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Eight Dead, Dozens Injured After Crowd Rushes Stage At Texas Music Festival; Congress Passes $1.2 Trillion Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill; Biden Says Migrant Families Separated Under Trump Deserve Compensation; Trial Over Arbery Killing Begins With Nearly All-White Jury; Officials Hold Press Conference After Eight Killed After Chaos At Houston Concert. Aired 4-5p ET
Aired November 06, 2021 - 16:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[16:00:44]
RYAN NOBLES, CNN HOST: Top of the hour. I'm Ryan Nobles, in today for Jim Acosta.
And we begin this hour with breaking news out of Houston. That's where eight people are dead and dozens injured after fans attending a music festival surged toward the stage during a performance by the rapper Travis Scott. Squeezing audience members had nowhere to go.
Look at this video. It's from the sold-out event. It shows the moment the performer pauses and looks out in confusion as an ambulance moves into the densely packed crowd of about 50,000 people. Last hour, I spoke to a woman who was in that crowd. She's also an ICU nurse. She actually passed out and was apparently crowd surfed to safety. Listen to what she told me.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MADELINE ESKINS, ATTENDED ASTROWORLD FESTIVAL: Right before I passed out, I tried to turn my head to tell my boyfriend, I couldn't turn my head, but I tried to tell him to -- I really was going to have him tell my son that I loved him because I honestly did not think I was going to make it out of there. I'm not trying to be dramatic. I straight up thought I was going to die.
I've never seen anything like it. I've never felt like I was going to die. I mean, it was absurd. And there was so little resources. I mean, the medics that were trying to help didn't look like a lot of them had been properly trained. That's not to take away from what they were doing. They were still trying their best. They weren't given the proper resources. Some of them been given proper training. They had no idea what they were getting into, I'm sure.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
NOBLES: Let's go now to CNN's Rosa Flores who is in Houston for us. And Rosa, we're waiting for a press conference to start any minute now. While we wait for that update, what else are you hearing from witnesses? ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, I talked to a variety of
witnesses who were at the concert when this all happened and they described those intense moments but one account really stands out and this is a dad with his son, his 9-year-old son was with them, and they were in a VIP section so to the side. So his vantage point was very interesting because he could see what was going on. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JESSIE DAHL, ASTROWORLD CONCERTGOER: The whole crowd was kind of pulsating. It was like this weird vibe was going on and then it just, it was like the biggest mosh pit ever. Everybody was pushing and people were jumping barricades, trying to get out.
And I was trying to shelter my son as much from seeing any of that, you know. So like here, look over here. I'm just glad my son's OK, to be honest. I kind of regret bringing him. You know, I didn't know it was going to go down how it did.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
FLORES: Now, his son, I talked to him, 9 years old, and he said that he was happy to be OK. Now the performer that was on stage when all this was going down was Travis Scott. He issued a statement, and that statement says in part, quote, "I'm absolutely devastated by what took place last night. My prayers go out to the families and all those impacted by what happened as Astroworld Festival. Houston PD has my total support as they continue to look into the tragic loss of life."
Now we know that at least eight people have died. That's according to authorities, but Ryan, as you mentioned, we're here at a press conference, we're waiting for it to start. The last press conference, officials said, and they warned that the number of dead could increase because there are multiple people who were transported to the hospital in critical condition.
We know that at least 23 people were transferred to hospitals here and that included more than one child, we learned from Texas Children's Hospital today. In total, about 300 people were treated on scene -- Ryan.
NOBLES: All right. A lot of unanswered questions. Rosa, when that press conference happens, we will take it live. So we appreciate that, Rosa. You stand by. We'll get back to you in a moment.
Let's move on now, though, to a major moment in the Biden presidency. House Democrats finally breaking their lockdown to pass a historic infrastructure bill. This after months of intra-party divisions. The president taking a victory lap this morning.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Once in a generation investment that's going to create millions of jobs, modernize our infrastructure, our roads, our bridges, our broadband, a whole range of things. To turn the climate crisis into an opportunity. [16:05:00]
And it puts us on a path to win the economic competition of the 21st century that we face with China and other large countries and the rest of the world.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
NOBLES: CNN's Suzanne Malveaux is standing by on Capitol Hill.
Suzanne, explain what ended up in this final bill and how Democrats were finally able to get enough votes.
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Sure, Ryan. Well, as you know, Democrats are under tremendous pressure to prove they can get something done especially with those losses in the governor's races in Virginia and a near loss in New Jersey. So there were tons of lawmakers today who are essentially tweeting out and patting themselves in the back about what this could potentially bring to each one of their states.
It's $1.2 trillion and roughly half of that $500 billion is a new fund. But here's some of the highlights here. You're talking about $110 billion for roads and bridges, $73 billion for electric grid upgrades, $65 billion for broadband, and then more money for rail transportation, fixing pipes, improving the water quality, airports, ports, public transit as well as climate change protections, environmental cleanup and even something for electric cars.
