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Suspect Arrested in Church Shooting; Justice Department Opens Hate Crime Investigation in Church Shooting; Obama Uses Tragedy to Support Gun Control; Community Grieves in Charleston. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired June 18, 2015 - 13:30   ET

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

[13:30:17] REV. JOHN PAUL BROWN, PASTOR, MOUNT ZION AME CHURCH, CHARLESTON: So while we are in the midst of hurting, we are urging healing, and so right now, we are focusing on the victim rather than the emotional and the backlash of what might come. We just want to thank God and thanks for the people, and we are grateful for the news media because without it we could not get it out. We owe you all a grateful thanks. And you would not believe what the outpouring of love and pray praying together has been. It hassle helped us, and we have not had a great time to take everything in. It is an emotional roller coaster right now. Tears and joy and tears of hurt and anger and back to tears, and then thank you for the life of such a person.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Reverend John Paul Brown, who is the pastor of the Mount Zion AME Church in Charleston.

And, Reverend, thank you so much for the important, important words, and we will stay in close touch with you.

BROWN: Thank you.

BLITZER: Thank you.

And we will continue with the breaking news here in CNN.

And in Washington, the Justice Department is investigating the shooting as a hate crime. What does that mean? We will talk about that and get the latest information from the Justice Department when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

[13:35:48] BLITZER: Welcome back to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer, reporting from Washington.

Updating the breaking news at this hour, the arrest of the suspect in the horrific shootings in South Carolina. Police say 21-year-old Dylann Roof was arrested during a traffic stop in Shelby, North Carolina. Roof is accused of opening up fire in a prayer meeting and church bible study. We got in new picture of the suspect's car in North Carolina, and you can see that the police have it cordoned off, and in all, six females and three males were killed in the shooting. He told one woman that he was sparing her life so she could tell his story.

And among those killed was the churches pastor, the Reverend Clementa Pinckney, who also a South Carolina state Senator and prominent community activist. Two other victims have been identified. Taiwanza Sanders who was a student of Allen University in Columbia, South Carolina, and also Sharonda Singleton, a reverend at an AME Church, also a speech therapist and also a track coach at Goosecreek High School, and she is seen her with her son.

Let me quote now, "This is a crime that has reached into the heart of the community," and those are the words of the Attorney General Loretta Lynch, who announced a while ago that the Justice Department has opened up a hate crime investigation into the shootings at the Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

Let's discuss what's going on. Joining us, our justice reporter, Evan Perez, and our law enforcement analyst, former FBI director, Tom Fuentes.

And, Evan, what does it mean that this has been described as a hate crime investigation?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's based on what he said when he stood up to say he wanted to shoot black people, that is making it a hate crime. Federal hate crime law provides protection for specific groups that have historically the subject of discrimination, including African-Americans. And that is what he is going after, and that is what the witnesses told the police that were there. And obviously, there is a parallel investigation of South Carolina authorities, who have nine murder charges that they would like to pursue against this suspect now. The FBI and the detectives from the Charleston, South Carolina, Police Department are now in North Carolina interviewing him, trying to get information from him on what he was trying to do.

BLITZER: And, Tom Fuentes, you're a former director of the FBI, and presumably he's going to be charged with mass murder, murdering nine people. The fact that it was also not only a hate crime, but practically speaking, what does it add?

TOM FUENTES, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, not much, frankly. In this case, if he is facing nine death penalties in South Carolina for the murders of the people in the church, that is the most severe exposure that he would have, let's say. If he is charged with a hate crime federally, it adds to it, but you can't -- and how many times can you kill him, if he is facing the death penalty, and there is not much he can do, and there is a harder additional element to the prove what is in his heart and head when he was killing. And he did make the statements and social media postings, and that might not as difficult as in some cases, because it is clear that he had an anti- black attitude.

