalk. It was just a very surreal scene so yes.

COSTELLO: I mean, you work inside the Empire State Building. Is that what you said?

FOX: No, I work across the street from the Empire State Building. There's a chase bank and I work right across 34th and 5th Avenue.

COSTELLO: I just was going to ask you about all of these tourists lining up to get inside the Empire State Building to take the elevators up to the top and then they see this terrible thing transpire.

FOX: Yes, I mean normally people are standing in line every morning and I'm cursing the tourists that are trying to get up to the top of the Empire State Building. I mean, I've never actually been to the top myself, but you know, I'll never forget it.

COSTELLO: So do you know that 10 people in all were shot?

FOX: No, wow. I only saw the woman who had been shot, on the ground. And I saw another woman getting carted away on an ambulance but I had no idea there was 10 people, wow.

COSTELLO: Well, we're glad you're safe, Rebecca.

FOX: Yes, by chance I normally take the yellow line and the NRQ, but this morning I took the green line and I wanted to get to work faster, so by chance I missed all this.

COSTELLO: Thank goodness for that. Rebecca Fox, thank you so much --

FOX: Pretty lucky.

COSTELLO: Yes, you are lucky. We're glad. Rebecca Fox, thank you so much. We're going to take a quick break. We'll be back with much more from the Empire State Building.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Just about 18 minutes past the hour. Let's bring you up to date on the breaking news. Terrible news out of New York City, right in front of the Empire State Building, there was a terrible shooting.

Police tell CNN 10 people were shot. There are two confirmed deaths, a young woman. An innocent bystander was shot by this man holding a shotgun. Police quickly surrounded the Empire State Building, and they did shoot the shooter. The suspect is dead.

His body is lying near the entrance to the Empire State Building. Seven people, we understand, were triaged at the scene. A witness just told that me she saw a woman who had been shot in the foot, that's what most of the injuries were like.

People were either shot in the legs, in the behind or the feet, because of course it was a shotgun, and the pellets scatter. They were hit by shrapnel.

Our Rose Arce is on the scene right now. And Rose, you've been talking to witnesses and you described how one witness saw this man running down the street. Can you share that with us again?

ARCE: Yes, I've heard that from more than one person that they saw the shooting. It was very loud, several shots and a man securing the elevator inside ran out and began to pursue him, while calling for help, calling for police.

Apparently, rounded a corner on to 5th Avenue, chasing the guy, was catching up to him, the police stepped in and shot him. The man that he shot is still lying on the ground. The body is maybe 20 feet from where there's observatory entrance to get inside of the Empire State Building, right at the entrance where tourists by the hundreds come every single day.

COSTELLO: Yes, we're taking a look at aerial shots courtesy of WABC. We see the police are setting up a police line there. We understand police have said this is not terrorism related. We don't know a motive just yet.

I also want you to share the story of what this weapon looked like. People were standing in line to get into the Empire State Building. It was going to be an exciting morning for them in New York City, and then they see this guy with a gun running down the street.

ARCE: Yes, and I did talk to one woman who actually saw when he shot the man, and she really, her most vague memory is the size of the weapon. She kept repeating over and over to me it didn't look like a regular handgun, it was so big.

She described it as being a little bit box-like, that the barrel stuck out quite a bit. I asked her as long as a shotgun? She said it was like a short shotgun or an automatic weapon, she called, you've seen the guns not just a handgun.

COSTELLO: Right, so we have this big gun. It was exposed and he was chasing after a specific person. What happened to that person?

ARCE: Well, the person that he was chasing is the one, first off, the gunman shot someone then the elevator man chases him and then he is shot by police. That is the account I've heard from witnesses, I'm told other people were shot here, but it's hard to tell how they were shot.

COSTELLO: Right. And we do understand sadly that an innocent bystander, a young woman was shot and killed in the crossfire of this terrible incident. We're going to dig up more information for you. We're going to take a short break and we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: It's 24 minutes past the hour. To bring you up to date in case you're just joining us. Ten people have been shot near the Empire State Building in New York City. Two are dead, one an innocent bystander, a young woman, the other the alleged gunman.

This happened just after 9:00 a.m. Eastern this morning, as tourists were lined up to get inside the Empire State Building to take the trip up to the top, as people were going back and forth to work or making their way over to Penn Station.