Now, Ryan, as you know, covering Capitol Hill here, I mean, this process this day was so messy even by Capitol Hill standards. It was really incredible to see what happened, what transpired yesterday. The ultimate vote at the end when they finally adjourned, I think it was about 12:42 in the morning, the tally here was 228-206. There were 13 Republicans who voted for the infrastructure bill.
There were six Democrat, progressives, who voted against it. That core Squad group, and two others that you might recognize their names. The process started at the beginning of the day. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi saying look, we're going to vote on two bills. The infrastructure, bipartisan infrastructure bill and the Build Back Better or this larger economic climate package, that she was going to put on the table.
There was a small group of moderates that said, look, no, we want to see the Congressional Budget Office, a nonpartisan accounting, a score, if you will, how much is that going to cost? So Pelosi came back, said well, let's vote on infrastructure and just kicked this other one down the road, kick the can, and vote for a debate. That did not sit well with the head of the progressives, Representative Jayapal.
And so she said she and her progressive caucus had at least 20 that were going to vote against infrastructure. Finally, how this was all resolved, Ryan, at the end of the day the moderates got together with a few of the progressives. They came up with an agreement that said, look, we'll go ahead and promise that we'll vote for that bigger bill at a later point, the week of November 15th, as soon as we get those CBO scores.
So we'll see how this all plays out in the weeks ahead, Ryan.
NOBLES: And Suzanne, if they like those CBO score numbers which is kind of the --
MALVEAUX: That's right. That's right. Absolutely.
NOBLES: Yes, the one big caveat to all of this. You're right. It was a weird week on Capitol Hill. We never thought we'd see it happen, but it happened in the early morning hours of Saturday.
Suzanne Malveaux, thanks so much.
Let's go to the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue now. In the meantime, we saw President Biden get visibly upset when asked about migrant families who were separated under the Trump administration's zero tolerance policy.
For more on that, let's bring in CNN White House correspondent Arlette Saenz.
Arlette, what did Biden say?
ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Ryan, President Biden said that he strongly supported the idea of the federal government offering compensation to those immigrant families who were separated at the U.S.-Mexico border during the Trump administration when that administration was implementing a zero-tolerance policy.
President Biden grew very heated and raised his voice as he slammed former President Trump's policy and talked about what those families should be receiving. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BIDEN: In fact, because of the outrageous behavior of the last administration, you come and cross the border, whether it's legal or illegal, and you lost your child, you lost your child, he's gone, and deserve some kind of compensation no matter what the circumstance is. What that will be, I have no idea. I have no idea.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
SAENZ: So the president's heated response comes just a few days after he was asked and he disputed a recent "Wall Street Journal" report which said that the government was considering offering $450,000 per individual affected by that policy. The next day, the White House came out tried to clean it up a little bit saying that he was simply shooting down that $450,000 price tag.
Now, today, the president clearly was very passionate in saying that he does believe they deserve some type of compensation, but did not offer a figure of what exactly that would entail. Now a source had told CNN that the government was considering somewhere in the hundreds of thousands of dollars in compensation to these families.
But it's unclear where exactly that stands. And there are more than 3,000 children who were separated from their families at the U.S.- Mexico border during the Trump administration.
[16:10:07]
But it's unclear how many of those would actually be eligible for any compensation once the government decides on that figure -- Ryan.
NOBLES: All right, Arlette Saenz, live on the North Lawn of the White House. We appreciate it, Arlette.
A tearful day in court for the mother of Ahmaud Arbery as testimony begins in the trial of the three men accused of killing her son.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
NOBLES: Now to the trial of the three white men charged with the killing of black jogger, Ahmaud Arbery. It was an emotional day in court for Arbery's mother who saw the video of her son's death in its entirety for the first time as it was played in the courtroom.
CNN's Martin Savidge reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JUDGE TIMOTHY WALMSLEY, SUPERIOR COURT, STATE OF GEORGIA: The state of Georgia versus Travis McMichael, Greg McMichael, and William R. Bryan.
[16:15:00]
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In a trial where race and racism take center stage, the nearly all-white jury heard two very different accounts of how a 25-year-old black man, Ahmaud Arbery, was chased and killed by three white men as he was running in a coastal Georgia neighborhood.
LINDA DUNIKOSKI, PROSECUTOR: Mr. Arbery takes off running and a pick- up truck goes to follow him.
SAVIDGE: In their opening statement, the lead prosecutor described Arbery as under attack by the three defendants who say they believed that he had committed a crime.
DUNIKOSKI: In this case, all three of these defendants did everything they did based on assumptions. Not on facts, not on evidence. On assumptions. And they made decisions in their driveways based on those assumptions that took a young man's life.
SAVIDGE: Travis McMichael, his father, Gregory McMichael, and a neighbor, William Roddie Bryan, Junior, are facing life in prison on murder and other charges if convicted. It was Bryan who captured the killing in his cell phone.
