two new york city police officers ambushed and murdered. we've learned new details about those officers and the man accused of gunning them down. australia's prime minister has a warning for the public. stay alert. hear what he's saying about new terrorist chatter in the days since the cafe siege in sydney. after being blamed for the hacking of sony pictures, north korea may now be the latest victim of a cyberattack. hello and welcome to our viewers here in the united states and, of course, all around the world, i'm rosemary church. >> and i'm joining rosemary and

i'm errol barnett. we'll get to those stories in a moment. plus, this coming up, a former police officer in milwaukee, wisconsin, has been cleared after shooting and killing a mentally ill man and now we're getting a look at some of the evidence from that day. just take a quick listen here. >> shots fired. shots fired. he started beating me was going to hit me in the head. shots fired. starbucks, starbucks, help right now. >> what you just heard is the dispatch audio from the day dhe was killed. >> you can hear the panic in his voice. >> absolutely. >> but the reason it's so important you have this climate of tension in the u.s. between police forces and minority communities so let's go ahead and take a look at what's happening in new york city right now. it's on high alert for possible copycat attacks on its police after a man shot and killed two

officers over the weekend. investigators are looking into more than a dozen threats to the nypd posted on social media. the department is increasing security around the new year's eve ball drop in times square. >> the city's mayor met with the families of officers wenjian liu and rafael ramos on monday saying they are in tremendous pain. that meeting comes as critics blame the mayor for inciting violence against police by supporting recent protests. >> the attack on these two officers, the assassination of these two officers was an attack on the city of new york as a whole, on every one of us, on our value, on our democracy. we cannot tolerate such attacks. anyone with the ability to help us stop them must step forward. >> and both officers leave behind, you know, heartbroken families, officer ramos' funeral is planned for saturday. officer liu's family is waiting for relatives to arrive in the u.s. from china before they make

plans. >> yeah, his wife of just two months thanked the community for their support and offered condolences to the ramos family. >> this is a difficult for both of our families but we will stand together and get through this together. thank you. >> and the families of both officers say the men dreamed of making a difference and that that's why they joined the police force in the first place. our randi kaye has more. >> reporter: they were partners on patrol. officer wenjian liu was seven year veteran and officer rafael ramos who first joined the department in 2012. both were assigned to the 84th precinct in downtown brooklyn. officer ramos worked as a school security officer before joining the nypd and reportedly loved the mets. he was married with two children. on facebook his 13-year-old son wrote, he was there for me every day of my life.

he was the best father i could ask for. it's horrible that someone gets shot dead just for being a police officer. i will always love you and i will never forget you, rest in peace, dad. >> the heart he this is uncompared to other people's heart. >> reporter: ramos' cousin told "the wall street journal" god was a priority in his life. the 40-year-old officer grew more passionate about his church. on his facebook page a quote reads "if your way isn't working, try god's way." the same page said officer ramos had been married since 1993 and once studied at a seminary. before his death ramos was studying to become a chaplain. in fact, later that saturday afternoon, the day he was killed, he was scheduled to graduate from a chaplain program. the pastor at his church told us ramos had an infectious smile and loved his wife maritza and his two boy, justin and jaden.

>> i would like to thank all those who shared our sympathy and report for our family member rafael ramos who will always be loved and missed by many. >> reporter: officer liu who was 32 had been married just a couple of months. described by some around the neighborhood as quiet and in love. his parents are from china and according to period ya reports he was their only son. one friend of liu's summed up his passion for police work in "the new york times." "i know that being a cop is dangerous but i must do it." officer liu had said "if i don't do it and you don't do it, then who is going to do it?" randi kaye, cnn, new york. >> now, the more we learn about the gunman, ismaaiyl brinsley, the more we discover he's been troubled for a very long time. his sister says he was mentally ill but later in the program we'll have details on his criminal past including

terroristic threats and more than a dozen arrests. rosemary. >> all right, to australia now where prime minister tony abbott says security officials have intercepted an increased level of terrorist chatter since last week's siege at a sydney cafe. at 7 network's mark riley reports abbott is warning the public to remain alert through the holidays. >> reporter: the smiles of this swearing in was soon replaced by worried looks for tony abbott and his senior minister. >> as we prepare to join family and friends we do need to be conscious of the fact that the terror threat remains high. >> reporter: immediately after the investiture, the cabinet was told chatter had increased dangerously after the sydney cafe siege. it was time to issue a warning, they advised. >> an attack is likely.

