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CNN Tonight

Police Respond To Shots Fired At Michigan State University; At Least One Reported Dead After Shots Fired At Michigan State University; Victims Being Transported To Local Hospital, Areas On Michigan State University Campus Being Cleared, Police Say; Active Shooter Situation At Michigan State University; News Briefing To Take Place At 11:00 p.m; Students Shelter-In-Place, Shooter Still Inside Campus. Aired 10-11p ET

Aired February 13, 2023 - 22:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[22:00:00]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening, everyone. I'm Alisyn Camerota. This is CNN TONIGHT. And we begin with breaking news out of Michigan, a shooting at Michigan State University. University police say shots are fired on the campus in East Lansing. And they are advising everyone, students, staff, everyone there to secure in place.

A spokesperson for the university says one fatality is now confirmed. That is according to the Detroit News. Police believe there is only one suspect involved who they believe is on foot. Police are searching for that suspect right now. The ATF and the FBI are also responding to what they are calling an active shooter situation here.

I want to bring in CNN Senior Crime and Justice Correspondent Shimon Prokupecz, CNN National Security Analyst Juliette Kayyem and CNN Senior Law Enforcement Analyst Charles Ramsey.

Shimon, what is your reporting? What is the latest there?

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Right, Alisyn. So, we are just getting word of this one fatality inside Berkey Hall at the school, this according to Detroit News, we spoke to the school spokesperson.

So, some sad news out of there, and we're also hearing of multiple injuries. We don't know what those injuries are. But as you can imagine students, faculty running from this situation, certainly could have been injured during those moment as well.

Priority now there by the police, which has really responded en masse there, dozens and dozens of officers from all over that area, now searching for this gunman. They have a brief kind of description, not a very specific description of who they're looking for. Witnesses described him as a black male wearing a mask. And so that is what police are working on.

This all unfolded sometime around 8:30 or so, and the first notice that really went out on this was it was a note, an email and text that came from the school police, warning students and faculty of the shooting. And what it said was that, there was a shots fired incident occurring on or near the East Lansing Campus, secure in place immediately and then they told students and faculty to run, hide and fight. And then they explained what to do and they wanted student to evacuate and then some to hide.

But we know that many student and some of the faculty are hiding in classrooms and rooms around the school as police go from floor to floor, classroom to classroom, room to room, searching for victims, searching for the gunman.

But right now, the key here is that this is not a secure situation. Police are still searching for this gunman and that is all we really know at this point. The governor tweeting a message, Governor Gretchen Whitmer there saying that she has been briefed on the shooting at Michigan State University, the Michigan State Police along with the police -- Michigan State University Police, local law enforcement, first responders are on the ground. And she says, let's wrap our arms around the Spartan community tonight and we will keep everyone updated as we learn more.

So, that's what we're now waiting. We're waiting for more information. As you can see the heavy response there -- there's an officer there in tactical gear armed with an AR-15, again, with looks like an axe. This is all because they're going through these rooms in this school and they're using some of those tools to get inside some of those classrooms.

But, again, at this point, all we know is that there is at least one death, one fatality here, sadly, and several others injured, as police from all over there in that area are searching for this gunman as we await for more word here from the police. But this is all still very much developing and very much still an active scene, as you can see there.

CAMEROTA: And, Shimon, quickly, we don't know if that fatality is a student, a staff, anything?

PROKUPECZ: No, we don't know. We don't know much more of that. It's interesting though, Alisyn, as we talk about, the hour, right, this happens around 8:30 at the school. There was an early report that this may have started in the cafeteria. So, we're waiting for more obviously from the police there. But I think given the hour, perhaps there was an event going on or something going on at the school that would have brought people so many. It sounds like there were a lot of people there at the school at the time. And that's sort of why we're also seeing this large presence from police.

And the other thing that police are dealing with also are other reports, people seeing things, people calling 911, saying they're hearing things, saying there's -- they think they see the gunman, reports of maybe a second shooter. But right now, police are working on the theory that there was only one gunman, one shooter here, and that is who they're looking for. But they're responding to all these other calls. As you can imagine, so many people there frightened, scared, having witnessed this, having to run from this.

[22:05:03]

And so many of them right now are hiding in ruins and in areas around the school as police continue to search for this gunman, treat the wounded and go really floor by floor here trying to make sure that the school is secure.

