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CNN Tonight

At Least Three Dead In Mass Shooting At Michigan State University. Aired 11p-12a ET

Aired February 13, 2023 - 23:00   ET

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

[23:00:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: We do have breaking news this evening. There has been a school shooting on the campus of Michigan State University. One person is dead. We don't know who that person is. We don't know if it's a student. There are multiple injuries reported by campus police. They have been taken to a local area hospital.

We are waiting a news briefing from the Michigan State University Police any moment now. It is supposed to start. We should be able to have many, many questions answered if they are willing to share the information. The last we heard was that the shooter had fled, that the shooter was still on the loose, and that police were still searching for the shooter.

Students are still barricaded in some classrooms and some dorm rooms and elsewhere on the campus.

Back with me now, Shimon Prokupecz, Charles Ramsey, Shawn Turner, who happened to be on campus when they got this alert, and John Miller. So, Shawn, let me just start with you. What happened at 8:15 tonight?

SHAWN TURNER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Yes, Alisyn, around 8:15, maybe a little later, 18:18, we all -- everyone on campus got an alert on our phone that really caught us off-guard. It indicated that there was an active shooter on campus and that shots were fired, and notified us that the campus was going into a shelter in place status.

That alert came out and for those of us who were leaving campus, I was just about to leave the campus at that time, got off campus and turned on the police scanner to find out what was going on.

To be really candid, I mean, we -- you know, we expected that this might have been a situation where someone may be heard something and thought there were shots fired, but it very quickly became clear that this was a real sort of tragedy unfolding on campus.

I immediately got home. I still had people in my building on campus that were -- that were working late. So, for most of us here on campus in a leadership positions, we went through a mode of (INAUDIBLE) to ensure that not only our students but our staff members, all of our employees, were safe in either in the buildings they were on campus.

CAMEROTA: Shawn, let me just stop you for one second. The press conference is starting. Let's listen.

UNKNOWN: -- Department of Police -- public safety and Deputy Chief Chris Rozman --

CAMEROTA: Okay. Oh, we've lost the audio of the press conference for a moment, but we are working to get that back and reestablish that. Let me go back to Shawn right now. Shawn, I interrupted you as -- I will go back to this in a second. I interrupted you as you were saying, of course, your natural -- do we hear this? Not yet. You were saying your natural instinct as it always is, is to thank -- oh, we had the sound back. Let's listen to the police.

CHRIS ROZMAN, INTERIM DEPUTY CHIEF, MSU DEPARTMENT OF POLICE AND PUBLIC SAFETY: -- shots fired and a shooting in multiple locations near campus. Please understand that the information that we are sharing -- our priority right now is the safety of our students and our campus. The information that we are sharing may change. But we are going to be as transparent as we can and share as much information as we can. But that information may change as it's preliminary.

This incident started this evening around 8:18 p.m. at Berkey Hall on campus. We received multiple 9-1-1 calls of a shooting inside Berkey Hall. Numerous officers responded. We were quickly on scene within minutes. There we did locate several victims of a shooting. The incident did move to a building in close proximity, the Michigan State University Union Building, where there is another report of a shooting immediately following the first incident.

Police and emergency responders acted quickly. We tended to the victims at both of those scenes. There was an overwhelming law enforcement response to campus to help with this situation.

[23:05:00]

I can confirm that there were at least five victims. All five victims were transported to the hospital. Some of those victims do have life- threatening injuries.

The suspect in this incident, we believe there to be one suspect, was last seen leaving the MSU Union on foot of the north side of that building. We are just receiving surveillance footage of that suspect that we will be releasing shortly. Initial information is that the suspect is a Black male, shorter in stature, wearing red shoes, a jean jacket and a ball cap. We will follow up with additional descriptors of that suspect.

Community members on and off campus should remain sheltered in place. We immediately launched our emergency notification system and advise the entire MSU campus to shelter in place as the suspect is still outstanding.

For people on campus, please do not come to campus. I can't say that enough. For parents, we understand, I can only imagine the emotion that's involved right now. It's going to help us and it's going to help our response, it's going to help us identify the shooter -- the less people that are on campus at this point. Please, do not come to campus.

