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DR. DREW

Shooting in Oregon Mall

Aired December 11, 2012 - 21:00   ET

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


DR. DREW PINSKY, HOST: Good evening. We have breaking news out of Oregon.

A gunman opened fire at a mall near Portland tonight. At least three people are dead, according to CNN, including the gunman himself. It happened at the Clackamas Town Center. A witness saw a man wearing a hockey mask and carrying an assault rifle.

According to a Portland TV station, SWAT teams are in the mall escorting people out. The mall was full of holiday shoppers who apparently had to scatter and hide from this violent, violent gunman.

Joining me through and will be with me through this and other discussions tonight, attorney Darren Kavinoky, who grew up in that area, right around where that mall is, I guess, Darren. And attorney Lisa Bloom.

I also have Kyra Rowland on the phone. She was actually in the mall when the shooting happened.

Kyra, what did you see?

KYRA ROWLAND, WITNESS (via telephone): First, I`ll back you up. I have a six-month-old baby that I was holiday shopping with, and we were at the perfume area in Macy`s, and I had my baby in my arms.

And I was just kind of browsing, and I all of a sudden heard two shots and then everybody was looking around, kind of confused. And then more shots started, and everybody got down on the ground. And I started to get down on the ground and then more shots were going.

So there was about -- after that third time, there was about 15 to 20 shots. I then put -- threw, tossed my baby into the stroller because I figured he would be safer there than in my arms and I just -- we ran. Everybody just ran, and everybody was -- there was lots of screaming and everybody was running towards the exit outside of the mall.

PINSKY: Kyra, let me ask you, did you see this man?

ROWLAND: I did not. I did not. But once I finally got home, I turned on the news and I find out that the man, he was behind us, basically. He was just heading in towards Macy`s, and right where I was, where the perfume department is, is about 20 feet away from the door, you know, the main entrance to Macy`s.

So after his gun jammed, he was heading -- he ran into Macy`s and so - - I did not see him but I`m sure if I had turned around, there was probably someone right behind us, so I just feel like if I hadn`t stopped to smell that perfume, that maybe I wouldn`t be talking to you today.

PINSKY: Wow, Kyra, what a story. And did you -- was anybody hurt sort of with the exodus? Did anybody fall?

ROWLAND: People just dropped whatever they were shopping with and just ran. One person had tripped but there were -- you know, multiple to help, to pick her up, and I had my stroller so I wasn`t worried about getting tripping or anything.

PINSKY: Was he shooting towards you guys as you headed for the exit, do you know?

ROWLAND: There was still shots being fired, and I don`t know -- you can`t tell. It just sounds like an echo. You can`t tell which direction or how close it is. So that`s -- now that I find out how close he actually was is why I`m so shaken up.

PINSKY: How are you doing? Are you OK?

ROWLAND: I`m OK. Just the more information I find out, the more I just feel like there was an angel with us, and I`m just so thankful that everything happened in my -- you know, everything happened the way it did as far as timing goes, because --

PINSKY: It`s incredible.

ROWLAND: Yes.

PINSKY: Kyra, you know, we talk a lot on this program about how people react in crises. We just saw some sort of ignominious behavior at a subway station recently.

Did you see any heroic in the mall?

ROWLAND: No, but I did, once I was out, I did hear somebody about a lady who just -- she was so -- she didn`t know what to do in the store, so one of the clerks, one of the makeup guys, he helped her out of the store, you know, to weave through, you know, all the makeup counters and all the purses and whatnot, and then he said, you stay out here, and they went outside. And he said that, you stay out here and find a safe place and I`m going to go back inside and grab some more people who need help.

PINSKY: Wow. We have to find out who that man was.

ROWLAND: Yes. He`s a Macy`s employee, and -- yes, I`m just so blessed for him as well.

PINSKY: And then once you all gathered outside, was there a sharing of stories? Was there any --

ROWLAND: No. I was so -- everybody was so in shock. I was just crying and I just -- I kept saying, "Oh, my goodness, oh, my goodness," and I was just so scared for my baby, and it was just more of a shock. There`s lots of employees just scared and everybody was on their cell phone.

I had forgotten where I parked my car, and I was on the other -- the whole other end of the mall, and everyone was just trying to get out as far away as possible, because nobody knew where he was or who he was.

PINSKY: Yes.

ROWLAND: So, you know, just getting out of there was a feat.