Chief Ramsey, what a nightmare. What a nightmare. I mean, it's our national nightmare, of course, but what a nightmare for these students, what a nightmare for law enforcement, what a nightmare for the school administration and law enforcement, particularly, as Shimon was just saying. I mean, they had just gotten to the scene. This is a huge campus and they're trying to secure the campus. One suspect is still at large. And as Shimon said, they're getting all of these leads or potential leads and trying to sift through them in the fog of war here.

CHARLES RAMSEY, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, yes, it's a large response, you have multiple jurisdictions that are responding. You have to coordinate what takes place now because they've got to do a search. That's a big campus. They've got to do a thorough search. So, they have to organize the people who have responded because they are going to have people through the various buildings, trying to find this individual who is responsible for this.

One thing that I think is very important that we say for those students that are right now on lockdown, stay where you are, do not venture out and do not let anyone into your area that you do not know. And so I think that's very, very important, they just stay put. I know it's been a while. I know they get a little antsy. But right now, that's the best course of action. Let the police do what they do, thoroughly search all the buildings, every area of the campus.

But it's going to take time. It's a very large campus. They've got a lot of response vehicles that have shown up, a lot of police officers. But now the trick is going to be coordinating it so that it's a systematic search of the campus to find this individual.

CAMEROTA: Chief, I'm so glad you're saying that, because as we know in these situations, many students do listen to live news feeds off and on CNN. So, I'm glad that you are reiterating that to them.

So, Juliette, you and I have talked so many times about hard targets versus soft targets. And, of course, by definition, a campus is a soft target. And even though it hardened our high schools, sadly, tragically, we've had to, and our elementary schools, tragically, we've had to, campuses are much harder.

JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Yes. I spent a lot of time on sort of campus security. They are cities. I mean, there are cafeterias and stadiums and concert halls and residential areas. They are many cities (ph). So, you're never going to be able to enclose them in the way that you can, say a high school that might have limited building. Also the residential aspect of it, the party aspect of it is very different because people are coming in and out. There were no identification systems. MSU and other major universities have lots of students living nearby, in housing. So, basically, we spent a lot of time on response, which is what do we know at the moment that it's known and what are you telling these young adults.

And I have to say from the moment this started, the Twitter feed in the communication by MSU has been incredibly -- I know people want more information sooner, but their primary goal is to protect students. They are still getting called a potential active shooter. They just got on Twitter about seven minutes ago with the suspect description and saying just possibly black. So, they're not even confirming the race of the suspect. They are still getting reports of potential active shooters. A lot of these are going to be false positives. People are nervous, we know that. But as Chief Ramsey said, stay put.

And then what you're seeing here is how an incident commands should work. We've talked -- Shimon and I have talked a lot about incident command after Uvalde. This is how it works. You've got to university and college police out in front. They have been, if they're doing it right, which they clearly have been working with local law enforcement emergency management. Those then in a case like this will search quickly into the surrounding areas, searching resources and even the state. I think I saw some state police. And that's how it's supposed to work until you essentially destroyed the threat, which they're not at yet.

So, that's what we're looking at right now. So, the students watching this, stay put and follow the communications of local public safety and verified public safety, not a lot of the noise that is going on, which always does in these cases.

CAMEROTA: Shimon, this is one of the biggest colleges in the country, I mean, 50,000 on the students right now. Can you imagine the scope of what these first responders and police have to deal with? And I know you and I are both seeing this latest police tweet. Can you read it to us?

PROKUPECZ: Yes. So, the latest tweet from the school police there, the Michigan State University Police, says that the -- this was several minutes ago. The suspect description is a short male with a mask, possibly back.

[22:10:04]

Please continue to shelter in place. And as we were talking about here moments ago, we are still receiving multiple calls of an active shooter on campus.

Of course, people are hiding. People are just scared for their life at this moment. They're in rooms around this campus and they're just maybe peaking out a window or seeing things somehow. And they're calling 911 just out of fear for their life because they really don't know what's going on and the fact that police are still here searching for the gunman. You talk about this being such a large university. Well, many of our colleagues here at CNN attended that school, and so some are just texting and letting me know that there's actually classes, night classes there. So, perhaps that's why students were there at this hour because there are night classes, and so that's probably why the students were there at this hour.

