lence last night, they're not respecting the memory of freddie gray. >> the people the peacemakers we saw in that piece, that's the baltimore i know. the mayor, we're expecting her to make remarks up. i know you'll be live in baltimore throughout the night. let's go to the mayor who is going to be speaking on "the situation room" right now. happening now, stand off, a night of violence, looting and violence brings a that state of emergency in baltimore. protesters gath as the troops and the police line the streets trying to prevent another flairup. presidential frustration. >> you've got some of the same organizers now going back into these communities trying to clean up in the aftermath of a handful of criminals and thugs who tore up the place. >> president obama speaks out forcefully on the rioting. but he also says police and the public need to do some serious soul searching. and city wide curfew.

beginning just hours from now, anyone not going to work or going for medical treatment needs to be off the streets in baltimore. i'll talk about all of this with leaders on the issues of race the national urban league president is standing by live. i'm wolf blitzer. you're in "the situation room." and the breaking news 1,000 national guard troops are now deployed in baltimore, along with thousands of police officers as a state of emergency takes hold after a night of rioting. there have been many protestsers on the street today. as community leaders try to keep the peace, it's a far cry from the rock throwing, the looting the burning that's shaken baltimore to its corps. but darkness is just a couple of hours away and the city remains very tense right now. authorities are taking no chances. they'll impose an overnight curfew. our correspondents analysts and guests are standing by with all

of the late breaking developments. but let's begin on the streets of baltimore. for the latest brian todd is standing by. brian? >> reporter: wolf this has turned into a very dynamic street protest here. it started over here on the corner of north avenue and pennsylvania avenue. this is one of the flash points where a lot of the violence the looting and the burning took place last night. the protesters start there had and just walked ending here converging chanting support for freddie gray. so far it's been mostly peaceful. many of the protesters are determined to keep it that way wu all eyes are going to be on this neighborhood once darkness descends in a couple of hours. a city on the ray zosh's edge of tension tonight. a daytime street demonstration boils over when one vocal protester is detained by police. baltimore police are called in reinforcements from other law enforcement agencies and the national guard as they prepare

for what comes next. >> we have the ability to respond quickly to incidents of lawlessness that take place. >> tonight, anxiety over what will 457 when darkness descends on the neighborhoods and a curfew takes into effect. last night rioter took over the streets throwing rocks and other objects at police. at least 20 officers were injured, more than 100 cars and at least 19 structures burned in the mayhem. one car sped past or cameras separating for a police line stopping just feet from the officers and narrowly escaping a police van that tried to cut it off. this man said he wasn't looting but understood why others are rioting. >> people are tired of being pushed. that's what all of this is people fighting back. >> hundreds were arrested. this mother might have saved her son from that fate after she caught him rioting, she smacked him on the head and dragged him

away. in the aftermath many in these neighborhoods try to clean up and absorbed what they've lost. >> they shattered the windows, came inside and broke inside the atm machine. it was a whole atm machine that was fully functioning that we found around the corner. broke in. all of the money gone. it's actually ripped to pieces. >> con stance lee is disrespondent. >> i didn't sleep at all last night. it's hard to take it all in. looking at these people smiling and laughing thinking it's all okay. i's not okay. you don't know what we go through to try to keep our doors open. >> reporter: and back at the protests these people have just gone down on their knees in support of freddie gray. there's a speaker over here exhorting them to march in peace. we're going to see where the demonstration goes. like last night, wolf we were never sure where the marchers

were going to go when they were going there and where some pockets of violence would pop up. >> what's going on brian, behind you? >> reporter: well it's a street march, wolf. it started over here at northern pennsylvania moved six or seven blocks around the block and these people are congregateing here to listen to this gentleman with a bull horn speaking in support of freddie gray, exhorting people to march in support of freddie gray. there was some tear gas fired over here a couple of hours ago. that was a fairly minor incident with police. there was a man detained just over here earlier. and that agitated this crowd. when there is interaction with the police the crowd does get agitated. as we saw last week and of course as we saw last night. that's what we're watching for all evening tonight, wolf. so far this demonstration as of this hour has been mostly

peaceful. >> and brian, so right now it looks peaceful. i hope it stays that way. but police are there, they're on the scene if it doesn't remain peaceful right? >> reporter: that's right. they are less than a block behind us. we can't really get a shot because they're behind this crowd here. they're to the right of where chris is shooting. and there's a line of students that got between the crowd and the police. and i asked them why they were there. they said just to make sure that there's no friction between the police and the demonstrators. you do have people in the crowd policing the crowd. this is what we saw last week as well. we did not see that last night. so a key question tonight as darkness descends and the curfew takes effect are these crowds going to be able to police themselves? again wolf we saw it often last week and it was peaceful and these people are to be commended

for it. all eyes are on tonight when darkness descends in three hours. >> be careful over there. we'll stay in close touch with you. brian todd on the streets of baltimore were us right in the middle of the latest demonstration. so far peaceful. our justice reporter evan perez is getting new information into the investigation of the death of freddie gray the 25-year-old man who was in police kus dis, wound up with a broken neck in police custody and died a few days later. evan what are you hearing? i don't think evan is hearing us right now. we're going to try to reconnect. i can report to our viewers what evan perez has learned, that baltimore police are planning on presenting their report to the prosecutors on the death of freddie gray this coming friday. baltimore police getting ready to make their presentation to prosecutors on the circumstances leading up to freddie day's

death this friday. let me check back with evan perez to see if he's hearing me now. evan, can you hear me? >> reporter: i can hear you now. as you just mentioned, the police department says they're still planning to meet their deadline of friday to turn over their investigative report to the state attorney's office. the state attorney's office is going to make the ultimate decision as to whether or not there will be charges in this case. you talk to people on the street they're expecting charges on friday. so that's one of the issues that the authorities are now going to be facing. there's going to be an expectation on the streets of something that is not going to happen. that the state attorney's office is still going to be reviewing the case before making a final decision. >> basically they're going to make their report available in confidence in secret let's say, to the state prosecutors. they then will spend some time reviewing all of this before they decide if any of those six police officers who were involved in freddie gray's arrest will in fact be charged. is that right? >> reporter: that's right, wolf. that's right. they're going to spend some time

reviewing the case. and the police say that they're not done with the case. even though they're going to present preliminary report to the state attorney's office with evidence of what they found so far, they say the case is not going to be done. it's going to take some more time some more work on their part to finish this up. >> all right. evan where are you in baltimore right snow? is it quiet? it is lively? what's going on? >> reporter: it's relatively quiet here wolf. we are in front of city hall. there's a big police presence here. just a little while ago i was over at the scene there at north avenue and pennsylvania avenue and you know there's a lot of tension there because, you know, while you have a lot of peaceful protesters there are a few agitators, people who are very angry and at any moment you can sense that things can go -- the wheels can come off. there's a few times you see the police reaching in with their batons with their shields

grabbing people and putting them back. they're detaining them because of the fear that those people would agitate the crowd and cause bigger problems. i heard from one law enforcement officer that someone was trying to set another fire at that cvs right there. so people were trying to set another flame, another fire at a place that had already burned down where people were trying to clean up earlier today. >> there's a lot of anger as we can see on the streets of baltimore right now. evan perez, thanks very much. we're standing by for a news conference of stephanie rawlings-blake the mayor of baltimore expected to hold a conference shortly. and later we're expecting to hear from the governor of maryland larry hogan. lots of live events coming up as we cover the breaking news of baltimore. i want to go to cnn's miguel marquez on the streets of baltimore. he was there 24 hours ago during the worst of the rioting. he's back on the scene with us

right now. what's it like where you are, miguel? >> reporter: this is the epi center of the anger from last night. when you and i were talking last night and that hose was cut, that was right down the street here about 50 60 feet away. the mood here is much different. i want to show you what's going on. this is north avenue. a major avenue here. you have the police keeping anybody from going down there. a couple blocks down there is where freddie gray was arrested. a very symbolic place here. there are a lot of protesters yelling at the police here but in an organized way. they have a bull horn that they allow the protesters to have so they can yell directly at the police. on the other side it's become almost a street party. so the mood here is much much different today. but it does become scuffles at times. people get too heated at times and things take off. i tell you that a large number

of people just went up this street. they're trying to organize individuals to help clean up the area here. all of that is going on at the same time. it is a range of emotions after the anger that we saw last night. and i can tell you after spending so many days in this neighborhood what we saw last night was the manifestation of years and years of anger with freddie gray as the lynch pin to all of it just unleashing it and the job now for the baltimore pd and the baltimore mayor and this state is to put it back in a box. and i am not sure that they're going to be able to do that very soon. >> once again momentarily we'll be hearing from we believe the mayor, stephanie rawlings-blake the captain, the police spokesman, eric kowalczyk. we'll have live coverage of that. you've been there for days. are these the same people who show up every day or are there

new faces in the crowd? >> reporter: there are a lot of new faces. people from across baltimore have descended on west baltimore today to help clean up to give it a new vitality. the music, it's actually too cool. let me let you listen to it for a second. ♪ ♪ all impromptu. and everybody who comes here will quickly tell you about the issues that they have with the police whether it was to themselves or to their brother or to their cousin or to their wife or to their mother. it goes on and on. there is long standing resentment between individuals here and police. so in some ways every brick and botment bottle that was thrown was a personal act by the person doing it. >> it sounds a lot different than it did yesterday. but as we all know just a few individuals can ruin what is so far at least right now very

peaceful loud but peaceful demonstration on the streets of baltimore. once again we're awaiting the mayor of baltimore, receive any rawlings-blake and the spokesman for the baltimore police department captain eric kowalczyk. we expect them to be speaking to reporters momentarily. mark morially is joining us right now. is there anything major you want to hear the mayor say right snow. >> i think the mayor has to demonstrate a path forward, wolf. she's got to ensure that she has a plan in place to ensure that the kind of disruption and looth doesn't occur while at the same time protecting the rights of the protesters to protest. she's got to articulate the details forward to deal with the underlying issues. miguel talked about them. they're related to the land standing issue between the police and the community in

baltimore, to relate it to the lack of opportunity and high unemployment in baltimore. these issues have melded and merged and the reaction we see is a result of pent up feelings. too many people are being left behind. >> we're waiting for the mayor, the spokesman for the police department. if i interrupt you, you will understand why. >> certainly. >> i saw a quote that jumped out at me. you were quoted by a reporter in the news conference that the president had in the rose garden today. earlier you said and the reporter quoted this the u.s. your words, is in a state of emergency of tremendous proportions. we are in the throes of a national crisis. explain what you meant. >> so let's look at the facts, wolf. 12 high profile incidents in an 18 month period.

