information. >> and having grown up in los angeles, my grandparents lived out near san bernardino when i was a kid. i know the area very well. this is the edge of really los angeles county. i know san bernardino is its own county. it's the edge of the ex-burbs. if that camera shot that our viewers are looking at were to pan further out, there is a lot of room to roam out further east of san bernardino. pretty much desert almost all the way until you get out to the nevada line. when we look at what the first responders are doing right now, if you're the police, if you are the u.s. marshals, the fbi, what are your one or two first main courses of action in an area this large? >> i would be putting the choppers up. i would be starting roadblocks. i would be deploying -- because you're right. the desert is -- i know a little bit about the area.

i would have to have roadblocks on the main roads. and we'd be shutting everything down and checking every vehicle. but this is going to require so many officers. >> harold, who would -- i know we're going to bring in kelly evans and bill griffeth. who would lead this operation right now? who is taking charge? >> sheriff's office or p.d. there locally. they will rely -- they all have interdepartmental agency support. >> thank you very much for joining us on very short notice. >> thanks very much. >> we have a market that is down over 150 points, but america's attention is captivated to what appears to be yet another mass shooting. >> and we're trying to figure out whether those two are correlated or not. i mean, you look at a chart of

the dow, and it started to follow about the time this may have been happening. we have this incident in southern california, and the dow is at the lows of the day right now at 173 points. thank you, guys. if you're just joining us, we have breaking news at this hour. right now, we are covering an active shooter situation in san bernardino, california, roughly 60 miles due east of downtown los angeles. up to 20 victims have been reported at this time. >> we have sue herera with us. the victims could be wounded. doesn't necessarily mean they perished. >> exactly right, kelly. at least 20 people shot, according to the san bernardino

police department. an fbi spokesman confirming to nbc news that the fbi is sending resources to that particular area. we have multiple injuries, at least 20 people shot. we have possibly as many as three assailants still on the loose. the los angeles time is reporting that the suspects are heavily armed, possibly wearing body armor. we have another source, the san bernardino police department saying they were wearing ski masks, they were wearing possibly vests, which could account for the "los angeles times" note that they were wearing body armor, and they are wearing camouflage, reportedly. we do not know at this point whether this incident took place inside the inland regional center, or around the inland regional center. that is the center that provides educational facilities for young people and adults with disabilities. but it appears as though from the scanner traffic that we're

hearing, from the san bernardino police department, that that was the site, either in or around the inland regional facility. that was the site of where this particular situation developed, and then, of course, developed into 20 people being shot. they are continuing, it looks like, to transport victims from that particular site. the tape that we showed you earlier, we should note these are live pictures from nbc's los angeles affiliate knbc. the sheriff citing three suspects, one to three suspects that they're seeking. they set up a staging area, i'm understanding from both the "l.a. times" and also from nbc news. they set up a staging area a short ways down the street from the inland regional center. you're looking at a golf course across from that that was put on lockdown and it appears as though some people are walking across to the golf course from that staging area. so they've set up a staging area where they were transporting victims by pickup truck, and by

other means to that staging area, which was where they had the balances, the fire department, the sheriff's cars and the police cars in that staging area to help with victims. we have reached out to governor brown. he has been briefed, or is being broef e briefed at this point. we are awaiting a comment from him. hopefully -- the governor's office just telling us now, the governor has been briefed. he's closely monitoring this disturbing and ongoing situation unfolding in san bernardino, that from deborah hoffman, deputy press secretary from governor brown's office. so we hope to have a further statement from the governor shortly. so that's a look at the staging area that is a short ways down the street and kind of caddie cornered across the street from the inland regional center, which is an educational facility. you can see some of the heavy armed forces moving in.

the police and fire department are on the scene. the fbi is responding as is the sheriff's department. so we're going to keep monitoring, guys, this ongoing and very active situation in san bernardino, california, just east of downtown los angeles. right in behind the 10 freeway and the 210 flreeway. up to 20 people have been shot in this incident. we are waiting further word on any more casualties and we will keep you posted. >> sue, briefly on that note here, as we're entering the afternoon hours and trying to figure out where the suspect or suspects are, is there any more information? has anybody indicated whether they appear to be -- if they know where they are? at large, does that mean they could have already fled beyond the area? >> they are at large is the last that we have heard. a previous guest pointed out, if they were wearing masks as was reported by the sheriff's

department, it might be easy for them to integrate back into the crowd, because if they take off the mask, they weren't seen before. as far as we know, they are still at large. they are being sought by the sheriff's department, san bernardino police department, the fbi is on its way. you see the helicopter landing. that's a public golf course right across the street from the inland regional facility. nbc and cnbc reached out to the golf course. they have been told to shelter in place and stay exactly where they are. >> thank you for now. sue herera back at headquarters. let's bring in former officer mike baker. he joins us on the phone. the key question here, of course, for san bernardino, for the entire l.a. metropolitan area is when are we going to get word as to where this suspect or suspects are, and the longer that it goes before we get that word, does that mean a larger potential area being on lockdown? >> it does. the first thing you have to do

is secure the perimeter. there's some assumptions you have to make in terms of where the perpetrators or shooter may be. you have to also identify more than one. and then if you're having a hard time, once you deploy them and you have a hard time identifying where the shooters are, you have to assume you have to start widening that perimeter. that requires all the people. trying to get people to a safe area, and locking things down. it's an incredibly difficult heavy lift. and requires an awful lot of support. >> really, this is still happening right now, as these shooters are still at large. you try to figure out what the

motive might be. what are they trying to accomplish here at this point, what we believe is that the shootings took place at this inland regional center, which is a facility for disabled people to rehabilitate them. and you wonder if that's where the shooting occurred, what possible motive must there be, especially when you consider that these three shooters apparently we are told were masked? they didn't want to be identified. they may be heavily armed. what in the world do you think they're after at this point? >> we're horrified by something like this and you stand back and you're a little bit detached. right now they're not so much concerned with motive. they're in the weeds trying to solve the problem. >> i get that. but it's like they're set up for war of some kind but they're in a remote area east of los

angeles, and they are shooting at a disabled civilian center. so you try to make sense of that, right? er it really does. just the atrocity of it all is enough to turn your stop act. but there's limited options. you've got disgruntled employee, psychopath, potentially terrorism. you don't know at this point. that is a notoriously difficult thing to do. as you know, you get ten witnesses and they see the same event and come back with ten different accountings of that event. >> still very early in that regard. if you're just joining us, you see the word live there.

i'm told that is, in fact, live. seeming like we're seeing these scenes before. at least in the areas that we're looking at at this point. >> i think to anybody watching, they see what appears to be, at least on the outskirts, on the periphery, relative calm. police on the perimeters are checking vehicles. they're doing aerial surveillance. there's a tremendous amount of work going on. and, you know, in a way, it's comforting to see what appears to be relative calm, because these people are extremely

well-trained. >> we think back to november 13th, the evening we were on air when paris happened. the key difference between what we're seeing now and then is immediately suspects detonated their suicide vest and there was a hostage situation we knew about. in this case, we don't know where the suspects are. >> you talk about entering a facility and doing room clearings, you have to worry about the devices. and it is an enormously difficult task.

my guess is they will locate the shooters. and we're going to have a situation on our hands here shortly, i would imagine. >> mike, thank you for joining us. >> sure, thank you. >> that's mike baker, former cia covert officer. >> it bears repeating, if you've just joined us, it's 13 minutes past the hour. you're expecting to see "closing bell." i'm bill griffeth along with kelly evans. we are at the new york stock exchange where the dow is down 139 points right now, but we're watching this story unfold in southern california. in san bernardino. it's 60 miles due east of los angeles, where a shooting occurred maybe an hour and a half ago. we know about 20 victims. we don't know what condition they are in. at this point, one to three shooters are still at large at this hour. we want to bring in former fbi swat team member kevin keiran, who joins us on the telephone. clearly, it's all hands on deck

right now, but how do you deploy resources when you're not sure where anybody is at this point? >> well, a lot like what mike was saying. you've got an inner perimeter. it may be that they have to wait until something else happens to figure out where the rest of these guys are. if they slip away, it gets really tough. >> why is that, kevin? because in this day and age, i'm sure there's multiple points where there might be cameras and other sorts of equipment. why do you think that would be extremely tough? >> well, the cameras aren't necessarily realtime. they can go up and stuff like that, but once they're away from the camera in realtime, there isn't any way to do that. and those guys get out of the area. we know now one of the guys left

the area, and came back. it's not hard for them to blend in. >> makes it difficult, especially when they were wearing masks. >> we want to go back to sue herera headquarters with some more of the developments as we're getting them here. >> we have a little bit more information about the inland regional center, which i think is pertinent because of its apparent size. they strive daily to serve more than 30,000, and this is from their website, 30,000 individuals with developmental disabilities in san bernardino and riverside counties. it is the largest in the state of california. it is non-profit, private, community-based that allows people to obtain services. they say their core values are independence, inclusion, and empowerme

empowerment. when you look at the fact that they serve 30,000 with disabilities, i think it puts it in perspective, perhaps the fact that that might be a relatively large campus that we've been seeing those yarls of live from our affiliate knbc in los angeles, bill. >> i'm looking at a wire report of a father who has met with reporters and he read a text from his daughter who works at the inland regional center and she simply texted him saying people shot in the office, waiting for cops, pray for us, i'm locked in an office. so we are hearing from some of the people who are inside there. i go back to whether that can help the police try and figure out where these guys may be going, if we can figure out what they're trying to accomplish. i can understand one person, if it's one shooter, you can talk about a disgruntled something. a former employee or whatever that may be affiliated with the

