authorities as the case against him is prepared. this is our special coverage of the boston bombings. i'm anderson cooper. thanks very much for joining us. today marks one week since twin bombs exploded in this city. we're now getting live aerials of the boat where one of the suspects was captured. gives you a sense of the size of the boat. here's the latest information that we have. a source with firsthand knowledge of the investigation tells us that the 19-year-old suspect is on a ventilator, heavily sedated. he was shot in the neck. he's unable to speak right now. dzhokhar tsarnaev is communicating with authorities. an interview team goes into the room to question him every few hours. their questions have focused mainly we're told on finding out if there are other bombs, weapons or accomplices. we're told he responds by nodding or shaking his head. a justice department official tells cnn that authorities could soon file terrorism charges against dzhokhar tsarnaev.

boston will fall silent at 2:50 this afternoon for the victims of the bombing. president obama will also observe a moment of silence. and bells will ring to mark the moment when the bombs first went off. the surviving suspect lying in the hospital dead right now handcuffed under 24 hour guard. even though he is still in serious condition as we said investigators are questioning him every few hours with the doctors in the room with them. we are getting new information about this suspect and how the investigation is done. deborah feyerick joining us in new york. don lemon is outside beth israel hospital in boston. deb, start with you, what are you learning? >> well, anderson, we can tell you that investigators and doctors are staying close by the alleged suspect. he is on a ventilator, he is heavily sedated and also restrained. one of the reasons is because they don't want him when he does wake up, when he is sort of -- when he does wake up, they don't want him to rip the ventilator out of his mouth. they're really trying to keep him as calm and as stable as they possibly can. they don't want any additional stress to the body.

what we are being told is every couple of hours, every several hours, investigators will go in and in the presence of doctors they are asking him questions. now, this could be in writing because the suspect may have sustained some hearing loss during that shootout and the flash bang grenades going off at the time. investigators are asking basic questions, safety questions. are there anymore bombs? is there a bomb stash? are there any weapons? also, was anyone else involved? even a nod of the head could obviously direct them to continue looking. they're trying to pursue all avenues as far as that is concerned. we're told by officers being briefed he did sustain several injuries, one of them we're told in the upper leg region and that's where he may have sustained the greatest amount of blood loss. he then did have a neck injury, but we're not sure, we're not clear exactly how he got that neck wound or where he got that neck wound whether it was in the final moments before he was

arrested. he was moving inside the boat. he managed to get out on to the side of the boat. and from there we are told that he fell. he fell on to the ground about six feet from where he was. so you can imagine a boy who has been a man, a suspect, a terror suspect not only wounded, sustained great blood loss, hasn't eaten, dehydrate and had that sort of final fall on to the ground and that's where law enforcement sources basically handcuffed him and put him in the ambulance that took him to the hospital. so he is communicating with them, he is allowed to nod. he is just allowed to nod to investigators when they're asking him questions. they're waiting for him to increasingly become more aware and get out of that sedation so that they can talk to him at greater lengths, anderson. >> and, don lemon, you've got information about who's questioning the suspect. >> yeah, i certainly do. to add to what debra said who's

questioning the suspect, it's a group called the high value detainee interrogation group. and this group was established seven or eight years ago it was after the capture of saddam hussein and the interrogation of saddam hussein. and what homeland security realized then is they needed one specific group with global knowledge of terrorism, international knowledge of terrorism, to go in to question these high-value detainees rather than a local person who has knowledge of the local area, local municipalities but didn't necessarily have global knowledge of terrorism. and so that's the group that's going in. and i spoke with a former fbi agent who worked with that particular group and i said to him, i said what types of questions might they be asking him? he said i would imagine he's asking about his brother's trip, rhetoric, associates, devices, alternate plans, others involved, where the ideology came from, was his dad involved? anything to get him talking. did he see the kids?

