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Wolf

Baltimore Tense after Looting, Rioting. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired April 28, 2015 - 13:30   ET

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

[13:30:00] WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Because there was at lot of indications throughout the day, especially since Saturday night, that this could turn ugly?

NICK MOSBY, BALTIMORE DISTRICT COUNCIL MEMBER: I know about 10:00 we tried to send e-mails off and know what the appropriate tactical steps and what we should communicate to the community. Unfortunately, we really haven't seen urban rioting like this since the '60s. I mean, folks have constantly compared this to Ferguson, but it's a total different monster. West Baltimore is blocks upon blocks of streets and houses with abandoned buildings and abandoned residencies and good incubator for rioting like this. One thing I want to stress is that, unfortunately, through this violence which is going to overshadow probably 90 percent of the peaceful protesting, these folks, I don't condone any of it, unacceptable, and we must development enforcement to go after them, but these folks are expressing anger and us from decades of systemic and structural issues in the poor urban communities. This is not a west Baltimore thing. This is an urban American thing. After we get calm, after, you know, we're able to calm the situation down, it's critically important that we develop priorities of going out there and providing real opportunities for the young men and women crying out for help.

BLITZER: We are just getting word, Nick, that as you can see on the screen, there have been according to police, 235 arrests, 34 of them juveniles, juveniles you were talking about social media, talking about that film "Purge" that seemed to instigate some of this, tell us what was going on?

MOSBY: Yesterday, I have a young guy in my office from the community who works in my office who reached out to me and told me that his social media feed was filled with meet at Mondawmin and we'll purge the city from Mondawmin to downtown and kept getting it on Facebook, on Twitter, kept getting it on Instagram and so we immediately reached out and we found out that it was true and accurate. The police probably met the demonstrators with 50 to 70s officers and armored tanks and basically pushed the activity south on to the street which is a main east/west thoroughfare called west avenue. The protesters took it completely out of hand when like I said I was stuck, I saw police cars windows bashed out and it really continued for hours. And again, unfortunately, you know, that time period of about ten minutes of all the events that have taken place over the past two weeks is going to really overshadow all the productivity that's come out of folks trying to really exercise their right and movement. BLITZER: If you can stay with us, I want bring back Cedric

Alexander; also from Los Angeles, the former chief of police, Bernard Parks.

What's your reaction when you hear the city councilman make those points, Bernard?

BERNARD PARKS, LOS ANGELES CITY COUNCIL MEMBER & FORMER CHIEF OF POLICE, LOS ANGELES POLICE DEPARTMENT: Something evidence in many of our cities, poverty, lack of education, under education, unemployment, large return of people out of the state prison system, these are the same issues that were relevant in '65 riot in Los Angeles, same issues that were relevant if the '92 riot and if you go through our communities and you add homelessness, mental illness, and the issue of veterans not being able to come back into their community, these are the same elements here today. So you can use the police or the city government as a poster child for these failures but if you don't get into the issue of the poverty, mental illness, mental health, what do you do rehabilitating people out of prison, how do you educate our children, why are we still in today's age under educating a large population of children, particularly in minority communities. This will continue to fester.

BLITZER: Cedric, you're on the president's commission to come up with better policing techniques, better ways to deal with the kinds of problems. You heard the president of the United States make his points just a little while ago in the rose garden at the White House. What long term we know there are enormous problems out there, but what needs to be done immediate lily right now to make sure we don't have another night like last night?

CEDRIC ALEXANDER, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL ORGANIZATION OF BLACK LAW ENFORCEMENT EXECUTIVES: That document that we were directed by the president to put together, it is very clear in there. There's six pillars in there, Wolf, and one of them the beginning the first pillar is building trust and legitimacy between police and community. If you were to go through that document and I encourage everyone to pull it down from the U.S. Justice Department site, in there, there are things we can do right at this minute to begin to build relationships in our recruitment process, the police officers, in our training, in the technology that we know we need going forward, but it is very, very important, regardless even of what's happening in Baltimore at this very moment, relationship building is key and it's going to be a very important as that community and other communities across this country continue to move forward.