regional center. but when you have three active shooters, at least according to the sheriff's department there, what does that say to you? what does that say do you think for as little as we know? >> it brings me back to 1997 when they had that big north hollywood bank robbery. it was obvious on a big shootout. the guys were on the move. their motivation was to rob the bank. there's no telling whether this is considered just to be a soft target, or something else that's motivating these guys. whether it's a disgruntled client, or they tend to stay there and verbalize their problems. it's tough to tell right now. >> you were on swat team. are you guys -- you're just

standing by waiting for an assignment to go somewhere? it's early to deploy for as little as we know at this point, because you want to go with the shooters are and you don't know where they are at this point, right? >> no. and i think that's part of it. but you have enough tactical elements that they'll want to be getting close to the area so that they can respond more quickly than staging somewhere. policing is a lot of activity. it makes it tough. but i wouldn't imagine they're staging anywhere. i would imagine just like in that north hollywood shootout in '97, those guys were mobile and then they find the guys a few blocks away. >> when did they begin shutting

down larger areas of the roadways? >> it's obvious that they're not sure whether they have the guys contained or not. that's such a big spread out area, unlike paris. l.a. is extremely different. it will be interesting. >> kevin, we'll leave it there for now. we're now going to bring in larry barton, a current fbi instructor, also joins us on the line. appreciate your time. i don't know if you heard that discussion, but the question now is how much of the larger area do you shut down trying to find these guys or guy?

>> the police are facing an enormously complicated situation. if it is more likely three and that appears to be what we're dealing with, what it says is it's not likely to be workplace violence. this is a coordinated attack, number one, and in terms of the area, the problem is that device. it is a timed device. i will tell you from a threat perspective, studying this for 30 years, those three persons, or two people, whoever we're dealing with, are willing to die. you don't go into this kind of situation, and obviously murder people and take others hostage without an expectation that you're willing to give up your life. this is an extremely serious complicated situation. >> for our viewers, larry, you just made a reference to what kind of device is this. there are some unconfirmed reports about there being some sort of explosive device on the scene, so we appreciate you

referencing that. we don't actually know if there are one or multiple devices, as you mentioned. these people put themselves in a situation in which should they be apprehended. >> most people get angry at work. the most dangerous category is called the grievance collector. somebody who's mad at an organization, or some political issue. it could be terrorism. this appears to be something very unique and different. i have to tell you that the police are being very judicious in not simply running into the scene. they need to be analytical. they're using sophisticated technology to determine where people are positioning

themselves, those being held hostage as well as the perpetrators and they need to be thinking about plan b, meaning if it gets worse. there's many contingency elements under way. >> what happened in paris, there was intent on the part of some of those bombers, for people to flee a stadium, to create the kind of panic or movement that would trap them and do more damage. >> let me just point out, volume has slowed appreciably in the stock market. as i mentioned, 140 points. clearly, local police are in charge at this point. what services should the fbi provide? >> the best response will always be local. they know the access, the

egress, they understand the highways. the bureau is going to be providing tactical advice. they certainly will be working the u.s. marshals, they'll be working under the ics command system to support one another. they have the armament in place, they have the technology, and they have the intel in terms of that community. >> we're watching live coverage from knbc. i guess some of the cameras might be in lockdown positions. that aerial shot hasn't moved at all. i'm wondering, would they restrict shoppers from flying in

the area and keep just police choppers? >> very much so. it's very possible. and again, it's hard to tell. but here's my best guess right now, which is you're going to see that atf system come into play, where basically local chief of police talking to one another with the county, and of course, you're talking midday, so there's a little bit of good news here in terms of you're not at rush hour. but things will come to a standstill because no one wants to place any civilians in a high risk environment. so it's better to stay in place, stay where you are, and that's what police will be encouraging businesses and residents of that area to do. >> larry, stay right there if you would. let's get back to sue herera. >> this live picture that we're looking at is from our affiliate knbc in los angeles. there are two reporters on the ground from that affiliate knbc, megan reyes is one. she says that law enforcement are searching buildings room by

room. they are not sure if there is a suspect still in the building. tony chen reporting for knbc on the scene, reports that he is standing 30 yards from the perimeter. he sees three bodies just from his location. a lot of family members have gathered on the scene. he's confirming that he's hearing from law enforcement that upwards of three shooters are being sought. he sees swat numbers around. and i just want to clarify what larry mentioned earlier. he mentioned the possibility of a device. there's a lot of noise on the police scanners about a possible device in the building. nbc news has not been able to independently confirm that. the police scanner does say that they are putting someone inside the building to deal with what they're terming an ied, but that scanner noise that has not been confirmed formally by knbc. we do know that the president has been told of this, but we do

not have any information about the extent to which the president has been made aware of the shooting in california, or whether he will make a statement. we should note unfortunately, he has had to make a statement in the past few months about a number of mass shootings, so i think we probably can expect some sort of statement from the white house shortly. we do not have any more information on the suspects, other than they are looking for three. the "l.a. times" -- the note from the "l.a. times" that they may have been wearing b ining br is being echoed by a number of other news organizations as well. we now have 20 shot, and the reporting from knbc indicates that three bodies on the ground. but that's only one report from a knbc reporter. so i'm waiting for a second confirmation on that. >> we're at that point where you

don't know what's real and what's not. much of it can be misinformation. you have to take a lot of that with a grain of salt. >> we've watched stocks fall as this news has unfolded with the dow at one point down 170 points, but we were seeing pressure across the board anyway today. a lot of different things going on. crude oil having a horrible session. that was having an impact. different things regarding the fed. the dow is only down about 117 points. it has moved off the weakest levels of the session. the volume has lightened up a bit, too. we should be careful before we tie any of that too closely to what's happening in these tragic images we're broadcasting to you now from california. >> larry barton with the fbi, an instructor with the fbi is with us. you mentioned something earlier, that police will train and train and train for incidents like this. i grew up in southern california. i know the san bernardino area. it's grown a lot in the last 20, 30 years, but it's still nowhere

near the population that you'll get further west as you get closer to los angeles. you would think that a police department like san bernardino is going to train, but you wonder how much they actually expect an incident like this to happen even as they will train for whatever they can imagine is going to happen, right? you know i mean? >> absolutely correct. that's right, bill. what happens is that most of the simulations that you're going to have law enforcement all over the country, and that includes around the world, in most major cities, often does occur in rural areas. in other words, not only in downtown los angeles or chicago or dallas or london, but you're also going to be testing in rural areas. in terms of vulnerability, unfortunately, a perpetrator will understand that the rural areas pose an opportunity for them. it's a little harder for first responders, although there's a fantastic high quality medical center that's nearby here in san bernardino in this case.

the reality is getting people through traffic is very difficult. so rural areas do pose a lot of challenges just in terms of logistics for police. but that's one of the reasons why they do test very aggressively there. >> i also wonder, larry, what's at stake for the broader los angeles area? just real quick here. what do you do if you're in this situation and you're dealing with a potentially large area where the suspects might be? >> one of the questions that you're going to face is copycats. candidly, that's one of the worst fears that i think all of us who teach, whether it's in a rural setting or a major city, that this is likely to be a day inspired by recent events, and just as we know from school shootings, this tragedy will likely inspire others. so we really have to look at testing, both in rural settings and major urban settings. we're all vulnerable, no matter where we are in society. that's a big lesson from today.

>> larry barton, thank you so much for your time, sir. appreciate it. >> thank you, bill and kelly. >> if you're just joining us, again, you're expecting to see "closing bell." we do have 30 minutes before the stock market closes for this wednesday. but we are covering this active shooter situation in san bernardino, california. 60 miles due east of l.a. it's up to 20 victims that have been reported shot at this time by what we are told to be one to three active shooters who are still very much at large right now. >> sue herera has the latest development. she's been following this story for us and has more details now. hi, sue. >> hi, kelly. we are going to lead this particular segment with the fact that we apparently have three people who are deceased. knbc's reporter tony chen, who was on the scene as we told you, just went on air and said he was 30 feet from the perimeter. he was at the triage area, the staging area, and he has seen

three deceased individuals. we don't know exactly what part of the staging area they were in. msnbc now saying that law enforcement is confirming to them that we have three confirmed fatalities. 20 people shot, now three fatalities. the irc, the independent living facility that we told you about earlier, we have a little bit more information about what may be going on there. this particular situation unfolded at about 2:00 p.m. eastern time. a little after 11:00 local time. and the situation unfolded in one part of the facility, but the facility actually has several wings, as you can see there. police entered the building. at some point, they're searching it now room by room. they do not know if they still have a suspect in one of those buildings. there are between one and three

suspects still at large reportedly wearing body armor. reportedly they were wearing ski masks. and reportedly, they were in camouflage. police entered the building, they began preliminary searches, and then reportedly, according to several news sources, they found a suspicious device. nbc news has not independently confirmed that. the police then pulled back. the bomb squad was pulled in and sent the robot in to examine that particular situation. so that's the latest that we have. we have three fatalitfatalities according to knbc's tony chen and msnbc, and police are searching that building room by room. kelly and bill? >> sue, for now, thank you. let's bring in former fbi assistant director chris swecker now. just dealing with where are these suspects and how large an effort might it have to be regionally to find them?

