. top of the hour this thursday morning. i'm jim sciutto. >> and i'm erica hill. happening right now, testimony is underway in the double murder case against disgraced and disbarred former south carolina attorney alex murdaugh. he's accused of killing his wife and youngest son in 2021. we'll take you inside of the courtroom just ahead. and aas soon as today police in fem memphis, tennessee, could release a number of videos from the death of tyre nichols. you see him there. overnight the memphis police

chief called it a failing of basic humanity. >> this incident was heinous, reckless and inhumane. those five officers and others failed our community and they failed the nichols family and that is beyond regrettable. in our outrage and frustration, there is still work to be done to build each other up, to continue the momentum of improving our police and community relationships and partnerships. to show those who watch us now that this behavior is not what will define our community and our great city. >> cnn's shimon prokupecz is joining us from memphis. the community awaiting the release of the video. what are you hearing? >> reporter: and really many of the law enforcement officials across the country are waiting for the release as they brace for the fallout from this. that is the biggest concern, certainly for officials all across the country and here in

memphis, a big concern is the reaction to once this video becomes public. and that is really every step here that has been taken by officials is to prepare for that. and those are the two things that are going on right now. we have whether or not any of the officers are going to be charged by the district attorney here in memphis, and then obviously word on when this video will be released. we expect there to be something in the next few days. possibly today, tomorrow. but that is something that law enforcement officials across the country are waiting for. and on word of whether or not these officers will face any charges. that is what is happening here in memphis. at the moment, as you heard from the police chief in that video that was released late last night, preparing the community for the release of this video. her describing just how heinous and how inhumane the actions by these officers were.

it was really remarkable to hear her take that tone. she's moved very quickly once all of the information and the internal investigation was complete to fire these five officers. much of what the community has wanted was -- has been to see this video. the family has seen the video. so now we wait for word from the district attorney here possibly today on whether or not these officers are going to face charges and when this video is going to be made public. so definitely some critical developments here, perhaps as soon as today and certainly tomorrow. >> shmimon prokupecz, thank you so much. joining us now to discuss, retired special agent cnn law enforcement contributor steve morris. good to have you on this morning. police chief has obviously seen these videos already and described them as heinous and reckless and inhumane and she does expect community outrage

understandably it seems. there is a conflict here between the public's right to know and the concerns about what the reaction will be. what right move here now and what preparations do you believe police there should be making? >> well, i obviously -- it appears that these videos are going to be inflammatory, not just provocative but inflammatory. and the police have to walk this hard-line between being completely transparent and bringing out information that will enrage the community. i think we have to lean towards being transparent, specially in a situation like this. and i think the more transparent the police are, the less outrage there will be. if they didn't release these and they were somehow leaked, the outrage would be intense. >> and the police chief, as jim pointed out, she's been very

clear how she feels about it and was apparently according to our reporting, she was emotional speaking with tyre nichol's mother in the wake of this video. that is according to the family attorney ben crump. in terms of the outreach and transparency, one of the things that struck me that we heard from sara sidner in the last hour is what the communication has been like to this point and she was noting how the d.a. had met with activists and we're still awaiting charges, but the fact that that communication is happening, that is a shift, i would say. how important is that, steve? >> that is a -- it is a horrible situation. but it is a wonderful shift. i have not seen to my recollection a police department come out and so quickly repudiate the actions of officers. i can only assume that the videos must be extremely

disturbing. and so i think they're taking the right -- the right tack on this. i just -- i applaud them for coming out so strongly. and, you know, the fact that their charging or at least alleging that some of these officers simply didn't say anything about it, would be an indication of how severe the situation is. >> well we are also joined now by joey jackson, criminal defense attorney. to steve's point there, we've seen police departments react to these events differently over time. we've seen juries react, i think you made that point around the time of the chauvin trial, more open to holding police accountable it seems over time. and i wonder, are you seeing that as well? >> yeah, i really am, jim. i think we're in a new era of