we don't know when and how an attack may come, but we do know that there are people with the intent and the capability to carry out further attacks. >> reporter: although the martin place gunman man haron monis was not suspected of having real links to terrorist organizations, they believe those radical groups were capitalizing on the deadly shootout calling for attacks on australians. >> australians should go about their lives as normal because what terrorists are trying to do is to scare us out of being ourselves. >> reporter: the main concern so-called lone wolf attacks. random assaults on innocent victims going about their daily lives. this week, christmas shopping. >> it's important that people remain alert and aware. >> reporter: and report any suspicious activity to the terrorism hot line. 1-800-123-400. >> and services were held tuesday for the two victims of

the siege. ♪ family and friends gathered for a private memorial service for 38-year-old katrina dawson, the lawyer and mother of three was shot and killed during the siege at the lindt cafe. tuesday a private funeral was held for the other victim, 34-year-old tory johnson. he was the manager of that cafe. the 16-hour siege ended after the gunman and both hostages were killed. it is just past 5:00 p.m. in north korea and as far as we know right now the country is still having trouble with its internet service after a total outage that lasted more than nine hours. the website of the state-run news agency is set to be down and some analysts say this outage may have been the result of an attack. >> yeah, the disruption comes just a few days after the u.s. said it would respond to the cyberattack on sony pictures

which it blames on north korea. global affairs correspondent a aeli aeli aelise lab lot reports. >> reporter: kim jong-un mobbed by adorning north korean workers, the image of a confident and beloved leader lashing out at the u.s. whom he says is responsible for the film portraying his assassination. while denying involvement in the sony hacking, north korea warned it was "sharpening bayonets to do damage thousands of times greater" threatening counteraction against the white house, pentagon and the whole u.s. mainland. >> the government of north korea has a long history of denying responsibility for destructive and provocative actions and if they want to help here, they can admit culpability and compensate sony for the damages they caused. >> reporter: today in new york as the u.n. security council took up north korea's bleak human rights record, the u.s. ambassador said pyongyang is now threatening the rights of the rest of the world. >> it is exactly the kind of behavior we've come to expect

from a regime that threatened to take, merciless countermeasures against the u.s. over a hollywood comedy and has no qual qualms about holding of tens of thousands in gulags. >> i think it was an act of cybervandalism that was very costly, very expensive. we take it very seriously. >> the president does not understand when you destroy economies, when you are able to impose censorship on the world and especially the united states of america, it's more than vandalism. >> reporter: administration officials say the white house is considering sanctions against north korean officials, banks and companies and wants china to rein in north korea's ability to launch further attacks. today, beijing condemned the attack but said there is no proof north korea was behind it.

>> really tough financial sanctions are going to have an effect on china too, not just north korea because a lot of these institutions are in china, and the danger there is that it might trigger some sort of trade war with china, some economic retaliation. >> reporter: elise labott, cnn, the state department. now, we are well into the holiday season but millions of americans could be in for a wet christmas. coming up, details on a storm that could threaten holiday travel plans in the air and on the ground over the next two days. plus, there are growing fears of terrorism in france as the country deals with three attacks in three days. and forced religious conversions are causing discord in the world's second most populous country. my name's louis, and i quit smoking with chantix.

