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Nine Killed In "Hate Crime" Church Massacre in South Carolina. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired June 18, 2015 - 08:30   ET

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

[08:30:00] CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: There were presidential candidates there. Hillary Clinton was there. Jeb Bush was supposed to come down. Obviously, they're going to cancel political events. Now I say obviously. Is it -- isn't what we need, in a situation like this, the leadership? This is when your fabric is being tested. Who are you? What do you value? What do you do to those who attack what you value? This is a time for leadership as well.

GOV. BOBBY JINDAL (R), LOUISIANA: It is, but it's also time to give these authorities space to hunt down and track this killer. It's time to give these families space.

Look, I'm glad they canceled their political events. If there's an opportunity, if they happen to be there, if they want to go in a worship service, I think that would be appropriate. If they want to go and support the community.

Let me say this. One of the rays of hope and one of the very, very few bright things you see in this, you listen, you watch, you hear the response of the community and you hear them -- you're right, this is -- you brought them together and you hear them talk about -- and I've been listening and watching all morning and you've seen the senators' colleagues, you've seen other members of the church, you've seen the leaders in the local NAACP and the Christian community and other pastors all speak saying, we're going to pray, we're going to heal, we're going to provide love and support to these families.

Look, these are incredible people. I think most of us watching this are thinking, if that had happened in our community, I mean the first impulse is hate and revenge. And it's an understandable human emotion when something this awful as happened to your friends, your family members. And what you're hearing from this incredible community is, we're going to pray and we're going to come together. And we're going to come back to this church. We're not going to stop praying and we're not going to stop having Bible studies here. We're not going to stop having services here. We're going to remember these lives. We're going to honor their lives. We're going to -- we know what they would want us to do.

That's very impressive. And as a Christian, I'm -- it's encouraging me to see people of faith try to come together and, through their faith, try to make some sense out of this. Keep that eternal perspective. If you do have faith, if you do believe, Christian or otherwise, but as a Christian, if you do believe that there is another life after this, that, you know, bad things, awful things happen to good people. Things that we can't always understand or explain. And sometimes I struggle to explain to my kids, when they see -- when they ask me, dad, why did this happen? And, you know, our faith teaches us and --

CUOMO: Faith is important at a time like this. It's unfortunate it was also the garget.

JINDAL: Well, that's right. It's -- sometimes it's hard to make sense of life without faith. I honestly don't understand how you can comprehend and deal with evil sometimes without faith.

CUOMO: Well, this is just the beginning of this process. The worst also is a test of people to be at their best and we're seeing it early on down there and we'll stay on this story.

Governor, thank you for joining us. Thank you for the meaningful words.

JINDAL: Well, thank you for having me. Our praying are with the people in Charleston, South Carolina.

CUOMO: Appreciate it.

Mic.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Well, a few things are clear, the nation is praying for the people of South Carolina, Charleston in particular. We also know that a manhunt continues right now, looking for the gunman who killed nine people, storming into a historic African- American church. That suspect is on the loose. We're going to talk to a man who has a very specific view on this area, this district. Congressman Mark Sanford will join us about the shooting in his district.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The victims, there are three males and six female victims in this tragedy.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're going to put our arms around that church and that church family.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:37:04] PEREIRA: So we're watching this breaking news. A horrifying massacre inside a historic black church in Charleston, South Carolina. Nine people shot and killed during a Bible study.

We're learning from a local state senator that 13 people, including the shooter, were inside that class. There were three survivors. We're told that one of them was a young girl.

The shooter remains on the loose. Look at these pictures very closely. Police have released these images. Authorities were very quick to label the shooting a hate crime because of what the shooter apparently said and did before he opened fire.

We want to bring in South Carolina Congressman Mark Sanford. This shooting happened in his district. He is also the former South Carolina governor.

And it is with a tremendously heavy heart that we -- we talk today. I can see the grief in your face, sir. First of all, this is a terrible day in your district. Tell me what you're hearing from the people you're speaking to.

REP. MARK SANFORD (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: Shock, disbelief, incredible sorrow. And, frankly, a real sense of quandary, of, I don't understand, this doesn't make any sense to me, which indeed it doesn't.

PEREIRA: Well, I also know that this hits quite close to home. Clementa Pinckney, who was a state senator and the pastor of Mother Emanuel AME Church was a colleague in the Senate. He was there the entire time you were governor. You obviously knew this man well.

SANFORD: I did. And you want to talk about somebody who lived and walked this notion of faith. He did. I mean I cannot say enough good things about Clementa. He was a remarkable human being. He had a gravely, deep voice. I mean a radio announcer's voice, if you will. And he approached life with that same level of gravitas. I mean just very serious, very thoughtful. An incredibly considerate and warm human being. He served the low country of South Carolina, mid-south. I think it was a real honor that he would be asked to pastor at this church, given its historic significance in Charleston.