accountability. i think that is certainly facilitated by technology, right. and the more we have these instances that are caught on camera, the more public is outraged and the more there is demand for accountability in that this could not stand. are we not going to believe our lies. so, yes, as it relates to cases we've seen, george floyd is the prime example in minneapolis with respect to the brutality, the more public gets involved and demands for justice the more we see jurors who are impanelled and mete out that measure of justice so i think we're seeing the police department acting swiftly with respect to do what they need to do to discipline the officers and then the federal investigation in conjunction with the state investigation and i think that will do a lot really to have the public know and understand that, you know what, people are taking this seriously, everyone is looking and it will deter future

misconduct. >> joey, as we await these charges, there is a call for murder charges, not manslaughter. just walk us through, remind us of the difference there and why that is so important. >> yeah, of course. erica, so when it comes to murder, the law penalized things and not to get to technical but it is based upon mens rea and that is the status of the mind. that means any crime requires a mental state and activity. when it comes to murder charges, you're looking at intent. you charge based upon when you did something intentionally, you knee what you were doing, that was your goal, objective, it was your purpose. that is intent. that is murder. and then you look at other things like for example if you acted recklessly or carelessly, or negligently. when you start looking at reckless activities and negligent activities now you're talking about manslaughter and lesser charges an the public is

saying based upon the brutality and the specific nature of what these officers were doing, the length of time at which they do it, fact it was described as using him as a pinata and you look at the autopsy report and the public is saying that seems awfully intentional. it doesn't seem negligent or reckless, it seemed like you knew what you were doing and did it anyway. so that is the distinction when you have murder intent versus other lesser included offenses. >> and we should point out that internal investigation found they violations excessive use of force and duty to intervene and duty to render aid. great to have your insight. thank you. this just into cnn, the justice department said that it has seized a dark web website from a notorious ran some wear gang, that site has extorted more than $100 million from different organizations. the fbi said the so-called hive

ransom ware group has used the website to shame its victims. >> evan perez joins us now from the just department. and evan, there has been an epidemic of these kinds of extortion cases here. i wonder how essential hive has been to all of this and what we expect from the attorney general when he speaks minutes from now. >> well that is right, jim. this is an epidemic. it is also a very lucrative business and the justice department and the fbi as well as law enforcement in europe has been fighting this because you see this group, hive, and others that are targeting, targeting health care organizations and they managed to steal the data and the information for hundreds and thousands of millions of people at a time. and then they use this website to try to shame those organizations to try to get money to try to extort money from those organizations. and what we know is that the fbi along with working with law enforcement in other countries has seized this website.

one of things that they're trying to do is in the next hour we're expecting to hear from the attorney general from the fbi director chris wray, and i think the message that they're trying to send is that their working to try to thwart these groups that are wreaking havoc across the globe. in the case of the hive group, they say they're are about 13 hup companies or organizations that have been victims of this group. including back in -- a few months ago, a hospital in louisiana which said that it's information was on 270,000 patients was posted and was stolen as part of this effort by this group. and, so, that is what the fbi and the just department say they are focused on which is to try to seize the money that these groups are extorting as well as to try to prevent other groups from doing the same thing.

>> goodness, i mean the hive sounds something straight out of a hollywood movie script. but frighteningly real for customers involved. thank you so much. >> sure. still to come this hour, wall street is reacting to the latest strong gdp numbers as the u.s. economy finished 2020 growing more than expected. we'll take a closer look. plus southwest is anticipating even more losses in the wake of that holiday meltdown. what the airline ceo is saying this morning. and we are live in walterboro, south carolina, where alex murdaugh this morning has been seen crying in court. as he listened to testimony from the first witness in his double murder trial. we're bring you up to speed with the very latest. with bank of america. see cousin jimmy over therere? his girlfriend just caught ththe bouquet so... he might need a littttle more help saving. for that engagement t ring... the groom's parents.

