bill bratton. i understand you are in the london bureau where among the subjects you discussed today was public event security. i.e. prime minister thatcher's funeral where you have 2000 vips attending. how are we going to defend and protect our public events when this goes off within the security cordon apparently surrounded by police, ems, volunteers at the finish line of your beloved boston marathon. >> the reality as was evident today is you can't protect everything all the time. you try to prioritize, focus. you try to identify if there is a threat. boston police commissioner indicated there had been no threat received by either his department or to his knowledge federal agencies. the fact that homeland security is not advising other areas of the country to raise their terrorism level, terrorism concern level is an indication to this stage there is no credible threat that's been this afternoon in boston. >> and commissioner, if you were back here, would it be your guess that they will have one

bill bratton in our london bureau tonight. pete williams, our justice correspondent, continues to make calls and report this story out from our washington bureau. pete, what do you have? >> reporter: well, i was struck by what the police commissioner said about urging people to stay home. the fact that there seemed to be at least as far as his information goes two separate incidents and two separate places in boston. one at the scene of the marathon, the other at the jfk library. and we also have seen a number of local communities raise their sort of alert level, putting more people on the street. and i'm assured, though, by a couple of federal officials that i've talked to that they're not -- this is not happening because of some additional information that something else is going on that we don't know about. that these -- that the department of homeland security, for example, an official there tells me it has not put out any kind of an advisory urging local communities to be on a higher level of alert. that what we're seeing

bill bratton in our london bureau tonight. pete williams, our justice correspondent, continues to make calls and report this story out from our washington bureau. pete, what do you have? >> well, i was struck by what the police commissioner said about urging people to stay home. the fact that there seemed to be, at least as far as his information goes, two separate incidents in two separate places in boston -- one at the scene of the marathon, the other at the jfk library. and we also have seen a number of local communities raise their sort of alert level, putting more people on the street. and i am assured, though, by a couple of federal officials i've talked to, that this is not happening because of some additional information that something else is going on that we don't know about. that these -- the department of homeland security, for example, an official there tells me that it has not put out any kind of advisory urging local communities to be on a higher level of alert. that what we're seeing around town, or around the

bill bratton. i understand you are in the london bureau where among the subjects you discussed today was public event security. i.e. prime minister thatcher's funeral where you have 2000 vips attending. how are we going to defend and protect our public events when this goes off within the security cordon apparently surrounded by police, ems, volunteers at the finish line of your beloved boston marathon. >> the reality as was evident today is you can't protect everything all the time. you try to prioritize, focus. you try to identify if there is a threat. boston police commissioner indicated there had been no threat received by either his department or to his knowledge federal agencies. the fact that homeland security is not advising other areas of the country to raise their terrorism level, terrorism concern level is an indication to this stage there is no credible threat that's been identified prior to the event of this afternoon in boston. >> and commissioner, if you were back here, would it be y

bill bratton.veteran police chief in these united states including the city of new york. he is in london with us by phone. and commissioner, what to you make of what you've seen so far? >> well, i've just been on the phone with the boston police sources that they indicate the initial report is of two explosions. really as many as 50 injured including very serious injuries. needless to say, having policed that event for almost 20 years back in the '70s and '80s then the '90s, have a lot of intimacy for. upon first hearing it my concern is for friends and relatives actually running in that marathon as well as knowing many of the boston police law enforcement personnel that would be at that finish line. i'm certainly personally concerned about people i know that i know are going to be at that finish line. but professionally, it's certainly this is the first instance of this type that's ever been conducted at that event. they're going to be focused on trying to figure out what happened, who was behind

