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Baltimore Caught Off Guard?; Protests Lead To Rioting, Violence In Baltimore; Demanding Answers On Freddie Gray Death. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired April 28, 2015 - 8:30   ET

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


[08:30:02] MAYOR MICHAEL NUTTER (D), PHILADELPHIA: And now with additional partners, they are not going to allow it to spiral out of control. But again, what have we been watching? We have been watching people in Baltimore exercising their right to protest and free speech.

And then all of a sudden, another group of folks who have not been involved in the peaceful protests decided to move from free speech to free stuff. The pharmacy, the liquor store, the mall, and all of those kinds of activities have nothing to do with the death of Mr. Freddie Gray --

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: That's a concern that is going to foreshadow the story.

NUTTER: -- the fact and details of what happened in that tragic incident. So we want to make sure that justice is served here.

PEREIRA: We do.

NUTTER: There are multiple investigations, as there always are in these tragic and very, very unfortunate incidents. But that does not give you license or permission to burn down, if that's what happened, we know that the community center, the senior center was burned down.

I don't know who did it or why it happened, but it should not have been on fire. There were people working the other day at that CVS and people were building that community center and they are now out of jobs as a result of the actions of others.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Mr. Mayor.

NUTTER: Yes.

CUOMO: And when you talk about the actions of others, Mr. Mayor, just to give some perspective to this situation as somebody, who watched it firsthand, I don't understand how you can excuse the role of leadership and what happened here yesterday.

Whether that leadership is not being present and pushing for answers in the investigation early and often enough or not planning for what seemed to be more reasonable contingencies given the violence over the weekend or not having the right people in place and a plan to stem the violence yesterday before it over took portions of the city. I don't understand your motivation to dismiss leadership as a function of that mistake?

NUTTER: I have not used that term and I am not suggesting anything in that regard, that's your language. What I'm suggesting is --

CUOMO: You seemed to be talking past that point by saying that commentators don't understand how to run a big city and commentators don't know what you may know or the mayor may know, what do you think is knows that everybody else doesn't know? What do you think informs the decisions that were and were not made yesterday?

NUTTER: Well, I think it's the fact that the commentators don't know how to run a city because they are not mayors of cities. I am not blowing past anything. What I'm suggesting is that the mayor is in charge. The mayor has information that none of us, in particular have, she -- Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake would not want something like this to happen and was not negligent because some of these things took place.

I mean, there is some personal responsibility here, whether it's regarding kids in the afternoon or adults later on, and those children have parents, and I believe I have seen on your station, a mother grabbing her child and saying you should not be out here in this kind of activity.

Everyone has a level of responsibility. But we are where we are. Again, there will be, I am sure, plenty of analysis about yesterday or over the weekend or whatever the case may be, and the police officers, I am sure, were directed to do the best they could to make sure people were safe.

That they were not acts of violence between police and community leaders. Again, if I remember correctly from what the reverend said, we are trying to get to where do we go from here. What are we doing now?

What are the demands that people in Baltimore and cities all across the United States of America, whether in Baltimore or Philadelphia or anywhere else, how can we best address the real issues at hand about unemployment or lack of opportunity or education?

What about folks coming out of prison and re-entering opportunities? Let's try to work on solutions. There will be plenty of enough time for finger pointing and analysis, but we are where we are.

And what I'm suggesting is we need to get to that place because that kind of analysis, that dialogue and an action plan will actually help us to prevent these kinds of incidents.

I don't think anyone at the moment can do anything about yesterday or last night. It's great for the TV analysis, and it's not leading to anyone having a job. It's not leading to children getting better educated. It's not leading to the revitalization of communities that we really need all across America. CUOMO: It's also -- you are not going to do anything today to revitalize -- you're not going to do anything today, probably, Mr. Mayor, not to seem cynical to revitalize communities, but by being held to account for what already happened, you bring some peace to the reverend and leaders in this community and the hearts and minds of those who were compromised by last night.

And give them some assurance that it won't happen again and when you don't want to discuss how you got into the trouble it doesn't give people confidence that you can avoid the trouble going forward, and that's why I was asking you?

NUTTER: I don't know what else the mayor is going to say today, and again, as I know her, I am sure Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake will engage with all of you in the news media and engage with her constituents.