we'll check chris's connection. he'll come back shortly. >> sue, you have more for us? >> the situation continues to unfold. those are live pictures, bill. and they're closer to the staging area. and if the helicopter widens out, which it has been doing repeatedly, we do know that the public golf course, the san bernardino public golf course, which is directly across the street from that particular facility is still on lockdown. all local businesses are on lockdown. all the local streets have been closed at this point. we understand as i mentioned that the police moved into the building, and according to numerous reports are still searching room by room. there are reports that there was a device. we don't know what kind of a device might have been in the building at this point, but they sent in the bomb squad, according to various media reports then sent in their robot to examine just what type of

device it was. and whether or not the robot could render it safe. but the bigger story is in this rather sprawling area, they still have three suspects at large. the fbi has been called in and is on its way to the scene. we should note that our jane wells is on her way, and as a matter of fact, she should be there relatively shortly. she was dispatched just a short while ago, so she will be on the scene for us in just a little bit, and if you know jane, she will ferret out the very latest on this story. so that's what we have right now, a very, very fluid situation. the atf is on its way as well, guys. so we have federal and local authorities working in conjunction. >> sue, thanks, as always. >> just keeping an eye here, the volatility index on wall street today is up more than a point. stocks are down. they have been down throughout the session. before this happened and roughly are unchanged throughout it all. a lot of that will depend, if you're a trader or investor

analyzing the situation on what's exactly behind it, if it's a politically motivated event, if it's kids looking for glorification or what have you, that's a very different thing than when we were following the paris attacks, with the fallout that had everything from geopolitical ramifications, to serious potential repercussions throughout the middle east. that may help explain why we've seen the market, as far as 117 points on the dow to as many as 107. >> clearly this is our primary story right now, but if you just -- we're just tuning in. i can point out some of the highlights of the market day. the dow is at near the lows of the session here. oil dipped below $40 a barrel. the dollar went to the highs of the year. that probably put commodities under pressure as well. and we've heard a lot of fed speak today that seems to suggest that maybe we will be seeing a rate increase in a couple of weeks when the fed does meet. >> chris swecker rejoins us on the line here. a former fbi assistant director.

thank you again and for your patience, and very little information still this hour. at this point, the biggest question is where are the suspects? >> yeah, that's always the first question. and listening to your compare earlier, and what i would offer up is i think the first responders on the scene didn't take the time to set up a perimeter. that's not what police responders do these days. they go straight in. they go straight to the sound of gunfire, and each successive wave of responders are going to go there until they've either pinned them down or they fled. so i think the situation is they may have them in an area, a defined area at this point. >> does any of this make sense to you? do we know where this has taken place? this is a relatively low crime area. you just heard from a former city official who describes that area as low crime. it's highly industrialized.

this is a social services center that caters to the disabled to try and rehabilitate them and get them -- mainstream them back into society. and now you have three -- if we're to believe the reports, if they're accurate, three masked men, or masked individuals heavily armed. there may even be, although it's unconfirmed at this point, an explosive device, but we don't know that for sure. does any of that make sense to you at this point, chris? >> well, what doesn't make sense at this point, if we're considering the possibility of a terrorist attack, it has all the hallmarks of that, is the target itself. it's just an odd target. an odd terrorist target. it is a soft target. it may make sense to the people with demented minds that stage these type of attacks. possibly a drug robbery. the facility may have a cash

sh -- cachet of drugs. it's certainly not workplace violence. >> maybe the randomness of it all is the point. that if it could happen there, it could happen anywhere. who knows? at this point, we are left to speculate with so little information as they continue to go door to door to door to look for possible victims and of course the potential shooting suspects. >> any comment on the number of people who have been wounded who are casualties at this point? >> the numbers have been consistent throughout the reporting. that's a little bit unusual. the fog of war that sets in at these moments, it's unusual to get a definitive casualty count. it tells me, i think the odds are that this is indeed a terrorist attack, not identical to paris, but the multiple attackers, the type of weapons, the possibility of an ied.

it's just the way my instincts are going right now. >> say that again, because you cut out. >> you dumped out at the critical moment. what do you think this is? >> my instincts tell me that this is probably a terrorist type incident. >> what does that mean, chris? >> across the board. >> what is the definition of a terrorist type incident? >> well, multiple attackers, body armor, long weapons, mass casualties. a pretty well-planned attack based on what they've seen so far. >> and you simply want to disrupt society, no matter where it is, is that the idea? >> exactly. it is an odd target. as you've said, maybe that's the point. these people are really off balanced to begin with. so maybe this is the ultimate soft target, and noticed they did their casing, etc.

>> i want to go back to something earlier that came up. it was the availability or lack thereof of live video cameras being used to track what was happening on the scene, and to find the suspects if they fled somewhere. talk to us a little bit about what you think might be available to help you find these guys or the people involved, or what challenges there are in a live situation in doing so. >> well, after the wave of initial responders, there will be another wave of people who are trying to sort through things like video. digital video can be transmitted pretty quickly to any location. i mean, electronically. it's not like the old days where you get the device exploited, as we said. so that can happen very quickly. eyewitness accounts. they're pulling them together as quickly as they can. they've got a makeshift command post. all of that information should be going. try to make sense out of it, and

that's the decision as to where else they need to deploy. >> all right, chris, thanks so much. chris swecker, former assistant director of the fbi. we want to go back to sue herera for any more developments. i'm sure they keep dribbling out here, sue. >> they do. the "l.a. times" is reporting at this point, bill, that police are now searching for an suv that fled the scene of that mass shooting. up to 20 people shot, three fatalities that we know of at this point from knbc. at least three suspected shooters banished from the building. the "times" also says the police used a robot to detonate a suspicious device found on the premises. so apparently they are looking for an suv that fled the scene. i actually just asked tom on the desk here to pull up a map for

me, because as you and i know, growing up in los angeles, there's a freeway everywhere. the inland regional center is sandwiched right in between the 215 and the 10 freeways, less than half a mile from each one of those. so that's why the police -- one of the reasons the police are so concerned that that suv may have gotten away, because that reportedly, according to the "l.a. times," is what the suspects used. they are also saying that the scene is still active. still dangerous. please stay away from it. they are also asking for those who might have information to call we-tip, and you can remain anonymous, but they are looking for help in finding up to these three shooters who broke into or placed a device around the regional facility. it's right near the freeway, so

i'm sure there's some urgency in finding them for many reasons, but of course, they don't want them to be able to get away. >> we are reminded of the boston bombers a cup of years back. they had to shut down the entire regional transportation system. that went on for days. that's why i keep going back to this question of where are there, and is there any information about how they've responded with the roadways at large, either in san bernardino, or again, in los angeles and the surrounding area. >> exactly. i think that's one of the things they're worried about. megan reyes is reporting that news helicopters are being asked to leave the air space and the scene by law enforcement. so perhaps understandably, we might not get any more live footage from them for a while. what you're looking at now is tape from knbc, but that may be the reason that we did not have the live shot just a few moments ago. just to recap. 20 people shot. three people dead. the air space around that particular scene is now being --

they're asking news personnel and news helicopters to leave it. and they are still looking for between one and three suspects that may have escaped in an suv. the police are looking for help in identifying them, and getting any more information about what is still a very active and developing scene. bill and kelly? >> thanks, sue. one of our previous guest mentioned that a world class medical facility is in that area. we're getting word that loma linda, one of the premiere centers there in southern california, says it is preparing itself for an influx of patients from that shooting. but they have no numbers as of yet. but you did hear from sue earlier that unfortunately, according to one of the reporters on site, that apparently there are three deceased. >> for the time being, while markets are still reacting to the situation, those images we're showing you now are from earlier. this is important because there has just recently been a change, perhaps having something to do with tracking the suspects. news media shots have changed from being live to showing you

images from earlier that you might have already seen. we don't want to confuse you there. >> let's bring in a retired fbi special agent. i thank you, jeff, for being with ugs. now a new wrinkle where we thought or still think perhaps -- it's still very early, as the story unfolds, that there were three suspects in the area that we're looking for. now it's possible they got away in an suv. so now what? >> well, it's a very serious situation that they got away. that's very problematic given what you've just stated, the highway system around l.a. and ontario and the valley, and all the areas around there, where there's extensive highways in and out of san bernardino. it gives them a fantastic escape route to go up into the mountains, into the forest. who knows where they went? this is very problematic for police. they're going to count on the public in maybe the course of that suv to give them some leads

on where that might be. >> what does it say to you that they've asked news helicopters to leave the area and we're now showing images from earlier? >> well, that's pretty standard procedure in a case like this. number one, news helicopters could possibly interfere with a police operation. the other thing is, if there are any suspects in the building or in and around that area, they could be monitoring the news traffic and the news feeds and get, you know, basically information and intelligence from those feeds. and the police don't want them to have that. >> and certainly, the priority, as we take care of those who have been wounded and get them medical help at this point. i guess that's the purview of the emts and the fire department. but they don't want to get in the way of the police investigation at the same time, right? >> right. number one priority, as chris swecker said earlier, to eliminate the threat. you go to the gunfire and you

eliminate the threat to further human life. and then you provide assistance and a pathway for the emergency people, like the fire department and emts to get in there and help the wounded. but the first thing you have to do is make sure it's safe for them. then you go right to the gunfire. so we don't know at this point. there's so much we don't know about this case. there could still be people in there and that would hinder an effort to provide help. >> i was handed a wire copy. the president and ceo of the southern california social services center, which is that inland region center where the gunfire erupted, says the focus is on a particular building that houses at least 25 employees as well as a library and a conference center, and she said that the incident is in the conference area, that an outside group was renting today. she says she is not at the

