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CNN Sunday Morning

Police Briefing About to Get Under Way

Aired October 13, 2002 - 09:33   ET

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

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


RENAY SAN MIGUEL, CNN ANCHOR: We are waiting for a news conference from authorities in Montgomery County, for the latest on the search for the sniper. Let's go back to CNN's Bill Hemmer. He is in Montgomery County, Maryland. Good morning, Bill.
BILL HEMMER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Renay, good morning again to you. Not sure what we're going to hear from the briefing. Oftentimes, we've heard very little, and that does not necessarily indicate a measure of progress or a lack of progress. The chief is quite quick to point that out many times, just because they don't come to the podium with the facts doesn't necessarily mean that the investigation right now has been hamstrung or slowed down.

But I tell you, a few things we're picking up on today so far. It's quite possible at some point today there's going to be a photograph released of the Chevrolet Astro van that someone saw, maybe more than one person on Friday morning. That was the scene of the last shooting, when Kenneth Bridges, a father of six was gunned down at the Exxon in Fredericksburg, Virginia. That was just about 48 hours ago to the minute, 9:30 Eastern time on Friday morning.

Since that time, Renay, there have been no shootings connected to the serial sniper. We point that out, because interestingly enough, last weekend, there were no shootings as well. Entirely too early to say whether or not that pattern will hold true, but it's certainly something we're watching.

The other thing we may get today is a larger composite released. Late yesterday afternoon, essentially, the police chief came out and released the composite, called together by the eyewitness accounts by a number of people here in Montgomery County, describing the truck. In fact, we're going to show it out viewers once again here.

In the back of that truck, one very important characteristic is this indentation on the right rear bumper. Apparently, through the evening last night, a number of people have called in. There's been some confusion about how much damage is there on the right rear and what it looks like. So it's likely today we will get a larger photograph with a better description as to how much damage has been placed there. We're waiting for that briefing, Renay.

And as I tell you that, I can tell you, also, that the principle characters here in Rockville out doing the rounds on the network news today, earlier today, and the chief saying, he's stressing this now, that he's satisfied with the number of tips, he says the public cooperation has been tremendous, and they're still making progress. He makes that point repeatedly. But the puzzle has yet to come together.

Later, he said "I wish I could give you a name, I wish I could give you an address, I wish I could give you a mugshot. But at this point, we're not at that point today."

Possibly more in a matter of moments here. That's why we're standing and waiting for more from the chief, Renay.

SAN MIGUEL: If I can ask you just a quick question here, Bill, about -- I mean, every detail that they can provide about this truck or about this Chevy Astro van that they may be releasing pictures of obviously could trigger some memory in somebody, because what we've heard, this is a very highly populated area, but yet this killer or killers seem to be acting in complete isolation. Nobody has come forward yet. You would think after 10 incidents that somebody would come forward and say, you know, I noticed somebody acting suspicious, I saw this truck in my neighborhood. There's somebody who is having a fight with a wife or a girlfriend or whatever, and they have a history of working with rifles or something like this. We haven't even heard that yet. And that's got to be frustrating for law enforcement.

HEMMER: I think frustrating. I think confounding. I think perplexing. I think you can use a lot of those adjectives right now to explain and describe a bit of the feeling and reaction you're getting here.

One of the things the chief will say, though, is that the reason why they put out this van yesterday, this composite picture, though, they describe it as possibly an older van with older paint. Oxidized, they say, not with a clean sheen or a clean glean to it. And he is indicating today that he wants to know if anyone has any history of owning an auto shop around the area. Maybe someone brought a truck in like this over the past week, week and a half and had it repainted, or possibly even prior to that, maybe there was some work done where they came in and asked for some damage to be repaired on board that truck. But that's the plea going out.

And a few more characteristics quickly, Renay. A rolled-up door in the rear is how it's described to us. We talked about the bumper at great lengths. He's described as an older truck.

Two more interesting things about this. On the side of that truck, there is some sort of lettering that the witnesses could not describe or could not say for certain what the lettering said. And in the picture that's been released, there are essentially two lines of lettering. One is in rather bold letters across the middle part, and then smaller lettering just below that. But what it says, again, is a wide-open question. And the other point, though, still no license tag number. No license tag, no license plate given for what may be on the back of that truck, Renay.