almost 20 police departments under a federal decent decree under investigation or pattern and practice violations of citizen's civil rights combined with in most major city in america, a black unemployment rate that exceeds 15 and in some cities 20%. when you take all of these things together it says national crisis. it says state of emergency. it says that we must take steps to fix these issues to confront these challenges or baltimore today could be someone else's hometown. last year people asked was ferguson an aberration. i think we understand that today ferguson was not a aberration. i said there are many fergusons in america. baltimore is one of america's largest cities. it's the home of the johns hopkins medical school and complex. it needs economic activity. it needs job creation. it needs to create hope for

young men, hope for young people that there's a way out. and when yaw have that and it's combined with police community tension, i think it's a national state of emergency and a crisis of significant proportions, wolf. >> i want to tell our viewers and you what we're seeing right now. she's sort of hidden but that's the mayor behind those people. mayor stephanie rawlings-blake. she's got a baseball cap on. looks like an underarmor baseball cap. she's wearing right now. the founder of under armor from baltimore. we's going to be making a statement and presumably answering reporter's questions and either the police commissioner or the spokesman for the police department. here's the mayor. she's about to speak. i want all of ou viewer to listen in. this is the mayor of baltimore, stephanie rawlings-blake. let's listen in.

>> good afternoon or early evening. all right. we're getting started. simmer down now. all right. good evening, everyone. thank you for being here. last night was a very rough period for our city. but today i think we saw a lot more of what baltimore is about. we saw people coming together to reclaim our city to clean our city and to help heal our city. i think this can be our defining moment not the darkest days that we saw yesterday. i spent the morning talking to residents. i visited along north avenue where residents were cleaning up and tried to give comfort to people who know that their lives are going to be disrupted in

major ways for a long time does of the damage that was done to their community. i saw the damage that was done to mondawmin mall and it breaks my heart. those of us from baltimore know how hard we fought for those resources and those stores, to bring good quality products and items to our community and to have those those stores destroyed, mom and pop kiosks destroyed senselessly. they are working to recover. i also visited lexington market where vendors are desperately trying to get back to normal. and dealing with the damage that was done as well. i want to sincerely thank the baltimore city police department and i want to thank all of our law enforcement departments who we have had in our city over the past week.

commissioner you're going to have to give all of the counties who have been here because i can't remember. i know that several counties in maryland they have sent us resources over the past week and they have been extremely supportive and i'm very grateful for that. i'm trying to think if i missed anything. and i also -- i should have started here but i'll end here. i want to thank the members of the community. not just the ones you see behind me but the ones that you haven't seen or won't see that have spent all day yesterday, all day today trying to figure out how we can come together as a city. how we can heal. we have churches that are opening themselves up to be a sanctuary and a refuge giving young people who are out of school a place to go and something to eat. we have you know so many in our community who are looking for ways to come together to

heal. i want to thank all of them and give a few community members an opportunity to give remarks. the first i would like to ask mark washington of the homestead development community. mark. >> hi. my name is mark aug. i'm executive director of the homestead month bello. while we stand here as a group of community leaders and representatives, what i want everyone to know is that we stand united as one baltimore. we hear the cries, the frustration, the anger. we understand quite clearly that things need to change in baltimore city. but what we saw last night not reflective of the majority of the city or the majority of youth in the city. we saw individuals take advantage of a situation and use it for their own cause. what they did was try to diminish the legitimacy of the

grievances that we have do have in this city with the baltimore city police department. i want to make it clear to everyone that not only do i stand in unison with these community leaders here but i stand in unison with this mayor. as we all move together forward for a better and truer baltimore. thank you. >> thank you very much. [ applause ] >> thank you. next i'd like to ask mike barb. i know i saw you somewhere. wroo's mark. very active in the community and with habitat for humanity. mike. sorry mark. mark mike. i know it's barb. >> it's been a long week. i name is mike barb and my title is chief officer of programs and community engagement for habitat of humanity at the cheesesapeake.

but i'm also a resident of sandtown for a number of years. the story of sandtown goes a little bit like this. since 1968 my neighbors in sandtown has been working to rebuild from the stories we all know following dr. king's assassination 50 years ago. and it's for me it's a little personal to the extent that i was born in baltimore in 1968 just a few months after that horrible time in our history. but our community -- i'm so proud of my neighbors today particularly for stepping up and working so hard to reclaim the community, particularly from those who are trying to destroy it. we know these issues behind everything that we're faced with this week are very complex. we're certainly not going to solve those overnight. but from a community perspective, what we're looking

for is opportunities to facilitate these conversations and dialogue about these really difficult issues. you know we understand issues of race and social justice in american history context are very, very deep and very very complex. so that's very much a part of where we are today and we still have a long way to go. but from the community's perspective to the extent that i would feel comfortable speaking on behalf of my neighbors -- i apologize. it's just the -- you have to -- i have such deep ad mere ration and appreciation for the sense of community in the sandtown winchester community. this is a very critical time. but again, today i was so proud to see everybody out cleaning up standing up to say this is not right in terms of destroying

our own community. and we won't go backwards. we won't go back to 1968. we'll use this as an opportunity to continue the hard conversations and grow and continue the rebuilding efforts that have been going on for a long time. thank you. >> thank you. [ applause ] >> thank you very much mike. last before i open up to questions i would like to ask mr. terrell. thank you for being here and standing in unity with our communities. >> i'm mark terrell, the president of the associated jewish community federation of baltimore. let me start by saying i love this city and i love all of the people that rallied in support of making sure that we get past this. it's clear that change must occur and that injustice corrected. but that needs to be done in a civil and resolute way. and i know that we have the right people together to make sure that we get past this to be

an even stronger baltimore. so i thank everybody for being here and for everybody working towards a productive goal. thank you, mayor. >> thank you. again i want to thank all of the -- [ applause ] -- community leaders who love our city so much and are willing to stand up and to help us get information out and to help us to rebuild. just thank you. i think i'm turning it over to the commissioner. i believe so. i think so. yes, yes, yes. i'm sorry. it's been a long day. i'd like to turn it over to commissioner batts who is going to give us a public safety update and then open it up for questions. >> just a couple of thought before we get started. my mayor takes a lot of shots and she's courageous enough to stand up and lead this city. you know i've been doing this job for a long time and i've been standing in front of microphones like this and news conferences way too many times. and i've lived through the cry

yot of rodney king, lived through riots in oakland and now through the city of baltimore. when these things happen the pain and trauma that happens in the community, you don't always see the richness of the community. these people who are standing behind me those are the people of baltimore that i know people who care who love this city who are very good people and do a lot for this community. when you're from baltimore, you're from baltimore. it's something in your dna. at the same time i see my officers boarding that bus behind you, they love baltimore too. i had officers come up to me and say i was born and raised in this city. this makes me cry. one of my officers came and said i went home and cried last night. this is a sad part of my city. what you're seeing today within our community also is people out celebrating and trying to heal this community. it's clear that what we have to do is change the culture within the baltimore police department. that's something that we've

started on two and a half years ago and doing things totally different, bringing this community inside the police department taking the police department and sitting down and reading to five six and seven-year-old kids. bringing athletics. we are more to do. but we can't do it this way by destroying their beautiful city. we have a lot of things that we need to change and we're willing to work that direction. very shortly we've had an okay day today. we had a small event that took place on the eastern portion of our city early this morning that resulted in a couple of arrests. we had some opportunists go into a couple of businesses. but overall today it has been a very good day. i was pleased to see north and pennsylvania we had dancing, we had people celebrating. we had people bringing calm and peace. we had one or two people that acted up that we made two arrests that are out there. but for the most part the city has been calm today.

people may ask also and put the question why don't you move faster yesterday. did you prepare yesterday. yes, we prepared. we aed had over 200, 300 police officers out there around the mall at the time it took place. why didn't you move faster? was they're 14 15 and 16-year-old kids out there. do you want people using force on 14 15 16-year-old kids that are out there? and they're old enough to know better they're old enough to know not to do those things they're old enough to be accountable but they're still kids unfortunately. so we had to take into account while we were out there. [ applause ] >> you obviously have a number of people still on the streets, a number of hours from now. can you talk a little bit about the curfew -- >> we will continue to put

information out on social media from the twitter. i will ask that you guys continue to put information out and make sure that the community is away. we have no exceptions other than medical or coming and going from work. that we will be stopping people who are out after curfew. we're taking that seriously. we don't want to engage in forceful action whatsoever. we have the national guard and state police and a multitude of other agencies from new jersey and d.c. as well as multiple counties in the state of maryland. we'll be out in strong numbers making sure we have no issues within our city. we ask everybody to cooperate and be understanding at this point in time. i know it throws people off who want to go out and have dinner and other events. but as we move forward, have a little patience with us as we move forward, please. >> the threat against police officers are we receiving any new intelligence that that's still ongoing?