center right now which serves people with developmental disabilities. does not know what the outside group was that rented the center. we have no idea whether that is pertinent information, but it is a new bit of information that you wonder if it does bear anything on the motivation for this, which we're trying to figure out, jeff. this just doesn't make a whole lot of sense, given the location, the type of community we're talking about here. low crime, high industrial, not a high populated area, and you get three -- if we're believing the reports, three active shooters who are heavily armed and maybe even using an explosive device, although that's unconfirmed. what are they doing in that area? >> this is absolutely crazy, because this would be the absolute lowest target on a soft target list that you would expect violence to occur. the first thing that came to my mind when you hear about an incident like this is workplace

violence. that would generally be one, not more than one person that's involved in that type of violence. if you have three and that's true, that would probably lead one to believe it's not a case of workplace violence, but still leaves a motive way up in the air. this would be the last place that anyone involved in terrorism would target for this type of act. >> jeff, thank you. jeff lanza, former fbi special al agent. there's 900 million to sell on the close, so some big selling as stocks have moved to their lows of the day. the dow is down 176 points. the weakness that we saw earlier in the day is getting a little bit worse here with about ten minutes to go. >> oil spent the latter part of the afternoon below $40 on that january contract, and the dollar hit its highest level of the year. so just some of the economic developments that we were following today. eamon javers has done a lot of reporting on so-called soft

targets, which i guess the inland regional center there in san bernardino would qualify as one, right? >> absolutely, bill. this is your classic case of a soft target. this is not the type of facility that would have had a lot of elaborate security precautions and that people would have been expecting anything like this at the scene. just over a week ago, we were talking to security experts in the wake of a paris attack, asking them what you can do to defend yourself, to stop the attack in progress, and what the experts were telling us was the tragic reality here is that once a gunman shows up on the scene and starts firing and you have defenseless people, there's not much you can do to stop that attack. but there's so much about this attack that we don't know. one of the reports suggested we may be looking at multiple assailants. if that's the case, that would indicate the potential anyway of some sort of pre-organization,

and the experts that we talked to over the past week or so have suggested there are ways to spot signs of pre-organization of an attack before it happens. they have said that oftentimes with organized bands of assailants like we saw in paris. not clear that that's what happened here, but in the case in paris, you might be able to spot the signs that an attack is being planned, because oftentimes the assailants will visit the scenes beforehand. they'll conduct surveillance to get a sense of what's beginnigo there. they might even test security by pulling a false alarm. they might do things like acquiring supplies or gathering uniforms to impersonate officers or medical personnel. all of those points in the chain of planning an attack, if you're talking about a coordinated assault, are opportunities for people to gather intelligence, to see that that is happening, and to interfein and stop it, or at least alert someone.vene andr

at least alert someone. the harsh reality of this is the point at which the gunman or men or women end up on the scene and start firing, it's just very, very difficult for people to do anything other than put an enormous amount of distance between them and the shooter as kwuk ly quickly as they can. scarily enough, we saw a statement from the chief of police here in washington, d.c., who said that previously her advice to people in active shooter situations had been, you know what, get away, hide, call 911, wait for the police to respond. now, though, she said she's changing her advice, and she says if you are in a situation where it is impossible to flee, you might have the fight for your life and you might have to do something to intervene in the attack while it's ongoing. that is just a horrible and scary thing to contemplate for so many of us at our workplaces, at county buildings, government facilities, to imagine the possibility that may have faced some of the people in california here today.

>> we've been trying to figure out what statement they're trying to make. typically, if you're doing this, you're trying to make a statement. nothing is adding up at this point. >> this is not the kind of target that would lend itself to some sort of obvious ideological statement. >> at least not yet. we heard the report that there was an outside group renting part of the facility. we don't know who the group was. whether that's even pertinent at this point. you try to figure it out, but nothing adds up at this point. >> you also want to look at the history of the workplace. have there been incidents of disgruntlement among the work force who are at that facility. some history of tension there? oftentimes with lone shooters, what we've seen in the past, bill, is that you see an escalation of threat level from somebody who has a reason to feel aggrieved here. somebody who was perhaps fired from this facility, somebody who had a romantic situation gone wrong. someone who had a psychological

problem. >> we think about the fact that there were possibly three shooters. if there was a lone gunman, i can see disgruntlement being a motivation of some kind. when you have three, that's a whole different equation there. >> entirely, and it presupposes some level of organization, like we said. to show up and coordinate the attack. that would not necessarily lead you to suspect you're talking about some individual with psychological problems, but there's so much we don't know about this situation, bill. if you're talking about three people showing up on a site at the same time, three people who

had some reason they felt they had to be there, and some reason they felt they had to carry this out, and law enforcement is going to be desperate to understand what that reason was, because that implies what they might do next. >> eamon, thanks very much. eamon javers in washington. >> let's get to a former white house counterterrorism official who joins us. to share your thoughts on the situation here, the details, as we know, unfortunately from covering the situations too many times, what we think we know now, we probably don't know anything really until it becomes much more clear. there are people caught up in the middle whose lives are at stake. one of the largest metropolitan areas in the country is an hour away from what we're watching. just some thoughts, please. >> that's exactly right. what we think we know now most likely will change. what is striking here, and i agree with what jeff said earlier, that this is not the

prototypical soft target. there has to be a personal connection to this in some way that i think will probably be uncovered. we think of some of the potential soft target environments, where an organized group or individuals with an affiliation-like target, there's no symbolism here. there's no international symbolism that could be derived from this. so if it's not random, and based on what we're seeing unfold here in some of the initial reports, then there's a premeditated component to it, it strikes me as something very localized. the fact of the matter is this an active situation, as you mentioned. the perpetrators are still at large. so apprehending them and beginning the process of integrating those who are involved in the event will hopefully lead to some answers. >> there are reports that police

are looking for an suv that may have fled the scene. it's entirely possible, though wildly unconfirmed at this point, that the shooters may have escaped and may be fleeing the area. that adds a whole new wrinkle to this story. it's a nightmare for law enforcement officials in outlying areas at this point, right? >> absolutely. because it's a heavily populated area with a number of egress routes. if this was premeditated and they did think through an escape plan, then it's just going to challenge what they're dealing with. they are not just a typical video cameras that you have for traffic, but you have other capabili capabilities, and then you might just get the random citizens who see something and able to report in. so i think the odds of finding these individuals is high. but the question is how long will it take, and will anybody

else be in harm's way? >> roger, also this comes as the country is debating. we ended that debate. the metta data collection that was once a regular policy is apparently not happening anymore. meanwhile, you have mobile phones with encryption that is keeping out local law enforcement, even with regard to some of the worst possible criminals who are out there. with these kinds of cross currents, obviously in wanting to protect liberty and privacy, every time we face a situation like this, does that make the work of both detecting things like this ahead of time and connecting the dots afterwards more difficult? >> it depends on what the motivation was and what's behind it. if it's just individuals with no affiliation of a terrorist variety or known organization, if it really is localized, and if it's domestic, that debit doesn't really influence. that national level debate doesn't influence the local law

enforcement department. the real challenge is do they have enough video capabilities deployed to be able to pull from that and get a sense of where these individuals might have gone? but unless these were people that were on the fbi radar screen, something more than just local law enforcement, some of the bigger surveillance policies versus security questions that we're dealing with in washington, don't really apply to this type of environment. >> sure feels like a highly organized operation with these guys. doesn't feel random, but we can't figure out the motivation at the same time, right? >> yeah. we're all looking for answers right now as the situation is active. it never works that way. typically the answers we receive are somewhat different from the initial theories. so there's a lot here still unfolding. the situation has to be brought to conclusion before we can

start identifying exactly what drove these individuals to commit the heinous crimes. >> roger, thank you so much. roger cressey. the bell is ringing right now with the dow down about 155 points on wall street. >> the market day ends here on wall street. we are covering breaking news right now, though. there is still an active shooter situation in san bernardino, california. three people reported dead. >> and so much more. sue herera has been following the latest developments. this event there in san bernardino. sue, what can you tell us? >> i can tell you that it is still an active scene, bill and kelly, and it will probably will remain so for some time. we have at least 20 people shot. we have confirmation from our affiliate at knbc that there are fatalities. the sheriff's department and the san bernardino police department confirming that there have been fatalities. they did not give us a number. however, i can tell you that the reporter on the scene from knbc

reported seeing three people that were dead. it is still an active situation. they are looking for as many as three suspects who they believe may have fled the scene possibly in an suv. it took place at a regional facility that helps educate and serve people with disabilities. the ceo of that particular facility saying earlier today that it was in the conference area that the event took place in the conference area, and that that conference area had been rented by an outside group. she did not say what group that was. we're efforting to confirm that. basically what we have is an ongoing active situation with multiple suspects, who were heavily armed, and according to the "l.a. times," were wearing body armor. they were wearing ski masks. they were camouflaged. and apparently, they are still on the loose. the streets around that particular area are still closed. news helicopters have been

required to leave the air space. so what you're looking at right now was taped earlier by our affiliate knbc in los angeles. the "l.a. times" also reporting and other news organizations confirming that there was a suspicious device inside the building. police responded to that when they got in there and saw the device, they backed off. the bomb squad went in, and apparently detonated that device. so that's what we know at this particular time. it's still, as we say, a situation that is unfolding. we have heard from people who texted their parents or family members from inside, many of them were sheltered in an office. a number of them were sheltered in the office. and at that point, they were safe. they also reported that there were several active shooters on that particular scene. so bill and kelly, i am still looking for more information for you, as you know that this is still unfolding. the president has been briefed, and the deputy press secretary says he has requested for constant updates.