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...guaranteed! ♪ your ticket to a better night's sleep ♪ welcome back. at least ten people were injured in the city of nantes when a van driver plowed into shoppers at an outdoor christmas market. >> authorities say the driver stabbed himself after monday's attack. he expected to survive, though, a prosecutor says this seems like an isolated case so far and not a terrorist attack. senior international correspondent jim bittermann has more now from paris. >> reporter: it was packed with christmas shoppers. at the christmas market in a pedestrian zone.

kind of a curious thing that the van was even in the zone because the driver would have had to have special permission to get there. in the process of driving into the crowd, he managed to injure ten people. he himself then tried to commit suicide and he is in most serious condition in a hospital. he tried to commit suicide by stabbing himself repeatedly in the throat. the prosecutor said this is not a terrorist act although there's still an investigation going on. he says it's an isolated incident. the interior minister who is on his way to nantes has been called back for asecurity cabinet meeting. there's been so many of these incidents in the last 48 hours that, in fact, something should be done at least as far as the ministers are concerned to increase the security around the country. jim bitterman, cnn, paris. >> and as jim mentioned there were two other incidents in france over the weekend. on saturday police say a man

stabbed three officers while shouting [ speaking a foreign language ] god it is great in arabic happened near the city of tour. police shot and killed the suspect counter terrorism authorities are investigating that attack. on sunday a man rammed his vehicle into pedestrians in de jean injuring at least 12 people. witnesses say he too was shouting [ speaking a foreign language ] it does not appear to have been a terror attack. reuters reporting that jordan will begin providing training and arms to iraqi forces in the next few days. the aim is to help rebuild iraq's army which lost huge areas of ground to isis fighters. >> meantime, kurdish peshmerga fighters help up sinjar mountain after they broke isis' months' long siege over the weekend. and yesterday we showed you a story about a german author who traveled deep into isis

territory. >> yeah, it's quite compelling. he risked his own life to get a close-up look at the isis militants and what life is like under their control and now he tells our fred pleitgen how he managed to get that extraordinary access. >> reporter: what i have here is the declaration of safe passage, i think it is, that you received from the islamic state. when did you get here? do you remember what it says also? >> yeah, it says that the khalif is giving a guarantee that i would be protected, the people of my team would be protected and i would come back to germany in safety and it's a clear guarantee. our problem was that we don't know if this guarantee was true because i cannot control the stamp on this declaration, on this guarantee and this was our risk. >> reporter: did they treat you

well when you were there? did they abide by what they wrote here? >> they were correct but they were not very kind to me. we had very hard discussions about our -- about the way of investigations about our freedom and sometimes the truth chose a tone that i didn't accept and we had disputes and after two days we had a very hard dispute and we almost decided to leave and to go back. >> reporter: what about censorship? how openly were you allowed to travel? what were you allowed to show? what did they want to see? >> at the beginning i wanted to go -- said i would prefer to go to mosul because i knew mosul and when arrived they said we have a good surprise for you. you can go to mosul.

you are the only one, first one, et cetera. and this was the good side but the bad side was that we had to give our mobiles -- to give our laptops to them and that all the photos were controlled, all the films were controlled. >> reporter: they they went through all of your stuff of your video. >> they went through all of the stuff and, of course, we said, no, we refused and we had again a huge dispute and they said you can leave if you want to leave then leave. so i think even if we hadn't taken one single photo, i was interested to see what was happening in this country. >> just incredible to see much more of the video and interviews he shot during his journey inside syria spending time with members of isis.

he said to our website, cnn.com. all right. to russia now where a former finance minister is warning of a full-scale economic crisis in the country. the central bank is bailing out trust bank, the first victim of a collapse in currency. alexie kudrin risks have iing t happen. >> translator: today i can say we are entering a real economic crisis, full scale crisis. next year we will feel all the effects of it. imports will decrease by approximately 40% and imports of the investment nature will be under the greatest risk. for the first time since 2000 under putin's and med verymedve

rule, the household income will decrease. and there's growing concern about religious intolerance in india. >> after this short break we will look at the national debate there over the ethics of forced religious conversion. and later after canceling its christmas release sony says it's now looking to breathe new life into the controversial come comedy "the interview." stay with us.