This was a very congested area. The body of the shooter is lying on the 5th Avenue side of the Empire State Building near the entrance to the Empire State Building, that body now covered with a white sheet.

I just want to show you exactly where we're talking about in New York City. You can see how congested this area is, right in Midtown Manhattan. Police, New York City Police responded very quickly to the scene of this crime.

Rose Arce is there. Rose, where exactly are you?

ARCE: I am right across the street, diagonally from where the body is lying. From where I am I can see the entrance of the observatory, when the tourists usually line up.

And the body, which is right now being examined by what appears to be the police photos marking, taking pictures and marking with numbers the bullets that they're finding on the sidewalk.

COSTELLO: Have police cleared the area of tourists now?

ARCE: No, there are a good number of tourists that are about a half a block away behind police lines, sort of catty-corner from where the body is lying. They are, in fact, there are several of them watching right now as the police are taking out numbers.

They've gotten as far as I can tell four in marking the bullets and also paying a lot of attention to a black bag that is lying next to the body, which is covered with the white sheet.

COSTELLO: Are they interviewing people yet?

ARCE: Yes, I've seen them take several people out from the observatory entrance, and start talking to them, and in the case of one woman, they walked her to her hotel, which was about two blocks from here.

I spoke with her. She was walking. She had not had somebody shot that she knew but somebody who was next to her had been shot and they've returned with her and with several other people who have their luggage with them.

Clearly tourists, some of them didn't appear to speak English, but they've brought them back to the scene with their luggage, and they were being talked to by what appear to be both police officers and FBI.

COSTELLO: I understand we have Kelly Wilson on the phone. Is Kelly a witness?

KELLY WILSON, CNN I-REPORTER/WITNESSED SHOOTING AFTERMATH (via telephone): Yes, I'm here.

COSTELLO: Took a picture right after the shooting. Kelly, can you hear me?

WILSON: Yes, I can.

COSTELLO: Hi, Kelly. It's Carol Costello. Thank you for being with us this morning. You snap this picture, tell us what it is.

WILSON: It's just me walking across 35th Street about a block north of the Empire State Building, and just saw a big crowd of police, of tourists taking pictures of the scene.

COSTELLO: And when you, I mean, did you immediately realize what had happened? Did it take you a couple of minutes?

WILSON: It took a couple minutes, I mean seeing a big group of police like that is uncommon in the city. I heard a lot of murmuring in the crowd and realized right away that a shooting had happened. At which point, I hustled on to get to work and get out of, away from the scene.

COSTELLO: But when you hear that 10 people were shot near the Empire State Building. There's a dead body lying near the entrance of the Empire State Building. A young woman who was just innocently standing by, was killed, what goes through your mind?

WILSON: Well, it's a terrible thing. First impulse is to think about whether it's time to get out of the city. COSTELLO: You're seriously thinking about leaving?

WILSON: Well, that's an immediate thought, and then the next thought was even if I left the city, I'd still be coming to work in the city. So there really isn't a way to avoid it.

COSTELLO: And I think, sadly, we can say this sort of thing happens all across the country.

WILSON: Yes, yes, there's been a lot more of it lately that you hear about. I don't know if it's just happening more often or you hear more about it.

COSTELLO: Does it make you feel any better that police are saying this was not terrorism-related?

WILSON: Not really. I mean it's -- terrorism isn't really the number one worry. I mean, it's violence, people against people, whether it's terrorism or any other cause.

COSTELLO: Does it seem to you these days that this type of violence is getting worse?

WILSON: I don't know if it's getting worse or if it's just being reported more. I mean, there does seem in some ways to be in a sense people are getting less, that some people are getting less sensitive to the value of other human lives.

COSTELLO: Kelly Wilson, thank you for sharing your thoughts with us this morning, and sharing the picture you snapped for us, thank you so much.

WILSON: All right, thank you.

COSTELLO: We understand that Mayor Bloomberg, the mayor of New York City, is going to hold a press conference any minute now. When that press conference begins, of course, we'll bring that to you live.

I just want to recap for those of you who are just joining us. It's been a terrible shooting outside of the Empire State Building at 5th and 34th. Ten people in all have been shot. This has all been confirmed by police. CNN has confirmed it.