we do not know if he will be making a statement later. he has done that if the past after every shooting situation where there were active shooters and either multiple victims or multiple fatalities. back to you. >> sue, just briefly, what's interesting here is that we haven't really seen a change in the number of casualties, as up to 20 people is what we're seeing on the screen there. you mentioned three fatalities. have either of those numbers increased? >> they have not. we have been able to confirm, i will say, that loma linda university and another regional medical center have reached out and talked to nbc news and have confirmed that they have received multiple victims. they will not comment more on that. they will not say what the status of those victims are. all we know is that according to a reuters spokesperson, or a police spokeswoman talking to reuters, the san bernardino center -- and this is just coming in, guys, so bear with

me. the san bernardino center was hosting an event when more than one gunman burst into the room and began firing. that's according to a police spokesman to reuters, which pretty much confirms, bill and kelly, what the ceo, mary beth field, who's the president and ceo of the inland regional center board of trustees told us earlier. back to you guys. >> thank you, sue. let's bring in michael solomon now. a former intelligence officer at the u.s. state department. we were asking, of course, about the numbers of people here who might be casualties, given the number of gunmen involved in the size of this potential operation. michael, what are your thoughts? does this all add up to you? >> it adds up, but the problem is that we're speculating at this moment. everybody's in a rush to judgment to try to come up with some kind of an answer for this. but unfortunately, we can't. this can be anything from workplace violence, which doesn't seem to be likely, because there's reports of multiple assailants, to terrorists hitting a soft target, which i don't know why they would hit a building like

this. you can't jump the gun. we're going to find out things that are reported, without having two independent sources to verify things that have been told. the first thing that needs to be done, of course, is secure the premises, secure the scene, and account for every person who was in that building at the time of the incident. make sure the innocent and those who are not injured are safe and taken care of. and then we've got to search the building to make sure there's no assailants that are hiding. so that's the first thing that's got to be done. and the police have to be careful not to release too much information because the hands hand of justice could be defeated. >> i'm going to ask a naive sounding question, but that thought occurred to me as well. because there's pretty much a dearth of information coming out at this point. i suspect they're still doing their job. >> exactly. >> a lot of moving pieces. but still, what would be the harm in getting as much information out as possible? you think you might be tipping off the suspects? >> you could be. because if somebody says hey, i

saw a black suv and these guys are in a black suv, it was heading south on 5th street, they're going to be turning around, going some other place. so you don't want to give them too much information. it's no different than the president telling people in the middle east we're sending in 50 troops and they're going to be there tomorrow morning. you can't do that. you have to be careful not to release too much information. got to let the police do their job. everybody wants to stick a microphone in the police captain's face and say okay, what's beginning on now. he has no idea now. he hasn't begun to sort it out. >> here we're showing images which are from earlier, they are not live. part of the reason is the need, perhaps, to be able to go after these gunmen. there were reports that they had left the scene. how much more complex does that make this ongoing situation, michael, and also with a large area there in san bernardino and obviously los angeles, tracking them down? >> it's going to make it difficult.

if there's so much misinformation out there. people are going to be running from pillar to post and chasing ghosts. you can't do that. you've got to have credible information. unfortunately, because of today's 24-hour news cycle, it's more like a race of who can get the story out first. even if it is speculation. and you can't have that. you've got to let the police do their job. and we'll find out tomorrow or in the next day in the news conference. you're not going to find out in the next ten minutes because even the police and the fire department, any emergency responses right now have no idea. i heard a report that somebody went into an emergency room or one of the local hospitals and wanted to know the condition of the patients. there's hippal laws. you can't ask that question. you have to take a deep breath. don't rush to judgment. make believe we're all on the same team and we want to win this thing and the way we're going to win it is get the proper information out there so we're not chasing our tails. >> and again, it bears repeating, the video we're

seeing is from earlier. so when you saw those people with their hands up, that was a while ago. the video we saw earlier was of a situation that happened earlier because of this lockdown against the news media to try and keep the choppers out of the air. that seems to be a chopper in the air there, michael. >> l.a.'s got more choppers than i think half the police departments in the country. it's like chopper city up here. you've got to be careful of who's in the air. got to start sorting out the difference between the police choppers and the press choppers. people have to stay out of the area and let the police do their job and try not to interfere. we all want to get the answers. i'd love to know what happened, but i'm not going to find out until you find out. we're not going to find out until the police have the answers. >> are there cameras in the area -- we're looking at traffic lights here. are there cameras that officials

might be able to use to see who was leaving the area at the time? is it too soon to be doing that? do they have that early access at this point? >> i would say if those are traffic cams and the traffic department in l.a. has access to all that stuff, they're probably starting that right now. they're probably looking at that right now. unfortunately, i'm in florida, but i know how big cities work. i worked in new york for a number of years. it's a matter of taking everything you've got. it's not only the traffic cameras, but you've got local stores and you've got local businesses out there and malls and everything else with cameras all around their parking areas. so you've got atm cameras that are going all the time. so there's a million ways of finding out what you want to know and it's going to take some time to piece it all together. it doesn't happen like that. it only happens like that in a 42-minute sitcom on tv. >> exactly. the issue going back to boston, that took several days to

resolve. and the transit in the area was held up. so when we look at this situation, how significant is it that the location of these people are still unknown? >> well, we don't know that. for all you know, there could be somebody hiding in one of the buildings. there could be somebody milling around in the crowd who could be one of the perpetrators. we have no idea. people say well, how come they're taking the innocent out and having them raise their hands? because they don't know who's hiding amongst the innocent. there's no way of knowing that. if you want to hide a tree, find a forest. >> we are told they were wearing ski masks, and it's easy just to take them off. >> take off your jacket and you walk out like you're everybody else. >> right. one thing that might -- i don't know if it's helpful or not, but you tell us. we saw that wide shot from the chopper a moment ago. that is a very sprawling area there. it's as if they're listening to me now. once you leave that vicinity,

you're in the open road almost immediately. does that make it easier or more difficult to track a vehicle down if you think you know what you're looking for because there's not a lot of traffic in that area right now. >> you know, if you know what you're looking for, and you've got a wide roadway like that, or even a turnpike or freeway in l.a., it's a lot easier than to try to track somebody onside streets that's covered with a lot of trees and bushes. they can pull into a driveway in a vacant house and sit there for hours. when you've got somebody traveling down the road and you've got helicopters following them, it's a lot easier than a wide open fairway than to try to track them on a tight street. >> and what kind of coordination happens here? unfortunately, a lot of regional -- especially in l.a. and new york as you're familiar with, will have gone through these exercises of how you get everybody on the same page to resolve a situation like this. this being san bernardino, michael, what kind of

coordination, who's leading this at the moment, and what resources -- how are those being deployed? >> usually something like this, it's led by the responding police officers that were first on the scene. that department usually takes precedence, unless it was over the borders, and then you would get the fbi involved. the investigation is usually led by the first responding police department. the other departments are going to be doing things like closing down bridges and maybe setting up roadblocks, or trying to find a vehicle. if the reports are out, you can bet your bottom dollar that they're not in that black suv anymore. they may have stolen another car. they might have carjacked someone. that's nor mally would be what was happening. >> hopefully we hear about that soon. >> if i committed a crime and they said i was running down the street wearing a black and white checkered shirt, you can bet the first white shirt i saw would be on my back. >> michael, thank you.

it's helpful. >> my pleasure. and again, my heart goes out to those people who are injured and the families around them, and the police officers who have to deal with this. it's not a nice task to come up on a scene like that. it's not. >> yes, sir. thank you, michael solomon. >> thank you. >> we turn now to david katz. assuming you guys are a private sector, a private law enforcement kind of operation, what do you think would be happening right now as they try to track these guys down? >> actually, i'm formerly in law enforcement. i was a dea officer and had experience in training how to engage active shooters. i did that with the fbi and the israeli secret service. your last guest was a wealth of information. he had pretty much a lot of what i would say. i echo what he was saying. i would say in addition to the

cameras being used to track down the vehicles, as your last guest mentioned, probably a great number of license plate readers. if they were lucky enough to get a plate or partial, they're using that as well. but there's so much information that is coming out, and quite frankly, it's kind of contradictory, but it's really tough to make an assessment. >> what are they going to look for? they probably know a whole lot more than we do at this point. what we think we know is that now perhaps the shooters are not in that area, that they've fled the area in an suv, so what do you do in the meantime in the area where the shootings did occur? do you still act as if you're expecting shooters to be there as well? >> you are not going to clear that scene until every square inch has been visually cleared by the swat teams. so when they say it's an active shooter incident, they really

mean it's not a secure location. if they believe that the assailants left in the suv, they're not simply going to say okay, we're good. we'll walk out. they're still going to treat it as if somebody could still be inside, because someone could be inside. just because there was a report of three, doesn't mean they didn't start with four or more. that's why they're still not releasing the scene. now they're in more of a pursuit mode. >> we're seeing school buses there, reportedly used to shuttle people away from the situation. appreciate you weighing in. >> you're very welcome. >> david katz, global security group, ceo. >> jane wells is apparently on scene now. jane, where are you? what are you seaing right now? >> i am down the street from the crime scene. with us here is san bernardino police sergeant. what is the latest you can tell me? >> this is still an active, fluid scene. we are still searching for the suspects. and we are still actively trying to evacuate the building with,