SAN MIGUEL: Also, the idea here of the law enforcement authorities being on such, you know, the situation is very tense. You talked about how rapidly they were able to shut down the highways after the last shooting on Friday, and within seven minutes, they were searching cars. There was an incident that happened overnight, I understand, that also dictates just what the mood is like there in Washington, right?

HEMMER: Yeah, I'll tell you what happened last night. Right around midnight, just south of Washington, D.C., there was a murder that took place. A woman was killed with apparently severe trauma to the upper part of her body. And immediately, law enforcement responded as they have not just to murders in the area, but to incidents like road rage. There was an incident midweek last week where a man was firing off his rifle inside of his house, and immediately, there were a dozen cop cars around his house and they shut down the neighborhood.

It's that sense of -- I don't want to call it paranoia -- but it's that sense of response that you're getting throughout the entire area, because people are so aware right now that they need to act so quickly in order to catch this sniper or snipers, this man or this woman, whether it's one or person or two people, or possibly more than that.

With the case last night, they shut down a road for about 30 minutes and checked the freeway, locked down the exits and the on ramps before they could ascertain whether or not there was any connection to the serial sniper.

It was the same case on Friday morning down in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Within seven minutes, that plan of action that was put in place the day before went into action within seven minutes' time. But the killer had escaped that dragnet, and that, again, goes back to your point before, Renay. It is very confounding for all involved right now how this person can continue to slip the dragnet.

SAN MIGUEL: Whoever it is must know the geography of the area, as our retired FBI investigator Don Clark says, must know it like the back of his or her or their hands.

HEMMER: I think that's a great point, Renay. I think the other thing is that when you listen to investigators and they look at the area here, it's quite evident, at least in Montgomery County, anyway, and quite possibly down in Virginia that whoever this person is is very familiar with his surroundings. Does that mean he or she lives here, or he or she works there? That is an open issue at this point.

SAN MIGUEL: All right. Bill, stand by, because I know that we're waiting for that news conference to get started. We're going to take a quick break here.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired October 13, 2002 - 09:33   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RENAY SAN MIGUEL, CNN ANCHOR: We are waiting for a news conference from authorities in Montgomery County, for the latest on the search for the sniper. Let's go back to CNN's Bill Hemmer. He is in Montgomery County, Maryland. Good morning, Bill.
BILL HEMMER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Renay, good morning again to you. Not sure what we're going to hear from the briefing. Oftentimes, we've heard very little, and that does not necessarily indicate a measure of progress or a lack of progress. The chief is quite quick to point that out many times, just because they don't come to the podium with the facts doesn't necessarily mean that the investigation right now has been hamstrung or slowed down.

But I tell you, a few things we're picking up on today so far. It's quite possible at some point today there's going to be a photograph released of the Chevrolet Astro van that someone saw, maybe more than one person on Friday morning. That was the scene of the last shooting, when Kenneth Bridges, a father of six was gunned down at the Exxon in Fredericksburg, Virginia. That was just about 48 hours ago to the minute, 9:30 Eastern time on Friday morning.

Since that time, Renay, there have been no shootings connected to the serial sniper. We point that out, because interestingly enough, last weekend, there were no shootings as well. Entirely too early to say whether or not that pattern will hold true, but it's certainly something we're watching.

The other thing we may get today is a larger composite released. Late yesterday afternoon, essentially, the police chief came out and released the composite, called together by the eyewitness accounts by a number of people here in Montgomery County, describing the truck. In fact, we're going to show it out viewers once again here.

In the back of that truck, one very important characteristic is this indentation on the right rear bumper. Apparently, through the evening last night, a number of people have called in. There's been some confusion about how much damage is there on the right rear and what it looks like. So it's likely today we will get a larger photograph with a better description as to how much damage has been placed there. We're waiting for that briefing, Renay.

And as I tell you that, I can tell you, also, that the principle characters here in Rockville out doing the rounds on the network news today, earlier today, and the chief saying, he's stressing this now, that he's satisfied with the number of tips, he says the public cooperation has been tremendous, and they're still making progress. He makes that point repeatedly. But the puzzle has yet to come together.