did his brother tell him how to pick a good place? where did the money come from? where did they build a bomb? how did they learn? who built them? any help? encouragement? anything going on at the mosque? any good books you've read lately. and i said back to this former fbi agent, this early on while he's medicated he can't talk he has a throat wound and he says this may be their only opportunity. he said, they would, you're right take it slow at this point because they want to build a rapport, they want to get him to trust them, they want to treat him with dignity and respect and give him some hope. the way they may be doing this questioning, anderson, is by what they call a sedation holiday where they ease off on the medication a bit so he is cognizant, conscious and aware enough to answer those questions, as deb said either by nodding or by writing them down. >> interesting. don, appreciate that. deborah feyerick as well. the focus is obviously now on the search for answers and on

filing charges against the suspect. boston's police commissioner says it's likely the two brothers were planning more attacks. he says the explosives, the fire power that they had that officials found suggests they did intend to strike again. >> the two suspects were armed with handguns at the scene of the shootout. and there were multiple explosive devices including a large one that was similar to the pressure cooker device that was found on boylston street. i saw that with my own eyes. i believe that the only reason someone would have those in their possession was to further attack people and cause more death and destruction. >> want to talk more about the investigation and possible charges against the suspect. i'm joined by cnn national security analyst and boston globe columnist julian and jeffrey toobin in new york with us. let's start with you. does the arsenal -- what does their arsenal suggest to you? >> for me having been in

counterterrorism -- we have different groups in the attack. we saw that london july 7th attack. at this instance it appears nobody was involved. so they were involved throwing out with guns, we say possibly it's just them. but the idea that they were heavily armed and have lots of explosives therefore means there was a bigger conspiracy is just not true. there's a lot of evidence cutting both ways. >> the other thing i don't understand is they seem to have planned out this attack very well, but not really planned out what would happen afterward. the idea that did they not realize that all these cameras around? you have this young 19-year-old suspect who is attending classes who is going to the gym, going to parties on the campus after the attack. >> that's exactly right,

anderson. and that really does cut to this notion that sort of their sophistication level. what we know today is not what we knew thursday night. so part of that gets in the decisions on the lockdown that some people are complaining about today. but really the truth is is that it didn't appear that they had sort of an exit strategy. since they weren't suicide bombers, you sort of wonder what were they actually thinking. that's what they're trying to get out. the most important thing at least from ed davis, the commissioner, there's no particular threat right now to the city. and as we were talking earlier, the recovery -- we have an investigation going on. the recovery is simultaneously going on which is really important to the city as well. >> and jeff toobin, our legal analyst, cnn's tracked down a video clip linked to his youtube channel from a militant jihadist. obviously that's something authorities are going to be looking at. sources tell us the suspect now, dzhokhar, is communicating with officials in some rudimentary way nodding yes or no.

they've chosen to question him without reading him miranda rights. what does that mean for any information they might be getting? >> well, it's very important to the people -- we've been talking a lot about miranda and i think it's important for people to understand what it does and doesn't mean. if you are questioned without your miranda rights, all that means is that the statements you make cannot be used against you in a criminal court. they can be used against other people. they can be used as leads to other inquiries. and you can still be prosecuted with lots of other evidence. all it means is that those statements cannot be used against you. from what it certainly appears there is lots of other evidence against this fellow. so the fact that the government might be giving up the chance to use some of it is not much of a sacrifice on the part of the government. >> he also at this point could indicate he wants an attorney and doesn't want to answer any

questions, correct? >> absolutely. even when someone doesn't get miranda rights, the statements still have to be voluntary. he can't be tortured. he can't be waterboarded. he can't be mistreated. but if he wants to answer questions without his miranda warnings, the government can ask him these questions and follow-up on them. >> and in terms of filing of charges, how likely do you think that is today? >> you know, that's very hard for me to tell from this distance. he has to be in a position where he can understand what's being told to him so he can understand the charges. he has to be able to communicate with a lawyer. from the sound of it he's not really in any position to have actual conversations. frankly, there's not a huge rush. he's not going anywhere. it is better probably to have him understand what's going on in a full way rather than rush to have an arraignment when he's