[13:35:16] BLITZER: Nick Mosby, you're a councilman. We know there's a state of emergency in Baltimore right now. That's understandable. We know schools have been closed, not going to be a Major League Baseball game, the Orioles aren't going to play because of the 10:00 p.m. curfew in part, and there are thousands, literally several thousand National Guard troops on standby to come into your city if necessary. If the community starts seeing National Guard troops, military personnel, joining local and state police on the streets of Baltimore, what will be the impact? MOSBY: I mean, immediate shock. It's real to sit and see tanks,

you know, coming down streets and, you know, armored folks around the city but it's surreal to see buildings burning, cars on fire, folks running around with masks. At the end of the day no one wants to be in a police state but it's also critically important we attack this issue and attack it immediately. We have to defuse and deescalate this as soon as possible and need the subject matter expertise to make it happen. Obviously, you know, the situation has escalated throughout yesterday into the night and we cannot afford as a city, community, country to see that again broadcasted throughout the world. These kids are not just Baltimore kids, these are American kids. And we have to get to them. We have to make sure the folks causing the unproductive rioting make sure we provide the right enforcement. And again, I will continue to stress I do not condone it. It's illegal. And we have to go after it. But we have to calm the situation as quickly as possible because the longer we allow it to go on the more destruction that could happen and the further the chasm between the criminal justice system, police and community will continue to grow. This is an issue that's going to take time to heal and nothing that's going to happen overnight but we have to deescalate the situation as quickly as possible.

BLITZER: Well said.

Nick Mosby, if you don't mind, stand by.

Cedric Alexander, Bernard Parks as well.

Up next, we will speak with a leader of the community, Congressman Elijah Cummings. He's standing by. He took to the streets to stop the violence last night. He lives in this community. We'll ask him what's going on right now, what needs to be done. Representative Elijah Cummings joins our conversation after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[13:41:13] BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There's no excuse for the kind of violence we saw yesterday. It is counter productive. When individuals get crowbars and start prying open doors to loot, they're not protesting. They're not making a statement. They're stealing. When they burn down a building, they're committing arson. And they're destroying and undermining businesses and opportunities in their own communities.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Strong words from the president of the United States in the Rose Garden just a little while ago condemning the violence that erupted on the streets of Baltimore last night.

Once again, Nick Mosby is joining me, a Baltimore district councilman; and Cedric Alexander, the president of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives; and Bernard Parks, the Los Angeles city councilman, former chief of the LAPD. You hear the president, Bernard Parks, make a strong statement

like that, what goes through your mind?

PARKS: I think those are statements that are necessary, but Wolf, I think what we keep going through these processes and whether no matter what city they're in, I think we're missing one of the major points that is, we keep critiquing whether -- how the police handles a circumstance in which they have little power to change. The real problems in our society have to do with things outside of the police department. We can create all kinds of relationships with the public, but if you can't provide them a job, can't provide them mental health, can't provide them with the things that are necessary in the communities like drug stores, grocery stores, then the police are just dealing with symptoms and when they break out as it relates to issues throughout our nation the police are critiqued on how they handled it. The real problems in our society are not within the police departments wherewithal or expertise. The police department can do little about poverty. They can do little about education. These are things that keep getting overlooked. If you go back to the '65 riots in L.A., and you read all the reports that identify what the problems were, many of them still exist, and yet we're still critiquing how the police responds when there is an outbreak.

BLITZER: That's a fair point. The president made that point as well, part of a much bigger picture. The police can't control the issue of poverty, a bigger issue that has to be assessed.

Cedric Alexander, the Baltimore Police Department just updated us and said there have been 235 arrests. Of those 235, 34 juveniles and 201 adults but adults mostly in the range of 18 to 30. And we're trying to figure out if these people arrested were local residents of the chance from Baltimore or so-called outside agitators. At least the initial impression we're getting, these are local residents of the community, not necessarily outside agitators. That's significant, right?

ALEXANDER: Well, it is significant and significant in the sense that it tells you that there are people who are indigenous to that community where we're seeing these problems today and last night, that are making themselves known and are pushing back against the police. But, you know, I tell you, Councilman Parks is so much right on point in terms of what he's saying. This is a much larger social issue. Police departments are left to do the work, and the fact that we are left to do the work, it -- the fact of the matter is, this is what we have to contend with. So we still have to build those relationships, we still have to look to technology to help us as we advance policing in the 21st century, because there's some things right here, right now, that we can do. Are they largely systemic issues? They are, Wolf, but there are things we can do here and now to help build and grow our communities.

[13:45:25] BLITZER: A lot of stuff all of us need to do to fix this problem. That will take a long time.