In their opening statement, prosecutors played the cell phone video. Among those watching and listening in the courtroom was Arbery's mother who said she had never seen it in its entirety and was clearly emotionally overwhelmed.
WANDA COOPER-JONES, AHMAUD ARBERY'S MOTHER: I decided to remain in so I can get familiar with what happened to Ahmaud the last minutes of his life.
SAVIDGE: At no time during the five-minute chase the prosecutor says did the defendants tell Arbery they were performing a citizen's arrest. Instead, prosecutors say Gregory McMichael shouted threats.
DUNIKOSKI: So how do you know Mr. Ahmaud Arbery was under attack by strangers with intent to kill him? Because Greg McMichael told the police this. "Stop, or I'll blow your (EXPLETIVE DELETED) head off."
SAVIDGE: In the defense's opening statements, Travis McMichael's attorney portrays a very different story.
ROBERT RUBIN, TRAVIS MCMICHAEL'S DEFENSE ATTORNEY: This case is about duty and responsibility.
SAVIDGE: Describing Travis McMichael not as a vigilante, but as a 10- year veteran of the Coast Guard who felt a duty and responsibility to protect his neighborhood using his training.
RUBIN: It is scenario-based training. You're relying on muscle memory.
SAVIDGE: The defense maintains Arbery was seen on video on multiple different occasions inside a neighborhood home under construction without permission, including the day that Arbery was killed.
RUBIN: The evidence shows overwhelmingly that Travis McMichael honestly and lawfully attempted to detain Ahmaud Arbery according to the law, and shot and killed him in self-defense.
SAVIDGE: Gregory McMichael's attorney also argued his client's actions were well within the law.
FRANK HOGUE, GREGORY MCMICHAEL'S DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Greg McMichael was absolutely sure this was the guy, the same guy he had seen on surveillance videos, inside a house multiple times where Greg had sound reasons to believe theft had occurred.
SAVIDGE: The state's first witness was the second police officer on the scene the day Arbery was killed. His body cam video shows such a gruesome scene Judge Timothy Walmsley delivered a warning to the courtroom when it was played.
DUNIKOSKI: And what did that man covered in blood seated over there say to you when you asked him, are you OK?
OFC. WILLIAM DUGGAN, GLYNN COUNTY POLICE: He -- it was a quick reply of basically, no, I'm not OK. I just I think killed somebody.
(END OF VIDEO CLIP)
NOBLES: Let's bring in CNN legal analyst and criminal defense attorney, Joey Jackson.
Joey, listening to the opening statements in this case, do you think the defense effectively raised the possibility of doubt in some of the juror's minds?
JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: You know, Ryan, good to see you. It's still too early to tell, but I can tell you that they have three significant problems that they need to be worried about notwithstanding the opening, which is just a preview of what the evidence has shown.
Problem number one is the citizen's arrest law. In order to use that, you have to demonstrate that there was a crime committed either in your presence or that you had immediate knowledge of. Right? That's at issue. Was there any crime committed? The prosecution indicated, right, that he was seen on this tape, that is Ahmaud Arbery, but he was just milling about at this particular open site. He wasn't doing anything of a criminal variety.
And with respect to the citizen's arrest law, it says that if it's a felony, you can detain. And so if you're not doing anything, which is the prosecution's argument, how does it amount to a crime much less a felony for which you can detain and arrest someone?
The second problem they have, Ryan, is even if they buy, that is the jury, the notion that this citizen's arrest law applies they have, that is the defense, the burden of overcoming the issue of, was it self-defense? Were you in immediate fear for your life? Did the action of shooting, was it proportional to the threat posed and did you act reasonably?
And finally, Ryan, the final issue relates to the initial aggressor.
[16:20:04]
If you can establish, the prosecutors can, that they were, the defense, the initial aggressors with regard to bringing aggression to Ahmaud Arbery, then you lose the privilege of even using self-defense. And so yes, the defense made the case in the opening with regard to what they felt the evidence will show, but unless they can overcome those three major obstacles, I think it's a very difficult case for them.
NOBLES: Of course, one of the major issues that's kind of hanging over this entire trial is the issue of race. And Arbery's mother said it was discouraging to her to see that the jury was made up of 11 white people and only one black person, and the judge said that there appeared to be intentional discrimination in jury selection, but also said there were valid reasons for striking some of the potential black jurors.
Did the judge's comments give any room for a possible appeal by the prosecution after the trial? Is that even an option?
JACKSON: Yes, so what happens is, is that to the point of having this jury in its composition, is struggling. So just address that briefly. You have this community which is 69 percent white, which is about 26 percent black. You would figure that a jury would be a nice cross section of that demographic.
It's not. And so that's troubling. What's more troubling is you have an acknowledgment of the court that there appears to be intentional discrimination, but no fashioning of a remedy that would address that.
Like what? Well, perhaps we unseat the jurors that have been seated based upon the view of the judge that it was intentional discrimination. Maybe you invite the black jurors who were kicked off the jury and impanel them. You can always come up with a reason to indicate why you struck someone from the jury. What's critical is your underlying reason why we know you really stuck them.
