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$100K Reward Offered in Birmingham Mass Shooting; Violent Crime in the U.S. Dropped about 3 Percent Last Year; Colorado Store Shooter Found Guilty of 10 Murder Counts; California AG Alleges ExxonMobil Misled Public About Plastic Recycling. Aired 3:30-4p ET
Aired July 24, 2024 - 15:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[15:30:00]
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Today in Birmingham, Alabama, Crime Stoppers and the FBI announced they're offering up to $100,000 as a reward for help in identifying multiple gunmen who opened fire in a city's crowded entertainment district on Saturday night. No arrests have been made yet in what police are calling a targeted hit that left four dead and 17 others injured. CNN's Rafael Romo is joining us now from Birmingham.
What were you learning after this news conference today, Rafael?
RAFAEL ROMO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, officials are trying everything they can to encourage people to come forward with tips. At a press conference, the FBI announced, as you just mentioned, that it will offer a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of anybody with ties to Saturday's mass shooting. Add to that, that amount, an additional $50,000 being offered by Crime Stoppers and you get a $100,000 in rewards.
Birmingham Police Chief Scott Thurmond said he believes this was a targeted hit on one person and the other victims were caught in the crossfire. Let's take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHIEF SCOTT THURMOND, BIRMINGHAM POLICE: There's just motivation from, as Carol mentioned that, you know, some of the individuals that were killed have extensive criminal histories and because of that, there's oftentimes motivation from others and there's people who are willing to pay to have them killed and so that's part of it.
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[15:35:05]
ROMO: And here's another key detail, Brianna. Police say the shooters are believed to have used illegal gun conversion devices that can be used to override the trigger mechanism of a gun so that it functions like a machine gun. That would explain the reason why police officers here at the scene found more than 100 shell casings that were collected on a Saturday.
Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin says that they're doing everything they can to stop those shooters and get them off the streets.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR RANDALL WOODFIN, (D) BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA: As a community, we cannot give safe harbor or shelter to people who want to just simply kill people. We can't give them cover. They should not feel safe in our community. They should not feel safe anywhere.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMO: And Brianna, let me end with this. The police department has identified all of those who died as follows. 21 year old Anitra Holloman, 27 year old Tahj Booker, 27 year old Carlos McCain and a 26 year old Roderick Lynn Patterson.
As you can imagine, this community still very, very shaken. Now back to you.
KEILAR: All right, Rafael Romo live for us from Birmingham. Thank you.
Despite mass shootings dominating recent headlines, violent crime is actually down across the U.S. New statistics from the FBI show an estimated 3 percent drop last year.
Let's talk about this with CNN's chief law enforcement and intelligence analyst John Miller. All right, John, walk us through these numbers.
JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, what we're seeing is a couple of numbers of significance. So first going to the overall numbers and we can look at that graphic.
You've got violent crime overall. That's shootings, manslaughter, murder down 3 percent. So that's a good story on a day when we're hearing bad news out of places like Birmingham.
Property crime overall down 2.4 percent. So that is from 2022 to 2023. Those are the numbers we're looking at based on the FBI's collating them. If you zoom back, though, and you get the larger story, which is what's the five year trend? We'll take a look at our other graphic, which is you see that over the time, say, from, uh, the five year analysis murder is actually up almost 10 percent, aggravated assault up almost 7 percent -- 6.5 percent.
So you see that we are not where we were before pre-pandemic pre- criminal justice reform laws in many states pre- the defund the police movement, all of which had different effects on police agencies across the country.
KEILAR: Yes, the crime rates have become obviously a central political issue, which I think it's is why it's so important to look at them and see where the truth is here. You have former President Trump accusing President Biden, Vice President Harris of being weak on crime. What are the statistics showing?
MILLER: I mean, what the statistics tell us is that in 2014, 2015 right up through about 2016, 2017 we actually entered from a crime standpoint, the safest, least violent period in American history in terms of violent crime and crime in general. After the shake up caused by those other elements, pandemic reaction to the George Floyd protests, police department shrinking, budgets being cut so many different things that contributed to that. We saw that crime start to creep up again dramatically in 2020.
And then we've been seeing these declines happen. So there's good news and there's bad news. One, The big picture is crime is still trending down. That's positive. But two, as we just saw in Birmingham, as we see in Baltimore, as we've seen in Chicago, Milwaukee, so many major cities, they struggle with violent crime and guns and shootings and murders that result from shootings and they continue to struggle with them. And, you know, they're working on new strategies every day to try and overcome that.
KEILAR: Yes. John Miller, thank you so much. We do appreciate it.
MILLER: Thanks, Brianna.
KEILAR: Still to come, California filed a lawsuit against Exxon Mobile, accusing the company of decades of deception. We'll explain why ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEILAR: Breaking news. A jury has reached a verdict in the King Soopers murder trial. There are 55 counts and the verdict is still being read. But the headline here is that Ahmad Alissa has been found guilty of 10 counts of murder.
Stephanie Elam has been following this trial. Stephanie, Alissa hadn't denied carrying out the murders. He did plead insanity. The jury had to decide whether the gunman was of sound mind and they did think that he was.
STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's exactly what we're learning right now. I was just listening. I got through 27 of the counts so far.
Of the 10 counts of murder which he was found guilty of in first degree here, first degree murder here that they're saying that he is guilty of. It is not at issue in this case whether or not he was the one who pulled this gun when he walked into a King Soopers grocery store in Boulder, Colorado on March 22, 2021. That was not the issue here. What the jurors had to decide was he legally insane at the time.
What they were looking to do is the jurors needed to see if he was able to form intent and also could he distinguish right from wrong.