We are doing everything we can to ensure the safety of our campus and all of our students. We currently have hundreds of police officers and law enforcement officials, state, local, federal on campus working in a coordinated effort to ensure the safety of campus and identify and apprehend the suspect.

All campus activities will be canceled for the next 48 hours, including sporting events, classes, and all campus-related activities. Please follow our Twitter page for updates. We are sharing live updates at that location.

I can't stress this enough. You're probably hearing a lot of information and misinformation right now from social media, the scanner, calls that we are receiving that are not accurate. We strongly encourage you to follow the accurate information source. We will continue to provide as many updates and accurate updates as we can.

There have been false reports, false reports of additional shootings. There have been false reports of the suspect seen in numerous different locations. Those reports are not accurate. Please follow us for accurate information.

As I said, we are very early on in this investigation. It remains ongoing. And we are going to continue to meet back here and provide updates on the hour. We wanted to provide as much accurate information at possible -- as possible right now, and we will continue to do that moving forward.

As I said, information is very preliminary at this point, and we are working very hard to gather that information to accurately get it out to our community, to students, to parents, and to everybody who needs the information.

Please know that the safety and security of this campus and our students is our absolute priority at this point. We will meet back here at midnight for an additional update. We will push out some information, including a photograph of the suspect that we've just obtained immediately following this briefing. Thank you. We will see you back here in an hour.

UNKNOWN (voice-over): You are welcome to be here. This is a safe place. You can work from here if you need the space. I believe back in here, there are some (INAUDIBLE) that are available and maybe getting some additional support as well.

[23:09:59]

CAMEROTA: Okay. We've just been listening there to the deputy chief of the Michigan State University campus police named Chris Rozman. He just confirmed for us that, yes, indeed, there has been a mass school shooting at Michigan State University.

There were different location sites. We had known that, John, before that. That had been confirmed. There were multiple locations on campus. One was at Berkey Hall. They found, they said, multiple victims there. And then there was another one at the MSU Union Building. It sounds like a student union there. They got other reports of a shooting. They went there. There were victims in both of these scenes.

He said five -- at least five victims have been transported to the hospital. They do have life-threatening injuries. They've already confirmed that one person was killed. Then they believe that the suspect left the student -- the MSU Union Building on foot. That's where he was last seen.

They do have surveillance footage of the suspect which, of course, would be very helpful. They're going to release a photo, they said, very shortly after this. Ball cap, red shoes, possibly Black male. Everyone needs to continue sheltering in place. If you're currently sheltering in place in a dorm room, in a classroom, continue to do so.

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: So, what they are encountering is, you know, groups, who barricaded themselves in rooms, are being found by police who are arranging to get them out, get them a student staging area, and then bring them to a place where they will be interviewed to see what they saw, what they might know.

What they are also seeing is people self-evacuating. So, the preferred method would be shelter in place where you are, even if you're locked in a classroom, reach out and contact the police and say, this is how many we are, this is the room we are in and, you know, who is coming to get us, how long do you think that's going to be?

But where you have a gunman who is not in custody and police SWAT teams and rescue task force moving through the building, it's better for that to be done in an organized way where contact is made ahead of time.

CAMEROTA: Yes. I've also done interviews with Sandy Hook victims who said that, you know, once you've been sheltering in place and you know there's been an active shooter, even when the police come to knock on the door, you're so petrified and you don't believe that it's the police --

MILLER: Right.

CAMEROTA: -- knocking in the door. You just don't even want to open the door. You can imagine the terror.

MILLER: And then there are people that are -- you know, these are the groups that are in classrooms. Typically, in these situations, you will find people in closets. You will find people, you know, in janitors' rooms in hallways. They ran to wherever they could run and close the door behind them. So, this will go on for a while.

CAMEROTA: Shawn Turner is with us. Sean, as we've said, you happened to be on campus. You are a professor there. So, at 8:18, you said you got this alert that there was an active shooter. It's remarkable to hear how quickly they were able to send out the alert and how quickly police were able to respond.

TURNER: Alisyn, I'll tell you, when the officer says that this was an overwhelming response, that is absolutely true. I mean, it was a matter of minutes before the campus was crawling with law enforcement.