And so, as you said, it is a huge campus, there's a wooded area, there're lots of places for someone who would flee and run to hide and to try and escape. And so all of this is something that police now have to search, go through the woods, go through this area, to try and find this gunman, and then obviously get to students. Who knows how many students were there at this time given how large this area is.

And it's not only searching this one immediate area where this may have happen, but now they have to go through this entire campus and go through other rooms and go through other areas to make sure that they're not missing anything, to make sure the gunman is not hiding in any of those rooms, and obviously to make sure that there are no other victims.

And so given this response, it's probably going to take some time for that to happen as police here continue to search for this gunman and treat other victims. We know others have been injured. We know one, sadly, has died. We don't know if it's a teacher or a student. But obviously now the key is to try and figure out where this gunman is.

CAMEROTA: Okay. Folks, let's take a beat to check in with all of our sources on this. We're going to reset and we're going to take you a very quick break and we'll bring you back to the breaking news that we have out of Michigan State University. We'll be right back.

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[22:15:00]

CAMEROTA: We are in the middle breaking news here, a shooting at Michigan State University. A spokesperson for the university says one fatality is confirmed. We don't know if that is a student. We don't know if that is a staff member. We don't know that information yet.

Police believe there's only one suspect at the moment and they believe that person to be on foot. Police are searching for that suspect. They're advising everyone, students, staff, faculty to secure in place.

My colleague, Erin Burnett, spoke to a student just a short time ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NITHYA CHARLES, MSU STUDENT (voice over): Yes. We are in like a lounge area in our hall. There is a probably about 30 people over here. Everyone is obviously kind of stressed but seems to be calm right now.

ERIN BURNETT, CNN ANCHOR (voice over): Absolutely. Well, I'm glad you're all are together. As you, say there are 30 of you. I know we can hear some of you in the background. I'm not sure if that is an announcement there. But, Nithya, did you hear any shots fired or did anyone?

CHARLES (voice over): I did not hear shots fired but some of my co- workers who are in the union building heard definitely suspicious noises. And I know our facility staff who was in the building at the time did hear shots fired, yes.

BURNETT (voice over): Did hear shots fired, all right. Well, Nithya, please stay safe there.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Okay. We are back with Shimon Prokupecz, Juliette Kayyem and Charles Ramsey.

Shimon, I just want to read this latest tweet from the Michigan State University Police. I'm sure that there are lots of concern parents watching us right now. So, here's the latest that we have. Victims are currently being transported to Sparrow Hospital. Brody Hall, Snyder Phillips Hall, Mason Hall, Abbott Hall, Landon Hall, the MSU Union and Berkey Hall have all been cleared and secured.

So, that second part is good news, that all of these dorms or if these were just student common areas have been cleared and secure, very good news. The victims currently being transferred to Sparrow Hospital is not good news. Do we have any number on how many victims there are, Shimon?

PROKUPECZ: Yes. We don't have a number on the exact number of victims. We know that, as you see on our screen there, that at least one person has been reported dead, and that is according to the Detroit News, who spoke to the spokesperson for the school. The fatality, according to the Detroit News, occurred in Berkey Hall, which is one of the areas you just mentioned that was cleared. So, about seven buildings here, according to this latest tweet from the police that has been cleared. So, it sounds like the police are making some progress.

They don't know exactly how many buildings are there, but as you can imagine, given the size of this school, police here, this is, what, about an hour-and-a-half or so, nearly two hours since this happened. So, police are certainly making some progress in going through the school, going through the different areas in these buildings to try and secure them, find the victims.

But, you know, listening to the student that Erin spoke to, and you can hear the sounds in the background, I mean, I can't -- one can only imagine what students go through these days. You know, you're on class, you are doing activities at the school and now you are running for your life, hiding because there is a gunman on the loose there in the school.

So, right now, that is the priority, really, is for them to get to these students, make sure they're okay, and then, obviously, to find the gunman. The good news is, though, there have been some reports of shots fired. Police are not indicating that there has been any shooting since they arrived on campus. You can see so many of the ambulances there standing around, which is somewhat of an ominous sign there. But let's see what happens there as we try to figure out more from police and authorities there as we wait for an update.

But I do want to make one point, is that we are getting updates and we should be appreciative of that from the school police there that are updating us in tweets and updating for many of the family members who are at home watching this, waiting on word for their kids and their loved ones. So, we will wait now and see what happened here as we wait for more from -- to hear from police as they continue to search for this gunman, try and get to these students that are hiding in the various rooms around the school.