PINSKY: Kyra, say your prayers tonight and be thankful you`re all good. You`re going to be shaky for a couple days. It`s normal to have an acute stress reaction, not sleep and feel anxious and have all kinds of crazy, jittery kinds of feelings for a few days. That`s normal. So, don`t worry about yourself, OK?

ROWLAND: Thank you. I won`t be going to the mall for a couple days.

PINSKY: All right, Kyra. Good luck. Thank you so much.

ROWLAND: Thanks, Dr. Drew.

PINSKY: Darren, tell me about that community. You grew up near there. Anything we should know about the community, what`s it like?

DARREN KAVINOKY, ATTORNEY: Well, actually, to be accurate, I grew up on the other side of the state. But, in fairness, it`s a small state, Dr. Drew, and I`ve been there many, many times.

Portland is the most metropolitan city in Oregon, certainly the most populous. This is an area about 11 miles away from downtown Portland, very, very well-populated. This particular mall has several, what you call anchor tenants, large retailers like the Macy`s, an incredibly bustling mall. And I`m sure this time --

(CROSSTALK)

PINSKY: It`s sort of amazing that more people weren`t hurt.

In fact, we got another witness I guess. Taylor Gibson -- Taylor, are you there?

TAYLOR GIBSON, IN THE MALL AT TIME OF SHOOTING (via telephone): Yes.

PINSKY: Taylor, tell us what you saw.

GIBSON: I actually work in the mall. I had been walking from the back of the store to the front. I heard the first gunshots and my first initial reaction was that something had fallen, a big something had fallen, and then as I heard the second and the third, it immediately occurred to me that this is not right. These are gunshots, and this is happening right now. This is really happening.

At that time I had other employees with me, and we started to round up as many guests that we had in our store and escorted them to the back room. I then at that point realized that we need to shut our front gate, that our gate was wide open. And from where we are in the mall, we are maybe about 20 feet from where the shooter was.

PINSKY: Oh, Taylor. So, Taylor, so you actually went out towards the shooter, towards where there was action to pull the gate down?

GIBSON: Yes, I did.

PINSKY: Did you see him?

GIBSON: I did not see him, luckily, thankfully. That was my worst fear at that moment. We don`t have a pull-down gate. We actually have an automatic gate so I had to crouch down in the very front of the store and use my key and watch it come down as slowly as possible.

It was probably the worst 45 seconds of my life. I was just waiting.

PINSKY: Yes.

Lisa, that`s just incredible. These stories are just --

LISA BLOOM, ATTORNEY: I have to tell you, Dr. Drew, I`m so sad every time I see a story of another mass shooting in America with an assault weapon that up until a few years ago these were illegal, now they`re legal, and that somebody can go into a heavily populated area, as Darren said, into a Macy`s during the holiday season, knowing there would be a lot of people there, a lot of targets, and fire off all these rounds.

And according to your first guest, apparently stopped because the gun jammed, and thank god for that.

PINSKY: After 25 rounds.

BLOOM: Yes, and if the gun had not jammed, how many more people would have been killed. It`s so sad for our country.

PINSKY: Darren, I`ve got to take a break.

KAVINOKY: Sure.

PINSKY: I would come back to you as soon as we do.

Taylor, can you hang with me?

GIBSON: Yes.

PINSKY: Thanks. We`re going to take a quick break.

Is that -- can the control room tell me, is that a live shot we`re looking at there at the Oregon mall right now? OK, this is a live shot. We`re going to continue, then, giving you breaking news on the Oregon mall shooting. Take a quick break and be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PINSKY: Lieutenant James Rhodes is with the Clackamas County Sheriff`s Department. He`s on the phone with me now.

Sheriff, what can you tell us? Can you update us? We`ve heard there`s been three deaths including the shooter. Did he harm himself or was he taken down?

LT. JAMES RHODES, CLACKAMAS COUNTY SHERIFF`S DEPARTMENT (via telephone): We`re not able to release that information yet, but he is deceased and we`re continuing the search with a team of officers, fully going through floor by floor, room by room, store by store. There`s several employees and patrons who have hidden themselves in back bathrooms and cloakrooms and so forth.

So we`re carefully methodically going through every square foot in the mall, making sure we didn`t miss anybody and rescuing and removing people from the mall.

PINSKY: We`re hearing there were some injuries as well? Can you update us on that?

RHODES: We have at least one patient that was transported to the local trauma center and a then some minor injuries that were treated at the scene.

PINSKY: Can you give any information about the weapon he was using and the nature of these injuries?

RHODES: The one injury that was transported was a gunshot wound. The specifics as to the weapon, we`re not ready to release that yet, but it was a firearm and it has been secured. But as far as the specifics or the type of variety, we`re going to withhold that information right now.