Now, if you listen to the defense, the defense had said that while they were not contesting whether or not he was the shooter, they were arguing, quote, he was in the throes of a psychotic episode at the time. They also said that he had severe treatment-resistant form of schizophrenia. They also said that Alissa was telling psychologists that he has heard consistent voices. Now, we do know that the jurors were deliberate in first degree here,
first degree murder here that they're saying that he is guilty of. It is not at issue in this case whether or not he was the one who pulled this gun when he walked into a King Soopers grocery store in Boulder, Colorado on March 22, 2021. That was not the issue here. What the jurors had to decide was, was he legally insane at the time. What they were looking to do is the jurors needed to see if he was able to form intent and also could he distinguish right from wrong.
Now, if you listen to the defense, the defense had said that while they were not contesting whether or not he was the shooter, they were arguing, quote, he was in the throes of a psychotic episode at the time. They also said that he had severe treatment-resistant form of schizophrenia. They also said that Alissa was telling psychologists that he has heard consistent voices.
Now, we do know that the jurors were deliberating in this case for about five and a half hours before they came back with this verdict, which we are still hearing the results of. But so far, every count that I heard so far today, he had been found guilty.
And I'm sitting here watching a feed of Alissa in court, and he's just been taking notes the whole time listening to this, looking pretty impassive and unmoved as we are hearing these counts being read out loud.
What's also noteworthy in this case is that a judge ruled just last year that he was fit to stand trial. At first, it was decided that he wasn't fit, now ruling that he was fit, and that's how we've ended up here.
I know this seems like a really long time, but as it was working its way through the legal system, getting to that decision made last November that he could stand trial, and now hearing in this case that those 10 people that lost their lives and as well as the 38 other counts of attempted murder that Ahmad Alissa, who's now 25 years old, is now being found guilty in this case right now.
KEILAR: Yes, Stephanie Elam, thank you. This shooting, of course, happening in March of 2021 at that King Soopers grocery store in Colorado, 10 people losing their lives that day. All right, Stephanie Elam, thank you for the report, and we'll be right back.
[15:50:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEILAR: Two major developments in California in the battle against pollution. Paper or plastic will no longer be a choice for shoppers in the Golden State.
A new law signed by Governor Gavin Newsom bans all plastic shopping bags. And the state just filed suit against ExxonMobil claiming the petrochemical giant has been lying to consumers for decades about recycling.
CNN's Nick Watt is in California. All right, Nick, why is the state taking this unprecedented legal action?
NICK WATT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, California likes to see itself as at the vanguard of environmental policy. And ExxonMobil is the biggest producer on Earth of polymers. Those are basically the building blocks of those single-use plastics that so many of us use too much of.
So what is interesting, though, and what is groundbreaking here, is ExxonMobil is not being sued for the alleged pollution, but they're being sued over their marketing and PR strategy. The AG Rob Bonta here in California calls it a decades-long campaign of deception in traditional old-school media and on social media. Trying to convince, he says, to convince the public that plastic recycling is the answer to plastic pollution. And he says it absolutely is not, and ExxonMobil knows that it is not.
He said that economically, technically, a lot of plastic cannot be recycled, and he said recycling rates in this country for plastic are about 5 percent. So his argument is, by claiming that they can solve this problem of plastic pollution by recycling, ExxonMobil has actually led to consumers using more plastic. Take a listen to something else he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BOB BONTA, CALIFORNIA ATTORNEY GENERAL: The company has propped up sham solutions, manipulated the public, and lied to consumers. It's time ExxonMobil pays the price for its deceit.
Microplastics have been found in our lungs, maternal and placental tissue, breast milk and blood.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT: And the AG says that microplastics have also been found in our drinking water, in our food and on our beaches. And just to give you an idea of how big a chunk of the pollution problem plastics are, the state claims that of the millions of tons of trash found on California beaches over the past few decades, more than 80 percent of that is plastic, and the state traces that back to ExxonMobil.
We, of course, reached out to ExxonMobil, haven't heard from them yet. But what the AG in California is asking for, he is saying ExxonMobil stop lying about how effective recycling is, and also he wants them to pay some civil penalties -- Brianna.
KEILAR: And the ban on plastic shopping bags, hasn't California tried this before?
WATT: Yes, California has tried this before, and it didn't really go very well. So back in 2016, they banned those thin, single-use shopping bags and replaced them with thick, four times thicker plastic bags that are designed to be used 125 times each.
But guess what? People don't use those thicker plastic bags 125 times. Instead, they throw them in the trash. So one of the sponsors of this bill actually claimed that the use of plastic bags has gone up.
[15:55:00]
And actually right now Californians, each Californian is throwing away about 500 plus plastic bags a year, and that is why this new law is required.
No plastic whatsoever, only paper, so no plastic bags will be getting thrown away, finally, when it kicks in 2026. Let's see if it works second time around -- Brianna.
KEILAR: Yes, let's see. All right, Nick Watt, thank you so much.
When we come back, why pesto is just the best-o, and no, I'm not talking about the delicious pasta sauce, although we do enjoy that too.
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KEILAR: And finally today, I want you to meet Pesto, a nine-month-old penguin who calls Australia's Sea Life Melbourne Aquarium home.
[16:00:00]
Pictures of him have gone viral, he has fans all over the world. What's so special about Pesto?
Well, he's not even a year old, and he's already much bigger than his parents. At three feet tall, he towers over them, at 50 pounds, he already outweighs them. And it's no wonder why, because he eats about 30 fish a day, which is twice as many as the average adult penguin. He's certainly cute, and he will eventually shed those brown feathers and start to look more like mom and dad.
"THE LEAD" with Jake Tapper starts right now.
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