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Luigi Mangione Indicted for Murder as Act of Terrorism; Madison, Wisconsin Police: Determining Shooter's Motive is Top Priority; Flurry of Diplomatic Activity Amid Optimism for Gaza Deal; Investigation into Russian General's Killing. Aired 4-4:30a ET
Aired December 18, 2024 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[04:00:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There is no heroism in what Mangione did.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Luigi Mangione has received 157 entries or deposits into his prison commissary account.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've never seen social media reaction that is so on a person's side who committed just a blatant murder.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Gun violence is the number one killer of children in this country. That's a legacy we cannot accept.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How many more lives need to be lost? How many more lives need to be taken for people to wake up? When is it enough?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Moscow, furious, and Russian politicians have vowed revenge for the general's killing, while acknowledging his death is a major loss.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: Live from London, this is CNN NEWSROOM with Max Foster and Christina Macfarlane.
MAX FOSTER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, and a warm welcome to our viewers joining us from around the world. I'm Max Foster. It is Wednesday, December the 18th, 9 a.m. here in London, 4 a.m. in Pennsylvania, where the suspect in the murder of UnitedHealthcare's CEO is set to appear in court on Thursday.
A judge will determine when Luigi Mangione could be extradited to New York, where he's facing an 11-count indictment. The charges include first- and second-degree murder as an act of terrorism in the death of Brian Thompson, meaning the murder was meant to scare and intimidate the public.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALVIN BRAGG JR., MANHATTAN DISTRICT ATTORNEY: This was a frightening, well-planned, targeted murder that was intended to cause shock and attention and intimidation.
JESSICA TISCH, NEW YORK CITY POLICE COMMISSIONER: There is no heroism in what Mangione did. This was a senseless act of violence. It was a cold and calculated crime that stole a life and put New Yorkers at risk.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: The police commissioner also called the support that Mangione has received on social media an appalling celebration of murder. CNN's Danny Freeman has details on how Mangione's supporters are reaching out, and more on when he'll be back in court as well, or returned to New York at least.
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DANNY FREEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It was an incredibly busy day in the case of Luigi Mangione here in Pennsylvania and in New York. Several headlines made, and it seems like the soonest he could be back in New York could be as early as Thursday. But the biggest headline, the Manhattan District Attorney officially announcing that indictment against Luigi Mangione on first degree murder charges in New York.
Mangione also indicted by a grand jury for murder in the second degree as a crime of terrorism. DA Alvin Bragg saying clearly this was a killing intended to invoke terror.
Meanwhile, we also have updated information on Mangione's interactions with the outside world, or really we should rather say the outside world's attempt to interact with him while he's been behind bars at this prison.
Per a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, as of Tuesday evening, Luigi Mangione has received 157 entries or deposits into his prison commissary account. And as of Tuesday morning, he's received 33 emails and six pieces of hard mail. That's up from just two pieces of mail that CNN reported he had received on Monday evening.
And still at this point, the only visitors he's had while in custody has been his attorneys. Now, on Thursday morning, Mangione is scheduled to have two hearings not far from here out in Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania. One on those Pennsylvania charges, then the other right after on extradition.
And CNN has learned on Tuesday that Mangione is not going to fight extradition anymore. That's according to his new attorney from New York. And a prison spokesperson told me earlier on Tuesday that he could begin his journey back to New York as soon as court is over.
Danny Freeman, CNN, Huntington, Pennsylvania.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: As we've mentioned, authorities are taking note of the unusual reaction some Americans are having to this case. They're going beyond relating to Mangione's alleged frustration with the U.S. health care system and making him out to be a hero. CNN legal analyst Jerry Jackson explains how public sentiment could affect the prosecution of this case.
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JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I've never seen social media reaction that is so on a person's side who committed just a blatant murder. This is a guy who's seen as a deity. They're calling him St. Luigi. Right. Do you get a jury who buys into the notion of the health care industry?
[04:05:00]
So disruptive to the common person that this person deserved this. Right. I'm speaking about the CEO who died.
So, you know, could you get a jury to nullify? Could you get a jury that's hung? I mean, the evidence is really compelling. I doubt it.
If you base it on the evidence and the facts alone, the question is, no, at least to this point, he deserves a presumption of innocence. We're not at trial yet. But from the public disclosure of the evidence, I think it's pretty damning.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: Well, authorities say determining the motive for the deadly school shooting in Madison, Wisconsin, is a top priority. As of now, they say it appears to be a combination of factors. The investigation underway as a candlelit vigil was held to remember the teacher and the student killed and the six others wounded at Abundant Life Christian School on Monday.