[08:35:07] I heard some of that dialogue last night in terms of people that she had been reaching out to and talking to. So I'm not going to be in a position to solve some of the issues and challenges in Baltimore.

I have enough on my hands here in Philadelphia. She is a standup person and leader as I know her, and so I am going to leave it to the mayor in Baltimore to work with constituency groups and leadership groups and people who are about positive action and positive change to work in partnership with them.

So that terrible situations like yesterday afternoon and certainly last night do not take place again in the future. I have confidence that she will work with community leaders in that regard to make sure that Baltimoreans are safe and secure, and we don't have a replay, if you will, of those incidents again.

PEREIRA: That is a point we can all agree on. None of us want a repeat of what we saw yesterday. Thank you for joining us, Mayor Nutter of Philadelphia.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: OK, Michaela. We are also looking at the strange role that social media played in the riots. What set off the violence in Baltimore. We'll break that down.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CUOMO: All right, joining us right now is somebody who understands Baltimore better than most. He writes for the "Baltimore Sun." He covered the riots last night. He has been doing it for decades. His name is Dan Rodricks.

Dan, thank you for being with us today. Sorry to be with you on an occasion like this, but this is your city. This is what you know and love. What did you see last night?

[08:40:05] DAN RODRICKS, COLUMNIST, "THE BALTIMORE SUN": I saw a lot of -- I saw a city I had not seen before. I saw a city that was described to me 40 years ago after the '68 riots when I got to Baltimore, and it's shocking to see it in this city.

We are standing in a plaza where there was full of thousands of people after the Ravens won the Super Bowl. I have been here on a very festive occasions.

I've been here on a very sad occasion when people gathered in the city hall plaza to mourn loved ones who were killed in Baltimore's long epic of homicide and heroin addiction that's been going on here for years.

So I have been here for many different reasons, different occasions, sad and joyous, but this is still kind of shocking to me to see my city in this condition.

CUOMO: Why is it this way?

RODRICKS: In writing for many years about -- I and other people have been writing for many years about the other Baltimore. This is a phrase that actually Billy Murphy, the attorney for the Gray family used in 1983 when he ran for mayor.

And he was running against a popular incumbent, William Donald Schafer, who was trying to rev up the city after the '68 riots all through the '70s and into the '80s, and doing something about the loss of population and loss of manufacturing jobs.

But what happened during all of that, Chris, was this chasm opened up between downtown central part of the city and the east side and the west side, and it became concentrated with poverty and that has been allowed to fester for many years. That's what Billy Murphy was referring to in '83 as the other Baltimore or Jessie Jackson says, the two Baltimores.

CUOMO: Fester meaning what? Not getting the right education? Not getting the right services? What do you mean?

RODRICKS: It has not been enough. There's a part of Baltimore that has been so isolated from this part of Baltimore that you see when you walk through downtown, when you hear on those joyous occasions that I'm talking about, the celebration, all that stuff is great.

People from out of town come here. They crowd the city and the city is life on those days, but this whole stretch isn't Baltimore because it's such a vast, sprawling city that never seemed to be touched by that.

We all understand. You have to have redevelopment and bring people back down to love cities again. You know, we actually are seeing it downtown. Population has started to increase in downtown Baltimore.

But, you know, out there, the west side, the east side, if you drive out there and visit the city. You are struck by these two Baltimores.

CUOMO: Especially right now because that's where so much of the incendiary behavior was last night. They say Freddie Gray is just a symptom. They say there is a culture here. They say there are a lot of Freddie Grays. They say that nobody cares. Martin Luther King's assassination set off riots in '68. He says that riot is the language of the voiceless. That's what was going on last night?

RODRICKS: I think so. If you want to pin on it something, a way to express themselves in a way they just don't otherwise know how. Our eyes are wide open now. They have been for a while actually on police brutality.

"The Sun" has done really important stories about the extent of police brutality in Baltimore City. We have the period of zero tolerance policing that went on for ten years or so and that alienated people further from the police department.

I mean, it brought down crime, it brought down violent crime, during the time of Martin O'Malley when he was mayor, but there was a price for that in terms of the relationship between police and the community, which I believe is broken.

CUOMO: So we see what happened last night, the question is how it got that way. You had trouble over the weekend. There is now talk about how the reverend, who you know, met with the older members of the gangs, saying let's have peace? That they have heard about a purge.