Last brief point, Ryan, and that's this. You know, we heard the defense say, hey, there's bubbas. That's not me saying, it's them. Where are the bubba jurors? They were referring when they made that statement to white, non-college educated men. And so they already said, the defense attorneys, what they were thinking. They acted in accordance with that thinking. The judge did nothing. And I think that's troubling.
To the question of an appeal, the answer is no. You only appeal if you're the defendant when you get convicted. The prosecution, if there's an acquittal, has no basis or remedy under the law to appeal an acquittal. If a jury utters the words, not guilty, the case is over.
NOBLES: Yes. Double jeopardy. The ship has sailed at that point. They would need to remedy that much sooner.
JACKSON: Right.
NOBLES: All right. Let's turn now to the case of the 18-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse who is on trial for killing two people and wounding another during riots in Kenosha, Wisconsin, last year. Now a juror was dismissed for making a joke about Jacob Blake. He of course the black man whose shooting by police sparked the protests in Kenosha. Is this a case of clear racial bias?
JACKSON: I mean, clearly, with regard to that joke, you know, if I'm permitted to say what the joke was, the reality is when he's being walked out, that is the juror, by a court officer, he indicates about Jacob Blake, you know, why did the police stop shooting only six times, and the joke was well, he ran out of the bullets.
I'm not sure that, well, in fact I know that that's not an appropriate statement to be made, number one, or joke to be made, but if you're a juror in that case, it certainly isn't. And so the judge did the proper thing when the joke was reported to, your honor, the judge sitting, to excuse that juror. It just brings into the question, Ryan, what is the mindset of the other jurists who were impaneled and hearing about the case.
NOBLES: OK. One more quick question for you, Joey. The FBI released new infrared aerial surveillance video that shows the moments before Rittenhouse shot one of the victims Joseph Rosenbaum, dead. Now witness testified that Rosenbaum lunged at Rittenhouse as he was shot. How important is this?
Actually, Joey, we're going to have to cut you off. Sorry about that. We are going to go now live to Houston where officials are providing an update on that deadly scene at the Astroworld Music Festival. Let's listen in to this press conference.
MAYOR SYLVESTER TURNER (D), HOUSTON, TEXAS: -- standing with us. You know, last night was tragic on many different levels. And this is a very, very active investigation and we'll probably be at it for quite some time to determine what exactly happened.
Let me just cover a few things first. Based on our latest information, you know, eight people are reported dead from the event last night. In terms of their ages, one is 14. One is 16. Two are 21 years of age. Two are 23. One is 27. And one remains unknown at this time.
[16:25:02]
So a total of eight that are reported dead. Six of the eight family members have been notified. And we know that at least one is outside of Houston Harris County. Residing outside of Houston Harris County. As was based on last night, 25 were transported to the hospital, 13 are still hospitalized including five that are under the age of 18. Based on the information that we currently have, no one is reported missing. So zero persons are reporting missing. Four of the 25 have been discharged from the hospital.
Let me just say as it relate to what happened last night, as far as we are aware, this is -- I'm not aware of any incident of this kind that has taken place at any one of our special events either on the county side or the city side, pretty much in the last, I would imagine the last 40 years where anybody has lost life.
Now we've had an event where there may have been a crowd rush or somebody had to be ejected or maybe somebody had been injured, but nothing of this magnitude that any of us can recall and certainly that I can recall that has taken place in this city. This incident is being thoroughly investigated and reviewed. Thoroughly. It is important for us to ascertain from last night what took place, what happened, where missteps may have occurred.
And in so doing, there will be, there have been conversations with, for example, representatives of Live Nation. We'll continue to talk to Travis Scott's people. We'll talk to as many witnesses as we can who were present last night. We're talking with those individuals who have been hospitalized to try to get a much better understanding of what took place, what went wrong, where were the missteps.
Certainly, HPD and other law enforcement organizations will be looking at as much of the video footage as possible to try to again to ascertain what took place. We'll look at the security plans themselves. We'll look at the collaboration that took place between the county and the city even leading up to this particular event. As you know, NRG is a county facility. This is where this incident
occurred, but it also occurred inside the city of Houston. So we'll look in depth at the collaboration between the two entities. In terms of personnel, and Chief Finn can go into this even more, but let me just say preliminarily, we know that there were about 528 HPD officers that provided security for the event and an additional 755 persons representing private security that Live Nation had that was providing security at this particular facility.
So there are a lot of, let me just say to you, there are a lot of unanswered, a lot of unanswered questions. And over the next several days, several weeks, could be even longer, we'll take an in depth look at everything that took place, why it took place, how we can -- what steps we can do moving forward to mitigate an incident of this kind from taking place at any other point in time.