according to former boston commissioner bill bratton from his information. how did they get there? one person couldn't have put down four bombs if there were four. even if there were three bombs. one person couldn't have put down three bombs. not possible. >> i tend to agree with you. i think it's multiple people. but, again, you talked about the trade-off between civil liberties and security. and so as much as there was security at this event, it still is essentially open to the public. so you have all sorts of people going in and out from all over the world. it doesn't surprise me that a terrorist group or a small cell would be able to plant bombs in this fashion because even very unsatisfies indicated device e devices can cause a lot of damage. >> what would you expect to be the advertisementing in terms of planting this bomb? they couldn't have put this there a week ago and used a cell phone to turn it on, right? >> i think it was quite close to the detonation. >> so it was today. it was an hour or so, or now it's speculation. i don't want to speculate. so in other words, you t

bill bratton was the boston police commissioner before leading the nypd and the lapd. >> it is extraordinarilydifficult, as you might imagine, that 26-mile route. double it, 52 the miles because you have two sides of the street. most of the security would be focused on the finish line area where the actual bombing occurred. >> reporter: atlanta, 1996. a backpack holding pipe bombs packed with nails exploded in olympic park. two died. more than a hundred wounded. it wasn't until 2003 that police tracked down domestic terrorist eric robert rudolph. >> get back, please! >> reporter: london, 2005. a series of coordinated suicide attacks on the subway and bus system left 52 people dead, 700 injured. the attackers used home made explosives packed into backpacks. those attacks on finds of the secret service when president obama was sworn in for the first time in 2009. dan bonngeno was the lead secret service agent as people packed the national mall in downtown d.c. a potential terrorist could have been hiding in plain sight. >> you can't guarantee anything. you reduce the probability to hopefully som

john mill and bill bratton are here.te us in terms of what we know at this moment. >> what we is that the events last night, which start with the assassination and murder of an m.i.t. police officer a robbery at a gas station, a wild car chase including bombs being thrown during the chase from out the windows of the suspects' vehicle, that ended in watertown with a shootout using that vehicle for cover, throwing more explosive devices. one suspect killed in that shootout. another officer at that scene severely wounded. and the suspect who gets away jumps in a siblocks and then hops out on the run. so that 20-block perimeter is a place where they have told lock your doors. don't answer for anybody but the police. and they say that they're the police, make sure you can tell it's the real police andhat is the tense situation folding moments ago, inhat neighborhood, at an address ev the suspects, a woman was taken out in police custody. this could be a relative, a girlfriend, a mother, a wife, and she is probably being broug

>> it's the latest game-changer reporter: bill bratton has >> it's the latest game-changer reporter:ton has been boston's police commissioner, new york's, and chief of police in los angeles. >> the game-changer here is that the big data error, the social media error, all aspects of that new world that was nonexistent even on 9/11. all of that came into play during this event. >> reporter: what time did you hear about the boston marathon bombing on monday? >> something just blew up. reporter: when did you start seeing the images of the explosions that were played back over and over? the man in the orange jersey falling. horribly injured people being raced away. the face of martin richard, the eight-year-old boy who was killed? it was in the anguish and confusion of the after math that we began to see the impact of the internet and social media, for better and for worse on a story of this magnitude. tweets became the new public story of this magnitude. tweets became the new public service announcements. when photographs of the tsarnaev brothers were released and the public was asked fo

we were listening to bill bratton talking about his memory, of his dad taking him up at 5:30 to looke reenactment, driving 26 miles and having the honor of sitting next to his father at the finish line. and how the events of yesterday are going to change the way you look at boston's most special day for years to come. >> well, i was a kid reporter in 1976. i think mike barnicle might have run in this one, but it was 100 degrees, i remember dog day afternoon was playing at the theater on boylston street when they came down the finish line and a run for the hose is what we called that one. i was in the globe car with a wa wa walkie-talkie. >> barnicle, you never ran a marathon, did you? >> dan is right, 1976 was the hottest marathon on record. i nearly expired. >> thank you, dan. >> with you in the flat bed truck trying to get jack craig. >> that's exactly right. >> the visual image is just fantastic. thank you very much. the boston globe's dan shaughnessy. thank you for coming on the show. >>> in less than three hours from now, the fbi is set to hold a news conference with the latest