>> we have no new intelligence. but also we had one gentleman who shot at officers last night at one event in the northwest. but we deal with threats on a regular basis. i want to focus on the fact that we have these wonderful citizens mind us and they're willing to be the positive and not the negative within our city. >> -- of saturday's protest, which ended pretty badly at the end of the night. announced today and is circulating flyers for a protest here this coming saturday. is the city prepared for that and thou does the city respond? >> we're putting -- we're bringing in a lot of resources that continue to come in like i said from other states, jersey, pennsylvania also from the washington, d.c. area. our numbers are growing with the national guard here state police here also the numbers are growing to mike sure that everyone is safe. it's the same thing.

when people come from outside, it's one thing when people are saying we have pain within our community. 's one thing when people say they want our police organization to say. we need to change to adapt to what the citizens say here. but when people come outside and authority this community and then when it's done they leave and go home it's not the right thing to do. what aye been told is activists within our community are trying to have conversations with people who are leading this stuff to remind them this is where we live, where we worship and where our kids go to school. so don't destroy it. >> -- a group of high school students demonstrating and the seshl media posts. did you find a district -- >> i think probably there was a social media posting that said come out to mondawmin mall at 3:00 and we're going to do a purge. the only thing i know about purge is a movie that's part one and two about running on a ram

package. the kids came out of high school. so you could make a corollary about some of those kids being out there at that location. mon dau minute is a hub for about eight different schools. on a daily basis we have big number of kids that drop off there on a constant basis. that wasn't just one high school that was there. when we started making mobile field movements there, there were buses in line and they let the kids off the buses. we had greater numbers that grow out there. [ inaudible question ]. >> do they have arrest powers in baltimore city? how does that work? are you concerned with coordinating that and keeping them in line with the approach you're trying to take? >> my responsibility as the incident commander that oversees all of these responsibilities within the city of baltimore is to make sure that they act at the level that we have expectations with our citizens citizens and our residents. we're working through that. i just had a conversation with the colonel of state police

discussing how to make sure that we operate appropriately and by the same procedures. [ inaudible question ]. >> one more time. >> what's the latest on the injured police officers from last night? >> we had a number of police officers and i have to check on the firefighters. i had about 15 of our officers a lot of them were bruises on their hands from rocks and bottles being taken. i had one officer o'brien who was in the hospital i went to see him, struck in the head. he was held overnight. i hear he's doing well. all the rest of my officers have been treated and released at this point in time. >> thank you, guys. thank you. >> we'll be doing another briefing in about an hour from now. >> all right. there you hear the captain of the spokesman for the police

department eric kowalczyk saying there will be another brief in an hour or so. we heard from the commissioner anthony bats and we heard from the mayor, stephanie rawlings-blake makes the case that things are clearly better today but they're taking serious threats to make sure it stays that way. i want to get quick reaction from mark morali. what do you think of what we just heard? >> i think what you saw was an effort to demonstrate a united front of community leaders behind the idea that the violence people have seen is not representative of baltimore, of its young people of people who want change in baltimore. and i think you saw the beginning of that effort by the mayor to put a coalition of community leaders together to speak along with her on that point. second commissioner batts said we must change the culture of the baltimore police department. and i think long term for the

mayor, for the commissioner and for the community, getting their arms around how to accelerate what steps you take how you really begin to change the culture and the reality of the baltimore police department is something i think we've got to keep a close eye on. thirdly, what we didn't hear and that is an update on the investigation. i think there's going to be great anticipation by friday. and whatever the baltimore police department will recommend to the city prosecutor to the city state's attorney will be transparent and will be public. so i think that this was an effort to take a different tact and to take a more forceful tact. and i think the mayor and the commissioners should remain visible. i think they should remain visible in coalition with community leaders who speak with them so that people across the nation understand that there's

outrage and that those who are outraged at the conduct of the baltimore police department do not support and will not associate themselves with violence. because that distracts from the real issue which is justice for the young man who was funeralized yesterday and lost his life in police custody. >> stand by mark. for viewers just tuning in evan perez is our justice reporter. you reported the news that this friday there would be the presentation from the baltimore police department to the prosecutors, the evidence they have against any police officers who were involved in the arrest of freddie gray. is that right? >> reporter: that's right, wolf. and the problem here is as mark morali was just talking about one i think there's a lot of interest in the public. they want to see some of this public. they want to know what the police have. i don't think the police are ready to tell that. they want to present the evidence too the state

attorney's office which is going to take some time to review it and decide whether or not to bring charges. that's part of the issue. a lot of expectation on the streets. it's going to be a challenge for them to keep the streets calm while they still ask for patience while people finish doing their work here in the police department. >> let me get sunny hostin into this this, our cnn legal analyst. you were a prors court, sunny. i know you're also good friends with the mayor of baltimore, stephanie rawlings-blake. that's appropriate. if the police are making their presentation of evidence that may have to the prosecutors, city or state prosecutors, it's appropriate to keep it secret right? >> reporter: it is very appropriate. because let's face it it's still an ongoing investigation. the police department will make their presentation they will go over the evidence that they have gathered thus far and they may recommend charges. but it is up to the government the state attorney's office to

determine what the evidence is and what evidence supports which charges. and so that investigation is going to continue. it doesn't end with a tiny little package or rather a tiny package given to the state's attorney's office. and any leaks as to what the police department has found could jeopardize that investigation. and so i hope that the public understands that that is the process, that is the process that is undertaken in every single criminal investigation that is forwarded to a prosecutor. and i hope they'll give the state attorney's office the time it will need to either make a case or not make a case. >> yeah. go ahead, mark. >> i think sunny is right. but the expectation has to be set. one concern that they should be aware of is while there may be an effort to keep it secret and in the normal course and scope of things, that's what is

traditional and normal and appropriate, i would have a concern that misinformation incomplete information could leak out and make a very fragile situation in the community more difficult. i think they're going to have to reconcile -- certainly if the prosecutor receives the information on friday. at what point is there going to be a preliminary review a preliminary status report given to the public. this is a public the nation and others having seen a man lose his life in police custody. and with certainly a concern and a suggestion that a crime has been committed. the prosecutor and the police have to be very mindful of the fact that their responsibility is also to deal with public transparency and people's

concerns about what happened. i would point to an interesting situation that just occurred. and that was in north charleston where a decision was made to if you will arrest and book an officer after review of the tape prior to an investigation by prosecutor. now a prosecutor could take that arrest take that booking and certainly take it in whatever direction they want to consistent with their prosecutorial responsibilities. so i think there's got to be some reconciliation that while sunny is right, and traditionally this should be confidential it should be private until the prosecutor is willing to act, the need here to satisfy the distrust that is in the air about whether this investigation is going to be thorough and fair. so maybe the prosecutor and the police department must be jointly to set the community's

expectations i might add, at some point before friday. >> i think that's a fair point. was expectations are going to be high. but you don't want to do anything to jeopardize any legal case if there is going to be a prosecution against any of the police officers involved in the arrest of freddie gray. you don't want to jeopardize that. hold on. evan perez is getting some more information on a separate investigation. the arson that was going on last night. is that what you're learning evan? >> reporter: that's right, wolf. we're hearing that the atf is bringing a second national response team here to the baltimore area to help with the local fire department and local police department to investigation all of these arsons. the plan is to bring some of these cases to the federal, to the federal court to bring federal prosecutions in some of the arsons. as you heard the police say they've brought in resources from the federal government police from new jersey and d.c. to help with the situation. we've seen a difference in the streets. just earlier today we saw them grabbing people off the street

people who are agitating as opposed to yesterday where they were trying to hold back a little bit, saying they were caught off guard because this began as a bunch of 14 and 15-year-olds as the mayor and police said and turned into something much more serious. only three dozen of the 200 arrests were actually juveniles. this turned into something quite different than what they were expecting. >> i want tom fuentes to come in on. this. the reason they didn't rush to the cvs that were being looted they were afraid that there were 13 14 15-year-old juveniles there. you don't want to hurt young kids like that. but in the stricts that evan pointed out, there were 235 arrests and most of them were not juveniles. they were people 18 to 30 years old and only maybe 15 or 20 were juveniles. >> and even if they were juveniles, so what? are you going to let juveniles

burn businessesing with loot? i don't care if they're five years old. if they're in a position to do that that needs to be stopped. we're talking about a handful of teenagers overwhelmed one of the biggest police departments in the country? i don't buy it. >> how about the number just watching cnn, you could see those were not juveniles burning down the buildings and looting the cvs. those were grown ups. >> so jeffrey toobin what you're saying is the commissioner was wrong when he didn't send in the troops send in the police to deal with it because he was told that they were a bunch of kids as opposed to adults? >> absolutely. and he didn't have to be told. he could have turned on his television and saw who was looting. those were not children looting. and as tom said even if they were children, dow don't get to loot if you're a 14-year-old old. but they weren't children. >> pamela brown as a quick

thought. >> i have a hard time buying that was not the only reason they didn't go in. speaking to law enforcement officials today asking them what they thought was at playary and what i have been told is it appears that they didn't plan effectively. they miscalculated what the crowd was capable of. and perhaps because of the criticism against police in ferguson and the overmilitarization that may have play into the restraint that we saw yesterday in baltimore and perhaps they went overboard. >> don lemon is joining us from the streets of baltimore right now. where are you? what's going on. >> reporter: i'm in west baltimore at at a park with members of the crips, members of the bloods members of -- to try to crush the unrest and the

violence here. he ear at we're at a park. there are a couple hundred people here. they're playing music and sports. there are kids here. there was organized by an anti-violence activist carmichael stocki. there are nba players here who have come out to try to get the young people to do something positive. there's food they're barbecuing there's wings, potato chips, they're drinking soda. it's really quite peaceful. it's good the see people doing something positive. to piggyback on what you're saying about the young people -- >> don lemon, we're losing the connection. >> -- arrest records. >> go ahead. i think we've recorrectednnected. >> reporter: all you have to do is get the records. it will show who was arrested.

most are not teenagers. the interesting thing is i was out on the streets today. fails landing which is the original harbor up here in baltimore, a beautiful area. and little markets and bars and restaurants -- a couple of shops raided last night and looted. one particular convenience store, the owner's brother said he was there and he saw people he served every day. he said he saw people with their kids. one guy had his kid. one was eight and one looked to be six or seven years old and he saw young kids looting his business as well. we have pictures of it tonight. they have surveillance camera video of the people who were doing it. it's not just all young people who are doing this. >> brian todd you're there on the scene as well. what are you seeing? >> reporter: wolf we're kind at the epicenter of the activity in

this section of baltimore right now. this is the intersection where freddie gray was arrested on april 12th. this demonstration still going on. speakers here voicing support for freddie gray. justice and freedom are the common calls here. we want to call intentions of injustice for all of the people who have been targeted by police in the last year. to tell you how this has run the gamut from last night, that's one extreme. here's another extreme. look at these two young ladies reading their disney books while this protest is going on. they're sitting here reading their books as this protest is going on. these protesters should be on the move pretty soon. >> brian todd stand by. the mayor of baltimore stephanie rawlings-blake is joining us now. mayor, thanks very much. i hope you can hear me okay. can you hear me okay?