PEREZ: And he has been wearing a jacket -- there's pictures showing him with the jacket of the old apartheid era flag of south Africa and the old Rhodesian flag, and that is part of what the FBI is looking at, and if he has links to the hate groups, white supremacist groups, and his name is not one name that is coming up that authorities have seen -- Wolf?

BLITZER: They'll look to see if somebody else is potentially involved and how he got the weapon. We are told that his father may have given him that pistol to for a 21st birthday weapon.

FUENTES: Right, Wolf, and this will be similar to the ISIS wannabe investigation. Who is he affiliated with? What he just inspired? Did someone direct him? There are hundreds of white supremacist groups in the country alive and well, and the FBI has a robust domestic terrorist group. The Ku Klux Klan and the Aryan Brotherhood, and Aryan Nation, The Order. Neo Confederate groups are springing up in the south. Neo-Nazi groups are alive and well, and 70 years after the death of Hitler. So this is nothing new for the FBI to be address in addressing.

[13:40:] PEREZ: To be clear, yes, Wolf, to be clear, he is facing nine murder counts in state court, but the federal government feels that they need to send a message to all of the groups that Tom is talking about, that South Carolina and the south in general has a history, a very long history, a painful history in this area. This is a state that still flies the confederate flag over the public buildings while they elected an African-American to the Senate, so it is a very complicated history down there. And the FBI and the Justice Department want to make sure they send a message as well, that it is being treated in a different way.

BLITZER: And this is the decision that the Attorney General Loretta Lynch said to categorize it as a hate crime.

PEREZ: Yes.

FUENTES: If I could add something real quick, Wolf. They will devote as many analysts and FBI agents to this case, whether hate crime designated hate crime or not, before the attorney general or president spoke up. As soon as the chief of police asked for FBI help, they were on the scene that night, last night, and the hundreds of the agents and the analysts nationwide were already going to be dedicated to this case. And it really, all it took was a request for the assistance. Now, later if they determined it is a federal prosecution versus a local prosecution, that is going to be up for discussion with the Department of Justice and with the state authorities.

BLITZER: I assume they have to beef up security for the churches?

FUENTES: That will be their call.

EVANS: And they will be doing it in some of the parts of the country. And New York police chief said they are doing it already.

BLITZER: This is a sad moment in the United States, indeed.

Thank you, guys, so much.

The race-based shooting at the AME Church brings up the importance of the church. Back in 1818, it became in 18 the first African-American Episcopal Church founded in the American south. It was founded as a protest against discrimination. Later, it was burned to the ground by an angry white mob after one of the church leaders was accused of instigating a slave riot. The congregation went underground until the end of the Civil War. But the church, known as Mother Emanuel, rose from the ashes to become a beacon of hope in the civil rights movement in the American south.

The King Center tweeted out this photo at the church of Martin Luther King Jr back in 1962, and in 1969, then Coretta Scott King led the call for equality for black hospital workers from the church's steps in Charleston.

And much more breaking news coming up. And last hour, President Obama speaking passionately about the shooting in South Carolina. We'll go live to the White House.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:46:36} BLITZER: CNN has now learned the identity of a fourth victim of the church shooting in Charleston, South Carolina. Cynthia Hurd worked at the church, and was a regional manager who spent 31 years with the library. And the library going to be closed today and tomorrow. And our deepest condolences to the families of all of the victims.

And the president said that he and the first lady know several members of the church, and spoke of the horror and the sadness is of the lives lost. This is the 14th time that he has had to speak out to the nation about mass shootings.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I've had to make statements like this too many times. And communities have had to endure tragedies like this too many times. We don't have all of the facts, but we do know that, once again, innocent people were killed, in part, because someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting their hands on a gun. Now is the time for mourning and for healing, but let's be clear, at some point, we, as a country, we have to reckon with the fact that this type of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Let's go to senior White House correspondent, Jim Acosta, who is joining us now.