I do think there were a couple of really important things that the police officer said there. One of the things that happened here on campus is just with regard to the communication. As he said, there have been a lot of rumors and comments about what's happening on campus. Many of those things have not been true. It's just really important that people understand that.

This is a very walkable campus. And so, when this happened at Berkey Hall, and then you had the suspect moved to the student union and then leave the student union, what I can tell now in hindsight is that as that student -- as that suspect was on the move, what people were doing -- as I said earlier, seeing suspicious things and reporting that they were seeing suspicious things.

That really sort of got the campus all abuzz because people believe that the shooter is moving around campus. That may have been true but it is good to at least know that all the reports that we're hearing about shots being fired at multiple locations around campus, it's good to at least have it confirmed that that's not the case.

Two locations, extremely unfortunate, and to have one killed and five injured, obviously, a horrible day for MSU. Certainly, it could've been a lot worse.

I just want to say one thing about this community. The Michigan State University is a very tight-knit and very close community. Most of the people in this community around this campus, they have some affiliation with this campus. So, this really does tear through this community in ways that just aren't explainable.

The MSU Spartans are very proud bunch. They're proud of the affiliations. This is really going to resonate with this community and stick with this community, hurt this community for a long time.

[23:15:01]

CAMEROTA: Yeah. I mean, every single one of those does. Gentlemen, please stick around. We have a lot more questions for you. Up next, we're going to speak to a student, an MSU student, a Michigan State student who was there and can give us his take on everything that he heard and saw. We will be right back.

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CAMEROTA: We continue to cover this breaking news. One person is dead, at least five have been seriously injured in a shooting tonight on the campus of Michigan State University.

Joining us right now is Gabe Treutle. He is a freshman at Michigan State. He was there for this entire incident. Gabe, thank you so much for being here. Where are you right now? GABE TREUTLE, MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY STUDENT (via telephone): Yeah, I'm at West Akers right now.

CAMEROTA: That's a dorm room?

TREUTLE (via telephone): Yes, on the campus, on the east side.

CAMEROTA: As I understand it, you were in your dorm taking a chemistry quiz when you got an alert from campus police, and then what happened?

[23:20:03]

TREUTLE (via telephone): Yeah. After -- after I got that alert shortly after, I turned on the police -- police radar in our area. About 10 minutes after I did that, we got a report that -- that the shooter migrated over to (INAUDIBLE), which is about a block away from -- from where I'm standing. That really scared us.

We got the door barricaded. We were peering through the windows trying to make sure that he wasn't going to come over toward us, which probably isn't the best in our situation, but -- yeah. And then after about five minutes after that, they evacuated the entire building, the dining hall area, and that's what I captured in that video, the police coming over and just making sure that everybody was okay.

CAMEROTA: Yeah. I want to play that video. So, you took some cell phone video out of the window. Let me chew that up right now and play it for all of our viewers because what I see in it is -- I think we see pictures of -- here it is. Through the window, the students running. Can you just walk us through what we're seeing here?

TREUTLE (via telephone): Yes. So, we're told to get out of the dining hall area. They saw the shooter around there. They sprinted out and a line of police -- police came around and made sure everybody had their hands up. It was really a terrifying scene.

CAMEROTA: It looks terrifying. You can hear the students yelling. You can hear -- how many roommates are you with right now or were with you at that moment?

TREUTLE (via telephone): I'm with two. One was actually in the dining hall. We were really scared. We didn't know where he was. Yes, it was terrifying.

CAMEROTA: And had you found that roommate?

TREUTLE (via telephone): Yes. Since then, we came back. They evacuated him over to a parking garage.

CAMEROTA: What did he say happened in that dining hall?

TREUTLE (via telephone): I actually hadn't talk to him. He just got back.

CAMEROTA: Is he there with you? TREUTLE (via telephone): Yeah.

CAMEROTA: Can -- can you ask him or can I ask him what happened in there when he had to run out?

UNKNOWN (voice-over): Oh, my God.

TREUTLE (via telephone): Yeah, for sure.

CAMEROTA: What's his name? I don't know if he wants me to know his name. That is okay if not. But if he --

TREUTLE (via telephone): This is him here.