>> i can hear you, yes. >> thank you very much. u want to look back a little bit and look forward. i know you a little bit of time. was it a mistake to allow the looting to go on so long yesterday without police vehicles rushing to the cvs pharmacy or the liquor store or the cell phone store, the check cashing store and let the looter do what they were doing for at least an hour or two hours? >> so i want to say, just to be very clear, a lot of this started with high school kids. and we tried to have a response that was appropriate and not excessive. that's what our parents are asking us for. we worked very closely monitoring the situation trying to make sure that we were responding appropriately. we've had other jurisdictions have their officers in their city for over a week. we've been working to amp up our resource to make sure that we

were able to respond. so, you know we didn't -- it wasn't allowing rioters to loot and to burn down. wit was making sure we had the appropriate response and moved in. >> 235 people were arrested, except 20 who were juveniles, almost all of them were adults. they weren't kids. >> well we're talking about how this started. and you talk about over an hour. it was an evolving situation that started with a lot of kids after they got out of school. >> well originally at that mall that's when it started. the kids got out of school. they were talking about that film "purge" and that was that. but i was anchoring our coverage for a couple hours yesterday afternoon. we had the baltimore affiliates of ours. they were showing live pictures of helicopters flying over that area for at least two hours, showing people simply going in

and then eventually started to burn that cvs pharmacy. and my own sense was, and correct me if i'm wrong there, that if you would have sent a few police vehicles all those people would have run away as quickly as possible and maybe some of that cvs pharmacy, the other stores would not have been looted that quickly. >> what we had was pockets of people all over the place. and we were -- we were responding to situations as they occurred. nobody wants to see rioters and looters. and when they happen the reason why we have coverage of looters and rioters, not just in baltimore, but all over the country when these things happen is because they strike quickly. they move in small groups and, you know the police officers have to make measured and appropriate responses. we were focused on trying to get this riot. we didn't want any loss of life. we wanted to make sure that we responded appropriately. we got additional resources in. and we're prepared for this

evening. >> so tell me what happens this evening. let's say hopefully it won't happen. but let's say some stores are being looted. what are you going to do? >> what we've done. we had over 200 arrests last night. we have had very -- we've been having peaceful demonstrations during the day, that area that was burned yesterday. while we did have a few incidents pop up what you did see is communities coming together people coming together to celebrate our city and to clean up our city. and the communities really coming together in a way that the police can't necessarily do stepping in and talking to the people who are intent on creating mayhem and saying not in our city. we don't want this for baltimore. >> we're showing viewers of live pictures of people walking through the streets now. hopefully it will stay peaceful. it will stay quiet, as it has been through much of this day, almost the entire day. but clearly, you're ready for the worst case scenario. what about the u.s. military?

there is a state of emergency, as we all know, 234 your beautiful city of baltimore. there is national guard troops. how do you coordinate when to send in the military as opposed to city or state police? >> so part of our response time with bringing in the national guard was negotiating those types of things. we have officers that are coming in not just from other jurisdictions around the state that we had to coordinate over the past week as they've been coming in but we also had officers that are coming in from outside of the state. so we've been negotiating the terms and coordinating how they can support us as well. it was very clear when the rioters got out of control, we needed to bring in the national guard. and we wanted to make sure that we did that in a way that was coordinated and supportive. so we could bring peace, and not have the situation get even worse than it was. >> as you know, president obama

today was speaking out forcefully and emotionally for about 15 minutes or so in the rose garden during a news conference over at the white house. he said he is seeing too many instances of police officers interacting, his words, with primarily african american and often poor people in ways that raise troubling questions. here is the question for you, mayor. do you need to make major changes to the baltimore police department right now? >> absolutely. and i'm sure you know we have the department of justice community policing office in baltimore at my request to do collaborative reform. i'm not -- i'm not blind to the fact that we have to do a better job with our relationships between the community and the police. doj through the cops, the community policing came in last year and started this process of engaging communities and trying to get to better. i've committed my life my adult

life to improving baltimore. and this issue around police brutality and police misconduct and holding officers accountable, this is something i've worked on for years. in the last session, i was down in our state capital. i was one of the only elected officials that was down there fighting for reforms to the law enforcement officers bill of rights. i got a lot of pushback and not a lot of support. and i was down there because i didn't want to see something like this in my city. so i'm very keenly aware of the issues. and we've been pushing to get better in baltimore. >> we're showing viewers live pictures of people moving through the streets of baltimore right now. still peaceful. hopefully it will stay that way mayor. we're told now by our evan perez, our justice reporter that on friday the police department will make its evidence available to state prosecutors as far as the death the circumstances leading up to the death of freddie gray, the 25-year-old who was arrested wound up with a broken neck a spinal cord that was cracked, and he died

after a coma. is that information going to be made public? >> well, a lot of that information has already been made public with respect to the timeline and the information, the preliminary work of the medical examiner. but we will work in collaboration. you have to be -- we have to be very careful. and i've made a commitment to the state's attorney that we would be as transparent as we could with putting information out to the public. but we couldn't for freddie gray's sake compromise the investigation and our ability to hold those accountable if she decides that there needs to be charges brought. we have to be careful with how that information is going out. so we can do more than just seek justice. we can have justice for freddie gray. >> but do you think you'll be able to release something on friday? i've spoken to the attorneys for freddie gray's family.

they say they have not received information about what those six officers who arrested freddie gray, what they said five of them were told they did offer statements to investigators. so you think you'll be able to release something on friday? >> you have to -- again, you have to understand that we're doing everything we can to put out information, as much as we can, but also protect the investigation. what we've seen in other jurisdiction where there have been information put out too early when the investigation wasn't completed. officers had a chance to collaborate or collude and get their stories together. and it wasn't helpful to the investigation. we want to protect this process to ensure that freddie gray has justice. and it's a very delegate balancing act. and i'm determined to get it right. >> the governor of your state, larry hogan, he said he thought the police were overwhelmed yesterday, and he moved his staff and cabinet from the state capitol of annapolis to

baltimore. the governor overstepping his authority? >> you know, this is baltimore is part of maryland. and i am determined that i'm going -- that i will work with our governor. i'm not going politicize this. we want those resources here. i'm grateful that the national guard is here. i'm not let this turn into a political football. >> did you ever think, mayor, that you would see a situation develop where the baltimore orioles, the major league baseball team, will be playing a game tomorrow tomorrow afternoon in baltimore, but there will be no fans in the stadium. it will be closed to the public because of security concerns. people will be able to watch it on television. but no fans will go to the stadium to watch. did you ever think something like that could happen in baltimore? >> this is -- absolutely not. we're a sports town. we love our o's.

it's another sad day in our city. but what i will say is these dark days aren't going to last but baltimore will. and we're going to grow better from this. we're going grow stronger from this. what you've seen all over the city is community leaders coming together looking for ways that they can engage with our young people looking for ways that they can clean up our community. that's who we are in baltimore. and that will continue to shine through. >> mayor, good luck to you. good luck to the police commissioner. good luck to everyone in baltimore. someone who lives only 40 miles away here in the nation's capital in the washington, d.c. area. we wish you only the best. you've got a great city there. i speak as someone -- >> we do. >> who actually went to graduate school at johns hopkins. good luck to you and to the community. >> shut this down! >> this is cnn breaking news. >> and if you're just following us we're watching what is going

on the breaking news the state of emergency in baltimore. once again, we want to welcome our viewers in the united states and around the world. i'm wolf blitzer here in "the situation room." take a look at this. we're showing you life pictures of crowds on the street. they're around the same place, the same time when riots erupted just a little bit more than 24 hours ago. we're standing by for an update from the maryland governor about new moves to try to keep the peace in baltimore. we saw at least one clash a few hours ago with police firing pepper spray. right now one thousand maryland national guard troops they're on the ground to back up police. a citywide curfew takes effect about four hours from now. police say at least 235 people have been arrested in connection with the rioting, the looting, the arson. at least 20 officers were injured. tonight president obama says the violence is counterproductive and simply inexcusable. our correspondents our analysts

and newsmaker, they're all standing by as we cover the breaking story. we're watching what is going on very, very closely. lots happening right now. you just heard from the mayor of baltimore, stephanie rawlings-blake saying she is hoping for the best, but they are prepared prepared for the worst. we've got a team of correspondents and analysts all standing by as well as newsmakers. but let's check in with brian todd first. he is on the streets of baltimore. brian? >> wolf the protesters again on the move at the corner of fulton avenue and north avenue. i have to tell you, this has ban very dynamic protest, very fluid, largely peaceful. at this very intersection last night, where i'm standing and moving away from, there was a burned out car. there were businesses being looted all over the place. my team and i had to pull back from this intersection last night out of fear for our own safety. a different situation here this afternoon, this evening. this is a peaceful march. there was a little bit of tear

gas fired at demonstrators at this intersection up here at pennsylvania and north. earlier this afternoon. there was some tension between police and protesters when they apprehended a man. but largely, aside from those two incidents, it has been largely peaceful. these protesters are on the move and again, calling for justice for freddie gray. all eyes pointing to friday when the police send that report to prosecutors on what exactly happened to freddie gray on april 12th. >> hands up. >> don't shoot! >> hands up, don't shoot! >> they'll probably walk several more intersections where they started this rally this afternoon. again, we have less than two hours until darkness hits. we have about four hours until the curfew is put into effect. everything looks peaceful now after last night with all the ransacking the looting, the street fires, the hundreds of arrest. 20 officers injured. this is going to be a very tense situation in a couple of hours

when night falls wolf. >> all right. let's see what happens. hopefully it will remain peaceful and calm. the people can scream. they can shout. but we don't want to see any more looting. we don't want the see any more arson. we don't want to see any more violence. let's hope it stays calm. miguel marquez, you're also on the streets of baltimore for us where are you and what are you seeing? >> we are at the epicenter of much of the violence last night, just across the street from where the cvs burned. this is the gilmore homes section of west baltimore. and it is -- it is still very tense here. but today was sort of part political rally, part street party, but with a very -- a lot of heavily armed guests. the police here in full riot gear. this is north avenue very major thoroughfare here. they're keeping anybody from moving down that way, that way just a few blocks is where mr. gray was taken into custody, a few blocks beyond that is the western district which is also very heavily fortified today.