Nick Mosby, what do you think of the way the mayor and the police chief have handled this crisis since the death of Freddie -- the death that happened almost two weeks or so ago?

MOSBY: Wolf, I think there's been significant challenges, but, you know, it's really important for us to focus on maybe not Monday morning quarterbacking, what hasn't been done, but how can we handle and address things going forward. We have to take a succinct and sound approach to calming the city down and the subject matter experts who can perform that. If I could comment on the conversation prior, you know, you're right, police officers can't change socioeconomic issues and communities. However police officers like any public servant, teachers or firefighters, is critically important that we have sound and quality relationships with the communities that we decide to serve as public servants. I think that that's the main issue. It's you're right, social economic issues are there, but why is this prevalence of distrust with our communities and the law enforcement and why do time and time again we run into these issues where seemingly healthy young men goes in and 40 minutes later is paralyzed.

BLITZER: Those are excellent questions and important issues.

Nick Mosby, standby.

Ryan Young, is our correspondent, on the streets of Baltimore.

Give us an update. What's the latest over there, Ryan?

RYAN YOUNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, 10 seconds ago, you missed a stirring scene here. The community has taken over the intersection here. They started singing "Amazing Grace." And look at this crowd, there are all walks of life. Listen to them clapping and watch how long and big the circle is. The circle is wide. And now they're screaming "peace and unity." They sung "Amazing Grace" three times. This is -- you can hear it. They want peace. And this has been sort of -- you can see how people have taken over while people have started cleaning the CVS across the way. No tension here right now. This is more Baltimore coming forward and showing what they really -- what they told us what they want to show the world is that they can come back together. The police have faded in the back. Wolf, look back in this direction, that's the police line. You don't really see them anymore. They've been separated because of the crowd.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Peace, unity and save our brothers. Peace, unity, and save our brothers.

YOUNG: Why do you think this is important to be here right now?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is important right now. We're in a pivotal moment. There are multiple things going on right now. One of the most important things I think the message that the city councilman and the city representative sent out yesterday it was a sad message. The mayor got on public, got on national television and called her, said these were her children and also said these were the thugs of the city and the same breath. You can't call the children of the city and the thugs of the city the same thing.

YOUNG: Are you glad everybody is coming together? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It shows that -- it shows naturally unity and

peace naturally reside. Naturally humanity, we possess a unity and peace that naturally lives on the inside of us and this shows us.

YOUNG: You can hear the passion from people who have decided to come out on their own and sort of police themselves. Once again, Wolf, police have faded to the background, people singing and the tension has washed away so far.

BLITZER: All right. Ryan, standby.

Let me get reaction to what we JUST heard.

Nick Mosby, you heard -- unfortunately, Nick Mosby had to leave.

Let me get Bernard Parks to react to what he just heard from the one protester. He was upset that the mayor of Baltimore referred to some of those individuals as thugs, presumably, those who ransacked the store, went in looting, started the fires, destroyed police and other civilian vehicles. They weren't happy with that.

PARKS: The issue is whether -- there's many times in these circumstances that we get taken off course and we can debate and dissect a word and lose sight of the larger issue. The people involved with breaking in buildings and looting are criminals involved in criminal activity and there's no way that you can shine that and make it anything different. So the issue is, you can spend a lot of time depending -- I used the word criminal and the mayor thug and lose sight of the issue of why are we having fires in Baltimore and how did we get to this point. I think the issue is important for the media and everyone involved to stay as focused as you can on the main issues and the resolution and at some point we're going we'll come to grips with the fact that the major issues in our community, although we do need relationships with the police and community, they only go so far if that person in the community can't get a job, if that person is mentally ill and can't get care. These are major issue in our community that we need to resolve. They haven't changed in the last five decade that I've been in public service. So the key is again, let's not get distracted. Let's not get to the point of dealing with issues that are picking specks in the sense of looking at things very minutely. Let's stay on focus and let's stay with the larger issue of solving the problem and find out where the symptoms are, the things that we spend a lot of time on, and the symptoms rarely take us to a conclusion of success.

[13:51:04] BLITZER: Yep. Hard to believe this stuff is going on in a city like Baltimore now.

Bernard Parks, stay with us.

Let's take a break, resume our special coverage right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:54:49] BLITZER: We're standing by for a live news conference from the Baltimore city police. At the top of the hour, we'll have live coverage here. Get the latest information.