a hong kong typhoon and former official land their fates in the city's largest corruption trial. he was sentenced to five years. the real estate billionaire found guilty of conspiracy over payments made to former senior government official who was sentenced to 7 1/2 years. his younger brother was cleared of all charges. french industrial giant alstom has agreed to plead guilty and pay the united states a $772 million fine to settle a foreign bribery case. prosecutors accused alstom of paying more than $75 million to secure $4 billion in transportation projects and falsifying its records to mask the bribes. the u.s. justice department says the fine is the highest ever for foreign bribery in the u.s. now a nationwide debate is

ranging -- raging, i should say, at the moment in india over the practice of forced religious conversion. >> yeah, it's a question of ethics reaching to the highest levels of government. and as we report to the lowest levels of society. >> reporter: work, most don't want to do. sifting through garbage in search of anything that will sell. it's the only sorce of livelihood this muslim community has known for generations. employment options are limited because most don't have valid paperwork. think said they'd give us subsidized food, government jobs and lured us and we fell for it mohammed ismail says lured into a religious conversion. he shows me where it happened. "they put up bricks here, lit a fire, made us sit around as a priest performed a ritual and

told user's no longer muslims, you are now hindus," he says. 100 muslims were part of that ceremony. the hindu priest even gave ishmail a new name, mohammed i shall maim badge raj kumar which means hindu prince. "i don't understand why this is happening. which hindus being converted into muslims and muslims into hindus, she says. religious conversion has always been the controversial issue in secular india. hindu act ifs who back this point to a long history of evangelical christians and muslim groups converting hindus. "if christians and muslims have been converting our people for centuries, what's wrong if we convert them, we are not forcing anyone. they are coming out of choice, he says." despite the claims that the conversions were voluntary, this

ceremony is now at the center of a nationwide debate on the ethics of religious conversions in india. paralyzing parliament for days, opposition lawmakers demanding prime minister modi rain in hard-liners who they say were emboldened by his election. modi has in the past asked members of his hindu nationalist party not to make provocative statements but he has yet to comment on this conversion issue. ♪ they say modi's focus may well be on the economy and international relations, but what happens here in communities like this perhaps the real test for his government. saleem ma udas, cnn, agra, india. almost, a long history of law breaking coming up for you. we'll take a closer look at the man who ambushed and killed two new york city police officers and why his sister calls him an

emotionally troubled kid. plus, another controversial shooting death. find out what the district attorney decides about the police officer in this wisconsin case. ut it. i took mucinex dm for my phlegmy cough. yeah...but what about mike? he has that dry, scratchy thing going on... guess what? (cough!) it works on his cough too. what? stop, don't pull me! spoiler alert! she doesn't make it! only mucinex dm packs 2 medicines in one pill to relieve wet and dry coughs for 12 hours. start the relief. ditch the misery. let's end this.

thanks so much for staying with us here on cnn. i'm errol barnett. >> and i'm rosemary church. we want to bring you up to date with the headlines this hour. new york city is planning extra security for new year's eve in the wake of threats to its officers posted on social media. now, this comes after the ambush killing of two policemen over the weekend by a man who made threats online before shooting them and committing suicide. north korea is still having trouble with its internet service after a total outage

that lasted more than nine hours. the website of the state-run news agency is set to be down right now and some analysts say the outage may have been an attack. it comes days after the u.s. said it would respond to the hacking of sony pictures which it blames on north korea. at least ten people were injured in the city of nantes in western france when a van driver plowed into shoppers at an outdoor christmas market. authorities say he stabbed himself after that crash but should survive. a prosecutor says this seems like an isolated case so far and not a terrorist attack. now back to the man would killed those two new york city police officers. it's understood he had a troubled past actually. >> yeah, he also had a long police rap sheet and questions persist over how he got the gun used in that attack. nick virginalencia has that. >> reporter: at 28 years old ismaaiyl brinsley's life was full of failure. broken regisships and run-ins