and the crowd here has been basically either chanting at police yelling at police taking turns with the microphone sometimes to yell at police or you can see members of the nation of islam here. it's also become -- as i walk through the crowd here, a bit of a street party over here. the concern is obviously about tonight and what happens going forward. i think the next big point of concern for people here is on friday, when the police are going to hand up that investigative report to the d.a. people in this neighborhood keenly aware and want to hear what if anything happens with that. we're not expecting that but i can certainly tell you people in this neighborhood are. and if they feel it's the same old song that they have heard before it is very hard to see that this is going to go in a much better direction. the other unknown here is if someone happens, a police

officer gets shot a civilian gets shot then i think all bets are off and things could really take off here. >> wolf. >> stand by miguel. i want brian to stand by. i want to bring in cornell brooks, the president of the naacp who is joining us from baltimore. cornell, last night when we saw the worst riots in baltimore since 1968 in the aftermath of the assassination of dr. martin luther king jr., did you ever think this would happen in baltimore? >> wolf this is hard to imagine. it does call to mind the words of martin luther king who said over a generation ago that violence is the language of the unheard. in 2015 it may well be that this language violence -- >> cornell, i'm sorry to interrupt. i want to interrupt for a moment because the governor of maryland, there you see him, larry hogan, he is about to make a statement and answer reporters questions as well. he has moved his business from annapolis, the state capital to

baltimore. we heard from the mayor a little while ago. here is the governor. >> good evening, everyone. good evening. less than 24 hours ago, i issued an executive order which declared a state of emergency and deployed the national guard and all appropriate state assets to baltimore city. our entire team has been activated, and all state agencies are actively engaged in restoring order to the city and securing the safety of all law-abiding citizens. local, state, and regional resources have been deployed throughout the city. and the presence of law enforcement has been rapidly expanding. tonight we will have 2,000 national guardsmen and over one

thousand law enforcement officers on duty. we have law enforcement assets from nearly every single corner of the state of maryland as well as other states such as pennsylvania new jersey and the district of columbia who have all dedicated law enforcement officers to our efforts. this combined force will not tolerate violence or looting, which has led to the destruction of property and put innocent marylanders at risk. there have already been over 250 arrests and a citywide curfew will take place, take effect at 10:00 p.m. this evening. maintaining law and order, protecting innocent lives and property is our number one priority. we've also begun to assist the victims of yesterday's violence. at sunrise today, i surveyed the

damage done last night and thanked law enforcement officers for their dedication. i started at the west baltimore precinct in the corner of northern avenue and pennsylvania avenue then went on to the mondawmin mall. during these visits i saw neighbors working together to restore normalcy to their neighborhoods. we have mobilized over 2,000 volunteers through the governor's office of service and volunteerism. and this morning, we moved the governor's office to baltimore city. where we held a cabinet meeting where each state agency outlined their efforts to assist the baltimore city community. immediately following that meeting, i listened to a group of community leaders who voiced their concerns and provided input on how we can begin the

long process of restoring our community. we've been here all day and we will continue to be here until the threat of violence ends. our primary mission again is to maintain order and to begin to repair the damage inflicted by the violence and looting from last night. acts of violence and destruction of property cannot and will not be tolerated. baltimore's families deserve peace and safety in their community. but this is far from over. i have here with me -- turn the floor over to general linda sing, who is the adjutant general of the maryland guard. but before i do that i want to thank this entire team here at the maryland emergency management agency who have been

working around the clock coordinating state and local assets and they're doing a fantastic job. so thank all of you here in the room. general sing? >> thank you, governor. first i want to say i want to thank all of the folks who have actually welcomed the maryland guard into their neighborhoods and really into our neighborhoods. i want to ensure that you understand that the maryland guard is not coming in to just help protect and help reinforce what the police are currentry doing. they're doing it because it's also where they live. a lot of these individuals are coming from those same communities. and so it is extremely important to them that they work with they work with the police department, with the governor and with the mayor to protect a city we so

love and that we believe in. and as a result of that which i think is so monumental, in the last 24 hours we have actually activated over 1700 guardsmen. that is unbelievable numbers. because typically it takes us about eight hours to do an activation of a couple hundred. so we did 1700 in less than a 24-hour period. and that should say to you the city of baltimore, how important it is for the maryland guard to be there to support you. because i did not get any complaints. people came in from all the various parts of maryland regardless of where they live whether it was in the city or in the county. and they did it with a smile on their face so that they could be there to support the police department they could be there to support the communities. so i think that's extremely important. the other thing that i would like to say is that you know we are extremely professional in the way that we are going to

carry out our events and how we will deal with our communities in general. we have trained. this is what we train for. we are trained to be able to support the police department. we are trained to be able to support the government at the time of need. so rest assured that we will use the appropriate precautions and the appropriate steps to keep you and our citizens safe. i thank you. >> thank you, general. before i turn the floor over to clay stamp, who is the director of the maryland emergency management agency i just want to thank lieutenant governor boyd rutherford for his leadership. as i was heading up the office, the new governor's office in baltimore city he was here at mena all day working with director stamp and managing this operation. and we're working together as a team. so thank you, boyd for your efforts as well.

>> thank you. >> now we're going to turn it over to clay stamp. >> thank you, governor. as the governor's emergency manager, i have the honor and privilege to work with a system of dedicated individuals that starts with the federal emergency management agency and includes all of our state partners as well as our local jurisdictions across the state of maryland. and i can tell you that the governor has been clear in his direction, and we have fully engaged as a system as a community of emergency managers from ocean city to oakland, southern maryland to cecil county to make sure we do what is necessary to give baltimore city the help that they need. the help that they need so that they can get things under control and do what they need to do to become healthy. i'm happy to report that we continue to successfully handle a number of missions. we've been doing that for the last 24 hours. we've been actually activated since last saturday. we are still operating under a declaration of a state of emergency. i know there has been some

discussion about what that means. i just want the take a second and describe what that means. so as a mayor or a county council president in maryland, if a situation develops that exceeds their ability to manage that with the resources they have they have the ability to declare a state of emergency. and that state of emergency gives them certain authorities to do certain things. but it also gives them the ability to reach out for help. and reaching out for help what that means in maryland is they call the governor. governor larry hogan in this case and they say we have exceeded our ability to maintain this with our own resources and we need your help. and governor hogan responded quickly. and i engaged my counterparts and, again, we started moving fast to put together everything that needs to happen to deliver those resources to our group there in baltimore city. we will continue to do so. until this is done. and, again, governor hogan is

clear. we understand it. we're pulling out all stops to do whatever is necessary for to help baltimore city. i'm sorry. thank you. >> at this time we'd be happy to answer any questions anyone might have. [ inaudible ] >> well we're both pretty busy. but i can tell you we've been in constant communication with the mayor's office. i've spoken to them on a daily basis for the past week. we spoke multiple times yesterday. we spoke today. my senior adviser keiffer mitchell is a former baltimore councilman and a member of the legislature, has been assigned to work directly with the mayor. he is probably with her right now. and we're now coming in to try to help relieve the situation. but it's still baltimore city, and she is still the mayor.

we're here to help her. and we're trying to provide all the help we can possibly give her. >> are you aware of any problems either logistical or dealing with protesters that you have had since the national guard has been on the ground? i know police have made arrests. have you run into any trouble, again, logistically or with anyone on the ground? >> not to my knowledge. if anybody has something they want to talk about. i think so far, and i preface it by saying so far because we have a long night ahead of us but so far i think we've not run into any major issues. and any major glitches. we've got things a little better under control than they were last night. we've got norman power on the streets. and we're communicating better. and so far although there have been some arrests, we haven't had the kind of situations we had yesterday afternoon. >> what is the plan heading into tonight and how will you make sure that there isn't any

unrest? >> well you can't ensure that there is not going to be any unrest. i'm not a magician. but what i can assure you is that we will put all the resources that we have at our disposal to make sure that the disturbances don't get out of hand and we don't get overwhelmed like happened last night. we've got a lot of manpower on the street. you can see looking around this room there is a lot of people focused on this problem. and we're in management of the situation now. and we're going to put whatever resources are necessary to make sure we keep the people of baltimore safe. >> can you talk a little bit about your experience with the people of baltimore on your watch? >> yeah, well thank you, pat. i was really touched by the fact that when were up there when the sun was rising this morning. and we walked through ground zero all the neighborhoods who got hit the worst. and what i saw, there were folks up there this morning at 5:00 a.m. neighbors helping

neighbors, sweeping up the broken glass, helping people board up their windows, clearing the trash out of the streets. and we tend to focus on all the problems. we've got to focus on the violence. but there is a lot of good going on in the city too. and i found people that really love the city love their neighborhood and who are really angry about what happened last night. they were very happy to see us. we had people hugging us and thanking us. they were happy to see us. and as the general said, they were happy to see the national guard. they were happy to see the state police. they were saying thank you for being here. people are concerned. they want us to restore law and order. we've been very restrained. there has been a pretty good in spite of the tension throughout in the community, we've got a lot of people thanking us for being here. and we didn't have any major incidents yet. >> we have any idea how long the extra police and the national guard will be necessary? >> we're going to keep them here as long as is necessary. and we don't know at this point how long that's going to be. >> how would you judge that?