Hundreds of community members gathered for the event, including the mayor of Madison, who says the city will get through this tragedy.
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SATYA RHODES-CONWAY, MAYOR OF MADISON, WISCONSIN: Yesterday, the Madison community experienced a terrible and traumatic event. And we will never be the same. But we will get through this. And we will get through this together by relying on each other and by taking care of each other.
MYA CULLEN, UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN SOPHOMORE: How many more lives need to be lost? How many more lives need to be taken for people to wake up? I mean, our children, our loved ones are stuck between a crossfire.
When is it enough? When is it enough?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Investigators in Madison want to know why the 15-year-old female student opened fire and how she got hold of the gun. We've now learned the teen joined a local shooting range with her father months before the attack. He posted this photo on Facebook back in August.
The T-shirt she's wearing features the name of a German rock band whose lyrics were cited by the student gunman who carried out the 1999 shooting at the Columbine High School in Colorado. The Madison police chief said authorities are looking into whether her parents owned the gun used in the shooting. CNN's Natasha Chen has the details on the investigation.
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NATASHA CHEN, CNN U.S. NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Police in Madison, Wisconsin, are urgently searching for what led a 15-year-old girl to bring a 9mm handgun to school and open fire. Investigators say Natalie Rupnow, who went by Samantha, arrived at the Abundant Life Christian School Monday morning and killed a teacher and fellow student and wounded six others before taking her own life.
CHIEF SHON BARNES, MADISON POLICE DEPARTMENT: The past 24 hours have been a flurry of emotion, sadness, anger, disappointment, grief.
CHEN (voice-over): Grief as they try to understand why a festive day with students dressed in their holiday pajamas ended with them evacuating a shooting scene. Police Chief Shon Barnes says the motive was a combination of factors and they are looking into everything from possible bullying to her online activity, adding everyone at the school was targeted equally in the shooting. As for writings related to the shooting that have been circulating online --
BARNES: At this time, we cannot verify the document. We ask that you not share the document or spread any information that may be false.
CHEN (voice-over): But police are looking for original documents that may have been taken from the shooter's home and speaking to her parents, who they say are cooperative, to determine whether they owned or possessed the gun their daughter allegedly used.
RHODES-CONWAY: I think law enforcement will take the steps necessary, but we don't know nearly enough yet.
CHEN (voice-over): Not enough to know whether the parents will face criminal charges. While the police chief says they will look into whether the parents were negligent, he says that does not appear to be the case right now. Two of the shooting victims remain in critical condition with life-threatening injuries, and police are asking members of the community to respect the privacy of the student and teacher who were killed.
REBEKAH SMITH, CHILDREN ATTEND ABUNDANT LIFE CHRISTIAN SCHOOL: That particular teacher, she would have done anything for those kids. She would have been right there, loved the school, loved her kids, loved teaching.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Beautiful lights.
SMITH: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That they were beautiful souls.
CHEN (voice-over): It was at least the 83rd school shooting in the U.S. this year, more than any other year since CNN started tracking school shootings in 2008.
MELISSA AGARD, DANE COUNTY EXECUTIVE: There's going to be public debate about the motives and other aspects of this mass shooting. But let us remember this fact. Gun violence is the number one killer of children in this country. That's a legacy we cannot accept.
CHEN (voice-over): Natasha Chen, CNN, Los Angeles.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: Donald Trump has officially clinched the U.S. presidency after winning the electoral college. Electors in Texas gave Mr. Trump the victory when they awarded the state's 40 electoral votes on Tuesday. In Austin, the nationwide tally is a constitutionally required formalization of the November 5th vote, where Donald Trump won 312 electoral college votes and Kamala Harris took 226. It takes 270 of the 538 electoral votes to actually win the White House.
[04:10:00]
The electoral tally is now sent to Congress, where lawmakers will meet in joint session on January 6th to officially declare Donald Trump president. Mr. Trump is taking a new shot at what he perceives as a left-wing media bias against him. He's suing pollster Ann Selzer and her company, along with the Des Moines Register newspaper and his parent company, Gannett. Selzer's poll, published days ahead of the November election, showed Kamala Harris with a surprising lead over Trump in Iowa. That lead never happened.
And Trump ultimately won the state by 13 points. He says news coverage of the poll was intended to artificially help Democrats and that Selzer committed election interference.