Later, he said "I wish I could give you a name, I wish I could give you an address, I wish I could give you a mugshot. But at this point, we're not at that point today."

Possibly more in a matter of moments here. That's why we're standing and waiting for more from the chief, Renay.

SAN MIGUEL: If I can ask you just a quick question here, Bill, about -- I mean, every detail that they can provide about this truck or about this Chevy Astro van that they may be releasing pictures of obviously could trigger some memory in somebody, because what we've heard, this is a very highly populated area, but yet this killer or killers seem to be acting in complete isolation. Nobody has come forward yet. You would think after 10 incidents that somebody would come forward and say, you know, I noticed somebody acting suspicious, I saw this truck in my neighborhood. There's somebody who is having a fight with a wife or a girlfriend or whatever, and they have a history of working with rifles or something like this. We haven't even heard that yet. And that's got to be frustrating for law enforcement.

HEMMER: I think frustrating. I think confounding. I think perplexing. I think you can use a lot of those adjectives right now to explain and describe a bit of the feeling and reaction you're getting here.

One of the things the chief will say, though, is that the reason why they put out this van yesterday, this composite picture, though, they describe it as possibly an older van with older paint. Oxidized, they say, not with a clean sheen or a clean glean to it. And he is indicating today that he wants to know if anyone has any history of owning an auto shop around the area. Maybe someone brought a truck in like this over the past week, week and a half and had it repainted, or possibly even prior to that, maybe there was some work done where they came in and asked for some damage to be repaired on board that truck. But that's the plea going out.

And a few more characteristics quickly, Renay. A rolled-up door in the rear is how it's described to us. We talked about the bumper at great lengths. He's described as an older truck.

Two more interesting things about this. On the side of that truck, there is some sort of lettering that the witnesses could not describe or could not say for certain what the lettering said. And in the picture that's been released, there are essentially two lines of lettering. One is in rather bold letters across the middle part, and then smaller lettering just below that. But what it says, again, is a wide-open question. And the other point, though, still no license tag number. No license tag, no license plate given for what may be on the back of that truck, Renay.

SAN MIGUEL: Also, the idea here of the law enforcement authorities being on such, you know, the situation is very tense. You talked about how rapidly they were able to shut down the highways after the last shooting on Friday, and within seven minutes, they were searching cars. There was an incident that happened overnight, I understand, that also dictates just what the mood is like there in Washington, right?

HEMMER: Yeah, I'll tell you what happened last night. Right around midnight, just south of Washington, D.C., there was a murder that took place. A woman was killed with apparently severe trauma to the upper part of her body. And immediately, law enforcement responded as they have not just to murders in the area, but to incidents like road rage. There was an incident midweek last week where a man was firing off his rifle inside of his house, and immediately, there were a dozen cop cars around his house and they shut down the neighborhood.

It's that sense of -- I don't want to call it paranoia -- but it's that sense of response that you're getting throughout the entire area, because people are so aware right now that they need to act so quickly in order to catch this sniper or snipers, this man or this woman, whether it's one or person or two people, or possibly more than that.

With the case last night, they shut down a road for about 30 minutes and checked the freeway, locked down the exits and the on ramps before they could ascertain whether or not there was any connection to the serial sniper.

It was the same case on Friday morning down in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Within seven minutes, that plan of action that was put in place the day before went into action within seven minutes' time. But the killer had escaped that dragnet, and that, again, goes back to your point before, Renay. It is very confounding for all involved right now how this person can continue to slip the dragnet.

SAN MIGUEL: Whoever it is must know the geography of the area, as our retired FBI investigator Don Clark says, must know it like the back of his or her or their hands.

HEMMER: I think that's a great point, Renay. I think the other thing is that when you listen to investigators and they look at the area here, it's quite evident, at least in Montgomery County, anyway, and quite possibly down in Virginia that whoever this person is is very familiar with his surroundings. Does that mean he or she lives here, or he or she works there? That is an open issue at this point.

SAN MIGUEL: All right. Bill, stand by, because I know that we're waiting for that news conference to get started. We're going to take a quick break here.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com