what has to happen so you can finally say it's time to get things back to normal? >> you know i'm going have to make that call myself. and i guess i'll know it when i see it. but we're going get the best information to make that decision. >> it gives us an opportunity to clear the streets. and if people are in violation of the curfew, if we feel it makes sense we can start arresting people. [ inaudible ] >> look you know i don't want to point fingers at anyone. i'm not here to place blame. i'm here to try to solve the problem. i don't want to second guess the mayor's decisions. i know that she was trying the best she could. this was a difficult situation. the baltimore city police and fire were doing the best they could. and when she asked us for help, we immediately responded. i know that it typically takes

eight hours to mobilize the guard. we did it in three. because we were already ready, and we were prepared. we set up this emergency operation center last saturday. we prepared the executive order last saturday. our team has been in constant communication. we set up our command center. we've been work all week. we've been in communication with the the city all week. earlier yesterday, i talked with general singh and told her to prepare the guard and get them ready to be activated. so she took a lot of steps to get everybody teed up kind of on the starting line ready to act. when the mayor called i signed an executive order 30 seconds later. the guard was already on the way. >> you said that you started getting ready last saturday? >> well we opened up the emergency operations center here in preparation in case there was violence that broke out. >> as the condition of protests? >> yes. [ inaudible ] >> actually wanted to call in

the guard? >> look i don't want to get into what happened before. let's talk what we're going to focus on in the future. right now we're trying to keep baltimore city safe. and, you know we're trying to work it best we can with the city and provide as much support as we can. anybody else? well thank you all so much for being here. and let's all hope tonight is a little safer night. thank you. >> the governor of maryland larry hogan over at the maryland emergency management updating us on what the state of maryland is doing right now, including deploying u.s. national guard, state national guard troops on the scene there is a state of emergency under way. let's get a quick update from the scene itself. brian todd is on the streets. brian, you're walking with these protesters? i don't know if brian can hear me right now. clearly we can't -- brian can't hear me.

we'll get to brian in a moment. let me get reaction from the president of the naacp, cornell w. brooks is joining us now. you're in baltimore cornell. what did you think about what the governor had to say? >> well i am heartened by a few words. the use of the words "appropriate caution, appropriate steps" which were the words offered by the adjutant general singh. at this juncture anything that promotes a sense of security and calm for the residents and citizens of baltimore is a good thing. the fact that the mayor reached out to the governor indicates certainly that she feels that the presence of the national guard contributes to the security of this city. so i believe that that's important. and the most important thing here is that we establish not only a sense of security, but also a sense of trust. i think the fact that the

volunteers were coming in as you may know the naacp opened a satellite office so that we might signal to the community that we along with so many others continue to work day in and day out to bring about justice for the family of freddie gray but then in addition to that to respond to this ongoing challenge across this country. so this is a tense time. but there are a good number of people who are working to bring about justice with peace. not the least of whom are all the people on the streets that we've seen across the day cleaning up streets that they did not sully and dirty, and shoring up businesses that they did not burn or loot. so that's encouraging. >> cornell, don't leave us. stay with us. i want to try to reconnect with brian todd once again. he is on the streets of baltimore. brian, where are you?

>> wolf we're -- trying to get the cross streets here. we're on lauren street near north bruce street. we thought we might be going to the western district police station. but they have made a turn to the east heading toward north mount street. they may yet turn to the south to head towards that precinct. we're not quite sure where they're going. as was the case last night, we don't know where this is going. we don't know whether this kind of a march could turn violent later. last week when we were following marchers it did get a little tense on occasion. last night it wasn't so much marching as there were random looting and burning as you saw. but so far this is a very kinetic, dynamic situation with these marchers. i talked to the protest leader not long ago. he said he is committed to exhorting these people not to be violent. but we know from experience last week that when they start to march through the streets and pick up people along the way, anything can happen, wolf. >> let's hope it does stay

peaceful and you're going to continue to march with them brian. earlier president obama spoke out very forcefully on the rioting in baltimore, saying the city was torn up by quote criminals and thugs his words. criminals and thugs. but he also says there are police across the country who in his words, again, aren't doing the right thing right now. let's go to our white house correspondent michelle kosinski. michelle update us on what the president had to say in the rose garden. >> hey, wolf. he went on about this. it was only 24 hours ago that we saw this very low-key response from the white house on what is going on in baltimore. that's similar to what we've seen in other incidents since ferguson. but today the president knew somebody was going to ask a question about this in the rose garden during this press conference and he was ready. i mean he let loose on what he feels about this. for 14 minutes, using some pretty blunt language and saying there is no excuse for violence. >> senseless violence and destruction. that is not a protest.

that is not a statement. that's people -- a handful of people taking advantage of the situation for their own purposes, and they need to be treated as criminals, criminals and thugs who tore up the place. this has been a slow rolling crisis. this has been going on for a long time. this is not new. and we shouldn't pretend that it's new. if our society really wanted to solve the problem, we could. it's just it would require everybody saying this is important, this is significant. and that we don't just pay attention to these communities when a cvs burns. we're paying attention all the time because we consider those kids our kids and we think they're important. and they shouldn't be living in poverty and violence. that's how i feel. >> some of this was surprising

and that he said you know, this is not a protest. not everybody was pleased that he used the word "thug" there. but when you look at the entirety of what he said you can see him really trying to be diplomatic here and cover all the bases. first, he clearly wanted to call out strongly those who were committing violent acts as well as applaud the people within the community who were trying to stop that violence. even said they often get far less attention than the violent people do. and he wanted to support police officers who were doing their job correctly. but he also wanted to call out those police who aren't. and he put this extremely diplomatically saying that there have been too many instances of police interacting with people primarily african americans, often poor in ways that raise troubling questions, and saying that these things come up now it seems like every week or every couple of weeks, wolf. >> michelle, thanks very much. i want to go back to cornell brooks the president of the naacp. cornell, you think the president went far enough went too far? were you satisfied with his remarks?

>> the president sounded two themes that are equally important. the first theme that he sounded was the fact that violence and looting does nothing, nothing to offer consolation or justice for the family of freddie gray. nothing. and the second theme he sounded was that the overwhelming majority of people are attempting to protest peacefully. and so we have to both call out the violence but lift up the fact that most people are pursuing a reform of policing in this country nonviolently. those themes are important to sound. walking through the streets of baltimore, through sand town seeing people clean the streets, seeing men stand between police officers and protesters attempting to offer and create a wall of trust, that's important. it's a testament to the character of the people in this city.

i think at this juncture it's critically important that the president speak to the situation, as he has, and has so many people around the country are doing. because here is what we need to keep in mind. if a generation ago martin luther king said that violence is the language of the unheard, what happens when so many people are crying for reforms of policing in this country, and they don't yet feel heard it? it then seems violence is the language of the unseen and the unheard. we've got to heed what people are saying. policing has to be reformed in this country. we need body cameras. we need to pass the racial profiling act. we need to move away from a form of policing that engenders distrust and endangers both police officers and the community. well can do that. and the president is right. if we're all involved we're all committed and we're all committed to our young people we can do this. and the issue is important whether or not a convenience

store burns in ferguson or a drug store burns in baltimore. it's important all the time because of our kids. >> let's get some more thoughts cornell, if you can stay with us i would be grateful. i want to bring in tom fuentes, former assistant director of the fbi. we've heard now from the mayor, the police commissioner, the governor of the state of maryland. we see the protests largely peaceful right now there have been a few minor incidents, a few arrests. nothing like what occurred yesterday. but they're bracing for the worst. hopefully it won't happen as it starts to get dark. >> wolf, what i would like to see is some leadership from the president on down on what the police do about the fact that baltimore in the last 27 months had 632 murders. and according to commissioner batts, 95% of the murdered people were black. that's an average of 23 murders per month. where is the outrage about that or about doing something about that? and secondarily, what do the

police do to bring that number down? what is the policing on the street when you have this many people and the 600 murders weren't outside agitators, they were gang members and members of that community, you know that he has referred to. and he actually said that he blamed it on gang activity random confrontations. that's commissioner batts saying that's what is causing that. >> let me go to don lemon right now. don, you're there in baltimore there has ban lot of accusations against these gang members. i understand you have some representatives with you? >> yeah we had some representatives of the gang and we had technical issues. we can't get to them. and you'll have to watch it tonight, wolf. but it's really interesting because they're saying they had nothing to do with this. they said for the first time that they can remember, the crips and the bloods and the black guerrilla family, they have come together and there is a truce. this is what they're saying to

me. they were actually out there trying to protect the community and trying to get people not to loot and not to riot. and i asked them i said are you sure than? they said yes. why would we want to loot? why would we want to riot? in their estimation again, they can stay it better than me but they said we're making money. we don't need to rob a liquor store or a convenience store in order to make money. that's beneath what they do. they're not tempted to do anything like this. but we're showing something positive. we're here at the druid hill park. and just across this park here you had hundreds of people who are out across the park here. it was organized by many of the people here and they're from different affiliation here is. but mostly from mr. soki carmichael kennedy, who is an anti-violence activist. why did you guys do this? >> it was necessary. we thought that the kids vocalized their frustration last night, and we strongly condemned their behavior. and we thought it was necessary to come together and unified on a positivity front and give these kids another positive voice. now that we got that back we're