you know, the victims and witnesses. >> reporter: there are still people inside the building right now? >> it's my understanding there are. >> reporter: do you know how many are injured and how many are dead? >> i do not. i know there are multiple casualties, and there are confirmed fatalities, but i don't have any numbers. >> reporter: do you know how many have been removed at this point, fatalities and victims? >> no, i have not been given any of that information. >> reporter: how many gunmen? >> we've heard as little as one and up to three. >> reporter: are they in the vicinity? what do you know about their location? >> that we don't know. we did have a report that at least one of them left the location in a black suv. but i don't know what has transpired since then. >> reporter: and what is this facility? it treats the developmentally disabled. was there an event here today? what transpired? >> there was an event here today. it's the inland regional center. they house county and i believe some state offices and they do

work with the behavioral health. they do things of that nature. >> there was an event today? >> yes, but i don't have the details on what that event wuss. >> reporter: did the gunmen break into that event? >> i don't know, they just went in the doors and began shooting. >> reporter: have there been threats against this facility? is there anything to indicate this would be targeted? >> i don't have any information on that. >> reporter: we have heard names over the scanners. is there any sense of the i.d.s of the suspects at this point? >> i have not been given any information on that. >> reporter: i appreciate you spending some time with us. how many law enforcement on scene? this thing is huge. everything is scramble, it appear appears. >> i don't know the numbers. i would guess in the hundred range just by seeing officers come and go. officers from all the local agencies are here. >> it's a multi-story, multi-building facility. do you have any sense how long it will take to clear the facility? >> i don't, no. >> reporter: what about a report of devices? >> i don't have any information.

>> reporter: is there anything left you can tell me at this point? >> not yes. i think you've covered it. >> reporter: i appreciate you talking to us. at this point, there are fatalities. there are victims. we don't know how many of each, although earlier police said up to 20 victims. knbc reporting it has visibly confirmed three bodies, but police are not saying how many yet, and anywhere from one to three suspects may have departed in a black suv, may still be at large. but most importantly, they are still clearing the facility. they are trying to get injured people, perhaps more dead victims and witnesses inside. and everybody had to leave. so there's purses and backpacks that have to be looked over by s.w.a.t. to make sure they aren't any devices. why this place was targeted we don't know. and three gunmen is very, very different and unusual. >> how close are you? how restricted are you in your movements?

>> reporter: this is as close right now as you can get, and we are still a few blocks away. it is a three-building facility. several stories. several hundred people -- they serve as many as 30,000 people in the community, of course. there aren't 30,000 people in there on any given day. this event, the nature of this event, we do not know. >> you know, i don't hear any sirens. we're watching video now, but we were watching the live scene early on. and there didn't -- you know, it's just my impression, there didn't seem to be a sense of you are yhency among the officials as they went about their duties, which said to me that they didn't feel they were in an area that was in danger at that point. give us a sense of that right now. >> caller: i would say looks can be deceiving. trying to get in here was no easy feat. as one well-armed police officer told me, everybody's a little on

edge right now. especially knowing that as far as we know, none of the gunmen have been captured. who knows if there's anyone still inside. what the state of their health is, so to speak. but what i would say is we haven't seenambulances streaming out this way. from one local reporter, at least 21 ambulances came and went. they're heading this way to loma linda, great trauma center. but other facilities as well. >> jane, we know you -- i think you came from los angeles, and the question now is if these -- if there's a vehicle, if there are multiple people at large, to what extent are they going to have to further shut down the roadways. what was your experience getting there and in surveying some of the surrounding area? >> reporter: freeways are still wide open, which was interesting. the off ramps to waterman avenue were both closed. i had to go around. had to go through three different police barricades. the freeways at this moment are

still open. you can see police presence. there were certainly several cars coming by, lights and sirens flashing to get here. but no, they haven't shut down the freeway at this point. take that for what it's worth. >> do you know yet, is there going to be a staging area? are they even that organized yet, do you know? >> reporter: well, where we are is the media staging area. we can do a quick panaround here. this is from the south end of what would be the closest location of the crime scene. this is where the media is staging. there are some also at the north end. but this is where we've been told to come and wait for more information. they're not letting us get any closer. we still have some ambulances out there, but nothing has come by in the last few minutes. >> there's a wire report that the shooting happened as the inland regional center was holding an event for county personnel inside an auditorium. >> reporter: several hundred people work here.

as soon as news of this shooting came down, we knew it was in this block, we went online and saw this facility, immediately tried to go on the website. even then, we're talking minutes after the report came out, the website was down, nobody was answering the phone, it was pretty clear that this might be where it was happening. >> and the question is why. that's the big issue there. keep us updated. >> reporter: and why up to three gunmen? >> exactly. doesn't add up yet. thanks, jane. >> let's get to a former nypd crime scene detective. familiarity with this kind of situation, maybe. i don't know. what are your thoughts? >> it looks like it's a little hectic there. >> understandably. >> but under control. the police, their man concern right now is to secure the area, which it looks like they're basically done. make sure that there are no more shooters in the facility.

if there were three, and they think there's three, they're gone. but once they have secured the area, and gotten the people out, it's going to be tedious job of going by room by room, to double check and to make sure that there are no more shooters at the scene. once that has been done, it's going to be the tedious job of the crime scene unit to go in and photograph the scene, and collect discharge shells and bullets, and sketch everything. i don't know how large the actual shooting scene is, but it could be a day or two before that's even all been done. >> meanwhile, charlie, the suspect still at large. so what do you do about that? i mean, if they could be anywhere, and spent a couple of

hours, that gives them plenty of roadway in the surrounding area, and i just wonder how significant that is when it comes to finding them, the longer the time goes by. >> well, the longer the time is, they could be on a freeway. they could be doing 70 miles an hour for the last two hours. there's two aspects to this investigation now. there's the black suv, which three possible occupantsing and now there's the crime scene. so the crime scene is there. that's where my expertise is. they're going to be going in and checking the crime scene, collecting evidence while other detectives and personnel are going to be looking for the suspects. you're going to have people going to the various hospitals and even the morgue, collecting any bullets, evidence from the

shooting victims. all of this evidence will eventually get either to a local ballistics lab or the state and possibly even the fbi to determine how many different firearms were used, and then possibly compare to other shootings. it's going to be quite an extensive investigation, and a lot of people are going to be doing a lot of guessing, but there's not beginning to be any real answers probably for a few days to sort everything out. >> our colleagues at nbc nightly news are reporting that the loma linda medical center, which is nearby there, has received four patients now from the shooting, and they expect three more, just to let everybody know. i'm going to sound like i'm second guessing the police there, but that's the last thing i'm doing. but we're not getting a lot of information at this point for the news media.

do you think that's by design, or are they just doing their job and they don't want to have to take time to bother with reporters? would it be counterproductive to give us more information? what do you think is going on there? >> they don't want to give away any trade secrets at this point in time. they may know stuff that they don't want everybody to know. with modern technology the way it is right now, everything is going out on the airways instantaneously. they may have information. they may be talking to witnesses. they may actually know -- possibly the people we're talking to. and they may have mentioned the name or a place or something. so they're not going to give everything out. they're going to play it close to the vest. they're going to conduct their investigation.

and when they find it necessary to give news media information, then that's when they're going to do it. >> i haven't heard from the booth, but i'm seeing these tweets from a twitter handle, which claims that a local discount mall has been evacuated and that the police have set up a perimeter around that. there were unconfirmed reports that they may have seen a suspicious person in that discount mall. and again, you're going to get a lot of misinformation, and when you don't have a whole lot of information, you're going to grasp whenever you do get and try and make sense of it, whether it's the real thing or not. >> too many times i've seen where somebody gets a bit of information, they expound on it and create false information just for the sake of making

news. hopefully that's not being done here. and the police have everything under control, and they're going to have to get into this building and search room by room, closet by closet, floor by floor to make sure there's nobody else there. interviewing the witnesses can be very helpful. the shooters may have communicated between each other. and if that has happened, that could be good information. but if there's hundreds of people, it could take a long time to interview all those people. >> right. charlie, thanks. preeshlt appreciate it. >> you're welcome. >> let's get back to sue herera at the news desk. please get us up to speed on everything we know so far. >> all right. let me brief you. we just want to start with jane

overwhelm wells reporting that the police department will hold a news conference in about half an hour, so hopefully we'll get more clarity on the situation. we know 20 people may have been shot. there are probably one to three suspects, according to the sheriff's department, confirmed by the san bernardino police department. knbc is reporting at least three people are dead. president obama has been briefed on the situation. we also know that the sheriff says and continues to say and reported to our jane wells a few moments ago that it is still an active, very active scene. the shootings came at the inland regional center, which is a facility, it's a social services facility that basically deals with people who have developmental disabilities. police are looking possibly for a black suv that left the scene, and shooters were in a military style attire according to reuters, and the mall that is two miles down the road, the sears has basically closed right now voluntarily. back to you. >> on that note, sue, thank you.