PINSKY: Let me ask you a question. This is just for the viewers` sake. Why withhold information at this stage of the game just so we understand what you`re up to. Just to explain this to people.

RHODES: Well, it`s important for us, first of all, to make sure the mall is secure and we`re doing that. But immediately on the heels of that it`s going to become a criminal investigation. And part of that investigation is we`re going to determine the identity of the shooter. We`re going to the shooter`s residence, determine if the shooter had any accomplices and that type of information.

And so we protect that information until we can secure anything that might be, say, maybe a vehicle, how they arrived here, or a house or apartment they live in, and those types of this. So, we protect all that information until we gather and secure all that evidence.

PINSKY: Lieutenant, thank you very much for clarifying that, because I think a lot of people are wondering, why can`t we know that information. That makes perfect sense.

Can we ask this? Is he a minor or an adult, do we know that?

RHODES: Again, for the same reason, we`re not ready to release that yet.

PINSKY: OK, fair enough.

Is there anything else coming forth or any clarity about the situation that we haven`t heard yet, any new information?

RHODES: Only that we`ve now confirmed there was just the one shooter. And that shooter is deceased.

There was some initial conflicting reports about multiple shooters. We`ve verified we have the one shooter and the weapons are secured, and now we`re down to just treating any injury and secure everybody and getting them out.

PINSKY: And, finally, you may not be able to answer this. But people reported he was wearing a hockey mask. Is that accurate?

RHODES: I can`t confirm that.

PINSKY: Got it.

RHODES: But there are -- part of the nature of these things is the point of when the shooting began at 3:30 this afternoon, there was probably close to 1,000 people in the mall. We are flooded with 911 calls and they have conflicting reports. So we`ve heard all kinds of reports about various clothing and masks and locations and weapons.

So it`s going to take us a while to sort through all that stuff and determine what is true and what is not.

PINSKY: All right, Lieutenant, thank you so much for the update. We really do appreciate it.

I have also on the line now, Tony, I believe it`s Charro. He was in the mall at the time of the shooting.

Tony, can you give us a sketch of what you saw?

TONY CHARRO, HEARD GUNFIRE IN MALL (via telephone): Yes, I was at the Papaya Store with my two daughters and grandson. When we heard the bangs, I thought it was like the escalator collapsing or something like that, and I walked toward the front of the store to see what was going on when I noticed two people laying on the floor.

PINSKY: Oh.

CHARRO: I walked over to them to see if they were OK, and he was OK. The two were fine.

And I looked over to my left and outside the Best Buy store, there was a lady there that had been shot. I immediately went over to her to try to see if I could help her out in any way, and there was nothing I could do. I couldn`t find anybody to help me get her turned over or, you know, what- have-you.

PINSKY: Where was the shooter at that point?

CHARRO: The guy that was covering, I do believe was his wife, told me that he seen a guy in black run that way, pointing toward the food court and JC Penney`s. And then said he was wearing black.

He did say something white over his face, but he didn`t say he was wearing a mask or anything.

PINSKY: Where were your kids and grandkids at that point?

CHARRO: They were in the back of the Papaya at the time. They were getting ready to be escorted out the back doors. Because I ran back to go back in to be with them, and the doors were locked.

PINSKY: Oh, my God. This must have been just horrifying. You sound awfully calm right now. Are you OK?

CHARRO: Yes, I seem to be fine. I don`t know what made me just go out there, but I don`t know, I just went out and tried to help people.

But there was nobody around. All I seen was like bags. Everybody just dropped everything and took off running.

PINSKY: Oh my God. Tony, thank you for that update.

I want to go back quickly to Taylor.

Taylor, are you still with me?

GIBSON: Yes.

PINSKY: How old are you, Taylor?

GIBSON: I am 20.

PINSKY: This is -- I mean, you sound so young. And you were the one by yourself, a 20-year-old had to go toward the shooter to secure the store for your clients. Incredible. Incredible.

GIBSON: Yes. I`m assuming at the time that his gun was jammed from what I`m hearing is actually while I was shutting the gate.

PINSKY: But for the grace of God.

All right. Listen, we`re going to be back in just a minute with other accounts from those inside the mall. Please stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PINSKY: We`re covering breaking news of a shooting in a mall outside in Portland, Oregon.

Three dead, including the gunman himself.

Tony Charro, I believe your last name is, Tony was there at the mall at the time of the shooting. He`s on the phone with me.