[22:20:13]

CAMEROTA: Yes, we are not going to get ahead of ourselves. We are just going to give information as Michigan State Police bring it to us. But, obviously, it is a very nerve-racking time.

I'm also joined here in studio by John Miller, one of our chief law enforcement experts. So, John, it is a huge, huge crime scene now. I mean, it is Michigan State University, one of the biggest schools in our country, 50,000 students are securing in place right now. Well, maybe some live off campus. But in any event, I can't imagine the daunting process for the police to go through this.

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, so far, it's a very well-organized process. Unfortunately, in America, law enforcement has been through this drill before, they are very well-trained. But what you're seeing here is multiple missions. Mission number one is to hunt for the gunman. So far, apparently no contact. Mission number two is there are a lot of people got shelter in place or heard shots and are hiding. So, they are going building by building. And they're getting calls and they're going to those places and they're getting people out into groups and then getting them out of the buildings.

At the same time, as Shimon said, you have these calls of shots fired that keep coming in. So far, police have responded to all of those. None of those has panned out as a new shooting. That can be cause of people who heard the original shots and say, we heard shots, we're hiding, and that gets translated differently. You have got a unified command. So, that means you have got the campus police, you've got the Lansing P.D., you've got the state police.

CAMEROTA: Who is in charge?

MILLER: It would be whoever is designated as the owner of this incident, most likely the campus police, possibly the state police. It is a call that they make on the scene as to who is going to be running the operation.

CAMEROTA: I mean, I asked is because Uvalde, of course, as Shimon knows all too well. And so are the campus police equipped to handle this or did they immediately hand it over to the state police?

MILLER: It is -- again, they're going to get together and decide who is making those calls. I think a lot of lessons were learned by Uvalde. At the same time, they have staging areas for the ambulances. Unified command is at a designated building since the gunman is possibly still at large. I'm not going to say which building but that is where they are running it out of. And they have a very organized and systematic approach.

What they do not have is who the gunman is, where the gunman is, and there are some conflicting descriptions of the gunman. What they're getting a lot of, and this is causing a lot of running around, is reports of two men with rifles, three men walking in the dark armed. And they are responding to those and determining that those are two and three and four-person police teams with long guns who are moving around, responding to the calls and trying to get people out.

So, right now, we are in a process. Now, by experience, we've seen a number of these things before. You have a gunman who struck and fled. You may have gunman who struck and took their own life by self- inflicted wound. Statistically, we see that in about half of the cases. Or you may have somebody who is waiting for a confrontation with the police. So, it's extraordinarily fluid.

CAMEROTA: Okay. Juliette, Charles Ramsey, please standby, we need to take another very quick break. And I know you have some new information for us on the other side too. We'll be right back.

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[22:25:00]

CAMEROTA: Our breaking news right now, one person reported dead in a shooting at Michigan State University. Police believe there's only one suspect involved. They believe that person to be on foot. There is a manhunt right now at this hour. They are advising everyone at Michigan State, from students to faculty, to secure in place right now. Do not leave the room that you are in.

We are back with Shimon Prokupecz, Juliette Kayyem, Charles Ramsey and John Miller.

Juliette, I had read before the tweet that's from Michigan State University saying that victims, plural, are being taken to this area hospital. What did you hear in the tweet?

KAYYEM: Yes. So, I saw a couple things and talking to people in terms of the emergency management world. So, Sparrow Hospital is a level one trauma center. It is only about a mile straight down Michigan Avenue from campus. So, this is where they intend students to go and if anything happens and where students would go. So, this has been properly trained through the incident command system, through learning and testing how best to transport students.

So, what I also -- based on my experience, I'm very careful here, and this may seem dark in how I describe it, the fact that other area hospitals have not been opened is actually good news. Because what the police would be doing is, of course, triaging students depending on their injuries or worse based on location to the university. That's how we do it, is you would have eight or nine different hospitals. The furthest hospital is the least harm students would go to. The most harmed students or faculty or staff would go to the closer ones.

The fact that we are hearing of no other hospitals being prepared for the sea of victims is -- in our dark world, is actually good. It means they do not need to trigger sort of more hospitals. So, this is based on experience, so I know what I'm reading at this stage. We've, unfortunately, all been through this enough. We also are seeing pictures of ambulances not moving. That's better than when ambulances do move.