Where was that reflected in your leadership and your planning? Where were your mayor and your governor on the streets here yesterday to keep people calm and show that they do matter? Where was all of that?

RODRICKS: Well, I have the same question you do.

CUOMO: Are we wrong to ask it?

RODRICKS: No, I think there is a question that goes back to when we first saw the video of Freddie Gray April 12th, and that week before he died, what was going on in terms of the police response to that video? You know, there were some people who were focused on it and talking about it, but it really all changed when Freddie Gray died, right?

CUOMO: They've had police statements from five of the six officers involved since April 12th, not a word of it has gotten out. You know, usually the police are in a lock box in terms of information yet this time we hear nothing. It fuels suspicion. What has to happen to make today better and next week better than that?

RODRICKS: Well, I am still worried. I am still worried about what is ahead here. We still don't have all the answers in the Freddie Gray case. What is in the days ahead for Baltimore City here? That's a big question.

[08:45:04] It's kind of a frightening question, actually, to think about what the reaction might be whichever may this goes, you know? So I guess we are going to have to wait and see on that, every day and every hour.

CUOMO: Here is the hope, sometimes in a failure, it winds up being a catalyst to success. You have the community motivated and people on watch and the politicians who feel a different sense of accountability going forward, and we will do our best and keep our eyes on the situation.

And you hope for the process of justice to play out sooner than later, but I look forward to reading what you have to write because you understand it better than most. I'm sorry that you're watching your city this way.

RODRICKS: Yes, thank you very much.

CUOMO: Alisyn, back to you.

CAMEROTA: OK, Chris, well, community leaders there tell us they will rally gangs and students to stop the riots in Baltimore. So what will happen today? We will talk about solutions next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR STEPHANIE RAWLINGS-BLAKE (D), BALTIMORE: What happened here last night destroyed so much of the progress that the people who actually live here -- I wanted to make sure I talked to people, the people who are desperate for better in Baltimore and to let them know that I am here to support them and we are going to get through this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Well, that was Baltimore's mayor moments ago addressing last night's riots. She was standing right there outside of the CVS. It was burned down during those violent protests.

[08:50:08] Here to weigh in on all of this are CNN commentator and senior for ESPN, L.Z. Granderson and retired NYPD Detective Harry Houck. Great to see both of you this morning.

Henry, the mayor went on to say something else in this impromptu press conference that she just had. She said what happened last night was that there were splinter groups in the protesters that went in every different direction, and police can't do that, they stay in one line.

On social media, they told the protesters to splinter in every different direction. Isn't that a big challenge for police? What else could they have done?

HARRY HOUCK, RETIRED NYPD DETECTIVE: Yes, that's a big challenge because they didn't have the amount of officers on the street that they should have. They were not prepared for this, and as far as I am concerned, they were not concerned because of the mayor, and the mayor's comments.

If we had the 5,000 police officers that were being brought in today, last night, and we had 1,500 National Guard people, we would not have went through what we had to go through last night.

CAMEROTA: L.Z., this was 16 days after the arrest and injury of Freddie Gray. What went wrong yesterday?

LZ GRANDERSON, CNN COMMENTATOR: It's not what went wrong yesterday, it is what has always gone wrong or at least document what has been going wrong when it comes to the police department and its interaction with the minority community.

You know, a year ago, the "Baltimore Sun" printed a really horrific picture of the Baltimore police and its interactions and brutality over the years in Baltimore.

That was over a year ago and still nothing was done in the city's office to address that in a really substantial way. So when we talk about what went wrong, we can't just talk about last night, but we have to talk about what has been wrong because last night is a simple smaller piece of the much larger picture, which is very disturbing.

CAMEROTA: All right, couldn't a lot of this anger from the protesters be quelled if the police would just release some information and answers about what happened to Freddie Gray? It's 16 days later?

HOUCK: Yes, but these investigations do take a long time. I mean, we have three separate investigations going on. I don't know what people want, all right.

BERMAN: How about the police officers statements? The ones, who are the arresting officers, how about if we released what they said happened?

HOUCK: Yes, but you can't release those. We have an ongoing investigation right now. OK, so none of that stuff can be released and you know, also these officers might be arrested. All right, so they don't want to jeopardize the integrity of the investigation by releasing all these information.

CAMEROTA: How long is the investigation going to take?