Two people were killed, one a young woman who was just standing there -- she's an innocent bystander. Also police shot and killed the gunman, his body still lying near the doorway on the Fifth Avenue side of the Empire State building. All of this happened just after 9:00 a.m. Eastern time this morning, just the prime time for tourists to get in line to get tickets to go up to the top of the Empire State building.

Primetime for people to arrive at work, to get their morning coffee, to travel two avenues over to the Penn Station to catch a train to get to where they're going.

Police tell us no connection to terrorism and, of course, as I said it happened on the Fifth Avenue side of the Empire State building.

Rebecca Fox? I talked with Rebecca Fox, she was a witness to the shooting, she was walking to get her morning coffee at Starbucks, she had her earphones in, she was listening to music and then she suddenly realized what was happening. This is what she told me.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REBECCA FOX, WITNESSED SHOOTING: Basically getting my coffee a guy in Gillard walking on the street toward Fifth Avenue and 34th street and I saw people running and I didn't know what happened. I thought actually that there was a celebrity sighting but pretty far from it and I continued to walk down. I didn't actually hear any gunshots. I had headphones in but somebody had said that there was a shooting, and there were several shots fired.

So I walked across the street and this is before they blocked off the crime scene and I saw a woman had been shot on the corner next to the Hartland Brewery in the foot and she seemed in shock, of course you know, that she had just been shot.

Now I looked -- I looked in the middle of the street, right across, right at the Empire State Building in front of the doors, where you enter and there was a man lying on the ground. There was police all around him, like they had shot him down and a lot of this I heard just from the aftermath that this man had been in pursuit of another man running down the street and he had shot the other man next to the Starbucks on 33rd Street toward Sixth Avenue, shot him in the head and someone had shown me a picture of him and it was just very gruesome.

(CROSSTALK)

FOX: Another man across the street at the Empire State building I saw the police flip him over and turn a knife, I saw his head move up, like he was alive but people tell me that he's dead and that's basically what I saw. You know people are just -- it's just a crazy scene. You know it wasn't that long ago that 9/11 happened, so I really had no idea. But yes that's it.

COSTELLO: So -- so you were just going to get your morning coffee and you had your headphones on.

FOX: Can you say that again?

COSTELLO: You were just going to go -- you were just getting coffee this morning, you had your headphones on?

FOX: Yes. Like another normal day and not normal.

COSTELLO: Now tell us about this area and -- and I mean normally it's a safe place, isn't it?

FOX: Yes normally it is. You know it's funny because my parents said I was crazy for moving up here after 9/11 but I worked across the street from the Empire State Building for about five years now and nothing like this has ever happened.

It's kind of -- its mayhem and you know there are detectives everywhere, they are trying to map out the crime scene as we speak. I had pictures of -- something's beeping. Ok. I saw blood on the sidewalk. It was just a very surreal scene. So yes.

COSTELLO: There were so many -- I mean you work inside the Empire State Building. Is that what you said?

FOX: No, I wasn't -- I work across the street from the Empire State Building.

COSTELLO: Ok.

FOX: There's a Chase Bank and I work right across 34th and Fifth Avenue.

COSTELLO: Well, I was going to ask you about all of these tourists lining up to get inside the Empire State Building to take the elevators up to the top and then they see this terrible thing transpire.

FOX: Yes, I mean normally people are standing in line every morning and I'm cursing the tourists you know that are trying to get up to the top of the Empire State Building. I mean, I've never actually been to the top myself, but you know, I'll never forget it. So --

COSTELLO: So do you -- do you know that ten people in all were shot?

FOX: No, wow. I only saw the woman who had been shot, on the ground and I saw another woman getting carted away on an ambulance but I actually had no idea there was ten people, wow.

COSTELLO: Well, we're glad you're safe, Rebecca. And --

(CROSSTALK)

FOX: Yes I mean, by chance I normally take the -- the yellow line and the NRQ but this morning I took the green line and I wanted to get to work faster, so by chance I missed all of this.

COSTELLO: Well thank goodness for that. Rebecca Fox thank you for sharing.

FOX: I'm pretty lucky.