obviously not getting out on bail and the legal process is just in it's very early stages. >> early stages, certainly. jeff toobin, thanks, juliet as well. with so much attention focused on the bombers, we of course want to focus on the victims. the funeral for krystle campbell is underway right now. 29-year-old killed watching the marathon with a friend near the finish line. the mass at st. joseph's church in medford, massachusetts. her family asked cameras not be allowed inside. there you see her being brought to the service. campbell went to the marathon almost every single year. she's been called hard working, a popular restaurant manager, more than willing to get her hands dirty and support her staff. her grandmother says she was always smiling and big help to her when she recovered from a medical procedure. hundreds of people showed up for campbell's wake which happened yesterday with the line stretching around the block. so many people wanted to pay their respects. she died just a few weeks shy of her 30th birthday.

>> dozens of people wounded in the bombings are still in the hospital one week after the attacks. we are just learning 50 of them are still hospitalized. two in critical condition. at least a dozen have had to go through amputations. doctors say most of them are making very, very good progress. >> nearly all of the patients that have lost legs are already walking halls with physical therapists. it takes a lot of work. it takes a lot of safety, a lot of practice. and they have to learn new routines. but we're all gearing up for a mass exodus to rehab hopefully during this upcoming week. we're all looking forward to that. >> also boston police say the transit officer who was gravely wounded in the fire fight with the suspect says he's improving. they're very optimistic about his recovery. piece of good news for you there. with one suspect dead, it's hard to put all the pieces together. for investigators his wife is talking through her attorney. this hour you'll hear what she

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welcome back to our continuing coverage of the boston bombings. investigators are obviously still trying to understand all they can about 19-year-old dzhokhar tsarnaev. he was a really normal college kid, earned a wrestling scholarship, hung out with his friends. an immigrant from the northern caucasus region of russia. became a naturalized american citizen on september 11th last year. at least one friend who knew him says he and his older brother suspected they might be under someone else's influence. >> he was a follower. and somewhere down the line he was brainwashed by somebody who was also probably brainwashed. >> as recently as january he returned to his old high school to participate in a wrestling practice with some of his old teammates and old coaches as well. emotions are still very raw at the university of massachusetts dartmouth, that's where dzhokhar tsarnaev was a student. the campus reopened just yesterday after being evacuated last week. but we know that tsarnaev actually returned there after the bombings and seemed to go on

about his life as usual. that's what's so strange. he spent time with friends, even apparently commented on the bombings. he went to the gym. students who knew him said he seemed normal. >> he seemed very nonchalant. he didn't seem like nervous or anything. i was like, basically, these things happen in other countries and he's like, yeah, tragedies happen like this all the time and it's sad. >> tsarnaev also lived on campus with about 400 other students. again, there's still a lot of information authorities are trying to figure out. we've learned so much about these two suspected bombers in the week since the tragedy. one person we have not heard a lot about yet is kathrine russell. if you don't know her name, she's the 24-year-old wife of the suspect who was killed in the police shootout, tamerlan tsarnaev. they have a daughter who's a toddler. chris lawrence has been talking to katherine russell's lawyer. chris, what are you learning about this young woman?

>> anderson, basically her attorneys said that the first time she heard of all what had happened was by watching the news and that she had no idea at any time of what was going on with her husband. he says basically since those events she's been distraught, she's been crying a lot, that the family is basically in his words a mess. he says basically that right now she understands why federal investigators want to speak with her. they're trying to determine how much she may have known, but he is saying she didn't know anything about what was going on. anderson. >> people in the family's rhode island neighborhood i know have been saying that katherine russell started to change a lot kind of under this guy's influence, changed the way she dressed, the way she acted. what are you hearing about that? >> yeah. a little bit of context. we spoke with the attorney about this. he says, look, she goes by katy,