going to try to seek different resolutions than last night. we don't want our neighborhoods and communities destroyed with violence. >> you may recognize this gentleman right here this is will barton, a guard for the denver nuggets. he is out with this organization as well. why you? here. >> linked up with cannon over here we wanted to come out and show our support and show that it's another way to go about things to get results. and we feel feels like we do it in a positive manner that we can pull the city together and we can just come together and do some positive things to end this stuff and get results. but in the right way, and not just keep doing violence and rioting and stuff like that. because that's not going to do anything. that's not going to solve anything. >> you know i was surprised earlier by listening, they call them they said it's not about colors the members of the gangs. they said to me that they didn't have anything to do with this. is that true? >> from my observation, i agree with them. i think yesterday was a mix between juveniles and adolescents who were getting out

of high school. and most of those kids were opportunists. they saw opportunities to do some things that pretty much they wouldn't do on a normal day, and they took advantage of it. we condemned that. and that's why today we strongly come together and try to administer a bunch of positive individuals who have a positive influence like neil like my friend amy jones from new york who came down here today just to be here to show the kids that we understand their frustration. but they got to redirect and try to think about a positive resolution you know instead of being violent. >> you've got food out here. i've had some of the wings. they're really good. you guys saw me. i feel like i'm at home. i had some wings, chips and an orange crush. i feel like i was back in louisiana. you guys said to me you want people to feel welcome here with the pick kerrs that are shown on television that's not indicative of baltimore? >> it's not indicative of baltimore. the pictures that we've seen on television? >> absolutely not. baltimore is a lovely place to visit, a lovely place to live in. and we stand strong to rebuild our community. >> thank you, guys. thank you, guys. i appreciate it. and we're going to be out here

until there is a resolution wolf. we have been listening to the press conference. they're listening to the officials as well. and so here we are at an event that is a positive event, a better reflection they say of what baltimore really is. >> baltimore is a great city. we love baltimore. hope it stays that way and hope it remains peaceful. we're going to get back to you don thank you. . i want to bring in philip banks right now, a former nypd chief of department who is joining us. thank you so much for joining us chief banks. we saw the crowd today, very peaceful for all practical purposes. although there was some pepper spray after one protester was arrested. if this were your police department right now on this day after the violence the arson, the looting we saw yesterday, what would you be doing? what would you want your officers to do to handle this situation. >> well the first thing, wolf we have to protect life and property. not in any priority order. my priority would be to make sure that my officers were safe.

certainly make sure the people in that community were safe certainly protect the businesses. but i would be opening up dialogue with the people who are on the ground there to find out what these particular issues are to get as much intelligence as we possibly can and to map out a strategy and operational plan to make sure that people can protest peacefully but certainly with the ruckus and the violence and the chaos, that's something that has to be stopped. >> a quick question, chief banks. this is the worst rioting in baltimore since 1968 in the aftermath of the assassination of dr. martin luther king. if it happened in baltimore, it could happen elsewhere, right? >> certainly, it can happen elsewhere. if i was the police chief in another city or a mayor in another city i would have my people paying attention to exactly what is going on. i would get as much intel as i possibly can. because i'm certainly sure that the mayor and the police commissioner the police chief in baltimore did not think that this could happen over this particular incident.

i'm sure they were paying attention to charleston and ferguson and then it happened to baltimore. it certainly can happen. that's why developing those intimate relationships with the proper people is very, very important. once it gets to this point, it means that something you have done from this point prior did not work. and you need to change that. >> all right. stand by for a moment. i want to bring joey jackson, our hln legal analyst. he is a former criminal defense attorney as well maybe still a criminal defense attorney. i want to get back to the news that evan perez broke here in "the situation room" a little while ago that on friday the police will make their report available to state prosecutors on the behavior the arrest of freddie gray. eventually he died as we know, after his neck was broken. he was in a coma in the hospital. they're going to make that evidence available to the prosecutors. but presumably it will remain secret. but you know the community. they want details, and they're getting growing increasingly impatient. how do you balance, joey the need to reassure the community that the right investigation is

going forward while at the same time not doing anything to undermine potential prosecution, the evidence available? >> wolf that's a wonderful question. and let's start out here and let's go to the general, then we'll goat the specific. in general, we're hearing from - our leaders, and we have to keep in mind what this is all about. it's about freddie gray. it's about the overaggressive policing that occurred as to him. it's about his death. it's about whether his death was warranted. and certainly the community and everyone thinks not. so it's nice of course, to hear from the leaders. and we are hearing from them and they're very reassuring. but the true test of that leadership wolf will be what are people doing and what reforms are instituted when the cameras aren't rolling, when wolf blitzer is not there to cross-examine or at least ask the important questions and hold the police and the community accountable. what will happen? will businesses reinvest in the community? what will oh dmur the community? will people be upset in the community so that's important. >> hold on joey one second. brian todd has the protest lead were him. i quickly want to get to brian.

go ahead, brian. >> wolf, this is jay morrison. he has been leading this protest now for a couple of hours, this protest march through the streets of baltimore. jay, what is your goal? what is your goal tonight? >> our goal the goal worldwide attention to the oppression of blacks in america. we want freedom. we want independence. we want all our global citizens to join with us. we are organizing. rally with us please. >> you told me you did not want this to turn violent. are you prepared to encourage these people not to turn violent tonight? >> we are not animals. we are not beasts. we're not an a malice. we're not beasts. we will not turn violent. we are organizing. we are mobilizing. we're calling on world leaders and global leaders to join. rally with us. well want freedom, end the oppression of black people in america, please. understand our plight in america. >> thank you, jay. appreciate it. thank you. all right, wolf. a lot of energy in this crowd.

you heard mr. morrison say they do not want violence. he has encouraged these people all night not to be violent. they have a ton of energy. he is saying again no violence. some of these protest marchers last week turned tense but they did not turn violent. last night was one night in the last week that turned violent. they are hoping on the streets that that was an anomaly, wolf. >> all right, brian, stand by. i can see the passion there. i want to quickly go to cornell w. brooks, the president of the naacp for some reaction. cornell, you hear that passion. you hear that fervor. what goes through your mind? >> what goes through my mind is that people are entitled to be passionate, to be angry, and to be righteously angry, if you will. but acid test of leadership, the acid test of this movement is our ability to translate anger into action.

bear in mind the naacp, our headquarters is in baltimore. this is our hometown. thurgood marshall made his home in baltimore. we care dliep about the city deeply about what happened to freddie gray deeply about this challenge. at the end of the day, what we have to do is translate our anger into specific actions, calling for reform pushing for change in policing. the fact of the matter is on friday we've got toe make sure that the people in this city are prepared for having some information, no information, or information that they're unhappy with so that we're prepared to push for real reform long-term and in the short term. >> cornell, hold on for a second. i want to go back to brian todd. brian, you've got more over there. what is going on? >> justice! >> wolf back with jay morrison the march leader. jay, i want you to tell me what you were feeling last night when all that burning, all that

looting was going nonyour neighborhood. >> last night was a distraction. i'm a real estate guy. i understand the value of property. but the distraction was we all looked away from the six police officers that no one has been arrested. stop being distracted by property. six officers to a man whose neck was broke and spine broke. why are there no officers arrested to this day? if any american citizens a dead body woe be arrested. >> what happens on friday if you dent get the united states want? >> no comment. >> okay, wolf. we're marching on. >> continuing to march. let's get reaction from philip banks, the former nypd chief of department. what do you think, phil? >> i think that the leadership in baltimore have their hands full. but certainly, what i'm hearing through the line there's is people are upset, and people are angry and they have a right to do so. but i do hear that there is room

there to make those changes and make some progress. so while it appears that we're at defcon 4, i would certainly suggest to the mayor and certainly to tony batts, the police chief there is that there is room there to make some progress. it may seem we're at defcon 4. but what i'm hearing from you shifted to the person who played the professional basketball the comments if they were accurate comments coming from those gang members down there. it looks like there is some room that we can come to a compromise here. but be very clear. law and order must prevail. >> you're absolutely right. jeffrey toobin you've done a lot of reporting from baltimore on these gangs here. now we're hearing -- you just heard in don lemon's report that these gang members saying they weren't causing this violence. they were trying to prevent the violence. they were trying to stop the looting. they didn't need the looting to go on. they have their own sources of income. >> wolf allow me to express some skepticism about the benevolence of the crips and the bloods and the black guerrilla

family. these are killers. they are drug dealers. these are people who are not going to save baltimore. the black guerrilla family in particular the story i wrote about them in the new yorker illustrate how'd they took over the main jail in baltimore, the baltimore city detention center. they controlled it. they brought in drugs. they brought in cell phones. they made money off of it. the idea that these gangs are doing anything for the public good or anything other than continuing their reign of terror over the city is laughable to me. and i think to the extent the city is trusting them or relying on them they're going to have -- >> you agree with this, tom fuentes? >> absolutely. they're largely responsible for the more than 600 blacks killed in the last 27 months in baltimore. and it doesn't seem everybody cares deeply about everybody, except those people that were just killed in the last two years. >> what about that phil banks?