with police. >> career criminal, a troubled individual, clearly deeply emotionally troubled past. >> reporter: after bouncing from address to address as a teen, he leaves a new jersey high school in tenth grade and drifts according to "the new york times." traces of his troubles over the years are found in police reports that spread from georgia to ohio. in the last ten years, brinsley is arrested at least 19 times. in a 2013 police incident report in brooklyn, new york, brinsley assaults his five months' pregnant ex-girlfriend. the perpendicular put his hand on his victim's forehead and hit the victim on the head with his head. in another report from 2011 brinsley opens fire on a woman's car. he later flees, only to be arrested and charged for the crime. the list of police reports goes on and on. from probation violations to petty crimes to terroristic threats. his behavior over the years nothing short of erratic. in 2011 he confirms to a judge he once had been a patient at a mental hospital.

>> tried to commit suicide about a year ago. we got that from family members. >> reporter: raising the question how does a man with a history of mental issues get his hand on a gun. the weapon used in the attack was purchased nearly 20 years ago at a georgia pawnshop. how brinsley got the gun is unclear. seen here in this surveillance video just before the shooting, police say they believe he used a plastic bag to carry the gun. beyond that, they've released few other details. 30 minutes outside of atlanta in union city, georgia, brinsley's last known address. and acquaintance who did not want to go on camera describes the shooter as a mellow guy who was soft-spoken. a far different description of the man who posted this in one of his final messages on instagram "i'm putting wings on pigs today," he wrote "they take one of our, let's take two of theirs." >> what we're seeing on instagram he put out 119 images on his instagram account. a lot of these things are

self-despair but also anti-government. >> reporter: his attack has been called revenge for the recent high-profile deaths of two unarmed civilians but on monday new york's mayor said that the killings weren't just an attack on police but an attack on us all. nick valencia, cnn, atlanta. >> and ismaaiyl brinsley's family is speaking out for the first time since the killings. his sister says he was not seeking revenge. she says that he was mentally ill and needed help that he never received. >> this has nothing to do with police retaliation. this was a troubled emotionally troubled kid. he needed help. he didn't get it. i feel so bad for the family. you know, we give our condolences to the family. >> we are grieving, and we're very sorry for what happened for the innocent cops that were there. >> now, new york's mayor bill de blasio says the families of the murdered police officers and now

the families of all new yorkers, he visited the officers' homes monday along with the police commissioner and governor of new york. >> de blasio is also pushing back against the police union and others who say he's responsible for the officers' deaths. they say he should not have supported the recent protests in new york. >> i have throughout my public life expressed tremendous respect for the nypd. it's very well documented. i will continue to. i also think in a democracy that people express their desire for a more fair society and that's right and proper, as well but they must do it peacefully. there can be no violence and certainly can be no violence against those who protect us and who represent our society, the police are our protectors and much be respected as such. >> considering there are divisions among leaders there in new york, police commissioner william bratton is defending the mayor from his critics.

the two appeared together at a news conference monday. bratton says ongoing issues between new york's mayor and police are rooted in the city's long history. >> some officers aren't like me. amazingly some don't. i can't quite understand that but some don't. some of you have been around this town for awhile. can you point out to me one mayor that has not been battling with the police unions in the last 50 years? name one. name one. so the experience to this man in terms of some cops not liking him, it's nothing new. it's part of life. it's part of politics. >> and worth pointing out bratton was also police commissioner and former new york mayor rudy giuliani and started the stop and frisk procedure that reduced violent crime and giuliani talked about his own police policies and had a few