that's what her close friends have called her is katie. she had gone to college, raised christian but converted to islam after she married tamerlan. and she did become a very observant muslim. in fact, he told us that she wore a head scarf, which we have seen her wearing in pictures, anderson. >> all right. obviously still trying to find out more information. has she talked directly to investigators? and are those discussions ongoing? or is that -- does she need to be interviewed more, do we know? >> yeah. they're ongoing. in fact, she was here earlier this morning. our crews saw her leaving this morning with a laptop and we believe that federal investigators were with her. we know that investigators have been to this home, her parents' home, at least twice over the past several days trying to speak with her. when i talked to the attorney he said basically she understands

why. she understands that the government is looking at this as a national security threat. and she understands that. and she is talking to them through and with her attorney. >> all right. chris, i appreciate that. thanks very much. another story we're following is the fertilizer plant explosion in west, texas. homes were blown to pieces, lives destroyed. so many first responders killed. over the weekend some people began returning to what were their homes. and today, students moved into temporary school. coming up, a look at how west, texas is recovering. >> we're not just a community. we're a town. we're all family. we know each other on a nickname basis. it will never be the same around here.

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welcome back. i'm anderson cooper live in boston. krystle campbell's funeral has just finished in medford, massachusetts. we're seeing her being brought out of the church. her casket carried out of st.

joseph's church. she was 29 years old, a restaurant manager just weeks shy of her 30th birthday. tonight, a memorial will be held also for the 23-year-old chinese graduate student lu lingzi. she was one class away from graduating with a masters from boston university. much more coverage ahead from boston, but i do want to bring us up-to-date on what's been happening in west, texas. take a look. that explosion that devastated parts of west, texas, took the lives of so many first responders. in the city of west they're trying to cope with the death and destruction from the fertilizer plant explosion last week. 14 people were killed including a number of volunteer firefighters and ems personnel. martin savidge joins us now in west, texas. martin, what's the latest? do they know at this point what

caused that explosion? >> they're working to find that out, anderson and really there's an urgency to that investigation because this plant here is like a number of other plants, 6,000 similar plants located in many small town rural communities just like this one all across the country. investigators want to find out if what happened here was just something very unique to this particular plant, this facility, or is it something that maybe suggests the problem in handling fertilizer in general? that would mean there's a potential for other communities being at risk. investigators are today once again back at the plant site going over what is the obliterated remains of that facility. and the reason that the large parts of this neighborhood remain blocked off like you see here with the checkpoints is because all of that is considered valuable to the investigation. the files and the information in the warehouses of that building were destroyed. so it's really going to come down to almost a csi-type of investigation to determine the cause. they haven't so much looking at

what blew up, they want to know what triggered the fire. that was the first thing the firefighters responded to because if there hadn't been a fire, there wouldn't have been an explosion. so the focus now what caused that fire, anderson. >> and, martin, so many of the dead were the first responders, firefighters, all volunteers, ems personnel all volunteers. >> yeah. they were. and, you know, in some ways this town -- you have to remember it's very small 2,600 people. i think the fire fighting force was about 33 volunteers. so in that single blast, that single instant when you look at the numbers, they lost about a third of their firefighters and their ems force in this town in a single instant. a devastating blow. it's why it's had such a traumatic effect on top of just the human toll, the injured 200 and 50 homes destroyed, one in ten people in this town injured. the numbers are small overall, but in a community like this it is huge. and that's why people say it is

life altering, life changing in this town. the good thing, school started today. routines, getting back to them, that's always so important. but even there many of the students, the four schools in this town three of them were damaged. that means these kids are going to new classrooms, new hallways, meeting new students. the high school students, well, they're going to their arch rival school. they've been welcomed with open arms. the students there wore their team colors of this town to show their support for them. >> it's been just devastating for west, texas. i was down there the day after the blast. tight-knit community, good people, about 2,500 people in that town. we'll have more from martin throughout the day. in the midwest people bracing for more snow, more rain which could make for more pictures like this. this is grand rapids, michigan, where streets are waterways under water right now. many towns dealing with record setting rains that have caused flooding, hundreds of flight cancellations. three people so far have died. out in the rockies one man is