So, we don't know what the number of injured is. We also don't know how they were injured because there is a lot of fear in these active shooter cases.

[22:30:04]

Kids run, they run over each other, they fall. So, we don't know how many of those are bullet wounds and how many of them are related to what happened.

So, that's basically where we are right now. And areas around the university also are sheltering in place. Just out of precaution, maybe he is on foot. We are now 90 -- 100 minutes after. He could be far, a couple of miles at least.

So, you're going to just see this manhunt continue. But that's basically how the command system works with the hospitals and what we can know from what they're saying about the area hospitals.

CAMEROTA: I really appreciate the caution, Julia, that you're advising that we all use, but I mean, I just want to say, yes, we have all learned said sadly, woefully from our experience with this and, you know, I can't help but think of Sandy Hook where the ambulances were there but they never got to take the students anywhere. And so, we just don't know. When we see that line of ambulances, I pray that's good news, but I just don't.

KAYEEM: I know. And I'm with you, too. But the more minutes that go by, I'm just saying, Alisyn, just we know this, which is also good in the sense that you're starting to see them, ease up is the wrong word, but begin to sort of release the students and the sheltering in place. This is as I'm -- you know, this could cut both ways.

But just the fact that they haven't opened up any more hospitals may be a hint to us, based on experience, that they are not seeing the movement of a lot of people, which is just, you know, based on what people in the field are saying they've opened up at the stage.

CAMEROTA: Yeah. I appreciate that too. So, Chief Ramsey, as we have been saying, this latest -- first of all, we just got information that there will be a news briefing from Michigan State University at 11:00 p.m. eastern, so in half an hour. Of course, we will bring that to you and we hope to have more information then.

But in the meantime, the fact that the police there tweeted out that all these seven different buildings, it sounds like some of them are dormitories. It sounds like they may be, I don't know, dining halls, student union, have been cleared and secured.

I mean, they are moving quickly. The police are moving quickly to get all, I mean, here again, it is a huge, huge university. But it sounds like they've been able to secure some important buildings.

CHARLES RAMSEY, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yeah. It does sound like that. But again, as I mentioned earlier, you have multiple agencies that have responded. One of the first things you do is coordinate that response and you can kind of tell from that number of buildings that have already been secured, a systematic search is taking place around the campus.

They'll continue to move in a way in which they can clear as many buildings as possible, as quickly as possible. They'll eventually clear them all. But right now, they are systematically going through the campus. The campus police no doubt is heavily involved in this they know the layout of the campus better than anyone else. And so, it's clear to me that they have all trained together and coordinated their response because this is moving pretty quickly right now. Which is good, which is good.

CAMEROTA: Absolutely. Let's bring in former deputy director of the FBI Andrew McCabe. Andrew, it's awful, awful news. I can't imagine how the parents feel watching us right now. I pray that they've been able to get in touch with any of their students -- 50,000 students go to Michigan State University.

But as we've been talking about this evening in terms of figuring out who is in charge, there is the Michigan State Police, the FBI are now involved. ATF is now involved. The campus police, of course, were the first, I think, on the scene. So, tell us how you think it will work.

ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yeah. So, sure, Alisyn. These situations are very complicated, but the campus police and the local police are certainly in the lead on any investigation of an actively like this. The FBI and the ATF and other federal law enforcement agencies come in to try to provide assistance and particularly tools and capabilities that local police might not have inherently. But, nevertheless, the local investigation and potential prosecution is the kind of front line in terms of driving the investigation and determining who ultimately will be held accountable.

CAMEROTA: John, I'm sure that the campus police there, certainly, at Michigan State University, but at every campus have -- do these drills and pray that it never happens.

JOHN MILLIER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: And they do them with other agencies.

[22:34:59] What you are looking for in the active shooter situation from law enforcement is immediate action, rapid deployment, which is when you hear the shots fired, when the calls go out, whoever gets there first, that is a contact team. If it's two campus police officers and two Lansing people or state police person, they form that initial contact team and move towards the threat to stop that threat.

When the second group gets there, whether it's mix and match or whether they're all from the same agencies, who has a long gun? Who has a radio? Who's taking points? Who's going to do communications? They form a second team and they go forward.