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this just into cnn, the shelby county district attorney has announced that he will provide an update in the tyre nichols investigation at 3:00 p.m. eastern today. tyre nichols, the man who died from his injuries after allegedly being beaten by police. a lot of attention focused on the video, videos perhaps of that arrest. >> we have been waiting to hear whether criminal charges will be filed there, filed against the five officers who were fired. shimon prokupecz joining us live. what more do we know about this announcement. >> reporter: this is something that we've been anticipating and it is to hear from the district attorney here in memphis who is making all of the decisions on the state level as to whether or not any of these officers will face charges. and that video, the video that

we've all been talking about, for the family members that have described and seeing and how horrific the final hours were of this beating that he suffered. so, we are waiting on word exactly on what this press availability will be, whether or not any of the officers are going to be charged, whether or not charges have been filed. interestingly enough, i've been talking to some the defense attorneys and they tell me they're waiting for word on what the status of their clients are going to be today. and then we're here the courthouse because we're wondering if there is any activity here at the courthouse. the thing is obviously is will they file these charges, are charges going to be filed and then at some point we'll see the video. we don't know how all of this is going to play out because officials are not saying much. the police department has not described anything. they have not released any information as to how the events

transpired, almost some 20 days ago. so hopefully we could get some answers asked of that. because there are still a lot of remaining questions on what exactly happened here. but certainly significant. that later this afternoon, here, in memphis, we will be hearing finally from the district attorney on the status of this investigation and what is next. >> shimon, appreciate the update. thank you. for the first time since southwest holiday travel meltdown, company executives are set to take reporter questions. that is going to happen during the company's earning call this afternoon. >> this comes as the department of transportation announced an investigation into that ordeal, the lines were no fun. the airlines said it will cooperate with officials as they investigate. cnn aviation correspondent pete muntean has been following the story from the ugly early hours of that holiday meltdown. i mean, what exactly are investigators looking for and

then the next question would be what could the potential penalties be? >> we're still in the early stages of this investigation but so far it is focusedond why this meltdown happened in the first place. but now it is sort of taking this new turn. where the transportation department wants to know if southwest airlines overextended its schedule, over-scheduled flights so much that it may have potentially broken the law here. i want to you look at this statement from the department of transportation. it said that the d.o.t. is also probing whether southwest executives engaged in unrealistic scheduling of flights which under federal law is considered an unfair and deceptive practice. >> that is illegal. >> right. so that is something that the department of transportation has focused in on, pete buttigieg, he wanted a lot of consumer advocacy. and this is the biggest meltdown because airlines have struggled as they come back from the

pandemic. 16,700 cancellations. listen now to southwest ceo bob jordan. he was just on cnbc, and he takes the hit here but he also said in a statement earlier today that southwest did have the proper schedule in place and it did have the proper staffing in place but it was really weather that triggered this big meltdown over december. >> we really messed up that week. and you've got my sincere apologies and my full commitment. it is on me. you have my commitment to do what it takes to fix our issues. our customers are sticking with us. we really inconvenienced them but if you look at march and beyond, the bookings are strong, the leisure bookings are strong and so there are a lot of evidence that our loyal customers are sticking with us. >> reporter: off course he's trying to spin this since southwest airlines said it was going to lose between $$725,000,825,000,000 because of this meltdown. the lions share of the money

that they lost was primarily for refunds. southwest is investing a billion dollars in their infrastructure so this back end problem does not happen again. >> if unfair and descent sieve it illegal, i think a lot of passengers would be amazed. i'm just amazed. just saying. >> what is interesting, the airlines have gotten a really hard shake from the department of transportation about this. and the d. o. t. has tried to make the language about unfair and deceptive practices longer leading into the pandemic rebound. and so this is something that they're really focused on now. whether or not there was ape bit of slight of hand here by the executives, to make it so that we did sort of tee up this big meltdown. >> interesting. pete muntean, thank you so much. just ahead here, the prosecution currently questioning its first witness in the double murder trial of alex murdaugh. a little bit more on what the jury is hearing right now. stay with us for that.