The CIA director is expected to travel to Doha as early as today to continue talks for a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal. The discussions come as Israeli forces continue to pound northern Gaza. Health officials in the enclave said that Israeli attacks killed at least a dozen people in Gaza overnight. Meanwhile, outgoing President Joe Biden and his successor Donald Trump are both pushing for a hostage deal in the coming weeks.
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JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The trauma of that day and its aftermath is still raw and ongoing. I've gotten over 100 hostages out. I will not stop until I get every single one of them home.
DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT, 2024 PRESIDENTIAL ELECT: I'll be very available on January 20th, and we'll see. As you know, I
gave warning that if these hostages aren't back home by that date, all hell's going to break out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FOSTER: Top officials from the U.S., Israel, Qatar and Egypt are all touting progress in the ceasefire negotiations. Now Hamas is also signaling a cautious optimism, too. CNN's Jeremy Diamond has the latest from Jerusalem.
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JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN JERUSALEM CORRESPONDENT: Well, Hamas now becomes the latest party to these negotiations to express some optimism about the prospects of reaching a ceasefire and hostage release deal. We have heard optimistic comments over the course of the last week from U.S., Israeli, Qatari and Egyptian officials, and now Hamas is joining the fray.
But as with the others who are expressing optimism, Hamas is also adding a note of caution to their comments. In their statement, they are making clear that, quote, Hamas affirms that in light of the serious and positive discussions taking place in Doha today under the auspices of our Qatari and Egyptian brothers, reaching an agreement for a ceasefire and prisoner exchange is possible if the occupation stops imposing new conditions.
And that if is indeed that note of caution that they are raising, suggesting that Israeli negotiators are making additional demands as this negotiating process moves forward. A second Hamas source said that they view the current state of negotiations as, quote, positive and optimistic.
And it is important to note that amid this optimism, we are also seeing a flurry of diplomatic activity in the region. The U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan just last week traveled to Israel, Egypt and Qatar to try and advance a deal. He said he hopes that he can put the conditions in place to reach a deal within the next month.
And that is indeed the target here appears to be to try and reach a deal before President Biden leaves office on January 20th and President-elect Trump will then be inaugurated. And we know, of course, that the Biden administration has also been closely coordinating with the Trump administration over this deal, as incoming Trump advisers have also been traveling to the region and coordinating closely with the officials who they will soon be replacing.
It is important to caution, though, that as we are seeing this momentum, as we are seeing this optimistic language, the reason why we are also hearing notes of caution from all of the parties involved is because we have been this close in the past. We have been very close to a deal, and ultimately talks have collapsed. And that possibility still very much looms.
But Israeli and American officials who I've spoken to have pointed to a new set of conditions in the region in terms of Hamas being increasingly isolated. Israel having accomplished a slew of military achievements in Gaza, including the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, that might make them more willing to reach a deal now. All of this pointing us in the direction of a potential ceasefire and hostage deal. But again, the deal isn't reached until it's done.
Jeremy Diamond, CNN, Jerusalem.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: Well, now nearby to Syria, where earlier today the first domestic flight departed from Damascus Airport following the ousting of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. In this Reuters video, you can see the Syrian Airlines flight departing from the capital to Aleppo in northern Syria after authorities reopened the airport for internal flights. So that does give people a lot of confidence, a big symbol there.
[04:15:00]
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu travelled to southern Syria on Tuesday where he held a briefing on Mount Hermon, which is Syria's highest peak. Netanyahu and Israel Defense Minister Israel Katz reiterated that the military would remain on Mount Hermon, quote, for any length of time required. Israeli forces captured the summit and surrounding foothills after the fall of Assad's regime. Mount Hermon is the highest point in the region, making it a prized military asset as it overlooks Lebanon, Syria and Israel.
Meanwhile, Syrians are beginning to uncover the extent of the Assad regime's brutality as mass graves are being discovered across the country. One advocacy group believes that hundreds of thousands of bodies, quote, tortured to death by the Assad regime, could be buried in those graves.
Melissa Bell reports.
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MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: More than two weeks after the fall of Bashar al-Assad, the tragic next step in the search of many Syrians for their loved ones, some of the first images emerging of what are believed to be mass graves that may have been used by the regime to bury some of those who were first taken to the detention centers and then tortured to death. One at Al-Qutayfah, which is on the outskirts of Damascus, not very far from the Syrian capital, where one advocacy group has been speaking of the truckloads of bodies that were brought each week. What we understand is that four tractor trailers carrying 150 bodies each were brought twice a week, between 2012 and 2018, to this particular site, now be the subject of a search for some of those bodies in the hope that some may be identified.