PEREIRA: Well, he was a father, a husband, he was a pastor, he was a politician, he was active there in the legislature. There are going to be so many people mourning his loss.

The quandary, I want to get to you about that, because it is a quandary. Were you aware, in your time as governor, of concern about threats against houses of worship in your state?

SANFORD: No. This is so out of place. And that's why people are shocked. They're in disbelief. I think that Mayor, you know, Riley said it well this morning. I think that Chief Mullen said it well. I think a whole host of community leaders have said it well, which is, this is out of character for Charleston, for South Carolina. it does not make sense. It's an outlier. It immediately needs to be dealt with. And you're, again, you're left, again, in disbelief, but, obviously, with thoughts and prayers to the families affected.

PEREIRA: Yes, and an active manhunt underway right now to find this person and get them -- him off the street before he commits any other atrocities.

[08:40:08] I want to talk about what we heard one of the pastors of a neighboring church to Mother Emanuel AME said a little earlier on our program here. He said that there's a lack of racial harmony in your state and talked about the importance of reducing violence. Do you agree? Do you see it that way? And, if so, what do you think the solutions are?

SANFORD: I would say, no, I don't see it that way. I mean we come from a strained past based on slavery existing in our state, as it did in other colonies. And that's a regretful past. But ultimately past is past. And so I think that there are a lot of people, black, white and other in our community working to make things work.

One of the first calls I put this morning was in to Lonnie Randolph, who's head of the NAACP and he's been a longtime friend both before and during my time in governorship and since. And he's been a real friend. And so, I -- you know, I think that racial relations, ultimately, are handled one at a time. And there will always be outliers. There will always be bad apples in any basket. But I think that if your look in Charleston, if you look in Charleston County, the tri-county area, the state as a whole, there are a lot of people out there working daily with friends that they work with, friends that they know, friends that they worship with toward better race relations in our state and as a consequence in the region.

PEREIRA: Well, as a congressman, you're going to be on the front lines of some of the conversations about what to do now, because clearly churches want to leave their doors open. They don't want to lock them down. They want to leave them open to the faithful and to those in need, but there are going to be great questions about security at our houses of worship.

Congressman Sanford, thanks so much for joining us. And, again, our condolences to you and to your colleagues in the legislature.

SANFORD: Thank you.

PEREIRA: Chris.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: All right, the big question now is, where is this murderer and how do the authorities go about finding him? We know that law enforcement has put out his picture. They're asking everybody for help. This could be his vehicle. This is certainly who they believe the suspect is. We'll give you the latest on their efforts in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:45:40] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Back to our breaking news. Nine people shot and killed inside an historic South Carolina church during a prayer meeting. An active search underway at this hour for the gunman. Police releasing this image of the suspect. It's the most clear image that we have. And they're asking for the public's help in bringing him in.

Also, CNN has just learned that the Justice Department will be opening a hate crime investigation into this shooting.

Let's turn for more information to law enforcement and security analyst, Matthew Horace, and Joseph Giacalone; he's our former detective sergeant for the New York Police Department and now a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. Gentlemen, it's great to have you onset with us.

We are learning more information about what happened during that horrible hour inside the church just before 9:00 p.m. last night. 13 people total were inside, we hear. Nine of them were killed. Three of them three survived, two of them unharmed.

We spoke to the president for the NAACP in Charleston. Dot Scott is her name. She told us that last night she had talked to come of the victims' families and what they reported - They all reported the same thing. She talked to a half dozen of them. That the gunman said that he was letting one of these women live so that she could go out and report what happened. He then took off, as we know, and there's an active search underway.

What does this tell you, if anything, about the character of who police are looking for?

MATTHEW HORACE, FORMER ATF AGENT: Well, he has some sort of an ego and he wants to be seen as sort of like a god complex. He wants people to respect the work that he did and that's why he left those people living, to be able to tell the story.

CAMEROTA: Let's look at the latest photographs. These are snapshots of surveillance video. They have been enhanced by the police. They're much clearer than what we had an hour ago. One hour ago they put these out. Joe, what do you see, as an investigator, when you look at this photograph?

JOSEPH GIACALONE, FORMER NYPD DETECTIVE SERGEANT: Well definitely, we have to find out what that insignia is and plus, what's on his vehicle in the front of his plate. It might be like a symbol from a local college or something like that. We don't know yet. But these are investigative clues that the detectives are going to be running with.

CAMEROTA: He has a piece of black fabric or a fanny pack?