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right now the prosecution's first witness on the stand in the double murder trial of disgraced former south carolina attorney alex murdaugh who is accused e accused of killing his wife and youngest son in 2021. right now the officer that responded to the scene is on the

stand. >> dianne gallagher is outside of the courthouse in waterboro, south carolina. diana, a moment early in the trial is seeing the defendant alex murdaugh get emotional as the sergeant described arriving at the scene. tell us what you saw in that moment? >> reporter: you know, jim, it is quite different from how the sergeant said alec murdaugh was acting on scene when he arrived. we saw alex murdaugh, a now disbarred prominent here in the low country area become very emotional when the video from sergeant green with the collin county sheriff's office body cam began playing there. he cries, he gets upset. he has appeared that way throughout the morning on and off. but sergeant green was asked to describe what alex murdaugh was like when he arrived. he said he was anxious and agitated and upset. he's been asked several times if

at any point he was crying and he said no, each and every time. there was also a period where he talks about alex murdaugh having a rifle with him at that time. and he said that alex murdaugh told him after finding the bodies, he went and got the gun to make sure just in case he was going to need it there. he asked if he could take that gun from him. he put it in his patrol car. because murdaugh did appear anxious and agitated, he said. right now we've been going through that video. piece by piece, stopping and starting, having sergeant green sort of narrate that, he was the first emergency responder on scene. we are hearing alex murdaugh's voice as he explaining the situation to the sergeant. at one point he does ask him if he's seen them, once emergency responders arrived, if they have checked on his wife, maggie and son paul, murdaugh asked if they

are dead and the sergeant informed him yes and he asked if that was something on the stand that was obvious and he said any reasonable person would have known that the two of them were deceased because of the nature of their wounds. both of them being shot in the head at the time. he has described the gruesome scene that is there. we are not getting a chance to view this video because of what it contains and how graphic it is. but again, jim and erica, watc watching alex murdaugh and he knows the jury is watching him as well as this plays out. >> goodness. quite a few moments in this trial, dianne gallagher, and it is early too. thank you so much. with us now, misty maris, a defense and trial attorney watching this case closely. misty, good to have you on this morning. >> thank you so much, jim. >> it is early in this trial. it is a jury trial. how does a jury react to seeing a defendant break down like that as we saw murdaugh there see the

police cam of the crime scene. >> it is a great question because in reality the jury is always watching. remember, they are people sitting there, now they're seeing this body cam video, we know that the scene was horrific. both sides said that yesterday in opening statements. they warned the jury. you're going to see some terrible, disturbing and horrific images. and now the jury is absolutely going to be watching murdaugh and how he reacts to this. and he's sitting at the table and having an emotional reaction is what would you expect from somebody reliving this night. and so i do think that the jury is watching closely. scrutinizing. we talk about this all of the time. the jury is super observant, always paying attention. >> it is interesting that diane pointed out, this is the reaction and as you said, miffy, that you would anticipate from someone as this scene is being

replaced as they're reliving it. but interesting that the sergeant, sergeant green on the stand, that he was describing a different interaction in those moments. perhaps not as emotional as what we're seeing in the courtroom today. how important is that? >> it is very important. these moments after and his first interaction with the first responders, that is going to be heffly scrutinized. and we know yesterday from the prosecution's opening statement, a lot of the cases are going to be built around what we see on the body cam video. murdaugh is under no obligation to testify and in my opinion likely will not. this is the jury's opportunity to hear from him. in the aftermath of this horrific murder. so it is going to be incredibly important, they're going to be looking at there to see consistency, they've already been keyed into that from the prosecutors yesterday. so, it certainly is something that they're going to be looking at and this body cam footage, this is really critical to the case. and his demeanor after the fact,

all of that is going to be a huge component of the jury's deliberation. >> it is a big question to ask, but you've been involved in a lot of cases, it is early in the trial. you're aware of the evidence as we know it >> but a couple of themes here. a lot of this is battle of the experts. you could say whatever you want in your opening statement, what really comes out in the evidence. we know we're going to hear firearms expert and defense is going to contest the prosecution's version. the cell phone data. how strong is that expert testimony? will we hear about these prior bad acts and financial crimes. all of this is going to be really relevant in how this trial ultimately plays out.