COSTELLO: Yes, you are lucky. And we're glad. Rebecca Fox thank you so much.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Again to recap, ten people are shot outside of the Empire State Building in New York City. Two of them are dead, one is the shooter, the alleged shooter; his body still lying near the scene. The other a young woman who just happened to be in the area.

Mayor Bloomberg, the Mayor of New York City, is expected to hold a news conference in a short time, when he begins speaking of course we'll bring that to you live.

We're going to take a short break. We'll be back with much more after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Thirty-eight minutes past the hour. Breaking news to tell you about in New York City right outside the Empire State building, at 34th and 5th, a man with a shotgun running down the street shooting at another man; in all at least nine people were hit by bullets, by shrapnel.

We don't know, we do know one innocent bystander, a young woman was killed. And we also know New York City police shot the man who allegedly wielded that shotgun.

Our Poppy Harlow is on the scene, as you might expect it's hard for us to get a big, huge live satellite truck into that area. So we're using something called live view, it's sort of like Facetime on an iPad so there will be a long delay but Poppy Harlow is there.

Poppy tell us what you know.

POPPY HARLOW, CNNMONEY.COM: What I know is that you've got several streets Carol are shut down here in really the busiest part of Manhattan, 34th Street, just tons and tons of police around. We know the FBI is on scene. I've spent a good portion of the past hour talking with the witness that you also spoke with, Rebecca Fox, a young 27-year-old woman from Queens. She like many people were coming here to work at 9:00 a.m., works across the street from the Empire State Building, going to get her morning coffee.

And then suddenly she saw hordes of people running down the street, dropping their coffee cup left and right and when they cleared she saw a blood and then she quickly realized that there had been a shooting.

Here is what she told me. She saw four of the people that were shot all together we know that at least nine or ten people were shot. She saw four of them, one was a woman sitting on the corner right in front of the Hartland Brewery Restaurant at 34th and 5th Avenue looking completely shocked, shot in the foot and she was taken away in an ambulance.

Rebecca also saw a man on the ground whom she believes is the shooter. We cannot independently confirm it but she believes she saw the shooter, she described him as a Caucasian man -- in his -- middle-aged a Caucasian man lying on the ground. She said police tried to kick him over and then he was shot and killed again, we cannot independently confirm that this is the shooter. She believes it was. She also saw another man whom she believes the shooter was chasing, shot in the head and dead and then she saw a fourth man shot, but not killed. That is what she saw, again, blood all over the street. She did not see the face of the person she believes is the suspected shooter.

I really want to emphasize this because it's New York City and there are always fears of terrorism what law enforcement is telling us is that there is no connection, no connection to terrorism at this point. This is not anything connected to terrorism as far as they can tell.

Obviously they're doing checks on the suspected shooter, who is dead, but again, no connection to terrorism is believed and that's important to emphasize because you know I'm standing on 5th Avenue, Carol, looking straight down and you can see -- you can see one World Trade Center being rebuilt and Rebecca told me this morning, look it makes me think of 9/11, it wasn't that long ago when there was all this chaos and confusion, she was frightened.

So again, no connection to terrorism that we know about at this point in time. We're waiting for a police press conference from New York City police. I see this man, you can see him right here, this is the deputy commissioner of the New York City police department Paul Brown. So we'll expect to hear from him shortly.

But at this point, this is what we know.

COSTELLO: Is the weapon still on the scene? We understand that the man used a shotgun. Is the weapon still on the scene or have they taken that away?

HARLOW: Not that we can see but again Carol I'm about a half a block from the scene. It's all roped off. If we try to get closer we were pushed to the side by police officers so not that I have seen on the ground yet. I did see two pictures that Rebecca Fox witnessed so she showed them to me, one was that a woman that I told you about, shot in the foot, sitting looking just perplexed and shocked and terrified.

And I also saw another picture and in the foreground of the picture you can see the man that she believes was the shooter, laying on the ground, wearing dark clothing, but no weapons on the ground that we can see of yet, but we know of course, from police of what a single or multiple weapon -- what they may have been.

COSTELLO: Of course this has happened, Poppy in a -- in a tourist area, the Empire State Building.

HARLOW: Right.

COSTELLO: Tell us how unusual it is to see a man with a shotgun running down the street shooting at people?