Now there are a lot of rumors on social media. Let me caution people not to buy into the rumors. OK? Because there are a lot of rumors, but nothing is left out of the table in terms of persons who were there. People who may have fainted or people who may for whatever reasons were transported to the hospital. There's a lot of conversation about people who crowd surge, all of those incidents, whether or not anything else was involved.
All of those things are being looked at, but it is way too preliminary now to draw any conclusions but we are not taking anything off the table. This remains and will be a very active investigation. So with that being said, let me yield now temporarily to Judge Lina Hidalgo.
JUDGE LINA HIDALGO, HARRIS COUNTY, TEXAS: Thank you, Mayor. Thank you.
[16:30:00]
And to all of the law enforcement professionals, first responders who have been part of the swift response, thank you to them.
And to all the Good Samaritans because we know it could have been much worse if so many people hadn't stepped in.
The events of last night were tragic beyond belief. This is an artist that we know has a following amongst young people in particular, young people with bright futures.
Those were the people that were at the event. Went to have a good time.
And no one, no parent, no friend, no sibling should see their loved one off to a concert by a world-renowned artist and not be able to expect them to come home safely.
And when we read these ages, 14, 16, 21, 21, 23, 23, 27, just breaks your heart. And I know that the images we've seen are hard to stomach. And I imagine more will surface that are hard to stomach.
Since late last night, I've been on the scene. I've spent time at the Reunification Center talking to families, hearing their anguish. Those that didn't know where their loved ones were. Sometimes it's harder not to know.
So I appreciate everybody's work and collaboration trying to identify everyone.
Our primary focus has been to support the city of Houston, to support the Houston Police Department, the Houston Fire Department, as they were providing the security for the event, as they were helping and leading the response.
We have been at the Reunification Center. Our Institute of Forensic Sciences is responsible for identifying the victims.
I was in touch with Dr. Sanchez there and they are working as quickly as they can on those autopsies so they can release the bodies to the family and get some answers as to ultimately the cause of these deaths.
Throughout the morning, I and my team have also been on the phone with all of the relevant county agencies trying to untangle as much as we can about what may have led to this.
The roles in particular that Live Nation, that the city of Houston, and Harris County had in any of this.
It may well be that this tragedy is a result of unpredictable events, circumstances coming together that couldn't possibly have been avoided.
But until we determine that, I will ask the tough questions. And that's what I've spent the morning doing.
What I know so far is that Live Nation and Astro World put together plans for this event, a security plan, a site plan, that they were at the table with city of Houston and Harris County NRG Park.
So perhaps the plans were inadequate. Perhaps the plans were good but they weren't followed. Perhaps it was something else entirely.
The families of those who died and everybody affected deserve answers as to what took place last night.
And that's why I'm calling for an objective, independent investigation as to what went on and how it could have been prevented or how, or if this was a particular situation that was simply out of everybody's hands.
And I have directed county agencies to, as soon as we get that underway, cooperate and I expect and hope the same for everybody else involved.
As you all are aware, there was a similar incident in 2019 with Astro World. There was a breaching of barricades. There were some issues with crowd control.
Actions were taken after that experience. There were stronger fencing, and more re more robust barricades. More personnel and more security personnel.
You guys heard the increase in officers, 2019 had 47 HPD officers, 2021 had 76 Houston police officers. There was an increase in terms of private security, an increase in terms of event security. There was additional space for crowd control.
But I want to know and the community deserves to know is more needed to have been done.
So we'll focus on objectively finding out and reporting what happened, how it could have been prevented.
And the public has a role here, too. If you have any information as to what took place, let us know. Let the Houston Police Department know. Rumors, as the mayor said, that's not what we need.
[16:35:00]
But there are some serious questions that need to be asked.
So to the families, our hearts go out. On behalf of Harris County, our hearts go out to you. And just know that we won't give up on asking the tough questions about what exactly took place here.
I'll repeat remarks in Spanish after everybody speaks.
Thank you, Mayor.
TURNER: Thank you.
Before that, two things that I do want to acknowledge. And offer my condolences to all of the families who lost loved ones and to those family members who were injured.
I do want to do that. Number one, offer our condolences and prayers to them.
Secondly, I want to acknowledge the quick response of the Houston Fire Department and EMS unit. They had units that were already stationed around NRG Stadium. And they were able to step in immediately when reports of incident occurred.
So to Chief Pena, to his entire team, to EMS, I want to acknowledge their very quick response.
And then from the moment, for example, the reports were made known in terms of people falling, injured, roughly about 9:30.
This event came to an end at 10 minutes after 10:00, is when everything stopped and people were in between either on the scene or site or they were transported to area hospitals.
So I do want to acknowledge the very quick response EMS units and the fact this event did come to an end at 10:10.
And we do want a very, non-stop in terms of the review of this particular matter.
Back to you.
CHIEF TROY FINNER, HOUSTON POLICE DEPARTMENT: Thank you, Mayor.
Thank you. Good evening, everyone.
The mayor said it. We want to send condolences to the family.
Nobody, as everybody's hurting, our police department, fire department, citizens, nobody's hurting more than the family members. And all prayers go out to them.