lucky to be alive today. he survived an avalanche in the mountains west of denver. five of his friends, they did not make it. they were killed in what's being called colorado's deadliest avalanche in 50 years. one victim's father was torn emotionally when speaking of his son. >> what do you say? he was starting to grow and become a, you know, really good man. >> the snowboarders who died were all in their 30s, all from colorado. they were found buried in snow in the white river national forest. one of the victims of last monday's attack is a dance instructor who lost part of her leg. she says she will dance again. we'll hear from her next. çtoooowl

welcome back to this special edition of "cnn newsroom." a week after twin bombs rocked this city, here's the latest. cnn hears the 19-year-old suspect is on a ventilator and heavily sedated. dzhokhar tsarnaev is shot in the neck he is speaking with authorities. an interview team goes in every hour. mainly focused on finding out if there are other weapons, bombs or accomplices and he responds by nodding or shaking his head. a justice department official says authorities could soon file terrorism charges against the teenager. boston will fall silent at 2:50

this afternoon for the victims of the bombings. president obama will also observe a moment of silence and bells will ring to mark the moment when the bombs went off one week ago. as we remember the victims of this tragedy today, 50 people are still in the hospital recovering from their wounds. one of them is adrienne hasla davis. a dance instructor suffered a terrible injury in the marathon bombings. this is the cover of the boston herald. it reads "i'll dance again." she lost her leg about four or five inches below the knee but vows to keep fighting. i spoke with her last hour on the phone from her hospital room and asks her what she remembers the day of the bombing. >> i remember everything. i remember the first bomb going off. and holding onto adam, my husband. and thinking, oh, my gosh, i know there's never just one. and i just knew that something was about to happen.

and i started screaming, oh no, oh no, and the second bomb went off and it went off directly in front of us. i remember everything. i remember falling backwards because of the impact. and falling into sort of a pretzel. and then with adam we determined i was going to be okay because i didn't feel any pain and he held up my foot and we both thought it was over. i completely lost, you know, i would say 80% of my bone and muscle and just of my foot and ankle in general. and i was bleeding profusely. it was very scary. i was conscious through the whole thing. and i immediately just knew that i needed to get to a clean spot because i needed to save my foot. ifrs going to dance again and i was going to keep my foot. so i was determined to move to an area that was clean.

so i crawled on my elbows off the sidewalk and into a bar or restaurant. i haven't been back to it. i don't really recollect which one it was. and i went in there and started trying to open the door with my elbow and crawled in as the door was trying to close behind me and then crawled in to try and find people. adam was covered in shrapnel and i wasn't sure if he could move or not, but i knew my foot was bleeding so badly i needed to find help. >> even in the midst of that horror you were thinking about saving that foot, saving your foot so you could dance again. >> yeah, i was. i was determined to save my foot. i knew what it meant to not have it. and my version of an amputee unfortunately, i just didn't know much about it. i know a lot more now. but my version of it was just sitting in a wheelchair and

sitting at home and not doing anything. and i wasn't going to be that person. i now know obviously that's not the case and there's many things that people can do after losing a limb. i was headstrong and stubborn on not losing it and doing whatever i could. i also knew i had two choices. i could either fight it or lay there on the sidewalk and bleed out. that sounded awful and painful and horrible. so i wasn't going to choose that way. >> when she called us it was about 1:00 seattle time. her first words were get on the next plane. we've been hit. we were in a bomb. she didn't think adam was alive at that time. she says my foot is gone, my foot is gone, i don't know what i'm going to do. just get on the next plane. which is what we did. when we arrived the next morning by her bedside at 8:00 a.m. she had already been in the emergency surgery and her foot had been removed at that time. they didn't go in until

wednesday to make sure everything was clean and all the shrapnel was gone before they did the complete amputation. >> so it's amputated below the knee. >> just about four or five inches below the knee. >> in terms of using a prosthetic, that's actually -- >> wonderful. >> -- wonderful. that's a huge advantage. >> that's right. >> i understood when she woke up had she realized that much had been taken? >> when she first woke up on tuesday, i know she mentally knew that her foot wasn't there. whether she was mentally willing to admit that, i think that took a few hours. but by the time the surgeons, who are absolutely fabulous, came and spoke with her, she knew that an amputation was likely and was willing to face all the future challenges. >> well, adrienne's husband is an air force captain adam davis