The president is clearly moved by what is going on, and using this tragic and very, very sad moment and feeling the need to speak out on gun control in the United States.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, and you will recall that he has talked about this time and time again, Wolf, from the Ft. Hood shooting in 2009 to the shooting that almost took the life of Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, and the Aurora shooting, and the shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, and that is the day that the president described as the worst day in the presidency, and the list is on and on and he has had to talk about it repeatedly, and he tried to get gun control, and you heard him make reference to it in the remarks in the briefing room, and he said because of the politics in this town, he is not sure that something like that is achievable, because they tried it before. And they tried to close the gun show loophole with the Manson-Toomey Amendment, but the president saw that vote go down in the Senate, and he stood inside of the Congress in the state of the union speech, and he said that these people from these mass shootings, and the victims from the mass shootings deserve a vote, and he went down the list of the mass shootings in the country the, and he said that these victims deserve a vote. They didn't get the vote they wanted, Wolf, and it is an issue that has confounded the presidency in his time in the office, but in the last couple of minutes the White House has provided to us a list of the phone calls that he and is the vice president have made to the people down in South Carolina, and according to White House official, the president has talked to talked to the mayor in Charleston, Mayor Riley. And the White House told us he's made calls to the mayor of Charleston as well as a couple of other religious figures, including a bishop at AME there in Charleston, which had this terrible shooting. He's talked to a bishop at that church as well.

It's all hands on deck here at the White House, Wolf. Officials have been scrambling, dealing with this all morning long, and it's an issue that they have dealt with before. And I suspect, Wolf, with a year and a half in the president's time in office before he leaves this White House, he'll have to deal with it again -- Wolf?

[13:50:] BLITZER: I suspect you're right. Let's hope he doesn't have to deal with it and we don't have to deal with it either.

Jim Acosta, thank you.

More of the breaking news coverage coming up. CNN's Don Lemon just arrived in Charleston. We're going to speak with Don and get his impressions when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: A day of grief of sadness in Charleston, South Carolina. The community vows to come together in the aftermath of this tragedy.

CNN's Don Lemon is now on the ground in Charleston, just got there a little while ago.

Don, you know the community in Charleston. You know the history of this predominantly African-American historic church. Tell us about the grief down there. It must be so powerful.

[13:54:29] DON LEMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yeah. A church which has really gone through a lot. And now the community is going through these things as well. It's palpable when you drive in here and when you get into the airport. Everyone knows why we're in town. And when you drive up to the scene, this is where we are, a tourist spot here in Charleston. It's eerie to see some people out and about. It's palpable. You're exactly right. I see community members out. They want to talk to the media and want people to know about what's happening here and they want people to know that this should not happen anywhere. This church that's over my shoulder here is a safe haven for the people in this community. It was deemed as a safe haven. And especially for those who had been dealing with unjust from police officers, from what happened with Mr. Scott not long ago, not being shot in the back here, this is a safe haven for that where they could go and talk about it and where the reverend himself was trying to help out with that legislation as well with Walter Scott and other members of the community. So heavy hearts here.

Right where we are, it's sort of becoming a gathering spot where people are coming to talk to the media and really just to sort of feel that they have some sort of communion here. They can't believe this has happened, Wolf.

BLITZER: It's hard to believe in this day and age, he had the South Africa apartheid, the flag of the old Rhodesia on his Facebook page. People are tweeting me, saying, "This is not mass murder, a hate crime, it's an act of terror." Your thoughts?

LEMON: I agree with them. It's an act of terror. Listen, I think that Newtown was an act of terror. When you have people praying on people, this man, he targeted black people here. He targeted a certain group. He got himself into the church and then allegedly said, you know what, I'm here to shoot black people because you are raping our women and you are taking over our country. That is an act of terror by any definition.

BLITZER: All right. Don, we'll stay in close touch with you. Thank you very much.

That's it for me for this hour. I'll be back at 5:00 p.m. eastern on "The Situation Room."

For our international viewers, "Amanpour" is next.

For our viewers in North America, CNN's special coverage of the church shooting continues right after a quick break.

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