the opening statement, that is one piece. but what is the evident really showing? and that is what we're looking for as the trial unfolds. >> to your point in terms of evident, we heard from the prosecution and the defense that cell phone evidence is going to come into play here and as that is the norm around the world at this point in terms of evidence, how solid, typically, is cell phone evidence to try to put somebody in a location. >> that is a great question. because digital footprint is a huge part of any case, a big part of investigation and a big part of trial. look, it depends on what type of cell phone evidence we're talking about. we hear about this term pinging. right. did the cell phone ping? well when a cell phone pings, that doesn't necessarily put somebody in an exact location. it puts them in the vicinity. for instance, i'm here in the cnn studio here in new york. i could be pinging down 20 blocks away. so that is really something that can be scrutinized by the defense. there is other types of cell

phone data that is much more reliable and that is why we see these two individuals coming from snapchat and google to lay the foundation to get that evidence in. it is not just cell phone data that the prosecution is focused on, it is the lack of cell phone activity. it is this timeline that puts murdaugh in a video, his voice on the video and then five minutes later, less than five minutes later, down to the second, prosecutors said in their opening statement, there is zero cell phone activity from paul and maggie. so that is another component of this. what are the cell phones doing and what are the cell phones not doing. >> that is something that has already come up in the case of the idaho murders, prior to the murder there. pinging of the suspect around the house where it took place. misty maris, thank you so much. >> thank you. well overseas russia is intensifying attacks across ukraine. 55 missiles launched just this

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it requires all books be preapproved or vetted a by media specialist trained by pla's department of education. well now some teachers are taking action with reports that some are blocking access to all books after learning of the new requirement. cnn's layla sant a augusto has more. >> behind the covered wall of paper in this manatee county classroom, books, teacher dorn falls covered the bookshelves out of concern for a new state law that requires all books there classroom libraries to be approved or vetted by a media specialist or librarian that is trained by the state. >> we were instructed last week that we were essentially had three choices. as far as our personal libraries in our classrooms. we could remove them completely, box them up, we could cover them up with paper or some sort of something, or they could be entered into a data base where

the school district has all of the library books and all of the other kinds of books and if the book was in the system, then it could remain on a shelf, open. >> falls who is part of a lawsuit against governor ron desantis regarding hi stop woke act said it is all caused him and other teachers must fear and angst but it never instructed teachers to shut down classroom libraries. according to the school district, volunteers will catalogue books. if the book already has the green light, it could go right back on shelf. but it is not preapproved, it must be vetted before a student could have access to it. >> we're going to make sure that parents have a seat at the table. and that we protect their rights because nobody is more invested in the proper well being of kids than the parents themselves. >> reporter: according to

florida's department of education, the books must be free of pornography and suited to student needs and their ability to comprehend the material presented, appropriate for the grade level and age group for which the materials are used and made availability. violations could result in a third-degree felony. >> this is not saying we're banning books. >> reporter: during a school board meeting manatee county school officials said they don't now how long it will take to verify the books but in the meantime they have access to the main library but it has sparked confusion and high emotion. >> i would not suggest banning books. it is a slippery slope. this is good literature, with value. please, do not ban books. >> during a school board meeting, school officials are working to align policies with state requirements. school officials say a group of

library media specialists reviewed 94 book titles ore the summer. >> and that team did recommend ten titles to be weeds out of our collections or moved to our adult only resource library. >> there is appropriateness and inappropriateness. where books are concerned, we have to really keep the minors in mind. >> you cannot substitute adult supervision. you can just cannot. adult supervision, parents or a guardian or a grandparent have to be aware of what the child is being taught. >> while some parents praise what they call parents price at work, others worry it is a slippery slope. >> any time you restrict access to information, to knowledge, it is censorship. there is no other way to categorize it. >> reporter: and you know, in that pinal as county board

meeting, they made it clear there could be more additional titles removed as they continue with this vetting process and also made it clear that they will always error on the side of caution. another thing that the school board member brought up as a concern and a challenge, defining what is age appropriateness as they vet these books. i reached out to the governor's office as well and the department of education to see that clarity and i still have not received a response. >> that clarity is something that is lacking. it is fascinating and it is frightening on a number of levels. it reminds me of a great book for young readers by allegan gratz that is called ban this book. >> still to come, massive deadly russian air strikes against ukraine hours after the u.s. and western allies announce they're sending tanks to the ukraine front lines. if you used shipgo this whole thing wowouldn't be a thing.