also injured in the blast. he used his belt as a tourniquet. you can go to www.gofundme.com, help those affected by the bombings. you can also visit our website, impact your world on cnn.com. while the investigation continues, boston is returning to business as usual in some respects. coming up, our special coverage continues with a look at boston one week after the attack. man: how did i get here? dumb luck? or good decisions? ones i've made. ones we've all made. about marriage. children. money. about tomorrow. here's to good decisions. who matters most to you says the most about you. at massmutual we're owned by our policyowners, and they matter most to us.

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well, flags are flying at half-staff, but boston is returning to the hustle and bustle of every day life in a lot of respects. the massive manhunt for the second bombing suspect put the city on lockdown friday. businesses, schools, the transit system, they were all shut down for a time. we're live from beth israel hospital here in boston. give us a sense of how things are returning to normal. >> anderson, i can tell you it's finally nice to see boston as it should be. some of the sights and sounds i'm seeing here, there's cars, there's traffic. you hear the honking you normally hear on a monday morning. people are out and about right now on their lunch hour. they're going to restaurants that perhaps haven't been opened

over the past several days. and then i hear construction workers in a nearby building. anderson, there's definitely the sense people are back at it, work, school, whatever they might normally be up to. >> i know the teams are helping the city rally as well. what did the red sox do over the weekend? >> well, anderson, people said that the red sox didn't really have to do anything but show up. but they did much more for the city because everyone likes being back at fenway. it was really a packed stadium. they held this pre-game special. and one other thing that the red sox as well as other area professional teams are doing is they're auctioning off their jerseys to those who were affected by this tragedy. so at this point it's really the professional teams helping the city move forward. >> what is the police presence like where you are? where we are near the marathon still heavy police presence. what's it like where you are? >> so here at the hospital over

the weekend i can tell you there was a significant amount of police presence right outside the front doors here. they were checking bags as people walked in. and today there are police officers at the front, but they're not doing sort of that same level of checking. although if you walk inside, that's when, anderson, you see the investigators welles police officers really walking the hallways because everyone knows the suspect is inside here still recovering. >> all right. well, thanks for the update. coming up we're going to look at whether the fbi dropped the ball. should they have done more? we know they did interview one of the suspects before his trip to russia at the request of the russian government, but should they have done more? senator diane feinstein wants a review by the senate intelligence committee. an update next. and find a hote with free breakfast without bidding. don't you just love those little cereal boxes? priceline savings without the bidding. ♪

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well, some people wondering now if the fbi might have dropped the ball in this investigation.

senator feinstein wants a review by the intelligence committee. jim acosta joins us now from capitol hill. jim, what did she say exactly? >> well, anderson, senator feinstein, who is the chair of the senate intelligence committee, she did not say that the fbi dropped the ball. she didn't want to go that far, but she does want a review of what the fbi knows about all this and to get at what tamerlan tsarnaev was up to when he went back to russia back in 2012. he apparently made a trip there. and this was after he was apparently interviewed by the fbi back in 2011. the fbi said in a statement friday night that it had been asked to investigate tamerlan's ties to potential terror groups, to potential militant groups and that during that inquiry the fbi interviewed tamerlan. and so senator feinstein and some other senators here on capitol hill want to know how is it that tamerlan tsarnaev was able to travel to russia last year for six months and how did he get back into the country given all of that information?