HARLOW: I mean, look, I've lived here, Carol for 11 years. It's extraordinarily unusual. I have never heard of or seen anything like this happen in Manhattan since 2001, when I moved here. This is, as we said, a very busy tourist area, when you look at the numbers, about four million people come to the Empire State Building every year, just to visit the observation deck.

It's also a very busy commercial area, you've got major businesses here. You've got a Chase Bank across the street, a McDonald's, Hartland Brewery Restaurant on the ground floor, a Starbucks, the Duane Reade pharmacy. I mean, you've got a lot of commercial businesses here that would be, frankly, very busy at 9:00 a.m. in the morning.

So it's a very busy congested area with traffic running each way around it, so terrifying enough that this happened and actually in a place like this, it's actually a place that is so crowded around the fall.

COSTELLO: All right, Poppy stand by. I understand that Mayor Bloomberg's news conference is going to happen at 11:00, that's in about, oh, 15 or 16 minutes. Of course, when Mayor Bloomberg begins to speak we're going to take that press conference live.

I also have Tony Roman on the phone, he's a security expert. And I wanted to ask you, Tony, how do you think the investigation is proceeding right now?

TONY ROMAN, SECURITY EXPERT: Well, when the police response happens they send teams of detectives and specialty detective from the intelligence units to begin gathering information as to whether or not this was actually a random shooting between individuals who had a dispute, or workplace dispute or whether or not it's an actual terrorist attack.

Terrorist attack can take the form in separate ways. It could be a primary location or a distraction for a secondary attack at a secondary location and that's what the intelligence unit detectives want to make a very quick determination about.

COSTELLO: Well, we understand, Tony, I'd like to interrupt you for just a second just to make it clear for folks.

ROMAN: Yes.

COSTELLO: They've made the determination, as you said, very quickly -- this has nothing to do with terrorism, so this is I guess sadly what you call a meat and potatoes investigation now, right?

ROMAN: Well, it should be, but they're still going to keep the options open as to whether or not there was something further going on here. One of the secondary or third elements of this investigation will be to determine whether or not perhaps there's some small risk that this was an attack that would primarily be staged for determining what the police response would be, in order to plan for a future attack.

That's always on the back of the minds of the intelligence unit police officers. So even if they quickly determine that it's a random shooting, they still, as a second or third part of that investigation, will be looking at the terror aspect.

COSTELLO: We understand there are security cameras, surveillance cameras, all over the place, around the Empire State Building. I would suspect police are already busy getting those tapes into custody.

ROMAN: Without question. Many of those cameras are actually monitored by the police department at the Command and Control Center at One Police Plaza and at other locations. They also have radiation detectors, they also have gas detectors and a whole host of items that can protect the public in the event of future terrorist attack or a random attack such as this.

As you can see, by the way, the uniformed police responded, the initial response was incredibly rapid. And that had to have saved countless lives, because this gentleman was armed with a very dangerous weapon, a shotgun can take down a lot of people very, very quickly.

COSTELLO: See, you wouldn't really initially think that, that a shotgun could fire that quickly.

ROMAN: Yes, it can. There are various types of shotguns. There are semiautomatic shotguns that if you pull the trigger will automatically reload the next shotgun shell and you can fire 12, 15 rounds per minute. Even a pump shotgun, which you manually have to chamber each round by taking a slide that's at the front of the barrel and pushing it back and then pushing it forward. Even a trained individual or a very angry individual can put off ten rounds in a minute or perhaps more.

And they don't have to be that accurate, because it sends a wad of pellets into a pattern that widens as it gets further away from the barrel of the gun. So it can take down a line of people in a terribly crowded area like 34th Street in Manhattan, which is very similar to Times Square, kind of the crossroads of New York City and thank God it gets special attention from the police department.

COSTELLO: That's for sure. Tony Roman, thank you so much for joining us.

We understand our reporters near the scene have spotted New York City's Mayor, Mayor Bloomberg, so apparently he's going to hold that news conference from the scene. When that takes place, of course, we'll bring it to you live.

We have to take a break. We'll be back with much more.

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COSTELLO: Any minute now the New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg will hold a news conference near the scene of a terrible crime near the Empire State Building in New York City. Ten people in all were shot, including the shooter. The shooter shot dead by New York City police, his body still lying near the entrance to the Empire State Building on the Fifth Avenue side. Another person was killed, sadly, an innocent bystander, a young woman. We don't know if that woman was a tourist or a New York City resident but we do know she was killed in this incident. Eight other people were hit by gunfire.