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[ technical difficulties ] this is a test. >> is just department urging other if they may have retained any material. >> i couldn't talk about the latter question. on the former question, i'll give a start and then turn it over to the director. so i think as you could hear from the various statements that we've made, this really has proceeded in three steps. we begin with cooperation from private sector victims which is essential for us to succeed. then we use court authorized access to electronic systems. search warrants, court orders to get into the system.

this is not exactly hiding in plain sight, this is just hiding. and we hide and we watch as they proceed with their attacks. and we discover the keys and we deliver the keys to the victims so that they could encrypt their systems and not have to pay the ransom ware. and finally, we take down the infrastructure. we take down the servers that power hive's ability to go ahead. and we could only do that once we locate where the servers and that is what we were able to do-w very recently and resolved the matter last night. i'm going to turn it over to chris. >> so i don't think i could give you numbers on the size. but i could say a couple of things. you could look at the sheer number of victims around the world and around the country. the diversity of victims, both big businesses and small. the number of foreign partners involved. the thing to understand about

ransom ware and networks like hive, you have the developers who create the malware and the administrators which sounds benign but it actually i think almost like the hub of the -- of the variant and then all of the affiliates and part of what makes these things challenging is, and hive is a good example of it, is what we call ran some wear as a service where the sophistication that the first groups have, essentially they're marketing their cyber expertise to a whole range of less sophisticated but now suddenly dangerous cyber criminals and that is why this is so significant. as far as arrests, anybody involved with hive should be concerned because this investigation is very much still ongoing. and we are engaged in what we call joint sequenced operations. the attorney general described it well. but that includes everything from going after their infrastructure, going after

their crypto, going after the people who work with them, here, getting the keys and making those available. but it also includes hunting people down with our partners a around the world and sometimes the people may face a u.s. criminal justice system and sometimes they may face charges with all of our many partners who are increasingly latched up with us. >> thank you for doing this. a question on hive and then off the top question for you mr. attorney general. on hive, what is the connection to the russian government at this point with regard to hive? do you believe that the russian government is aiding or shellering people behind hive. and i notice that there weren't any arrests being announced today. do you anticipate that you will be announcing arrests with regard to that, then i have the off topic question. >> so i think on that topic,

we're in the middle of an ongoing investigation, i don't think we could discuss. i'm afraid that is the answer to your second question as well. but go ahead. >> i wanted to ask you with regard to the trump and biden special counsel, are you considering an effort to coor coordinate the work of the two special counsels such as their time line or final reports so that the public could have somewhat of an apples-to-apples comparison at the end of this or due view that as interference in the special counsel work. >> i don't want to talk about particulars of -- of investigations in particular, not a special counsel investigation. as a general manner, the people we choose for special counsel are experienced prosecutors and experience in the justice department and they now how the just department works and what the practices are and i'm fully confident that they'll resolve these matters one way or the other. in the highest traditions of the

department. >> for director wray, you could talk about how unusual this sort of operation is? has the fbi ever before penetrated a ran some ware network. >> so, we've been listening to this, of course, jim, was an announcement about some ran some wear gang and we shared that with our evan perez. there was more than one effort there to ask some questions about these classified documents that have been found. of course, among former president trump, president biden and former vice president pence's other files and they were having none of it. it was the easiest way to put it. there was a district question asked to the attorney general general and he piv yosted and talked about this. >> we'll continue to follow that story for sure. thanks for join ug today. i'm jim sctt