and so senator feinstein says there will be a hearing on this perhaps as early as tomorrow to get to the bottom of that. here's what she had to say. >> i asked the staff director of intelligence this morning to set a hearing particularly with fbi intelligence exactly when did russia call to ask about this individual? what did he do when he went back for six months? did he sit in his aunt and uncle's home for six months? or was he doing something else? and when he came back to this country, why didn't it ring a bell with the fbi intelligence unit that he should be checked out and vetted again? dhs clearly denied him to be naturalized as a citizen for some reason. so i think, you a comprehensive

investigation underway. as you heard the president say on friday, you know, we need to know everything we can about why this happened, what the

motivation was, how it happened. and all of those issues are under investigation. as for the process that the department of justice and the fbi are using to move forward in the investigation, they can comment on that. but i think it is entirely appropriate when you have an investigation like this into a terrorist act that that process be protected so that it is as effective as possible. >> is the president though getting a play-by-play briefing on what authorities are able to get from this man at this point? >> well, as you saw on saturday president obama convened a national security council here in the situation room to review the events in boston and he was updated on dzhokhar tsarnaev and the related investigation. he was also briefed by the leadership of the intelligence community about our ongoing efforts to combat terrorism and protect the american people. he commended the work done. and it is extraordinary work and

worth noting the work done by law enforcement officials at the state, local and federal level last week. the remarkable period from monday related

matters. but as i said in answer to your first question, this is an ongoing investigation that is really still in its early stages. >> there are questions being raised by lawmakers about whether the fbi was thorough enough as it looked into the older brother in 2011. is the president comfortable with that review that the fbi did at that point? has he asked for there to be any further review of what the fbi did at that point? >> let me say first of all as you heard the president comment on friday, the fbi did extraordinary work in responding to this attack identifying the suspects and working with state and local authorities to bring them to justice. with respect to the events in 2011 that you mentioned, the fbi has spoken about this and put out a statement. it is clear from that that the fbi followed up on the information that it received about tamerlan tsarnaev, the

older brother, they investigated it thoroughly and did not find terrorist activity, domestic or foreign. as for the president, i mean, you heard him say on friday and i think it merits repeating that -- i don't have it here, but it merits repeating in that he called for answers to a number of questions. as i said earlier, why this was done, what the motivations were, how it was done, any possible associations that the suspects may have had. and all of this is being investigated. and i think that you absolutely can expect that all the agencies involved as part of the broader investigation are examining these issues. yes. >> there's some chatter now that the immigration reform effort could be derailed because of what happened in boston. what's the white house view of this? >> well, i think we agree with

what some of the co-authors of the bill including i believe senators mccain and graham and rubio have said, which is that one of the positive effects and one of the reasons why we need comprehensive immigration reform is because it will enhance when implemented our national security. and it is another reason why we need to move forward with this very important bipartisan legislation. that is certainly our view. >> are you worried that the effort may lose some momentum now because of this? >> well, i would simply say that it should not because of the reasons i just mentioned. and the public and authors of the legislation as well as democratic office of legislation i think has said which is that one of the reasons why we need comprehensive immigration reform is we need to bring out of the shadows the roughly 11 million residents of this country who are here illegally.

the process of moving along the earned path to citizenship and the various hurdles that have to be cleared in that process allows for much more information to be known by the relevant authorities and agencies about these individuals. and that's very important. it also enhances the entry and exit procedures that are part of the immigration process. so we will continue to press forward in a bipartisan way with congress to move this legislation because it's the right thing to do for the middle class, for our security and for our economy. >> lastly, jay, senate republicans are saying that the boston suspect should be treated like an enemy combatant. is that something that you guys have looked at or made a determination on? >> he will not be treated as an enemy combatant. we will prosecute this terrorist through our civilian system of

justice. under u.s. law the united states citizens cannot be trialed -- tried rather in military commissions. and it is important to remember that since 9/11 we have used the federal court system to convict and incarcerate hundreds of terrorists. the effective use of the criminal justice system has resulted in the interrogation, conviction and detention of both u.s. citizens and not citizens for acts of terrorism committed inside the united states and around the world. the system has repeatedly proven that it can successfully handle the threat we continue to face. there are a number of examples of this. high profile. the times square bomber, faisal shahzad pleaded guilty and sentenced to life in prison. abdul the so-called underwear bomber was sentenced to life in prison. somali national