And, Tony, I got you back. I know you hung up on us and I asked my staff to bring you back here because we wanted to thank you. I -- you know, at a time like this, one of the things you do see is when everyone is running and appropriately trying to get out and keep themselves safe, some heroes step out of the crowd and move towards the action, and you were one of those folks.

Lisa, you were saying that.

BLOOM: Yes, attending to people who are down. In this chaotic situation where you hear gunshots and everybody is running, and you had the presence of mind, Grandpa Tony, to go out there and attend to strangers. So I just wanted to applaud you for that. Thank you for doing that.

CHARRO: Thank you. Thank you. It`s just instinct. I don`t know, I didn`t think about it, I was just doing what I need to do.

PINSKY: Thank God his gun was jammed or whatever. We`ll learn more as the evening goes on.

By the way, I`m sure Robin Meade will be covering this in the morning. Be sure to tune in with her show tomorrow when we get more details about exactly what has gone down here.

Now, it`s still kind of a black box mystery as the police do their investigation.

Yes, Tony, thankfully, the gun seemed to have jammed or something.

CHARRO: Yes.

PINSKY: And somebody was smiling on you there and your kids. It was your kids and grandson, is that right?

CHARRO: What`s that?

PINSKY: You say it was your children and a grandson who was with you?

CHARRO: Yes.

PINSKY: Are they cool now, is everybody good?

CHARRO: They`re a little shaken, but, yes, they`re doing good.

PINSKY: All right. Well, thank you, Tony. I just wanted to get you back to say thank you very much.

We`re now -- I`m joined now by Michelle Ward. Michelle is a psychologist specializing in criminal behavior.

Michelle, you were going to be on the show to talk about another psychopath, Jodi Arias, and lo and behold, breaking news happened, just as we were sitting down to do our show tonight. So, I`m glad to have you here.

I almost don`t know where to start. I got a million questions. I guess -- well, I start where I`m feeling right now, which is I feel like there`s something wrong with our country. I feel a sort of divisiveness and energy on the street.

Is there anything -- let me ask a simple -- it may not be a simple question, but a starting question. We`ve only got a couple minutes for this particular break. We`ll keep this conversation going. But is there something about the social contacts for a psychopath to start to act out? Are we in a time of economic distress and divisiveness and is that why we`re seeing this acting out behavior, or is it just random?

MICHELLE WARD, PSYCHOLOGIST: You know, Dr. Drew, those are my exact questions. Is it gun control? Is it a fact that we are in an economic depression? Is it, are there more mentally ill out there, more psychopaths among us?

I have no idea, but it seems we`re seeing more spree killings, especially in our youth. I have no idea who this person is, and, of course, it will unravel as the days go by. But it seems like we`re seeing more of this violence more and more often, and I don`t know what the cause is.

PINSKY: Michelle, we`re watching some sort of unbelievable video alongside of you. I`m trying to make -- you know, stuff is coming in as we`re doing the show tonight and I`m trying to make sense of it. If I`m looking shifty, because I`m not looking at the lens, because I`m watching the video with you guys.

I guess this was probably on somebody`s cell phone or something, is that right? Can the control room tell me that? It`s the SWAT team -- oh, these are kids --

BLOOM: That they let out. Can I just say, Dr. Drew, that any shooting is horrific? But a lot of times when you see these shootings, it`s because somebody has a vendetta, they go to an employers that had just fired them. They go to a school where they had been bullied.

This seems to me to be in a completely new category, just going into a mall and randomly shooting holiday strangers. Now, we may learn more that there was some vendetta. But just shooting holiday shoppers who apparently had nothing to do with this gunman at all.

PINSKY: And, Michelle, that`s what I want to get into with you after the break. What makes a psychopath tick? What makes them go over the edge or is this sort of random behavior? Or is this not psychopathy we`re seeing here? Is this something with a different kind of mental illness or a different kind of social problem?

Also, I`m interested in talking with anyone who was in the mall this evening who might have seen something who can give us more detail about what had occurred. We`re learning more about this as you are about this. So, please give us what you got. To call us at 855-DRDREW5 and you can help bring this life for us and understand what this is, why this happens, and hopefully share tonight together with the people who had to go through this so we can support one another and get through this together.

Be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PINSKY: We are talking about the mall shooting just outside Portland, Oregon.

Joining me, former Navy SEAL Cade Courtley. His new book is "The SEAL Survival Guide."

Cade, I obviously have a lot of questions for you. Bottom line is, this could have been any one of us. It is the holiday shopping season. We all visit the malls. There are thousands of people were moving in crowds all over the country.