Witnesses tell us the man with the gun had a shotgun, and as you know, when shotguns fire, pellets scatter and most of the people who were hit were hit by those pellets. They had injuries in their feet, in their legs, in their buttocks. Other people had more serious injuries. We do know seven people were treated at the scene and there probably are some five to six people in the hospital today.

Our Rose Arce, our producer, was on the scene. She talked with witnesses as this man wielding that shotgun was running down the street after another man, a security officer who was in charge of the elevators inside the Empire State Building came running out and chased that gunman down the street. I'll let Rose take it from there.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROSE ARCE, CNN PRODUCER: -- and one witness described to me that a man ran after another man and pulled a gun. He said it was not a small handgun but it looks to be sort of either a sawed-up shot gun or an automatic weapon and started firing into the man's head.

At that point people began to scream, the crowd dispersed and an elevator man from inside the Empire State Building came rushing out and actually pursued the guy with the gun and was calling for help, alerted the police, who apparently were inside, who then chased after the gunman, and caught him right in front of the Empire State Building tourist entrance, shot him, people say three times. In fact, his body is still laying on the ground outside of the entrance.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: I was talking to a security expert, he said that security man's actions were heroic but probably not advisable. But witnesses say that that man probably saved countless lives because at least he slowed the gunman down. New York City police were immediately on the scene because they're always stationed around the Empire State Building, they have been in light of what happened on 9/11.

There are also surveillance cameras all around this area. So police probably have surveillance tapes in their custody right now and maybe they're looking at them as we speak. We do know the suspect's body is still lying near the entrance. Police have been taking pictures. His body is now covered with a white sheet. We don't know about the other victim's body. We have not been able to locate that body as of yet. We understand that the White House has been informed of this shooting, we don't know if the President will make a statement. We suspect he might.

Mayor Bloomberg is also expected to conduct a news conference in just about six minutes. Our Poppy Harlow is on the scene. She's on Fifth Avenue -- Poppy, what do you see? POPPY HARLOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): We are waiting, carol, for a press conference here on fifth avenue right in front of the Empire State Building, I believe you're looking at shots of that. What I can tell you is since we last spoke New York City police commissioner Ray Kelly along with New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg went into a nearby building to be briefed.

I spoke briefly on the phone with the deputy commissioner, the man right under Ray Kelly, the deputy commissioner of the New York City Police Department, Mr. Paul brown, I asked if he had a moment to speak. He said we don't right now, we're getting ready for an 11:00 a.m. press conference. So we'll hear the latest from him, from the commissioner and the mayor.

I can also tell you that 9:30 a.m. approximately president Obama was briefed on this by John Brennan so we do know that the President is aware. Look, this is New York City and this is a place where they take extra precaution given past events.

And given, Carol, the fact that this is an incredibly busy commercial part of the city, it's right in midtown, the heart of Manhattan, very full of offices, commercial business, also a major tourist attraction. About 4 million people visit the observation deck of the Empire State Building every single year. So you've got to believe that this morning it was filled with not only people going to work at 9:00 a.m., the height of rush hour but also tourists and as you know, we spoke with one of the witnesses who saw what happened, saw the shooting, Rebecca Fox, the 27-year-old from queens.

She was terrified, didn't know what to make of it. She described the scene to me, people running in every direction, coffee cups strewn on the ground, right by a McDonald's and Starbucks and a local restaurant, blood on the sidewalk. Lot of that was cleaned up by the time we got here but again it's hard for us to see exactly onto the street because police are keeping us about a half a block away, carol.

COSTELLO: It's sad that this shooting happens on the heels of the Sikh shooting in Wisconsin and the shooting in the theater in aurora.

HARLOW: right.

COSTELLO: I'm sure Mayor Bloomberg will mention both when he holds his news conference and as you said Poppy, the President of the United States has also been informed and maybe he'll say something -- we don't know. I'm sure maybe mitt Romney will say something, too, we don't know.

But we are sure that Mayor Bloomberg will hold that news conference in just about four minutes. We're going to take a break. We'll be back with much more.

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