And I ask the whole nation -- because I know there's other news media here, not just local -- to pray for the families.
I want to go over a few things.
Last night, I put out some numbers in terms of security, police officers and private security. I gave a number of -- sorry, 367 police officers. That number was the number that we had assigned for the evening shift. We actually had 528 because we held over day shift officers.
Live Nation has just reported to us that they had 755 security officers. A lot of security out there.
But as everyone is saying, we leave no stones unturned. This is not happened to us ever in Houston since I've been a police officer. And we take pride of it. And we're going to get down to the bottom.
A lot of narratives out there right now. A lot of them. On social media. And even last night.
I think that all of us need to be respectful of the families and make sure we follow the facts and the evidence. And that's what we're trying to go here in the Houston Police Department.
I will tell you, one of the narratives was that some individual was injecting other people with drugs. We do have a report of a security officer, according to the medical staff, that was out and treated him last night.
That he was reaching over to restrain or grab a citizen and he felt a brick prick in his neck. When he was examined -- he went unconscious -- they administered Narcan. He was revived.
And the medical staff did notice a prick similar to what you would get if somebody was trying to inject. This is one part of it.
Another thing that's important, there are some individuals that were trampled. And we want to be respectful of that. We just ask you give us time to do a proper investigation.
Live Nation has stated from the very beginning they would cooperate. They're going to give us the video sometime this evening. I spoke to my commander in Homicide. So we're waiting to get that.
That's going to help us.
But I also want to call out to the community. Kids and young individuals that was out there, if you seen something, say something.
This is now a criminal investigation. That's going to involve our Homicide Division as well as Narcotics. And we're going to get down to the bottom of it.
I want to thank Live Nation and everybody else out there. There was cooperation.
[16:39:59]
I also want to say thanks to our police officers. A lot of them administered CPR.
Executive -- I'm sorry -- Executive Chief Larry Saddle was out there.
And something that was important, and the mayor just said it and I want to hit it again. And 9:30, right there. That's when a few people started going down.
Our people stepped up and immediately went to the producers and told them, hey, people are going down. This show ended at 10:10 p.m. So I just want to acknowledge that.
As far as arrests last night, 25 arrests. And 23 of those 25 were trespassing. One possession of marijuana and one public intoxication.
So we'll just open it up for questions after Chief Pena.
Go ahead.
CHIEF SAMUEL PENA, HOUSTON FIRE DEPARTMENT: Thank you.
Good afternoon, everyone.
I want to first start by expressing my most sincere condolences to the families of the victims. This is an unimaginable tragedy that they are experiencing.
And it's because of that that we're committed to work with our partners, police department and everybody else involved in ensuring this is a complete and full investigation into the cause of this tragedy.
Know that the Houston Fire Department, we're going to be looking into this permits that were issued and ensuring that the plan that was submitted was adhered to during the event.
This is going to be part of the investigation. Our commitment is to ensure we are turning every stone, as was mentioned here earlier by the mayor, to ensure we get to the bottom of this issue. The Houston Fire Department, we had a very robust contingency and
emergency response plan. The primary medical component was delivered by a third-party medical company for the venue.
The security wasn't the same. It was a third-party company delivering the security for that venue.
In spite of that, we had units that were prepositioned from the Houston Fire Department to ensure we were monitoring the progress and the event.
From the time -- as mayor mentioned, from the time that the incident started to escalate around 9:30, we requested additional resources to the scene to augment those who were prepositioned around.
And this is important. Even though the plan did not require for that, we had prepositioned units around the venue in case this incident escalated.
From the time that the mass casualty incident was declared to the first unit on scene was two minutes. When we began to make patient contact. That is an incredible response. And that can't go unnoticed.
As far as the planning, we here, in the city of Houston, take these events very seriously. Public safety is our primary concern.
The mayor has tasked us with ensuring that we have the resources and the plans and the contingencies ready to, for these events. We've done these before. I believe we had a robust plan to, for a non-event.
Certainly, the level of injuries, the number of people in that venue quickly overwhelmed the third-party vendors that were providing the security and the medical component. We quickly were able to respond.
In regard to the layout. There's no occupancy permit for an outdoor event. OK?
What the calculation for the footprint that was going to be used for the event, if we applied the assembly occupancy, the fire code assembly occupancy formula, they could have had over 200,000 people in this venue. OK?
That's just based on math. This venue was limited to 50,000 in that component.
Part of when we have large events, one of the things that we consider is to ensure that the crowds are subdivided. They had two separate stages, in two separate areas. That was part of the plan.
We had inspectors to ensure that the means of egress, the doors in and out of the that venue were maintained opened and unobstructed. OK?
These injuries did not occur as people tried to exit the venue. And that was evident by the -- by the fact that once the event was terminated, that event, that whole footprint was cleared out within the hour, 50,000. [16:45:00]
So the means of egress, OK, the exits, the doors, were kept open, unobstructed. That was our assurance.