How do we feel secure tomorrow and what can we do if we ever encounter something like this?

CADE COURTLEY, FORMER NAVY SEAL (via telephone): Well, the answer to the second question first, what do you do? Because we`ve already said, hey, it`s not if, but when this happens.

There are basically three phases to an active shooter scenario like this one. There is the pre-shooting, and what you`re basically asked to do is be aware of your situation. Just keep an eye on what`s around you, especially in a public place like a shopping mall.

PINSKY: All right. Cade, I`m going to stop you and say, how do you know that somebody is apt to break into this sort of behavior? Is there some tell, some sign?

COURTLEY: I mean, look, just the mere fact of not texting while you`re walking around taking your headphones out already puts you at a high level of awareness, and then, certain things that you should key into. Maybe in the summertime, you see a guy with a large trench coat. That doesn`t make sense, it`s 90 degrees out.

You see somebody who looks disturbed, maybe they`re pacing back and forth, sweating, nervousness, things like that that just don`t make sense that you will only see when you`re actually looking around your surroundings.

PINSKY: All right. Cade, there are some very important points which you`re making. One is another reason to take your face out of your phone and take your headphones out of your head so you can interact with the environment in a safe way and let alone have a life.

COURTLEY: Absolutely.

PINSKY: But number two is trust your instincts. If you see something that doesn`t look right, it`s probably not right.

COURTLEY: Again, let me go back to the -- OK it`s 90 degrees out. Why is that guy wearing, you know, a full trench coat?

PINSKY: Yes.

COURTLEY: Why -- there seems like there`s something obstructive underneath it. That doesn`t make sense. I need to tell somebody about it. The second phase to an act of shooting situation is the actual shooting, and this is going to be difficult for some people, especially if they`ve never been around gunfire. But you only have to think about two things. When you hear that gunfire, get down and move.

That`s all you need to think about. That`s called an immediate action and you are trying to get off what`s called the kill zone or get off the X.

PINSKY: Well, Cade, we heard sort of the eyewitness scenes we`ve been hearing is that people did hit the ground after the second shot, but then they got up and ran. Is that the right thing to do or do you crawl as best you can and stay as low as possible?

COURTLEY: Basically, the closer you feel like you are to the shooter, the lower you have to stay. That`s always been the case. Get down at your close-down crawl as fast as you can. As you get further away from the shooter, you can start moving in larger leaps from cover to cover, faster and faster to the point where you`re far enough to where you think you`re safe enough to run and really cover some ground in trying to get away from that kill zone.

PINSKY: And what is the third?

COURTLEY: And the third thing essentially is what I call when the shooting stops or your escape. You`re going to have a ton of law enforcement. They are going to be keyed up and you do not want to be somebody that they shoot.

So, if you think you`re near law enforcement or you`re getting ready to go through a door where there are cops on the other side, make sure they see your hands, because when you train for these situations, all you do is look at the hands. If the hands don`t have a gun or a weapon, you probably don`t need to shoot that person.

PINSKY: Listen, I`m going to ask -- Cade, I`m going to ask the control room to please play that video again of the innocent bystanders in the mall terrified but all holding their hands up. It starts to make sense. So, you hear there are little kids holding their hands up. We`re airing someone`s iPhone video from the mall where people are walking in an orderly fashion, people, little children with their hands up in the air, presumably because cops are calling out for them to do so, I imagine, yes?

COURTLEY: That`s -- before they even call out. Keep your hands up and yell, friendly, friendly, friendly. OK? And when you put police at ease, you know, you`re going to be in a much safer position. Just don`t make their job more difficult by tucking (ph) your hands away.

PINSKY: And is -- should people be moving quickly at that point or is that going to put them more --

COURTLEY: Absolutely. But again, like I say, they`re trained to look at the hands. You can`t shoot it down which your mouth (ph) to your foot. If they see a gun isn`t in the hand, they probably won`t pull the trigger.

PINSKY: One of the question back to phase 2. If you`re laying low and you`re trying to get away, you think there`s a proximity of a shooter, do you look back to try to figure that out to see whether you should get up and run or you just stay low?