. >>> bill bratton is the former police commissioner in new york and served in los angeles as well.good morning. >> i know this strikes close to home for you. when you talk about securing an event like the boston march than, open air, outside event with thousands of spectators and runners, what kind of sweep do you think would have taken place prior to this? >> well, there's a multifocus, there's the intelligence analysis that is going on all the time to see if there's any chatter, any discussion on a number of these channels about the event. at the same time there's the physical security component of it, the bomb dogs, the physical barriers that are put up, all the various planning that goes into pulling off an event like this, the crowd control, emergency responders, response if necessary. certainly in yesterday's event the boston marathon event the response to that event was instantaneous, it was the result of a lot of the training and emergency preparedness that's gone into american cities over the last 10 to 12 years since 9/11 but as has been clearly indicated you cannot preve

john miller, bill bratton back with us as well as gayle king and scott pelley.name, we know a little bit about them. where the father is, is the father alive, where the mother is, the siblings, all those kinds of questions. >> well, those things are coming out slowly but surely over time. looks like the associated press has found the father in russia. he told them that, of course, he couldn't imagine his boys being involved in anything like this. and he also told the associated press that he thought that one of his sons was a second-year medical student in boston, and as best we can tell, neither of these young men has ever been enrolled in medical school. who knows what they were telling their father. >> we heard from an uncle who describ described him as a loser. we're trying to figure out if these two are acting on their own or if they're tied to a larger group. how do you begin to make that connection? what needs to happen? >> basically, they are going to map out these guys' entire lives, every contact, every friend, every bank account, every check, every cr

bill bratton is boston's former police commissioner. >> reporter: i can guarantee, within a few minutes of the event in boston yesterday, brittish police services were on the phone to their colleagues in the united states. and have probably been in constant touch since, trying to identify, is there any potential relationship between the events in boston yesterday and the upcoming events here in britain over the next week? >> reporter: even if there is no hard evidence that london's events are directly threatened, police will take the risk of copycat attacks very seriously. as for the runners, few have been put off. >> i mean, i think we just carry on in, regardless. >> reporter: my had you been serunning sunday, says one tweet. he's worried it will be canceled. i'm worried it will go ahead. but go ahead, it will. while the attacks in boston dominate britain's front pages today, authorities say the marathon and the funeral will take place as planned. elizabeth palmer, london. >> the marathon passes through major landmarks. >>> a gruesome case, a philadelphia abortion doctor is on trial,

bill bratton is the great commissioner. thank you for coming back tonight. i don't know if you've accumulated any more evidence except for as the horror that an 8-year-old was killed and also the two people dead, we have new numbers on the wounded. over 100. 107, according to "the globe." they are at every one of the hospitals at the boston area. their patients are the people who came from that scene right now. >> like michael, i'm an evidence guy and after 40 years of covering these types of events, the first story is never the last story. you will appreciate this story has changed quite a bit over the last several hours. what we clearly know is that there were two separate devices, a horrific number of devices and injuries. two deaths being reported. there will be a phenomenal investigative effort made to quickly identify who did this. as michael indicated, as of now, nobody is claiming credit. and they will eventually do that, though. they will come out of the woodwork and claim credit for it. >> what do you make of this trash can thing? you're far from t

former police commissioner bill bratton reportedly cited as many as 50 people injured. again, in the chaos that is ensuing, it's difficult to get a real number, but as you can see, people being taken from the scene in wheelchairs and on stretchers. we are also getting the first pictures showing the destruction. you can actually see part of the grandstand apparently destroyed. people injured on the ground. now, this is an area in boston with a train line running right underneath. it's unclear if this could be an explosion from under the ground or above the ground, but if you've been watching us, you probably just heard reports that at least part of the subway system there is shut down. the boston bomb squad is on the scene along with fire, police and medical responders. obviously the boston marathon, a huge event. 27,000 runners. half a million spectators lining the race route each year. president obama has been notified. he has directed his administration to provide whatever assistance is necessary. again, i think it's important to stress we don't know the cause of this