choice words for critics in an interview on cnn's "new day." >> the children of black parents in this city are being saved by our police officers. and during the time i was mayor and i don't mind saying this, i saved more black lives than any mayor in the history of this city because i was not afraid to police according to statistics and not to what al sharpton would try to sell you as black propaganda. >> how do you explain the protests we've seen across this city and elsewhere where they think police are using excessive force and treating people in communities of color differently. >> it's the same way that people are more afraid of flying on an airplane than driving in a car. because you create the impression that when there's one big airplane crash, that, oh, my god, airplane crash, airplane crashes but people are not afraid of driving in a car and have a much greater chance of dying in a car. if i were a black father and i had a son there's less than a 1% chance my son would be marmed by

the police but 92% chance he would be harmed by another black. >> the idea it's systemic and widespread is an overextension. the idea that the mike brown case was the right case to hang this cause on may be an arguable assumption but the idea that blacks are at risk when it comes to the culture of policing, that's not new and you know that there's a lot of statistical support for it. you don't want to ignore that problem. >> you don't want to ignore the problem. but you don't want to do it just disproportionately to the real problem. to reduce the significant amount of crime in ft. green those police officers wouldn't have been in fort green. >> they don't have to be abusive and overdo -- >> all of that has gone down. >> you don't want to say that doesn't exist. >> it's like this. here's a highway that has 2% of the accidents, here's a highway that has 92% of the accidents. the president, attorney general and de blasio are spending all their time on the 2% highway and no time on the 92% highway.

and never talking about it and never talking about the police officers who save black lives which far outweigh police officers who abuse anyone and by the way, both cases you mention, great sympathy for their family but both those men were committing crimes. >> former new york city mayor rudy giuliani on cnn's "new day." a district attorney in milwaukee, wisconsin, concluded that a former police officer was justified in the shooting death of a mentally ill man. our affiliate wisn has the dash cam video and frantic radio calls that likely played a role in the d.a.'s decision not to charge that officer. christine paladino reports. >> reporter: that's the panic voice of christopher manney calling for backup after he shot dontre hamilton 14 times in the middle of red arrow park back in

april. the department of justice also released dash cam video of officers responding to manney's radio calls for help. >> he's going to need medical. black male. he's about 20. i need medical. >> reporter: manney approached him and asked him to stand up and then started patting him down. that's when hamilton grabbed n manney's baton and started hitting the officer with it. >> he exercised bad judgment that put him in a position where he had no alternative but to use deadly force. >> reporter: chief ed flynn says manney violated his training by patting down a mentally ill person. he fired him back in october. manney is still trying to get his job back. >> i would expect him to appeal his termination. i'll oppose his rehiring. i don't think he should be a police officer.

dl dont-- >> thee protests broke out after the decision was announced. the u.s. department of justice will do a civil rights review of that case as it has done with some of the other high-profile incidents we've seen. now, still to come here on cnn, a meteorologist shot outside his tv station makes his first public appearance and describes how the shooting unfolded. plus, it is the movie north korea does not want you to see and for now they may have gotten their way but sony pictures says it's not over yet. that's next here on cnn.

still no claim of responsibility for two explosions both believed to be caused by bombs. the first blast rocked a bus station in gombe killing 20 and suspicion fell on boko haram. later an explosion hit a market in the city of bauchi causing a massive fire. red cross workers are reporting heavy casualties. now, many of the recent terror attacks in nigeria have been pinned to boko haram. the militant group has released a new video now with very disturbing images and an equally disturbing threat. >> as nima elbagir tells us boko haram is intent on executing all infidel hostages from this point on. that's a quote from them. we have to give you a warning here, this report contains

graphic images. >> the truth is whatever >> reporter: dozens of prone victims executed. fighters pose and parade their their midst. as civilians in northern nigeria take up arms against boko haram, this massacre and the release of the video chronicling it appear to be an escalation in boko haram's campaign of intimidation. standing in the blood of his victims, a man claiming to be a boko haram commander addresses the camera. [ speaking a foreign language ] "killing, slaughtering, destruction and bombing," he says," will be our religious duty anywhere we invade." this video was uploaded on to a video sharing site and then distributed to the media. we have no way of verifying its authenticity but it is ten unrelenting minutes of a massacre as it unfolds. the commander, the reported commander addresses the camera claiming to be in the town which