What we're looking into is what caused the crowd surge. What led to the crowd surge and those incidents at the point of the, where the concert was being at, the stage.
So again, our role in this is to participate with the police department. We are going to be looking at the films and video as the chief mentioned.
And we're going to ensure that the items that should have been in place were in place and that we learn from this event.
Really quick, Mayor, the permits issued for this were for LPG and we had inspectors there to monitor that. We had a permit for the pyro. Inspectors were on scene for that.
We had a permit for tents that were erected in the venue. We had inspectors for that. And we had inspectors for the means of egress. The doors in and out of the that venue to be opened and unobstructed. And we had inspectors for that.
But again, we're going to be looking at the entire incident to ensure that we're doing the right thing for these families. They deserve it. We owe it to them. And we're going to participate wholly.
Thank you.
HIDALGO: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
NOLES: OK, just to recap what we learned from this press conference in Houston. They ran down the list of victims in this case.
Incredible. Eight people killed. All of them under the age of 30. In fact, two individuals were teenagers, a 14-year-old and a 16-year-old that were killed.
The other interesting thing that came out of this press conference. There had been reports online of people being pricked or injected with what some were saying could potentially been some sort of narcotic.
And the police chief, Troy Finner -- and we've been reluctant to report on this at great length because we did not have it from official sources.
But in this press conference, the police chief did confirm there was at least one security officer who was in the process of trying to help people out of the scrum who felt a prick of some kind in his neck.
He was treated. They gave him Narcan, a drug designed to reverse the effects of an overdose. And then, while examining him, did discover evidence of a prick or injection in his neck. So that is another level of chaos that we saw going on here. You heard the police chief say there that they are now dealing with a
criminal investigation and described it as a criminal investigation as discussing the reports.
And even the actual specific incident that they had where someone had claimed that they had been pricked by something.
Both the mayor and chief made it clear there are many, many rumors that are being spread on the Internet that they do not have confirmed, that may not necessarily be true.
But because so much was happening, the fog of the tragedy that there are a lot of things out there on the Internet that might not necessarily be correct.
This is very, very significant. That the police chief did confirm that there was at least one report, incident, of people injecting other people with drugs.
Which just, you know, you have to ask the question, is that part of why we saw such incredible loss of life?
Obviously, this was a hectic, chaotic situation where there were a mass of humanity crushing into each other. And that can certainly lead to the loss of life and fatalities. There were many, many injuries that were a direct result of that.
But I think the question that probably a lot of us have right now is, were these injections, this alleged situation happening, could that have also contributed to the deaths of so many people at an incident like this?
One of the other things I think was important what we learned from this press conference was that this isn't the first time this particular festival, the Astro World festival in Houston, has had problems.
There were incidents with people jumping over gates, where there was chaos at incidents in the past.
[16:49:57]
And what the officials said in this press conference, this is an example. This happened in 2019. It wasn't even this event that we've seen last night.
And what the officials responded to and they said that there were a lot of changes made to the security protocols in and around this event to prevent what we saw in 2019 from happening again in 2020.
Again, let's go back and recap what we learned from this press conference.
Eight victims in total. The youngest, a 14-year-old that was killed. There was another victim, a 16-year-old. Every single one of the eight victims under the age of 30. There are still 13 people hospitalized, including five that are
hospitalized that are under the age of 18.
Let's go back now to the back and forth here, the mayor, Sylvester turner, answering questions from reporters there.
Let's take a listen.
TURNER: -- or whether an event takes place at NRG Park in the county which falls within the city of Houston.
We want to make sure that all of the attendees are protected and we give them everything they need to so they can attend then go home safely.
So having said that, anyone of us can take any questions.
(CROSSTALK)
TURNER: Yes, one at a time.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE QUESTON)
TURNER: We don't have that.
FINNER: Yes, there were.
TURNER: Chief Troy Finner.
FINNER: Yes, ma'am. So the number of narcotics administrations, we don't have that number of. We know there were several, many instances where they did administer Narcan on scene.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE QUESTON)
FINNER: I think.
TURNER: What we're saying is we are not taking anything off the table. Everything will be taken into account.
And until we look at medical information, talk to those who were hospitalized, talk to witnesses, we know that Narcan was provided. We're going to take a look at everything.
(CROSSTALK)
TURNER: One at a time. One at a --
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: We were on level red COVID-19, so in first place, why did you guys authorize an event with thousands of people under these circumstances?
TURNER: We just hosted the World Series in the city of Houston. There were a lot of people there. This was an event that was outside as well. UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Can you comment on the 520 officers who were
inside among the crowd? What's the difference in the amount of officers compared to 2019? What was the number?
TURNER: Much more officers. I'll get you the numbers. I don't have the exact assignments right now.
I want everybody to realize we're not even 24 hours into it and that's going to be part of our review and part of the investigation because we do want to know exactly what happened.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: But were the majority of officers in the crowd or are we talking about somewhere outside?