Another site in the southern province of Deraa, also now believed to be another of those mass burial sites. As Syrians try and establish the identities of some of the 150,000 people who've disappeared to try and figure out if any of them may lie in these sites. That's according to the International Commission on Missing Persons.
Still many relatives frantically searching for their loved ones in the hopes that they might be alive, but these are the clearest indication yet, the first tangible proof of what we've long heard about from outside of Syria during the Assad regime, of the brutality of its secret services, the brutality of its detention centers, with many of those bodies now, no doubt, beyond recognition. It's unclear also, for the time being, how many people may have been buried there.
Melissa Bell, CNN, Paris.
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FOSTER: Now, Russia has detained a suspect in the killing of Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov. Coming up, what investigators are saying about how the allegedly -- or how the alleged attack actually was carried out. It's pretty extraordinary.
Plus, new revelations by the head of the Catholic Church. We'll have the latest on the Pope's upcoming memoir when we come back.
And later, it is six months and counting for two NASA astronauts stranded on the International Space Station. We'll have an update on when they might be coming home.
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FOSTER: Breaking news on the killing of a top Russian general in Moscow. Russian officials say they have detained 29-year-old Uzbek citizens for allegedly planting a bomb that killed Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov on Tuesday. Russia's investigative committee says the suspect was allegedly recruited by Ukraine's special services, and he confessed.
The man allegedly placed the bomb on an electric scooter, which he parked outside the building where Kirillov lived, and put a surveillance camera in a rented car to monitor it. The investigators say the explosive was remotely detonated from Dnipro in Ukraine. Kirillov headed Russia's radiological, biological and chemical protection forces. His aide, who was with him, was also killed in the blast.
CNN's Fred Pleitgen walks us through the day of the attack.
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FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice- over): One of Russia's top generals and an aide just seconds before the fatal blast. We're not showing the moment of the explosion in this video obtained by CNN.
PLEITGEN: Russian investigators say the bomb with about 300 grams of TNT was hidden in an electric scooter parked just outside the entrance of that building. As the general and an aide walked out, it blew up, killing them both.
PLEITGEN (voice-over): Russian investigators say the device was detonated remotely. The blast so powerful, it shattered windows several floors up in buildings across the street.
At first we thought that cement might have been unloaded or something similar, this resident says. But the blast was so loud, it did not seem like construction work. It was very scary.
Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov was the head of Russia's nuclear, chemical and biological defense forces. Often accusing Kyiv of planning to use chemicals on the battlefield, the Ukrainians for their part accused Kirillov of overseeing the use of chemical substances against their forces and have claimed responsibility for assassinating him, calling the general, quote: An absolutely legitimate target and saying such an inglorious end awaits all those who kill Ukrainians.
The general is not the first, but the highest ranking Russian military official the Ukrainians claim to have assassinated.
Moscow furious, launching both a terrorism and a criminal investigation.
Investigative actions and operational search activities are being carried out aimed at establishing all the circumstances of the crime committed, the spokesperson said.
Asymmetric warfare, like this brazen drone attack inside Russia two days ago, is how the Ukrainian forces are trying to level the battlefield as Vladimir Putin's army has been making significant gains on nearly all front lines.
The lieutenant general's assassination comes just hours after Putin met with his top military brass, ripping into the Biden administration for its support of Ukraine.
In an effort to weaken our country and impose a strategic defeat on us, the United States continues to pump the virtually illegitimate ruling regime in Kyiv full of weapons and money, sends mercenaries and military advisers and thereby encourages further escalation of the conflict, Putin said.
[04:25:08]
And Russian politicians have vowed revenge for the general's killing while acknowledging his death is a major loss.
Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Moscow.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FOSTER: European leaders meeting in Brussels today to discuss the war in Ukraine and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy saying his allies might discuss the possibility of international peacekeeping troops in his country, which could potentially be deployed until Ukraine is able to join NATO. The topic had been first broached by the French President Emmanuel Macron earlier this year. So he says Ukrainian troops need more support now as Russian forces gain ground on the front lines there. Still to come, assessing the damage in Vanuatu after a massive earthquake hit the island's capital city. We'll bring you the latest on the recovery efforts.
Plus, the U.S. Federal Reserve meets for the final time this year. Will it cut interest rates again as expected? Details on what investors are watching out for next.
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[04:30:00]
FOSTER: Welcome back to CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Max Foster. If you're just joining us here are some top stories today.
The suspect in the ambush killing of UnitedHealthcare's CEO is now indicted. The murderer, Luigi Mangione, facing 11 years in prison ...