GIACALONE: Yeah, it looks like a fanny pack, you know, where you can -- They have them for firearms. You can put your firearm in there, keep rounds, clips, whatever you have. They're pretty popular, especially in the warmer climates where you can't wear pants because it's too hot.

CAMEROTA: I mean, Matthew, you were saying because police have this photograph this gets them started. I mean, this is a huge clue.

HORACE: This is a huge clue. Let me tell you what's going to happen next. They're going to identify the vehicle, the approximate year of the vehicle. They're going to check the registry in South Carolina and determine how many of those vehicles exist in the state. They're going to run each and every one, look and see if there are any of them locally and try to develop and narrow down on a number of suspects and finally on one suspect.

CAMEROTA: So then, Joe, how do they find -- Once they get some real information on who might have rented this vehicle or owned this vehicle, then what do they do? GIACALONE: Well, you're going to actually have to go to these

locations and find out based on, you know, the demographics. Male, white, you're going to be looking for, approximately 20 to 30 years of age. So you're going to narrow out a bunch of cars. But we don't even know if this car is not even stolen, too, so that's something else that has to be thought about as they're doing this.

CAMEROTA: Sure. But I mean, the fact that you get such a good glimpse of this person, chances are, I'm guessing, that they already have a name for this person.

HORACE: I would think by now. It's been almost ten hours and investigators have been on the case. Someone out there knows who this is and based on the nature of this crime, someone is going to and will give it up.

CAMEROTA: The good news is they say they have hundreds of leads already that they are pursuing. Matthew, Joe, thanks so much for being on set with us to walk us through all of this.

GIACALONE: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Let's get over to Michaela.

[08:49:13] PEREIRA: Nine people dead in this shooting. Police are not hesitating to call it a hate crime. We're going to talk about the role race might have played and why.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CUOMO: We are following breaking news this morning. Nine people have been shot and killed inside an historic black church in Charleston, South Carolina. We have a picture of the alleged shooter. This is who was identified as a 20-something-year-old male, you can see, slender build, about 5'9". They believe, the authorities locally, that this is his vehicle. That front plate, they don't believe to be a license plate. It's a vanity plate. And they are asking for any help in finding him. There is no word that he has been located in anyway. So this is an ongoing manhunt there.

Six females, three males lost their lives, including the pastor, who was a state senator in South Carolina and a man who loomed very large in the community.

Let's bring in David Mack; he's a South Carolina state representative as well and a radio host. What can you tell us about what the pastor meant to you and what he meant to this community?

DAVID MACK III (D-SC), STATE REPRESENTATIVE AND RADIO HOST: He meant so much to us. Senator and Reverend Clementa Pinckney and I entered the South Carolina state legislature 19 years ago. This would have been our 19th year together. He entered at 23, very focused, very smart, very compassionate, very caring, as it relates to the community, and had the perfect blend of being a pastor and being an elected official, a servant to people. And he was my friend. So right now, individually and collectively, this community is in a lot of pain, as well as all the other folks that were killed with attending a bible study, prayer service.

CUOMO: Just about the worst circumstances imaginable. The contrast between people getting together for all the right reasons and being killed for all the wrong reasons. The mayor came out right away and said we are going to love our way through this as a community. But - And that is obviously being respected down there by people of all faiths and all colors -- But the idea that this was designated as a hate crime, what does that mean to you?

MACK: Well, you know, I think it's obvious. And I think -- I was at the press conference when the mayor made that comment. Anyone that would go into a church -- and of course, race is a factor, this is a young white male, this is a historically African-American church -- And commits this type of act, it is a hate crime. It is hate. It is pure hate.

[08:55:02] And I think one of the things that we have to take this moment, that we have to use this moment for, is to heal as a country. It's not just the South. It's not just South Carolina. It's the United States. And right now we are operating -- I've said this before the tragedy on yesterday, we have some healing to do as a country because to me, there's just too much hate right now.

CUOMO: All right. Senator, thank you very much for joining us. I'm very sorry for the loss of your friend and the loss to that community of the victims as well as the Pastor Pinckney and all that he was doing there. We will continue to cover this story for this healing that you say is all important. Thank you, sir.

We're going to continue our coverage right now because although we know who police believed murdered nine people in a black church in South Carolina, he is still on the loose. That coverage is going to get picked up with Carol Costello in the "NEWSROOM" right after this break. Stay with CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED POLICE OFFICER (voice-over): Several victims regarding that active shooter. Give me at least four medic units.

MAYOR JOSEPH RILEY, SOUTH CAROLINA: The only reason someone could walk into a church and shoot people praying is out of hate.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You tell people to go to work -- do right, go to church. These people were in church. Were in church!

[08:59:58] RILEY: We will bring that person to justice as soon as possible.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are communities trying to live and survive. Why do we have to live like this?