COURTLEY: That`s the difficult part. Again, you know, I`m not talking about a bunch of people who are trained to call, and they understand, oh, it sounds like that, so I need to go to this direction. You want to try and game (ph) ground away from it, but here`s what you do is you do it in little bites. Go from cover to cover. When I say cover, this is very important. Cover is something like a bench, a wall, or even a large potted plant --

PINSKY: So, it`s not a clothing rack. Cade, I have to interrupt you. Hang on, my friend. I`ve got to interrupt you. We have a live press conference we`re going to be cutting away, too. There we go, right now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No rounds were fired by law enforcement in the mall today.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No rounds --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No rounds.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We take all questions at the end.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No rounds were fired by law enforcement today in the mall. Again, we are wrapping up our search of the mall and releasing everybody. We have a lot of work to do as far as gathering witness statements and staff before everybody (INAUDIBLE) so I`m asking for family and friends to please still be a little patient before we get everybody released from the mall.

And still, if you have questions, contact the sheriff`s office. I`d like to introduce Sergeant Adam Philips, the PIO from the sheriff`s office.

SGT. ADAM PHILLIPS, CLACKAMAS COUNTY SHERIFF`S OFFICE: I`ve been in contact with the mall management. They have said that they are going to be posting information for businesses, employees, and customers who were affected by this incident on their web page. You can find it on the internet.

The mall is going to be remained closed for the rest of this evening, and as long as the police investigation goes on, it will remain closed as well. We do not have a timeline for that. People who have stuff left inside the mall, check the Clackamas Town Center webpage for information on how to get it back.

Your property is secure tonight. The process will be developed on how to get that back to you. Family members, once again, if you are still looking for somebody, be patient. With the two people deceased right now, their family members are being contacted currently. If you haven`t been contacted soon, chances are your family member is not one of those people deceased tonight.

The next press conference that we have and all future releases of information, any interviews, are going to be done at the Brooks Building, Clackamas County Sheriff`s offices. That address is 9101 Southeast Sunny Brook Boulevard. We have a joint information center there that the media will be able to broadcast from.

And once again, all further information releases and interviews will be done there. At eight o`clock, Sheriff Roberts is going to be there for a live press conference, and now, open it up to questions.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The assumption is that this is a random act. Do you think it`s random?

PHILLIPS: Any information about the actual investigation is not going to be appropriate to release right now. I wish I could answer those questions, but it just wouldn`t be appropriate right now.

(INAUDIBLE QUESTION)

PHILLIPS: I don`t have -- I was not here. I don`t know what they did. I know that we got many calls from 911. The Clackamas Town Center security guards and employees all did the appropriate things. I heard many people locked in place, many people ran. Those are the two most appropriate things to do in these circumstances.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can you tell us more about the two victims at all?

PHILLIPS: I don`t have any identifying information about them.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Ages or anything?

(INAUDIBLE QUESTION)

PHILLIPS: I don`t have any information about the investigation at this point.

(INAUDIBLE QUESTION)

PHILLIPS: That goes right to the same thing. I can`t give that information.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Number of people --

PHILLIPS: That number stayed the same as Lt. Rhodes mentioned. There was one person transported with an injury.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That`s a critical injury, but any minor injuries?

PHILLIPS: I don`t know.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Were you folks in contact with mall security, watching it unfold on video camera?

PHILLIPS: I do not have that information.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How many people are still involved?

PHILLIPS: There are still police officers inside the mall. We`re being assisted by Oregon state police, Portland police, Milwaukee, Gladstone, Oregon City, federal law. Enforcement agents are also here assisting us. There are still many people inside the mall. As far as customers go, my understanding is that that number is dwindling consistently.

Part of a thorough search means going into every room that we can get into to confirm that nobody is inside of it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PINSKY: All right. Now, we are going to continue to cover this story and stay on top of it with my guests. We`re going to take a quick break and be right back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PINSKY: We are continuing to cover breaking news tonight, a shooting at a mall outside Portland, Oregon, the Clackamas Town Center, leaving three people dead, including the gunman.

I want to go back to my guest. I can`t help but thinking this is like the fourth shooting we`ve been covering in six months or as long. Something is up. I feel like there`s something, a divisiveness that I`ve never seen. I remember back in the 1970s, there was a lot of random violence. There was a random crime. There was a lot of crime back then, but this feels senseless and random.

Michelle Ward, you study psychopaths. Do you think that`s what this is? Is this a context for psychopaths to start acting out or is this something more? Let`s start to speculate about this killer.

MICHELLE WARD, PSYCHOLOGIST, SPECULATING IN CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR: You know, I`m not one to say that environment causes things, but I don`t think we`re getting more psychopaths into our culture. I think there`s something environmental that`s happening. I`m not sure if it`s, you know, the economic downfall. I don`t know what it is or it`s access to drugs and guns.