in new york city, you have to deal with a lot of these gangs as well. it possible as they claim today they're trying to cause peace as opposed to warfare on the streets of baltimore? or what is your reaction when you hear these kinds of comments? >> well i will say this not knowing the politics of baltimore, there have been gang members in new york city who have turned a different leaf. and everyone in a gang is not there for the same reason they're looking for a reason to get out. there could be some validity to them. certainly i wouldn't give them 100% trust because they are engaged in criminality. the mere facts of the gang they sell drugs, violence against a host of people. but there are large contingents of gang members that are looking for a way out. and i think that needs to be explored. >> cornell, do you have confidence in the mayor of

baltimore? do you have. >> do you have confidence in the governor? >> what i have confidence in the process of engaging a community. in other words, when information is made available as quickly as possible in as a transpatient a process as possible when we're very clear about the process of an investigation and this ongoing engagement with the community, i'm confident that that that and those set of steps can maximize the opportunity to keep the peace. and so the point being here is this is not a matter of a parade of personalities. the mayor, the governor, whoever. the fact of the matter is we all, community groups, the naacp, the mayor, the governor the chief of police, the commissioner we all have a collective responsibility as the president has said to days this problem. and so this is not a matter of

did the governor get it right or did the mayor get it right, but rather do we get it right? because the fact of the matter is we're concerned about the violence in the wake of these protests. we're concerned about the violence that led to the death of freddie gray. we're concerned about the violence that leads to the death of so many young people in cities like baltimore all across the country. so we've got to be confident in ourselves, in our collective ability to address this problem. that's the big question here. >> let me go back to brian todd. brian, what is the latest over there? >> wolf we're march toward downtown baltimore, a little more toward the inner harbor area on pennsylvania avenue. we do not know where this protest is going. this is much like one protest march we were involved with last week when they started at about 5:00. and they marched for four hours. we hiked for about five miles with those guys and we never really quite knew where they

were going. they may not know where they're going. one thing they have done this evening, what they did last week they blocked intersections. they will on occasion stop at an intersection sit down in the middle of it block traffic. that's the way they think they can make their statement. usually they quickly pick up and move on. now they've got some traffic moving along with them and people joining in honking horns, wolf. >> do these people know there is going to be a curfew in about three hours from now, brian? is that curfew going to hold? >> wolf, word has gotten around on the street that there is going to be a curfew. i can't imagine anyone around here who does not know there is going to be a curfew. but, you know they're out here. and again, where this goes and when it ends we don't really know. the one thing we can say about this crowd tonight and about some of the crowds last week, they've been largely self-policing. someone has gotten out of hand, if someone has jostled a policeman or a member of the

media, others have come in and said let's tamp it down. let's push back a little bit. they've been largely self-policing. that's what happened here today the opposite of what happened last night. we're seeing that again today. and we're going to see where this takes us wolf. >> all right. stand by brian. i want to get joey jackson to comment there has been an iconic image that a lot of us have seen now of a mother literally grabbing her son who was protesting and maybe going out to do some looting or whatever joey. you've seen the video. we'll show it to our viewers once again. she simply grabs him. she slaps him, and she says you better stop this. you better go home. it's a powerful image. i think we probably need more of that. but go ahead. when you saw that video, joey it really is wolf. it's touching and it goes to show that the fabric of that community is strong and the parents are concerned about their children and what's happening to their children and their children are not devolving, and there you see it.

just amazing, wolf. you see the mother being so concerned about her son and about what she wants for him and what she wants as the best not for him to go out to loot to engage in lawlessness, but to keep on message and keep on point and not dilute the message which we hope everyone gets to which is is overpolicing the answer? is what happened to freddie gray appropriate? law and order seemingly is being restored there, but the true test will be in what happens when the report gets released on friday and what happens going forward. will there be true justice? will in fact the officers be held accountable for whatever transgressions they engaged in and how he got in that particular position. it goes to show a mother very concerned about her community. more importantly, her son, and that he gets the message and the message is law and order is the message of the day. that's what should be engaged in not looting and other

behavior which is inappropriate and off point with what they're trying to do. >> i think all of us can remember times when we're doing something our moms weren't happy about, and our moms would get involved. i think all of us can recall those experiences in our own lives. look at the live pictures coming in right now. you see what's going on. it looks like they're getting more and more people as they're marching brian todd tells us towards downtown. >> but this these are protesters. these are demonstrators. these are not criminals. this is a crucial distinction that has been very important over these past few days. these people are protesting. they're yelling, screaming. this is what freedom of speech is about. this is what political protest is about. there's absolutely nothing wrong with what those folks are doing. the problem, of course yesterday, was when not protests the problem was criminals. the problem was looters. i think that distinction is

central and there's absolutely nothing wrong with what these folks are doing now. >> phil banks, one of the inspirations supposedly for the young people going out after school yesterday to start protesting was a film involving what's called a purge. the idea of a period of hours, ten hours. 12 hours, whatever where they could do whatever they want lawlessness, and it would be legal to go ahead and do that. it went out in posters, went out in social media. and presumably at least if you listen to the police chief and others it inspired some of the violence that took place. it's an awkward phenomenon isn't it? >> it is awkward and it's very dangerous. and it's something that needs to be looked at very seriously because what starts in baltimore will manifest in other places as well. it is something that is very dangerous. dangerous to law abiding citizens. it's dangerous to the law abiding protesters and dangerous to the police officers. that's something that needs to be looked upon. if i can comment on the mother

briefly who was using some discipline to stop her child. shortly before i left we did a project in staten island where we identified 30 or 40 gang members, and shethese were children under the age of 16 years of age. we knocked on the doors to speak with their parents. 90% of the parents were saying they needed help. they realized they had lost this particular child, and they did not know what to do. so thatsomeble of what the parents was doing is all across america. and what law enforcement and government doesn't help they too, lose confidence in the criminal justice system and they start protesting as well. there's a big, big problem. i'll say law enforcement and government has to stop using the strategies from 25 years ago. there are people in law enforcement who have those strategies and we have to stop that playbook from 20 years ago. >> cornell, it's fortunate that that young man had a mother who was so passionate really wanted to get involved and save her son

from committing some lawlessness, committing an act of looting or arson, whatever that would have sent him to jail, presumably for a while. unfortunately, as you know, as philip banks just said some of the young boys out there, they're gone for all practical purposes. they're not going to listen to a mom or a dad. >> yes, but many do and will. and we have to focus on those. and wolf i like to just make a comment about the purge. when we talk about social media and the purge, think about this. we have young people who use social media in constructive ways to use their mobile devices and their cell phones to transmit images from ferguson or baltimore to take a local instance of injustice and turn it into a global call for civil rights and criminal justice reform. that's important. we need to commend the young people who have done that. there may be some who have used

social media to call for unrest and lawlessness, but the overwhelming majority have done an extraordinarily commendable and profoundly american thing. that is to say they have used the technology they have to protest, to march, their exercise their first amendment roish rights to bring about justice for a grieving family. that's incredibly important, and the fact that that mother chastatizing disciplining her son on the street has been transmitted around the world, that too, is an indication of what can be done through social media. to deliver a positive and constructive message. >> no doubt social media can be very positive can be very constructive. at the same time unfortunately, it can be destructive as we all know as well. if the film purge inspires people to go out and commit lawlessness, acts of violence that is pretty destructive and could be damaging for the young people's lives. jeffrey, we have a new attorney general in the united states

loretta lynch. her real first full day on the job today. what does she have to do right now given the crisis in baltimore? >> welcome to the big leagues, loretta lynch. this was a big change from just being the u.s. attorney in brooklyn. i think the real answer here is when are there going to be prosecutions? when are people going to be held accountable for what happened in baltimore yesterday? obviously, it was an overwhelming situation. there is some possibility that the federal government can step in. they said they are monitoring the program, but when it comes to crime in the united states fairly or not, the buck stops with the attorney general of the united states. so loretta lynch will be responsible in some way for stepping in and saying what the federal government is going to do about this really desperate situation. >> tom, you're a former assistant director of the fbi. we know the atf is involved in investigating the arson. i assume the fbi is involved one

way or another in what's going on in baltimore, right? >> right, they're working on intelligence on the gangs themselves and what they're doing. their interstate trafficking of guns and other criminal activity. but the federal agencies can provide assistance but street policing and the safety of preventing looting and preventing murders on the street that's the police responsibility. everybody, all the politicians talk about local authority, that it should be the city's involved and the state's rights et cetera. it's not a federal government situation that they can really influence to any huge degree not in this situation, anyway. >> evan perez, you're our justice reporter. what are you hearing about the role of the federal government in baltimore? >> well wolf we know we had the community relations service from the justice department here in baltimore today. they were meeting with community groups. the problem, wolf is that the people who they were meeting with aren't the ones out there committing mayhem. they're not the ones out there burning stuff. these are people going to be out there protesting and it's not clear that they're talking to

the right people. the people that are doing all the damage are people who are not really going to be spoken to by the justice department. we expect that the civil rights division officials are going to be here later this week also to meet with the police and the mayor's office and also with the community groups and we also expect the cops office the community policing office to be also here this week to provide perhaps an update on what they have been doing with the police department. again, not the people that are causing all the problems are going to be involved in any of those meetings. >> phil banks, the curfew goes into effect 10:00 p.m. eastern time in baltimore until 5:00 a.m. how do police enforce it? >> tonight, listen here wolf. they put the curfew in order, and i'm going to make the assumption that a lot of thought process went into that. i certainly hope they didn't back themselves into a corner because you have a curfew and it's in place -- >> hold on one second. this is the spokesman for the baltimore police department. >> to enact a 24-hour juvenile

kerr view. he has the authority to do that. that has not been done. that is a decision that will be made if it is -- >> looks like we lost our connection with the spokesman for the baltimore police department. i interrupted you. wrap it up quickly. >> strategic decision. depending on what is going on in the street and the police chief should have the option to enforce it tonight or not enforce it tonight. certainly, not making a decision not to enforce it because it could aggravate the decision is something his management team needs to take and consider seriously. >> cornell brooks should there be a massive police military presence on the streets at 10:00 tonight or not so massive? >> well at this point, the reality is there is already a massive police presence with the calling up the national guard, police officers coming in from other jurisdictions. so they're there. the issue --

>> i think we just lost unfortunately, a lot of communications problems but we're going to stay on top of this story. clearly, for our viewers. i'm wolf blitzer. cnn's live coverage continues right now with erin burnett, "outfront." >> thanks wolf. we're continuing our breaking news coverage of the state of emergency in baltimore tonight. good evening. i'm erin burnett. protesters lining up in the streets of baltimore just hours before that new city wide curfew goes into effect. the city desperately trying to prevent a repeat of last night. maryland's governor moments ago announcing he's doubling the number of national guard troops on the streets tonight. 2,000 heavily armed eded troops at the ready. they will join another 1,000 officers. 3,000. it's extremely tense in baltimore. while most of the protests have been peaceful today. incidents like the one i