HOUCK: It could take a very long time. I mean, the commissioner said the other day, these investigations take a long time. You have hundreds of witnesses that need to be interviewed. You have the follow-up for the autopsy reports still have to come in. There is a lot of things going on in this investigation.

CAMEROTA: I mean, do you understand that the protesters say that's why they don't feel empowered. They saw something with their own eyes on video and they feel like the police are covering something up?

HOUCK: Right. I understand that, but they are also not paying any attention that the feds are going to come and investigate. The state is investigating and the Baltimore City Police Department is investigating.

CAMEROTA: LZ, you know -- go ahead.

GRANDERSON: I was going to say, if I can, again, I have to go back to the fact that this is one particular case, but this is a community that has seen this scenario play out time and time and time again. So the reason why there is such frustration at this particular level, and I want to make it clear that everybody involved last night were not protesters, some were looters and rioters, but there are 10,000 peaceful protesters that are concerned.

Because they've seen this story time and time again and unfortunately for the Baltimore Police Department as well as the mayor, you don't have the benefit of the doubt because they experienced this time and time again.

CAMEROTA: But LZ, I mean, given -- even with that frustration, you are not allowed to set cars on fire and not allowed to injure police officers, so what should the police force be doing, do you think?

GRANDERSON: Well, again, it's very important that we separate protesters from rioters and looters. What happened at CVS was not part of a protest. It was part of looters and rioters. There were 10,000 -- reportedly 10,000 peaceful protesters that very few the national media covered that were really --

HOUCK: Were there 10,000 people out last night?

GRANDERSON: Yesterday, there were 10,000 peaceful protesters who were not involved with any sort of criminal activity, as well as people that we saw well documented that were involved with violent crimes. Those are two separate groups that we cannot pretend they are interchangeable because they are not.

We do want the police to address those who committed crimes, but also we want to address the issue of police brutality that has been well documented in Baltimore.

CAMEROTA: How do the police regain control today, Harry?

HOUCK: Well, they have the 5,000 regional police officers coming in and the National Guard, I think they will gain control of the city today. I think we have probably seen the end of the looting and the destruction of property that we saw. I think today will be able to gain control and if we don't, then there is a problem.

[08:55:02] CAMEROTA: But you think that they will be on foot today. We won't see what we saw in Ferguson where when they tried to regain control, they were rolling out on tankers and they looked like a police state?

HOUCK: That's what it's going to look like because the National Guard is going to come in with Humvees. The police were -- in many instances last night the police were ambushed by rioters. There is one radio car came into the area and this officer was ambushed by rioters, and they have to go out with the equipment and protect the rest of the people in the city.

CAMEROTA: LZ, you are talking about years in discrimination and frustration, what do you want to see happen this morning?

GRANDERSON: Well, what I would like to see happen begins with the mayor's office as well as the police department. Not only address what happened last night, but talk about solutions about this long history of police brutality.

When your poor city, and Baltimore is a poor city, and it has been forced to pay out nearly $6 million because of cases involving police brutality, that is a state of emergency that needs to be addressed.

In addition to what is going on to the rioters and the looters, you have a systemic problem that you really need to focus in on and ask if you need the federal government to assist in, because it's been years and years of this.

CAMEROTA: Yes, I want to bring in Michaela. She is in the studio, and we want to go back to Chris, who is on the streets of Baltimore. Chris, your closing thoughts?

CUOMO: I am listening to what everybody is saying and everybody has good points and valid questions and this is a very complex situation that we see in places like this, and you are not going to get any quick answers to what happened to Freddie Gray or how to fix and make communities like this stronger.

All you can deal with is what is in front of you. You need accountability and leadership from your elected and you need to do better than you did last night, and that's going to be the test for today.

PEREIRA: Yes, and hopefully calmer minds and hearts will prevail, and it was interesting to see what the pastor had to say there, Chris. We're so glad you could bring us those comments.

CAMEROTA: Right. He said he will hold all the young people there at his church and teaching them peaceful protest. Obviously, we are checking back in with him. Chris, thank you so much for being on the ground there in Baltimore for us. Back to you. CUOMO: We're doing the job, and we'll spend the day seeing how they

are cleaning up and who is stepping up to do the right thing and we will be with the pastor and see how many kids he can reach.

Our breaking coverage of the unrest in Baltimore will continue, of course. We have the "NEWSROOM" with Carol Costello coming up with more right after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)