Well, we`re not clear as what`s going on here. We don`t know what this guy`s background is or even if it`s a guy. But something is definitely happening. We had that Colorado shooting in the Aurora movie theater --

PINSKY: Oh, yes.

WARD: -- recently.

PINSKY: That`s right.

WARD: Very similar to this.

PINSKY: That`s right.

WARD: I mean, as far as we know, it`s similar to that.

PINSKY: But then, with Michelle -- let me interrupt you, Michelle. That was -- that really seemed like mental illness, a dysphoric, schizophrenia, you know, some sort of really serious mental illness. Do you think this is that again or is this psychopathy, discontent? I mean, would a psychopath do this? Would a psychopath go, you know, I`m angry. I`m going to go out and kill some people.

WARD: Psychopaths are incredibly goal driven. So, if a psychopath`s goal happened to be, I`m going to walk into a mall and shoot random shoppers, sure. But I doubt it. I think there might be something a little bit more of a trigger having to do with maybe a different mental illness, perhaps, stress, or as we supposed said, maybe there is revenge involved.

It`s totally unclear at this point, but I agree with you, Dr. Drew, we are seeing an increase in this particular type of violence.

PINSKY: Karen -- no, excuse me, Darren --

DARREN KAVINOKY, GREW UP NEAR MALL WHERE SHOOTING TOOK PLACE: Yes.

PINSKY: Thirty minutes ago, you were trying to say something.

KAVINOKY: I was trying to say something and actually, it applies to this point.

PINSKY: Good. I`m glad I brought it all the way home at the right time. I appreciate you patiently waiting. But I did remember that I told you to hang on while I take a break and I`ll get back to you, so here I am.

KAVINOKY: Thank you for honoring that promise. You know, listening to this, I can`t help but wonder whether fundamentally there is more crime or whether now there`s just a whole different way to focus on it. When we look at just the guests that were on talking about their experiences tonight, I was left reminded about that old saying that adversity doesn`t shape your character, but it reveals it.

PINSKY: Hmmm.

KAVINOKY: And here, we`re hearing stories of heroism, and I`m sure as the story unfolds, we`re going to hear hundreds and hundreds more, people who put their own lives at risk for the sake of strangers. And so, I don`t get the impression that we, as a society, are fundamentally worse now.

I think we do a much more effective job of covering these stories. Perhaps, there`s some recalibration of the bar, there`s some new normal as more horrific crimes are coming out, but fundamentally, I just don`t think we`re that much worse.

PINSKY: Well, I`m not sure, Darren. I get your point, but I -- somebody threw some food on me in a subway station the other day for no reason and I thought, that`s random. What is going on here? There`s just a divisiveness. I actually have a witness on the phone who was in the mall. Her name is -- she, Morgan Murphy. Morgan, what did you see and hear?

MORGAN MURPHY, AT MALL DURING SHOOTING: I was at the mall with my son, and we were walking just passed food stations toward Macy`s, and all of a sudden I heard shots. I happened to be like next to one of the doors that leads to the back of the building and then out of the building and I just -- my first thought was grab him and go.

PINSKY: Just get out of here. Very wise. How old is your son?

MURPHY: My son is four, and we`re having a little bit of a hard time getting out the door, and there was a gentleman who was right outside the door who hadn`t quite realized what had happened, and when he saw everybody running and saw me struggling with my son, he dropped everything and helped me carry him to safety.

PINSKY: You`re getting a little emotional. Does that man -- have you had a chance to thank him adequately?

MURPHY: That`s the reason I called our local news station originally is because I hope he`s listening and I hope he knows how thankful I am.

PINSKY: Morgan, thank you for this call. CNN is now reporting that the gunman killed himself. And we, I believe, heard at the press conference that the police did not fire any weapons, so that is consistent with what the police were reporting. We`ve got more to talk about. Cade is still with me. I want him to speculate about who this monster was. Be right back.

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PINSKY: I`ve been hear breaking news, as we said, the Oregon shooting is just -- and it`s made me upset and thinking about the divisiveness in our country and some reason that Abraham Lincoln`s quote hearing about the heroism some people were exhibiting. "The better angels of our nature," to quote Abraham Lincoln, are what we need to rely upon as these things become more common place. And hopefully, this indeed -- that those better angels of our nature that will prevail, and that we will see less of this with time.

The Clackamas Town Center outside Portland, scene of a shooting, three dead, including the gunman, took his own life. We are hearing reports that people, eyewitnesses saw a man in a mask jogging through the mall with an assault weapon. Cade, you`re still there. Do you have any speculation about who this guy is going to end up being?