let's get back to jane wells, who is just by that scene where this happened earlier. >> reporter: with me is keith nelson, vice president of the board of trustees for the inland regional center. what can you tell us about what's happened here? >> we understand the event, there was an event in our conference center. >> reporter: what kind of event? >> we're not sure. county of san bern dee, as we understand. i've been hearing between one to three assailants entered that building and began shooting immediately. >> reporter: so it was county people. >> it was county or whoever used the center. we do have some staff located in that building and in the coffee shop and we haven't gotten an exact count of the our staff was injured or hurt. >> reporter: which building of the three? >> it would be the south building. the one closest to us. the detached building. a two-story building. we do have staff on the second story but not normally on the first floor. >> reporter: and this was on

first floor. what kind of security is in place? >> if it's a community event, the doors are open. so it's not a building that is locked and has security. >> reporter: so the other two buildings have multiple -- >> multiple locks. you have to have a key card to open the lock. >> reporter: why is that? >> it's a quasi-government building and needs some security because it handles benefits and entitlements. >> how many people work in this facility? >> in this facility, a little over 550. >> reporter: and how many people do you serve? >> we're the largest regional center in the state between riverside and san bernardino, over 30,000 consumers. >> on a midday like this one, how many people might be in that particular building? >> in that particular building, if there's a conference, up to 200, 250. >> reporter: have you ever received any threats that someone was targeting this? >> no, we have not. those would be reported to the board of trustee. >> reporter: three gunmen. this is crazy. how are your people handling

this right now? >> the few we've been able to talk to seem to be reasonably calm. what concerns me most is i've been getting some texts from our consumers and other work programs and they're pretty alarmed. our special needs community are in lockdown and they're concerned about what's going on. >> reporter: explain that to me. so your clients, these people who are develop genermentally disabled, they are in lockdown? >> yes. my son texted me and said they were all brought back to the building and under lockdown for security purposes. >> reporter: how come? >> i think stories travel fast and people don't know the details, whether we were targeted, whether our community was targeted. i think it's a safe thing for these programs to do. >> what kind of work do you do here? what sort of services do you provide these people? >> reporter: they're provided their benefit frs from the stat. anything from housing to therapy to social programs for the

developmentally disabled. >> reporter: how many of your people are not accounted for yet? >> we don't have that count. we'll be meeting at an offside location to do an inventory. >> reporter: is there anyone who has not responded to efforts to reach them? are there people that you just have not been able to reach? >> the last report i got from mary beth field, our president, she did not have anyone unaccounted for at this time. >> reporter: that's good news for you. >> that's great news for us. >> reporter: where do you go from here? eventually this will all come to some sort of conclusion and then what? >> i think we have to provide crisis counselling for our staff and consumers in the building. and evaluate our security and use of our facilities. >> reporter: what sort of budget do you have to provide security? >> we provide it through a very limited budget. i don't know if you've been following the news in california, but the developmentally disabled budget, we're basically on life support. we haven't had an increase in

over 12 years. >> i'm very concerned about consumers who might be in that building. just hope that this unwinds and we can take a little better control. >> reporter: keith nelson, vice president of the board of trustees for the inland regional center. i really appreciate you talking with me. we wish you the best of luck. take care. guys, back to you. >> jane, thanks. let me bring mike santoli in here. he's on set with us as we watch this story unfold. much of the decline came after word was getting out about this.

>> it did. the one thing you can be sure is that it didn't help. i do think it coincides with a few other things that were going on. after janet yellen spoke. a lot of that built into it. it did seem it was an acceleration of the selling. i'm not going to say a lot of it had to do with these events. we should all remember that the trading day after the attacks in paris, the market was up. it seems as if it's hard to draw a tight link. >> we want to bring in mark westwood, director of operations for kcee radio in the san bernardino area. what can you tell us about what you know about what's going on right now? >> we are getting reports now of a s.w.a.t. situation in pasadena

off fair oaks. i can tell you that the center, the inland regional center, this non-profit agency, is just about a minute and a half away from a freeway. if you time that out, and they could go west on that freeway very easily, they could have hit pasadena. so it could be a related event. >> mark, i just want to be really, really careful before we draw that link. and i understand we can make that deduction. but what do you know for sure at this point? >> well, what we do know for sure is 20 to 25 people injured. loma linda hospital, which is the hospital nearby, has been receiving victims. three fatalities. and the area is very, very much cordoned off. very hard to get to. we are going to have a local report at the police station, which is like three minutes away

from us here. we're attending that event. this started around a little after 11:00 and was during an event for county personnel at the inland regional center, which serves about 26,000 people in two counties, san bernardino and riverside. and identifying services that each plant needs and contacts private vendors to speech and occupational therapy and employment services and other things to people with challenges and disabilities. and they have a budget of about $247 million a year. >> wow. >> tell us about the area there, mark. i've heard it described as low-crime, high industrial. give us a sense of that neighborhood there. >> it's an upscale office area with retail and restaurants right around the corner. it's a three-story office building. it's directly across. s.w.a.t. are now using a staging area. there's helicopters above.

that's about all we know. >> as we watch and try to figure out how people are responding, one of the key questions is what's going to happen to all the folks involved in the larger regional area. how many of the roadways are open? we remember in new york, we had a couple of escapees from a prison and the entire state felt as if it was on lockdown. >> yeah. >> do you sense that there? have you gotten much in terms of reverse 911 communications from police? >> oh, yes. and governor brown is monitoring it. president obama is monitoring it. of course, the los angeles alcohol tobacco and firearms is here on the scene. they are very much looking at the situation as an active event. and not many people are being allowed in, for everybody's safety. we are still standing by to find out more information. the discount mall that they talk about is actually in the center

mall, which is only probably about seven minutes away from that, too. and that's a large regional shopping mall. >> so you do local news there. do you do much crime reporting? is there a very high crime rate? how would you describe that? >> san bernardino has a high crime rate. lots of domestic violence. but the area that is in san bernardino, a city of 206,000 people, a large geographic area, and that area is a pretty safe area. it's highly industrial office space. very upscale, high rent area. you wouldn't expect it to happen there. but whatever is happening here, whether it is, you know, terrorists or whether it is backlash of something at the inland regional center, or copycat or what it is, we just don't know yet. >> it is a conundrum. and again, we're looking at

video from earlier. mark westwood, thank you. appreciate your insights into that area there. >> thank you. joining us on the phone is donald schweitzer. there's where the suspect or suspects might be and how that's going to affect the larger area. what would be your approach here? >> the problem that law enforcement has right now is a crime scene that has to be addressed, and the first thing obviously is to rescue the people, bring them to the hospital. and search that scene. but then to have another ongoing investigation. the problem is that there's only one command center, and that command center is going to try to do both of those things at the same time. that is an area where there's a lot of roads playing in a lot of

different directions. it's not really feasible to shut down all the roads that the perpetrators could take in escaping from there. i think it's a big task, but i know this from my contacts out there, that the regional law enforcement agencies like lapd and many other agencies have been headed over there, so you're going to have a massive amount of law enforcement helping with this search, and unfortunately, this could lead to another scene that could be ugly, if it's in a place where there's a lot of people. >> certainly hope not. i know that area as i've mentioned before, and it is kind of wide open. it's hardly what you would consider a concentrated urban area. you're very close to those highways. once you get on the highway, you're in a wide hope space. i've heard traffic is very light today. does that make it more difficult, or easier to find these guys, if you know what

you're looking for, right? >> yeah, i think it's more difficult. these freeways could lead to easily four different counties that are all within half-hour to an hour. these guys could be in l.a. they could be in riverside, orange county. they could still be in san bernardino. they could be in palm springs up in the mountains. that's the task that law enforcement has. law enforcement obviously knows a heck of a lot more than what we know right now. they're looking at the video cameras from probably in the regional center, interviewing people. they're on to something. we haven't heard any reports right now, which is a little disconcerting, because you would hope by now that they would be on their tail. >> we heard that there's a police news conference coming, perhaps at the top of the hour. so maybe we'll get some more information at that time? >> right. >> it's in a couple of minutes here, as a matter of fact. at a quarter till the hour. so hopefully we'll get some more information at that point. and i guess at that point, the

point is to reassure the public to inform them for what they need to know, and to let them know to be, you know, out of harm's way as much as possible, right? >> right. law enforcement is not going to divulge a lot of information at that point, because they can't have their investigation compromised. the suspect will be privy to the same information. what they have to do is that they have to tell people to stay inside, be secure. they should be broadcasting that and making sure that people don't come near this location at this point. >> what do you make of the fact that they were wearing masks? >> well, it looked like it was premeditated, obviously. that this was not a rage type of a situation where somebody just got some bad information, went on in the car and took a gun and went back in. >> and the executive director -- the inland regional center's executive director told one of the wire services that the

building where this took place, apparently, they had rented out for a holiday party for county personnel. that's what this was about. >> yeah. i think it's speculation as to what the motives of these individuals were. but obviously, that's a possible one, that it was politically motivated or some disgruntled person. it could have been, you know, something way more than that. i think if they're wearing masks, and there's more than one person, you're talking about something other than having a problem with one of the officials in that room. it looks to me like somebody's trying to make a statement. a group is trying to make a statement. >> it's unusual, although unfortunately these kinds of attacks are becoming more common for it to have this many casualties. it's in the 10% or fewer of these situations. any reflection on that? we haven't actually heard an increase on that number in some time. it did seem like a lot of damage

was done quickly. >> this is going to add to the debate regarding gun control, for and against. this is a swigs wheituation whee can victimize people and cannot victimize themselves. i'm not a gun proponent, not politically motivated one way or the other, but it does cause my employees where my firm is, they're all talking about boy, i wish i had a gun at this point. >> thank you so much. we want to bring in former fbi special agent clint watts as we wait for this news conference by officials.