The good news is, what usually have is too many teams at some point, and somebody takes over command of the scene and says this is the systematic way we're going to do this. In this incident, what we're seeing is, because as you described, Ali, the size of the campus, the breath of the buildings, the number of people hiding in place it is -- if we -- if we're not making contact with the shooter, now we're searching for the shooter inside the buildings and outside the buildings.

In the, meantime, we have those people hiding. We're telling them to shelter in place until law enforcement reaches them. What we're seeing at this point, because now we're a bit into this incident is, you're seeing groups of 20 and 30 students getting together and saying, well, let's exit.

So, people who are handling the perimeters are seeing people exiting and then they have an entirely separate mission, which is, you don't want those people evaporating. What you want is immediate triage, is anybody hurt? Was anybody injured? And then you want something altogether different, which is witness triage.

Okay, what did you see? What did you hear? Nothing, nothing, okay. What did you, see what did you hear? And we've learned these lessons in places like San Bernardino where one of those people said, I saw the gunman, I think I know who it is. And that was the clue that actually put them on to the suspect. So, that has become something that they are employing here.

CAMEROTA: Let me just reset for all of our viewers who are just joining us right now. There is an active shooter situation at Michigan State University. One person has been killed. We don't know if that person is a student or a faculty or a staff member. They are searching -- currently, police are searching for the suspect.

They believe that he, likely, that's what the suspect has been described as, a male, fled on foot and there are multiple injuries. People have been taken to a local area hospital. We don't know the extent of those injuries.

I do want to bring in though right now who may have more information for us, John Turner, who is our CNN national security analyst. But Shawn, you are also a professor of national security communication at Michigan State University. Tell us what you know tonight. SHAWN TURNER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, it's been quite a

night. Earlier this evening around 8:15, we got a notice on our phones that there was an active shooter situation here on campus at Michigan State University. And as you might imagine, that sort of sent the entire campus into a state of heightened alert.

What I understand to be the case at this point is that the shooter is still on the move and as you reported, we have one person who we know is deceased and there are injuries on campus. What we are experiencing now is what often happens in these situations. Because the shooter has not been captured yet as we have students and faculty members and staff sheltered in locations around campus, everything begins to look suspicious.

And so, we're seeing lots of reports of shots fired. We're seeing lots of reports of suspicious individuals. And so, law enforcement right now is working very hard to isolate the location of this individual and to really try to make sure that those people who are sheltered, as John said, that we get the information that we need. We get them moved out of these locations where they are on lockdown. So, very tense situation here and a lot of friends and colleagues are very worried about what's happened here on campus at MSU tonight.

CAMEROTA: I can imagine. And Shawn, just out of, I mean, well, just because you're there, do you have a sense of who was killed or how many injuries there are?

TURNER: At this point, I don't. The early reports were -- were that we had one individual killed on the first floor in a place here called Berkeley Hall. But we don't, you know, that's not been confirmed yet. No idea if this is a student or faculty member or member of the staff at this point.

And also, as I said, Alisyn, you know, we've heard other reports of shots fired so we don't know if this was contained to that one incident at a hall here on campus. So, still a lot to learn and understand.

[22:40:01]

Right now, everyone is consumed with trying to make sure that there are teams from our campus are safe, you know, make sure that our students are safe because there are lots of parents all over the place who are very concerned about this.

CAMEROTA: There sure are. Well, Shawn, thank you very much for joining us. Obviously, we'll check back in with you throughout the course of this. We are very happy that you're safe and happy that you're there on campus for us tonight to give us the latest.

We also have new information from our reporter, Shimon Prokupecz. He's gathering that review with him momentarily. So, we're going to take a very, very quick break in bringing new information on the other side.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) CAMEROTA: Okay. We're back with the latest on our breaking news coverage tonight. One person is confirmed dead in this shooting tonight on the campus of Michigan State University.

[22:44:58]

It is still considered an active shooter situation because police have not found the suspect yet. They say that the suspected shooter is on foot, they believe. The description is that he is a short male with a mask. I also just got this in. This is from the Michigan State University spokesperson who says that Sparrow hospital, which is an area hospital near the university is treating five victims of this shooting.

The spokesperson says they are all in the emergency room. He would not comment on the severity of the injuries nor would he comment on whether or not there are any fatalities there. But we do know of one fatality so far. Five victims now at the hospital. I want to bring back Shimon Prokupecz's who has been reporting on this. We're also here with John Miller. Shimon, what do you have?