TURNER: The majority of officers are going to be outside.
(CROSSTALK)
TURNER: Yes, we'll get it to you. Yes.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: In the hundreds?
TURNER: One second. Hold on.
(CROSSTALK)
Turner: Hold on one second now.
HIDALGO: Let me add something here.
So we have some initial numbers here and chief will add what he receives later, but it is in the hundreds.
So in 2019, what I have is there was 409 event security, 30 armed private security and 47 Houston Police Department officers.
In 2021, excuse me? OK, 47. In 2021, 505 event security, 91 armed private security and 76 Houston Police Department officers.
As to the question on the COVID. Remember, our authority was stripped many months ago. And so we can't even require masks in Texas.
So, yes, go ahead.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Were there other reports of people feeling those needles or was it just that security officer?
FINNER: Right now, we have that one and we're going to move around. I know it's a whole lot of questions.
Who's next?
Go ahead. UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: My question is whose responsibility was it to
shout down the concert when it was established and was it the promotors -- at that point, why was it not stopped sooner?
FINNER: You cannot just close when you got 50,000 and over 50,000 individuals, OK? We got to worry about rioting. Riots. When you have a group that young.
I think that time I gave you from just a little bit after 9:30 to 10 minutes after 10:00 to get that closed down.
And there were a core operation and discussion between promotors, the fire department, the police department, and NRG officials. So I think that part is pretty good.
(CROSSTALK)
[16:55:08]
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: -- actually there last night. The last song actually started at 10:10, but there was quite a bit of time. In fact, people were screaming --
(CROSSTALK)
FINNER: We'll -- we'll -- yes. We'll verify the numbers. That's the numbers that the time I meant to say that I'm giving.
And definitely, we want to be transparent and truthful, but we'll check out that time.
But let me finish. Because this is important. If it was one more song, concert songs, it's a minute or two. So it's not significant. I think the significant thing is that we shut it down.
Thank you.
Next question.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: How many --
(CROSSTALK)
FINNER: Go ahead.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE QUESTON)
FINNER: Can you step up just a little bit? I'm sorry.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE) -- a little more about the office and the circumstances around how is he doing?
FINNER: I don't have that information right now. We're still trying. That was just interviews from an investigator of the medical staff. We're still trying to locate that particular security officer. OK?
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: What can you tell us about their deaths? Were any of them trampled?
FINNER: We don't have all that information. And that's something I don't want to speculate on. It's very important.
I said I wanted to be respectful of those families. I don't want to go any deeper on that until we get facts from the medical autopsies and toxicology reports as well.
Go ahead.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: The report of a 10-year-old in critical condition right now.
FINNER: That's what we have. Yes. Yes.
Go ahead.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE QUESTION)
FINNER: EMS.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE QUESTION)
PENA: So as I mentioned earlier, the venue, the medical component was being met by a third-party contractor. They had doctors on scene. They had medical EMTs. The had volunteers.
For a non-event, it would have been enough. But when the event started to escalate, we had to come in and augment their assistance, OK, their deployment.
I can't say enough about you know, the men and women of the Houston Fire Department. We went ahead and preplanned in anticipation for a contingency.
That's the reason we had units deployed around the perimeter and were able to respond so quickly.
Again, it's 50,000 people. For a non-event, it would have been -- it's happened in the past.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE QUESTON)
PENA: Yes, we had 62 units that responded to this. We had, at some point, over 20 ambulances that were pre-positioned and ready to transport in our triage and treatment transport or area.
Again, the coordination by the men and women of the Houston Fire Department on scene after the incident occurred was very robust. It was on point.
I'm very proud of the work they did but certainly, we have been here before. OK. We, it's our -- we ensure that we're planning for a contingency, right?
And in a non-event, again, this would have been just another normal major concert, but unfortunately, it escalated.
We're going to focus on what led that crowd to start to surge and what were the issues behind that.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (CROSSTALK)
PENA: No, I don't. I do, but -- I'll get you that number.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Have you met with family members of any of the individuals who died or are seriously injured? Can you tell us what and when the names --
TURNER: Number one, we want to make sure that all the family members are aware. Six of the eight family members have been notified already. Two have not.
So we want to be very, very careful. Very careful with that.
(CROSSTALK)
TURNER: I have not met with them. Not at this time.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE QUESTON)
HIDALGO: We spoke to some families last night. But at that point, we didn't know whether their person -- what was going to be the outcome of the person they were looking for.
But that is key is the autopsies are being conducted and so we have to wait until those results get back.
What our forensic sciences director was saying, some of the toxicology reports they can do without the bodies so they'll release that.
We are still trying to identify the eighth person we know, it's a male, but we don't know who it is.
And then there's one person, another person's been identified, but we haven't found the family yet.
[16:59:55]
So until we have that, obviously, we can't release all the information.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (INAUDIBLE QUESTON)
TURNER: (INAUDIBLE). You said 200,000. (INAUDIBLE)
PENA: Can you repeat your question, please?