how much technology is available to them to try and identify who these people are? are there cameras that they would have access to at this point? >> i don't know the situation exactly for san bernardino. the los angeles region has one of the most sophisticated and well-utilized centers for emergency response. they deploy faster and better probably than just about any region across the country when they have situations like this. i would also say their command centers are topnotch. if there's anyone that can handle this, it would be law enforcement. >> no question. but again, so do they have the street cameras that they might have access to? how quickly is it possible to

get access to the images that might have been picked up by those local cameras there? >> i have always seen, at least in the cases i'm involved with, where locals have overwhelmingly moved to support or help the situation. and so i'm sure the law enforcement officers are canvassing all routes around there and gaining imagery that might be in place. another thing i would tell you about the los angeles area is the way they use aerial surveillance. you know, they have lots of helicopters. they're used to doing that sort of patrol work on highways. they're the most adept probably at handling a situation like this. >> what comparisons would you draw to what happened in paris? >> i would say there are some things that are interesting about it. one, the premeditation. it sounds like they knew this party, or there was some event going on. they knew it was a high casualty opportunity to conduct this. i think the other thing is the

rumors of an explosive device are concerning, but we can't put too much stock into that yet until we hear what the results are. what i do find interesting is that in a lot of workplace violence situations, you'll see the shooters stay and try and hold the place, or fight to the death and commit suicide. if it's three or more individuals. if you remember back to the charlie hebdo attacks, this is more similar to an attack like that. i'm not saying it's terrorism, but it make you wonder what the motive was behind this. it's hard to pin it down between the two theories, is this workplace violence or is this a terrorist incident. >> i asked an earlier guest, who describe it as a terrorist event. he said quite clearly, he thinks it is so, and looking at the approach and number of victims. why would you hesitate using that word? >> i just don't know who the perpetrators are and what their connection was to this event.

but the event to me seems odds. -- odd. you can hit a lot of mass casualty targets in the whole los angeles region. this seems strange, this party. it seems like there has to be some sort of insider knowledge that this event was taking place. that's what's odd to me. on a terrorism scale, usually you're going for the spectacular, for a sustained purpose, to put fear not just in a local community, but throughout like an entire country or region. that's what's odd to me about the target. it could turn out to be that, but that's what causes me to hesitate into jumping to that one conclusion. >> we should mention here that we are waiting to hear from san bernardino police with further detail on what's just transpired here. and we appreciate you joining us. >> thanks very much. >> thank you. >> that news conference was to get under way a few minutes ago,

but again, things are so fluid. they're still trying to gather information. you know that they are being pushed and pulled in many directions. let's bring sue herera back in for what you know to this point as we wait for this news conference to get under way. we the news conference to get underway. >> bill and killy, as you mentioned, the numbers have not changed. we have three fatalities and at least 20 people shot. they have been transferred to various medical facilities around the area and they have confirmed to nbc news they do expect more. we also know, as you've been discussing, where this event took place. this situation took place. the city of los angeles emergency operation center has been activated and it is now on level one. they are monitoring the situation in san bernardino. president obama just a short while ago giving a sitdown interview to cbs news. and i'm going to paraphrase some of the things he said. our hears go out to the victims and the families.

we have a pattern now of mass shootings in this country that has no parallel anywhere else in the world. there are some steps we could take, not to eliminate every one of these mass shooting gz but to improve the odds they don't have this frequently. common sense gun safety laws, stronger background checks and for those who are concerned about terrorism, some may be aware of the fact we have no a no-flight list where people can't get on planes. but the same people we don't allow to fly could go into the store in a united states and buy a firearm. and there is nothing we could do to stop them. that is a law that needs to be changed. once again, the president calling for gun reform on his watch at this point. we know it is a fluid situation. jane wells on the ground there for us. we're expecting a news conference shortly. but bill, as you mentioned, it is still an active situation. they are seeking as many as three suspects who may have gotten away in an suv. there are some reports it is a black suv. there are reports that there is a device inside of the building.

there are conflicting reports now about how large that device is. we're waiting for nbc news to confirm that. so that is what we know at this point. the shooters were in military-style garb, they wore masks and camouflage and vests. it is called body armor. i'm not sure if that refers to something other than a vest and there are no suspects in custody. they are still seeking them at this point. guys, back to you. >> sue, thanks very much. and as it goes without saying, as soon as that news conference gets underway, we'll take you there. >> joining us in the meantime is rick hahn. a couple of hours have gone by. there is no reporting that we've gotten, maybe we're about to hear it, about where the suspects are. and this is a hugely populated area. not just this particular part of california but i mean southern california more broadly. right. it is a very densely populated area. and the fact that we don't know what -- where the suspects are,

but on the other hand police seem to be standing down tells you something that is probably either they don't know or they believe that the suspects have fled. the fact -- again, as everyone else is saying, we don't know exactly how many suspects there are, makes all of this difficult for us to analyze without having the intelligence that the police have. however, there may be one or two reasons why the police are seeming to stand down. the bomb squad may, in fact, still have a robot inside the facility there. >> all right. rick, give me a second. i'm sorry we have to interrupt because we have the reporter on-site there. jane wells, what do you have with us. >> we have the police chief of san bernardino and san bernardino sheriff john mcmahon making their way over here. i'm going to get out of the way because i'm in the middle of a bunch of cameras. they are going to slowly get over here and give us a news conference and update on the very latest information.

they are -- i'm not sure you could see him. lucky if you can. there is a gentleman with sunglasses and a shaved head right next to the fence back there. he just pushed his sunglasses up. that is the chief. the sheriff is nearby. they have been briefing each other for the last ten minutes as they try to get the latest information so they could come over here and give us an update. so momentarily we are expecting them. they started to move this way but temporarily stopped but as soon as it starts, believe me, we'll take it. >> rick hahn, if you are a police official, are you -- what are you going to tell people right now? you tell them what we already know, i guess. the event occurred and we have this many victims and all. but beyond that, is there something you want to get a message out there to maybe -- have people help you find these guys? >> well, this kind of mirrors the events following the boston

bombing. if, in fact, they have intelligence or have reason to believe that suspects have fled, then they are probably going to appeal to the public to look for those suspects as best they can describe them. and it may just be a vehicle description. apparently, the perpetrators are reported to have worn masks, making it very difficult. somebody out there knows who is responsible for this. and that is one of the great tools that the law enforcement community has, and that is relying on the public to come forward and let us know. >> and it looks like it is about to begin here, rick. so we'll let the officials gather in front of the microphone and let things get underway here. >> sounds great. thank you. >> i'll provide with you a telephone number in the event that you have information for investigative leads. the number manned by the sheriff's department is 1-866-346-7632.

you could also call 800-78-crime if you wish to remain anonymous. i'll make a couple of quick introductions. we have chief jared mcgaun from the san bernardino police department standing to my right. sheriff john mcmahon, to my left here. and the assistant director of the -- in charge of the l.a. office of fbi, david abaaoudich. with that, i will hand it over to the chief. >> good afternoon, everybody. so this originally started off at 11:00 this morning. late this morning, early afternoon. we receive aid call here at the inland regional center, 1400 block of south waterman of a shooting. it was quickly apparent we had an active shooter situation. there was a massive law enforcement response that initially was officers from our department that responded and very quickly as word spread through the region we had a

massive mutual aid response from virtual eye every law enforcement agency in the immediate area, to include the sheriff's department, colton, fontana, highway patrol, probation department, parole, a number of agencies responded. what we have so far is information that up to three people had entered the building and had opened fire on people inside of the building. we do have some preliminary numbers of upwards of 14 people that are dead. and upwards of 14 people that are injured. we think those are pretty reliable but keep in mind those are potentially subject to change. they are preliminary numbers. the 14 that are wounded have been taken to various area hospitals. in addition to the law enforcement response, there was a massive medical aid response from the area fire departments and american medical response. as officers initially arrived on

scene, they went into the active shooter protocol, the things that we train for. they immediately entered the building in search of the suspects. initial information that the -- i'm sorry, that the suspects were potentially still inside of the building. it is a massive facility. it employees several hundred people and it has taken a long time to clear the building. in fact i think we still have assets inside that are completing that clearing process. information that i think is probably the most reliable at this point is that the suspects have fled, potentially in a dark-colored suv. we do not have any identification on the suspects and we do not know what the motive is for the shooting at this point. so with that, i'm going to turn it over to the sheriff for a couple of comments. >> thank you, chief. we're working closely with the san bernardino police department in a unified command as well as our federal partners to make sure we have the resources we need to thoroughly investigate

this event. our officers are working hand in hand with members of the san bernardino police department as well as the other agencies to search the building as the chief indicated. that search is still ongoing. we have also, because of the information that the suspects may have fled the area, we have also shut down and locked down the courts and the local city and county buildings in the general area around san bernardino. we have an increased law enforcement presence at the high-profile areas, including hospitals. we've been in contact with the school district and their school police chief to take care of the school side of things. we continue to make sure that we do everything we can to keep the public safe. we've been in contact with the board of supervisors. they've pledged full support and the resources they have to help solve this as well. we will work together to investigative this -- investigate this case once the

scene is secure and work hand in hand with the city of san bernardino as we do in other high-profile events. i'll now have the assistant director of the fbi say a few words. >> thank you, sheriff. the fbi is here with our state and local partners as well as our partners from the atf and we are here to essentially treat -- assure that all of the wounded are extracted and ultimately public safety is the number one goal at this point. and we will work as a law enforcement community to assure that we've done everything we can in our power to find, locate and apprehend these subjects. at this point, i know one of your questions is going to be is this a terrorist incident. i will tell you right now, we do not know if this is a terrorist incident. so we start from the beginning. working with all of our local partners. we take the presumption that it may be, it may not be. but we'll work hand in hand with them from the beginning. if things change, we're here from the get-go and there i n