CONNOR ANDERSON, MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY STUDENT (via telephone): Yeah. My name is Connor Anderson.

CAMEROTA: Hey, Connor. What happened there, where we see you all running out?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Yeah. So, I was in the cafeteria, which is on the second floor. I got a text from somebody saying that there had been a shooting. It was on the other side of campus. Basically, we were in lockdown and everything was calm. And then everyone was listening to police reports.

We heard the shooter was getting closer to our location. Still thought we were safe. We started barricading the doors. At some point, we heard the shots. The SWAT and the cops came in. They all told us to get out of the cafeteria. We all stormed down the stairs and had our hands up walking out. They had us go to the nearest bus stop. And then as the shot got closer, they had us into a parking garage. We were kind of stranded there for a little bit until we got out with the cops.

CAMEROTA: But were you hearing shots?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Personally, no. People were.

CAMEROTA: Uh-huh. That's terrifying, Connor. That's really scary. How would you say many kids were in there in the dining hall at that moment?

ANDERSON (via telephone): I'd say 2 to 300 at least.

CAMEROTA: I mean, what a scary situation on every level because then once the police say, okay, you guys have to run out of here, was that, you know, chaos?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Oh, it was complete chaos. I mean, we all had to go down in one stairwell. People were getting trampled and everything. So, we all had to go at one exit. It took a while. I tried to (INAUDIBLE) people to stay safe.

CAMEROTA: Did you see anybody who is injured?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Uh, I did not. No, thankfully.

CAMEROTA: So, they took you -- they took you -- did they take you someplace else before you're able to go back to your dorm?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Yeah. Well, the cops (INAUDIBLE) us over. We were right outside, I think, Owen Hall, across from Miami East. We are near two ambulances and some cops. A lot of other news stations were there. But we were not given any instruction once we were there until just a few minutes ago when I got back that we were told to go shelter in place at our dorms.

CAMEROTA: And so, how are you and your roommate and Gabe feeling now at this hour?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Relieved. I'm feeling warm. I was freezing my butt off out there. I'm in shorts. So, just relieved, glad that it didn't get any worse than it was. Obviously, we are safe.

[23:25:01]

CAMEROTA: I'm glad you feel that way. The gunman, as far as we know, hasn't been arrested.

ANDERSON (via telephone): No, I haven't heard anything about that either. Obviously, it's scary. I am just glad that all of us are safe. All my friends are safe. I'm getting a lot of calls and texts from family.

CAMEROTA: I can imagine. And so -- but you, guys, you and Gabe and your roommates feel safe because -- are you barricaded in your dorm right now?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Yeah, yeah. We got a couple things in front of the door, making sure we are safe.

CAMEROTA: Oh, my gosh. Any other instructions from campus police? What are you supposed to do now?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Shelter in place. That was the only instruction. I don't think we're supposed to leave our rooms. That's what I'm guessing. I was in a big crowd of people. They have come from the parking garage. I don't hear any instruction. The only instruction we got was, at the end, they told us to go back to our dorms and shelter in place.

CAMEROTA: Weren't you scared walking back to your dorm?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Absolutely. Really not many police around. Once we did get back to our dorm, there was police doing body checks. They had (INAUDIBLE) and then they (INAUDIBLE) down.

CAMEROTA: Wow. So, meaning police are manning the doors of every dorm?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Oh, yes, absolutely.

CAMEROTA: That's scary. Have you all called your parents and made a contact with your parents tonight?

ANDERSON (via telephone): Oh, yeah. My mom has been calling me every two or three minutes, making sure I'm all right.

CAMEROTA: I can imagine. So, I'm interested, Gabe said that you guys turned on -- they turned it on while they were waiting for you, the police scanner. How do you all know how to do that?

ANDERSON (via telephone): I had gotten a link from one of my buddies. I'm not exactly sure how he got it. It shows how many -- there are 150,000 people listening in. It's pretty popular. I'm not exactly sure.