In the meantime, we've got some statistics, the latest numbers coming from Baltimore right now. We'll put it up on the screen. As of right now, there have been several arrests, more than 200, 235 people arrested. Of those 235, 201 are adult, mostly 18 to 30 years old, 34 juveniles also arrested. 144 vehicle fires, police vehicles, civilian vehicles, 19 structure fires, meaning buildings that were burned to the ground. 15 police officers have been injured.

Ryan Young is on the streets of Baltimore for us.

Ryan, relatively calm so far. Let's hope it stays that way. You have a special guest.

YOUNG: Yeah, relatively calm. I'll tell you now, you hear the music behind us. The people are singing. A lot of self-policing going on. As you see, young man that we had talked to earlier, leading people singing. They've been holding hands for the last half- hour, making sure it remains peaceful. When someone started yelling at police, they made sure to pull that person back from that line.

One young man, who's been in this crowd, wanting to talk about the community he lived in his entire life.

You said you're glad to see what's going on today, but you want change in the neighborhood?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, I do. Yes, I do. It's awful here, man. We have too many homeless people and too many abandoned houses. How is that possible? So how it possible? This is -- seriously, it's a liquor store on every corner.

(CROSSTALK)

YOUNG: When you saw what happened yesterday, when you saw the -- when it was burning, how did it make you feel?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It made me feel bad, but at the same time I knew it would bring attention. Look, it did. We're getting the attention we need. We might not be doing it the right way. That's because some people are not able to express themselves, but it should not be a liquor store on every corner, every corner.

YOUNG: Describe what's going on for everyone at home and what today feels like compared to yesterday.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's going on today is a lot of tension here. People is getting fed up, you know. It seems like -- it seems like it's just -- about to be the last straw. It's about to be last straw.

YOUNG: You think today's not peaceful? Today looks --

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's peaceful. Yes, it's peaceful! But people are getting tired. No justice, no peace. That's what it's -- no justice, no peace. It's been peaceful now. But when will the justice come? When will it come? Waiting too long. If an officer would have got killed, the person would have been committed -- he would have been arrested. He would have been went to court and all that. It would have been happened.

YOUNG: Thank you for stopping for us. Appreciate that.

So, you see a lot of people still want that justice/peace. People talking about that. They want to hear from the mayor and city council about the investigation.

To tell you, as we're talking now, there are people walking around with bullhorns addressing the crowd. It seems like 10 or eight people walking around, addressing the public, trying to talk to them. Meanwhile, right across the street, CVS is still being cleaned out. And we can see officers here. But so far, once again, Wolf, it is remaining peaceful at this time.

BLITZER: Let's hope it stays like it. But you don't see much of a police present where you are, Ryan, is that right?

YOUNG: There is a police presence. Let me show how they've been insulated from everyone else. I'll let my cameraman walk that direction. You see everyone is standing. They are at the ready but not needed at this point.

BLITZER: They're standing right there. It looks like they've got -- obviously, they've got shields, helmets. They're ready. The protesters are not doing anything. Yesterday, they were throwing rocks. None of that has occurred, right?

YOUNG: No. I'm going to walk down the line. This is the line. This is the line that insulates people from -- what's up, brother? This is the line that insulates people protesting from the police officers. They're doing this on their own. No one told them to do this. You see older men from the community making sure things remain peaceful. This line has been here for over an hour. No one's talking. If anyone walks up to the line, they have a conversation with the gentlemen who are here, and it's squashed at the line. It doesn't go past these men who are standing here protecting their community.

BLITZER: Ryan, how are you being received by the local community? Any problems?

YOUNG: None whatsoever. I took my badge off. Wolf, I took -- put the mic down, walked through the crowd for over an hour talking to people. This gentleman and I talked earlier, just to talk about the community and just to talk about the ideas of what's going on, what they absolutely want. That's something, they just want to be heard. They wanted to make sure that the picture that was shown to the world of the one that's going on here. Where men have shown up today to stand up and make sure the conversation doesn't change to what it did yesterday. Yesterday upset the two young men. Throwing rocks and being involved in what was going on yesterday. Yes, there were sad to see that going down, but they wanted to make sure today it's changed.

[15:00:07] BLITZER: All right, Ryan Young, thanks very much.

That's it for me. Thanks very much. I'll be back at 5:00 p.m. eastern in "The Situation Room." Our special coverage continues with Brooke Baldwin --