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yeah. So, think about this. You know, Shaun Turner kind of gave us who you were talking to just a short time ago, gave us a timeline of when this first alert went out, of shots fired sometime around 8:15. There were some reports that some of the first shots that were fired around 8:18 near this Berkeley Hall, we're hearing is where this fatality occurred.

So, we're closing in here on three hours. And at this time, police, number one, still looking for this gunman. But think about all of the students and faculty that are still sheltered in place hiding, fearful for their life as police still continue to search this massive campus.

So, at this hour, police are still going door to door inside these buildings trying to evacuate some of the students and faculty and staff members that are inside the school. We're waiting for police to hold a press conference here shortly in about 15 minutes or so. They said that they would do -- they would have one at 11:00.

But you know, as you said, we're getting updates from the police and from the school, which have been obviously very helpful certainly for us, but for family members as they say, five victims right now are being treated at Sparrow Hospital. The police also saying, tweeting that they are canceling all activities at the school for the next 48 hours including athletics, classes, and all campus related activities.

And they're telling faculty and students not to come to the campus tomorrow. So, key thing here now is that we know that there are five victims being treated at Sparrow. The gunmen still, it appears on the loose as police continue -- continue to try to evacuate students and faculty that are all still hiding in these classrooms now for almost three hours since this happened. And we're waiting for this police press conference hopefully soon within the next few minutes, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Yeah. I hope we get more information that we can share with the parents. John, do you have information on the students barricaded?

MILLER: Yeah. As they're going through these buildings, there's two things going on. As they are clearing the buildings, they are finding classrooms barricaded so that someone can't get through the door. And they are finding 20, 30, 10, 50 students who are behind these doors. And they are making arrangements to walk them out.

Again, you have to get to that critical information because we have an unknown gunman who is not in custody. So, the possibilities are that he's hold up or hiding in the building or that he left the scene on foot or by car or that he self-inflicted and is dead somewhere. But they don't know that.

So, what they're going to be asking all of these students as they bring them out of these classrooms and out of these buildings are, what did you see, what did you hear? Did you see the shooter? Do you know the shooter?

CAMEROTA: We are still joined by Shawn Turner who is our CNN national security expert and also a professor of national security communications at Michigan State University. He is there this evening. Shawn, in terms of students being barricaded, so, Michigan State University has night classes and so kids would have been in class during some of this?

TURNER: Yeah, absolutely, Alisyn. So, a lot of students would have gone to class this evening at 5:10 and those classes, many of those classes, go until 8:00 p.m. Some classes would go a little later. But even for those students who are not in class on a night like this, on Monday evening, there still would've been a lot of students out and about on campus after class, getting food and getting to their dorm rooms.

So, the campus would have been alive and vibrant when this happened. And as John said, you know, right now, we know that we have students still barricaded in places. The campus is still in lockdown status right now. We are seeing law enforcements clearing buildings and identifying where those students are and trying to walk those students out and ensure that they can get safe and contact family and friends. So, still a very uncertain situation here on campus.

CAMEROTA: Okay. We are awaiting a press conference by the police, university police to share what they know at this hour and who they are looking for at this hour.

[22:50:05]

That will be in roughly 10 minutes so we're going to take a very, very quick break and be right back with the latest.

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CAMEROTA: Okay, let me bring you up to speed on our breaking news tonight. There has been a shooting at Michigan State University. One person was killed. We do not know if it was a students or staff or faculty. There are also multiple injuries. This is all according to campus police. The campus police tweeted that the suspected gunman is, quote, "a short male with a mask." That's basically all we know, but they do believe he has fled and he is on foot.

[22:54:58]

They are actively searching for him right now. A local area hospital called Sparrow Hospital is treating five victims. This is according to, again, a campus police spokesperson. All campus activities are canceled for the next 48 hours including all of the sports and classes, all campus related activities, basically.

Police are tweeting, "Please do not come to campus tomorrow." Now, a news briefing is expected at 11 p.m. where we will hopefully find out more information about who was killed, about where the gunman is, who the gunman may be, the number of injuries.

We have a lot to learn on this very nerve-wracking night for all the students, some of whom are still sheltering in place as police try to comb through this incredibly large campus of 50,000 students. We have a lot to learn. We'll be back in just a few minutes. The press conference is five minutes from now. We'll be right back.

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