CAMEROTA: Control room, do we have a picture yet of the suspect? Do we have that? Okay, I want to show this right now. I just want to put up. This is the first picture that has been released of the suspect. I want everybody to look at the screen where you can see the red sneakers that they have talked about in the description, black pants, jeans, a jacket, but obviously, you know, he can throw any of that off, a baseball cap. It looks like he's wearing a black mask. He's been described as a Black male. Is that the gun on his hand?

MILLER: It appears to be.

CAMEROTA: There appears to be a gun in his hand. This looks like he's walking in, obviously, to one of the buildings. We don't know which of these buildings. There are multiple locations. So, everybody, take a look at that. Police, obviously, need your help there.

Connor, Gabe, thank you both so much. Really relieved that you guys are okay tonight. Have you heard of any students who are not okay?

ANDERSON (via telephone): As far as I know, no. Everyone I've talked to, all my buddies that go here, I haven't heard anybody that's injured or shot. I did hear some fatalities and a lot of injuries, a lot of ambulances speeding around campus. Not personally, no, thankfully.

CAMEROTA: Yeah. Well, thank goodness you guys are okay. Thank you so much for sharing your story. We really appreciate it. Again, the news tonight, there has been a mass school shooting at Michigan State University. As far as we know, one fatality, five people injured are being treated, some with life-threatening injuries at a local area hospital.

We are waiting for another update from the campus police in half an hour. We've just spoken to two students who obviously are traumatized and are barricading themselves in the room.

Here's the suspect. Please keep an eye out if you're in that area. Call police immediately. If you know anything, call 9-1-1. We're going to take a very quick break and come back with the latest.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[23:30:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: Breaking news tonight, a shooting at Michigan State University. One person has been killed. At least five people are injured. Some of those are life-threatening, we just learned, and they are at the emergency room at a local hospital. We do not know the identity of the person who has been killed. We don't know if it is a student, a faculty staff. We will hopefully get that information soon.

Back with me, Shimon Prokupecz, Andrew McCabe, Juliette Kayyem, Shawn Turner, who happed to be on campus when the alert went out on all of this, and John Miller. Also joining us is John Berman. Okay, Shimon, what is the latest reporting?

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: I just want to go back to that photo that we showed of the suspect. Obviously, that is the key thing here right now, to try and find this guy in the red shoes, jean jacket and the baseball cap.

What I think is interesting here is that he is going -- it appears that he's walking into this building here. So, we don't know what building this is. We don't know if this is Berkey Hall or Union, the other building where this second incident occurred. But I guess questions are going to be raised about how he got inside of that building.

Obviously, that's something that I wanted to flag because it appears he is walking in. I don't know where he goes from here because we don't have the luxury of asking the police right now. They say that his last known location was leaving that MSU Union Hall.

Obviously, from what I'm hearing from friends who attended the school, the way this area is, that he could be anywhere. We are talking about a very large area, a wooded area. There's a hall -- you know, just large community. So, obviously, the whereabouts of this gunman right now taken probably a lot of time because there's a lot to search through.

[23:35:02]

The other thing that is still going on, you know, we are over three hours into this, that police are still trying to get a lot of the students out of these rooms. They're still going door to door, trying to get many of these kids out. You know, you're talking to some of them, but a lot of these kids are still inside, stuck inside these classrooms, afraid to open doors because they're not sure if, in fact, it is the police.

So, all of that is still very much ongoing. Obviously, you can see the police here with this photo are trying to track this man's every move. So far, they've done a good job of finding some photo and video of him. I'm sure they're continuing to look through more to try and get a better idea on him.

He's wearing items that should be pretty easily identifiable. That's going to help them. And then you can see the gun, the handgun in his right hand. That, obviously, is going to be something that authorities are going to keep working through. But a lot more here for the police to do to try and find this man.

CAMEROTA: Yeah. We expect another press report -- presser from them in 25 minutes. Andy McCabe, let me come to you. I thought that that first press conference that they held was incredibly transparent. They just shared with us everything they knew. They admitted they didn't know everything. They got the photo out immediately, the surveillance video immediately of the suspect. I mean, really good police work so far, but doesn't mean that they're any closer to finding him necessarily.

ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST, FORMER FBI DEPUTY DIRECTOR: Alisyn, it's a really good sign that they are putting out what they have. They are being very transparent about the fact that they are still looking for this individual. They really need to take advantage of crowd sourcing, the search for this person. That's what they're trying to do at the last press conference, getting that photograph out, getting the description out, getting the last known location as to where that person has been sighted and where he might be going.

Very important for particularly the people who are still locked into these rooms and dorm rooms and classrooms on the Michigan State University campus to keep an eye out as to where they might sight this person and then, of course, call that into the authorities as to where they've sighted the person or someone similar to his description.

So, I thought they are handling it as well as they could under the circumstances, which are, you know, they are in a tough spot right now trying to find this guy who is a presumed mass shooter. Very little details to work with, but they are doing what they can and trying to take advantage of the greater university community to try to locate him.

CAMEROTA: Yeah. And let's remember, he can lose that denim jacket and change his outfit.

MCCABE: Sure.

CAMEROTA: But they don't always do that, amazingly. John Miller, you say that they also want to rewind the tape. They want to figure out where he went from here and where he was before this. Why?

MILLER: What you see here is a couple of indicators of preplanning. He's got the hat pulled down. He's got the mask. He's got this big jacket. So, one would argue, when you put this picture out, you know, his own mother wouldn't know. But that's not really true.

You know, people who are familiar with this individual would say, oh, I know those red shoes, I know that jacket, I know that jacket and that hat together, that's my friend George or something. So, that's a baseline, which is a picture is worth a thousand words.

What do you want to do with this thread, though, is pull it forward, which is continue that video canvas going forward to see what you capture, is there a better shot, is there better light from a different source, a different camera?

You also want to pull that thread backwards. You want to see, all right, what is the camera that he might've had to pass in either direction? Check the first one. If you don't see it there, check the second one. Go backwards. You want to get that moment where before he put the mask on, before he put the hat on, if there is a clear shot of what he really looks like. And all of that's going on right now.

So, we can probably hope for a better image as they expand the video canvas. I agree with you, I take my hat off to them for going with the image they got, which gives the public a baseline for, okay, this is what I'm looking for right now.

CAMEROTA: Friends, we have a disturbing update right now. This is coming, I think, from the Michigan State University Police. They now confirmed there has been three fatalities.

[23:40:00]

So, the death toll has gone up from this mass shooting on Michigan State University's campus. Three people have been killed now. Five victims, as we know, we heard it at the last press conference, are hospitalized. We believe there are still five victims hospitalized. The deputy chief said that those victims did have life-threatening injuries.

So, this is a mass shooting. It's another mass shooting at another school. It's horrible news. Obviously, there are terrified parents out there tonight and there are still students who are barricaded in their dorm rooms and classrooms as we speak.

We are going to take a very, very quick break, and we are going to come back with new reporting on the other side.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[23:45:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: We are back with more breaking news. Police say a suspect is on the loose after a mass shooting at Michigan State University. Campus police now confirmed there are three people killed. Five people are wounded at the hospital, some with life-threatening injuries. So, the death toll has gone up.

Back with me now, Shimon Prokupecz, John Miller, and John Berman. John Berman, you know, I think -- tomorrow is the five-year anniversary of Parkland, the school shooting that you and I both covered. We've covered many of these. I don't know what to say about that. I have a lot of wisdom about that. But, I mean, you know, I just remember the intensity of that and here we are again.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Look, I don't want to be (INAUDIBLE), but every other day or every other week, it's the anniversary at this point of another mass shooting, which is not to diminish, I think, the pain or the heartache or the concern that exists in East Lansing right now. What makes this different than so many of the mass shootings we cover is that generally, it seems, as if the shooter is either killed or caught right away.

I was just trying to think of the most recent mass shootings that we have covered and that we've done where the suspect was on the loose and there was a manhunt. One of them was Highland Park in Illinois, the fourth of July shooting, where it took until that night to apprehend that suspect.

But then the other one that might be the most pertinent, we have an expert on it right here with us on set, is the subway shooting here in New York City last April. No one was killed, but the shooting, it was a mass shooting in a subway car where the suspect got away, and then by the release of the video and piecing together the evidence, they were able to catch that suspect relatively quickly.