COURTLEY: Well, look, unlike you and some of your guest, I do not have training in mental health, but I do have an opinion. I feel like we`re living in a society that has a declined accountability. And with that, there seems to be a lack for reality. And, for somebody who think it`s OK to dress up like that and go shoot people because their life is that bad, you know what, we`re better than that.

If you`re out there and you`re that miserable that you want to take your life, don`t include other people, OK? Go get help, but don`t go out and be like, I`m going to take my life and I`m going to take others with me. We`re better than that.

PINSKY: Yes. The better angels of our nature, as I was saying. I want to go out to, I believe, he`s an eyewitness, Pete in -- he`s just a caller who wants to make a comment. I`m sorry. Pete is in Pennsylvania. Pete, go ahead.

PETE, PENNSYLVANIA: Dr. Drew, I have a question. What made this gunman go into the mall and shoot people?

PINSKY: We don`t know, Pete. I`m sorry. We have no information about the nature of this guy. I`ve got Michelle Ward who`s an expert in psychopathy. We were going to be talking about the Jodi Arias case tonight who is, in my opinion, Michelle back me up on this, is a psychopath.

Everybody (INAUDIBLE) I can see about that case, which we will be reporting on a future. But this guy, we don`t know. Is it going to be PT -- some sort of severe PTSD or some sort of manic episode or schizo -- we don`t know. Michelle, back me up on that. is that what your understanding would be?

WARD: Well, that`s exactly what I`m wrestling with. Is this somebody who`s going through a psychotic episode, some manic episode, or is this a more calculated thought out plot. But I do want to mention the heroism that we`re seeing in this case versus the subway pushing last week where nobody helped. It seems like everyone in Oregon was helping.

PINSKY: Yes.

WARD: And I was glad to hear that.

PINSKY: Yes. You`re absolutely right. Do we have other witnesses in the control room? Again, anybody out there that`s -- there`s a Patty. Can I talk to Patty? Are you there, Patty? Patty? There you are. Go right ahead, Patty. What did you see?

PATTY, ARIZONA: How I`m feeling is like -- is that what is going on in our society is like with the Aurora shooting and the twilight (ph) shooting death almost happened. And now, the Oregon mall shooting. What is going on in our society --

PINSKY: Patty, I`m being told --

PATTY: This is our now (INAUDIBLE).

PINSKY: -- that you actually had a nephew with the young child in the mall.

PATTY: Yes.

PINSKY: Are they out now? Are they OK?

PATTY: Yes, they are out. They`re fine, but they are really taken -- they are truly taken (ph) out and they just basically got out.

PINSKY: Yes. I mean, this, you know, I don`t know what to say. This is overwhelming. Hopefully, something we`re going to be reporting less frequently. Darren, I wonder if you have any -- you haven`t had a chance to ring in during this break yet. Any thoughts you have?

KAVINOKY: Well, it seems like something that`s a complex issue. And earlier, we hit around about gun control and guns being part of the problem. And obviously, there were some incidents that were in the news. Bob Costas covering the sports story where there was gun play involved, and this is an issue that has people very, very polarized.

I think until we`re willing to step back and acknowledge that fundamentally the way we`re dealing with guns, ammunition, and behavioral health in our society, it`s not working.

PINSKY: Well, yes.

KAVINOKY: And until we`re able to step back and take a look at that anew and be willing to solve problems, we`re going to keep this sort of recidivist behavior going on over again.

PINSKY: If you remember back with the Colorado theater shooting, he - - there was lots of warning there, but people, apparently, couldn`t do their job or people were undermining the ability to do their job. Yes, you`re absolutely right there. And I -- it`s about the assault weapon, maybe. People would, I think, agree there`s some stuff to be discussed there.

And also, when people need to be contained. When there are very serious mental health concerns, there`s got to be resources available.

We`ll take a quick break. We`ll be right back.

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PINSKY: All right. before I go, I want to read you that complete quote I mentioned with Abraham Lincoln, "The mystic chords of memory will swell when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."

Thank you all for watching. We`ll obviously be watching carefully. More to report on this story. Thank you to Lisa Bloom, Darren Kavinoky, Michelle Ward. Her new season of "Stalk" premieres tomorrow night on Investigation Discovery. I also want to thank Cade Courtley and to all of you who called, eyewitness reports who were just stunning.

Robyn Mead will have the latest on the story in the morning on "Morning Express." Thank you all for watching. "Nancy Grace" begins right now.

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