is a territory they took in the summer. well, we spoke to some of the residents who managed to flee bama then they said that hundreds of non-muslims were taken hostage by boko haram in the town. the commander says this video is proof that those hostages have now been killed, and he also says that from now on, boko haram will kill any hostages they take raising fresh concerns about the hundreds of hostages including dozens of girls still in boko haram custody. nima elbagir, cnn, london. >> now, we're hearing from a texas weatherman who was shot in broad daylight right outside the station where he works. patrick crawford was shot last week in the station's parking lot. he says he has no idea who the man was. >> the man that shot me didn't say any words to me. there was no interaction whatsoever. it was he just started shooting at me as i was leaving the parking lot of kcen tv station

so there was no interaction. i did not know him. hopefully the description that i gave the texas rangers and the police, hopefully that description is going to help to bring this person to justice for what he did and the crime that he committed. >> just amazing. crawford hasn't been released from the hospital just yet. doctors say elmore than likely spend christmas at home with his family. rosemary. >> all right, turning to australia now and a four-day camping trip turned into an 11-day fight to survive after an australian father and his two young boys got lost in the outback. they lift their brisbane home on december 11th. unfortunately they made a wrong turn. the car got bogged down in mud and were stranded. they survived by rationing out the four days' worth of food they packed and collecting rainwater. they were down to their last few slices of bread when a farmer remembered seeing their car. the father is fine.

the boys lost some weight but they are expected to make a full recovery. incredible. great story of survival there. anyone wanting to hit the roads in the u.s., there's a mix of rain, snow and other severe weather that could possibly throw some other folks in a wrong direction. >> all happening on one of the bitiest travel weeks across the united states and the entire year, incredible. let's go to the weather maps and show you what's been going on, errol and rosemary. tracking the storm now getting going. we've got the radar lit up here. we have an area of low pressure across the midsection of the country spawning a secondary low and that's the one i think will have the potential of bringing severe weather across the southeastern u.s. snowing across the midwestern u.s. we have accumulations up there on the back side of the secondary low anywhere from 3 to 5 inches but first things first it will bring severe weather that is this low that's developing now moving east of

texas and heading in across the southeastern u.s., potential for heavy rain frequent lightning, large hail and potential for rotating thunderstorms. can't rule that out. the snow with this storm will be limited to the midwest. that's because it's going to be essentially the low is going to be right on top of the midwestern u.s. and so on. the eastern side of it here will get this rush of relatively warm air that's going to be producing a rain event, a heavy rain event at that across the eastern seaboard. this will not be a nor'easter. initially with the model runs last week, that was the case. but thankfully things have not transpired that way and we don't think knell. the clock as we put into motion tuesday. severe weather for atlanta travels in or out of atlanta's hub here, that's going to be an issue as far as delays. as we head into wednesday, on the back side of this low, that's where chicago and points to the north and west will be getting in on snow. accumulations anywhere from 3 to

6 inches, in fact, could not rule out isolated higher amounts across the midwest and then as we head through thursday morning, which, of course, is christmas day itself, it'll be gusty, windy but then rid of the storm as it quickly rations offer to the north and east, breaking it down for you as far as what we could expect for today, this is the area we're looking for the potential of isolated tornadoes but mainly a severe wind threat here with some large hail so if you hear some thunderstorms outside your area across the southeastern u.s., potential that those could be severe certainly is there then look at this swath of very heavy rainfall cross the southeastern u.s. causing flash flooding over the next couple of days. so for tuesday the flight delays at the major airport, chicago because of rain and wind, dallas, atlanta and charlotte and as we transition into wednesday, chicago, we could get in on some snow there but philly, new york and boston, a rain event there with gusty winds, as well so watch that closely. if you're looking for a white christmas, a new system that