MILLER: And at the time, I was running the intelligence counterterrorism bureaus when that shooting happened. And, you know, we had a decision to make which was we got a very early lead on a name and a tip from a rental car place, a rent truck place in Pennsylvania, so we knew who we were looking for and we were trying to close that gap.

But the moment of truth came when we said, we have the picture. If we put the picture out, he knows we know who he is and that, you know, we are closing that. But the decision that we made was the same that these police officers made which is it's great to have 3,000 detectives looking for him, but if you can have eight million detectives in New York City, among the populace of the city all looking for him at the same time, that kind of crowd sourcing is of infinite value, and they made that decision right away.

BERMAN: It is the information you get manageable. The number of calls that come in, can you sift through them to get the ones that are most important quickly enough?

MILLER: I mean, we could because we have hundreds of 9-1-1 operators. In a case like this, they may have to build out a call center. We've seen in recent cases, even in the murder of the students, the college students out west where they funnel the tip line to the FBI's call center where they could handle the volume and put it into a lead tracking system.

And right now, you have the FBI on the scene with their SWAT team in case it's needed, but also with their victim witness assistance people, with their technical people, phone tracking people, all the support people that they can bring to this if they are needed.

So, these are going to be decisions that they're going to have to make early on in this investigation because once they have this picture out, the calls are already flooding in, once they get a better picture out. And I anticipate that they will, as they expand the video canvas, get a better image that shows more of that face, they will get even more calls. CAMEROTA: Yes, indeed. Shimon, to that point, I mean, I know there are no guarantees, but the fact that they did this so quickly and they have such a good shot, still framed from the video, this guy is not long for freedom. I mean, they're going to be -- I assume they have surveillance video all over campus.

PROKUPECZ: Right.

CAMEROTA: You know, they probably do know where he went next.

PROKUPECZ: Right, they probably do. And so, you know, whether he headed towards the woods or whether he -- maybe he got in a car, which we don't know yet and maybe that's something that they will release later as they try to put together sort of this footprint where he is.

The other significant thing is that he used -- it appears he used a handgun here. So, that's going to be certainly significant. Sadly, I mean, so many of the mass shootings we have covered certainly at schools involved, you know, AR-style weapons.

You know, if you think of the Uvalde, which is I obviously most recently covered, there was that kind of weapon.

[23:49:50]

And also, just the way the police have responded here and the way the police have released information here should be applauded because, you know, listening to how the police are responding, it was coordinated, it was sophisticated, they all knew what they needed to do, they all work together, they went into teams almost immediately, which is what they're supposed to do, try and go find victims, try and find the gunman.

So, clearly, it's going to be a very busy night there as they continue to search for this gunman.

CAMEROTA: Okay. We are waiting another press conference by Michigan State campus police there. You can see what looks like students, yeah, the aftermath of this shooting there. We are going to take a very quick break. We'll be right back.

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CAMEROTA: We are following our breaking news tonight.

[23:55:00]

CAMEROTA: This is video shot by a student at Michigan State University of other students running from the dining hall after police, a SWAT team, went into tell them that there was an active shooter on campus. They are -- that is, I think, police running towards them and police -- I'm sorry, students running out of the dining hall. One student that we spoke to earlier described it as chaos.

Let's bring in former deputy director of the FBI Andrew McCabe, who has been following this with us all night. Andy, what are the FBI and ATF doing at this hour?

MCCABE: There is a massive amount of work that needs to be done right now, Alisyn, on this scene, and that is in terms of clearing every single individual room that might be implicated in all of these buildings.

So, you know, if you are running this scene, you are looking for tactical teams, whether it's from the FBI or ATF or state and local police, anybody who got folks willing to contribute to the action, and you're going to send them into discrete parts of these buildings to clear these rooms, make sure that you don't have that armed shooter still kind of lurking inside at classrooms or in dorm rooms or holding people hostage, that sort of thing.

So, they are still very much in the tactical part of clearing this situation and that might go on for quite some time. So, we'll probably need to buckle in and be prepared to kind of watch this for the next few hours.

CAMEROTA: And we are going to be doing that. Andrew McCabe, thank you very much. Our breaking news is going to continue with John Berman in just a moment.

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