will move into the western united states, i think by the time we get into christmas day itself it'll be snowing out west so if you want snow -- >> that's kind of cool. >> yeah. >> if you can fly there. >> we had it in atlanta a couple of years ago. >> that one day of snow that shut down the city. >> does do that. we have like eight plows, i think, in the entire. >> we have eight now? >> is it that many? >> i think it's higher than that. >> progress, guy. >> ivan cabrera, good to see you. thanks very much. next here on cnn we remember joe cocker, the soulful singer whose raspy voice entertained for decades. ♪ are you sad because you're on your own ♪

all right. we want to catch you up on one of the biggest stories we've been reporting. "the interview" which is about a fictional plot to assassinate north korean leader kim jong-un led to threats against movie theaters and then sony, of course, decided not to release the film on christmas day and as they had initially planned. >> yeah, and now the company says it is looking at other options for releasing that film. tom foreman reports. >> i will be traveling to pyongyang, north korea, to interview president kim jong-un. >> reporter: for a comedy the tale of "the interview" seems as twisted as a spy novel. the latest turn coming from an attorney on "meet the press". >> sony has been fighting to get this distributed. it will be distributed. how it's going to be distributed i don't think anybody knows quite yet but it's going to be

distributed. >> reporter: that is a direct about-face from just days earlier when sony said it had canceled the christmas release and had no further release plans. spurring even presidential disapproval. >> if we said about a dictator in another country, can disrupt through cyber, you know, a company's distribution chain or its products and we start censuring ourself that's i problem. >> reporter: how could it be released? first online. "the interview" it could be served up on netflix, youtube or any streaming site, undeniably the business deal could be tricky and sony has tens of millions of dollars at take but it also has its own video on

dough hand service called crackle or it could release it through its playstation services. a second way. >> every night millions see our show. >> reporter: it could make a deal with cable tv releasing the film for free or on pay-per-view and thirdly, sony could take the film back to theaters. the company has insisted movie houses said no way would they show the film. >> at that point in time we had no alternative but to not proceed with the theatric release on the 25th of december and that's all we did. >> reporter: but some theaters operators are now calling that scapegetting saying some places have been willing to show the movie all along and still are if sony will just lower the lights, pop the popcorn and give the okay. tom foreman, cnn, washington. ♪ ♪ what would you do if i sang

out a tune ♪ ♪ would you stand up and walk out on me ♪ >> such a great voice there. the music world remembering the distinctive voice and moves of joe cocker. the british-born crooner hit the big time back in 1969 at woodstock with this rendition of the beatles' "with a little help from my friends." now we heard -- yeah. >> you hear it right there. cocker continued to perform four four decades in which he had several hits and unmistakable stage presence and hit number one and had a grammy for the duet "up where we belong" but told npr his favorite song he recorded was "you are so beautiful." ♪ you are so beautiful to me

[ applause ] >> wow, joe cocker died from lung cancer at his home in colorado. he was 70 years old. and many thanks for watching us here on cnn. i'm rosemary church. and i'm errol barnett. "early start" is next for those of you in the states. for everyone else stay tuned to "cnn newsroom." have a great day. ♪ what would you do if i sang out a tune would you stand out and walk out on me ♪ ♪ lend me your ears and i'll sing you a song ♪ ♪ i will try not to sing out of key ♪ ♪ oh baby i get a little help from my friends ♪ ♪ i get a little help from my friends ♪ ♪ hey hey hey i get a little

help ♪

calls for unity among flaring tensions among two new york police officers. and now asking for the public's help about the killer's final hours. and the internet back on in north korea after the outage. was this retaliation? and a delta worker accused of smuggling guns, some loaded on planes. we have a shocking breach of security. welcome to "early start." i'm christine romans. b