let's go to bill bratton, of boston. what do you think of the steps now the police have to follow and the fbi to get to the source of this horror? >> well, as your previous reporter just referenced, there was a huge crime scene there that they have now secured. and that's to allow them to conduct their investigation. try to make a determination of what type of explosive device or devices were used. that, so there's a, if you will, a prescribed procedure they'll now be going through and they'll be utilizing the full resources of not only the washington state police and massachusetts but all the various federal agencies that are now responding there. >> do you have -- is there any difference in how you approach this if you have an assumption it's domestic or foreign? or do you go the same police route of looking for evidence? >> no, actually in terms of you start off with the assumption you know nothing and basically start going from there and try to acquire as much information as you can. the federal agencies will be incr

bill bratton has been there before as a top cop in boston, then new york, then los angeles, he knows the same as the first story, and it's very difficult to control. you really have to work very hard at it. >> reporter: in boston last week the story was moving fast, the information even faster. sometimes incorrect. a report that the suspects had robbed a 7-eleven store, not true. >> suv. state police, suv. >> reporter: a report over police radio that the suspects had stolen a state police suv. not true. >> shotted fired. stolen suv from the state police. >> stolen suv from the state police. >> reporter: because of it one state police suv was fired on by other officers. luckily no one was hurt. but the origin of that story is still a mystery. >> when the story is moving very quickly, what's the most useful question. >> the most useful question is where did this come from? where is the source? because you're making life and death decisions based on that information. >> reporter: in watertown police also believed the suspect had a self-inflicted gunshot wound and shot at police from thi

. >>> and speaking to nbc last night, former boston police chief bill bratton said one of the remarkable things about the explosion is they occurred in the highest security portion of the race. >> most of the security would be focused on the finish line area where the bombing occurred. that bombing occurred within 25 yards of the actual finish line. the bleachers, the finish line, so the terrible irony is that it occurred in the most secure portion of that 26-mile race. >> for more, we're now going to hear from james boris, director of security studies. thanks very much for calling in. look, what additional measures might we now expect at events like these? because this is the first time, at least in memory, that a marathon in particular has been targeted. >> well, whoever is responsible for this kind of attack clearly wanted the kind of media coverage that they got. so maybe we'll have some different kinds of media coverage. maybe the cameras won't be fix odd one particular point of the race so much that guarantees them this kind of coverage. >> well, the trouble, as know, if anything,

he was on the plane with bill bratton. >> so you get back and you go we need to do something immediately bieber. police searched his tour bus in sweden this week and found drugs on board. no one was inside the bus at the time. lee cowan looks at the pop star's recent problems. is it typical teenage behavior or something more serious? ♪ >> reporter: justin bieber has guarded enough bad press lately to fill one of those stadiums he himself is filling on his european tour. but on thursday that tour came to a brief halt when his tour bus was raided by swedish police. >> they went and searched the bus, actually and found a small amount of drugs and a stun gun. >> reporter: so far no charges have been filed. bieber's management says it's all a nonstory and bieber himself took to twitter. "where do people even get this stuff?" he wrote. "whatever. back to the music." ♪ when the music makes you move ♪ >> reporter: drugs on a rock band's tour bus, hardly a headline. it is, however, when it comes on the heels of so many other performances bieber's been making off stage. it was just a few months ba

. >> bill: this city was a disgrace at one point. and giuliani came in with brattonnd they cleaned it up. but in new orleans. >> they never clean it up. >> new orleans, the problem is that the police are considered corrupt. there is no relationship between. >> bill: fire them and get other people. >> i totally agree. that's why the feds are there police are operating under consent decree under the department of justice. now debating consent decree on the prisons. you have to remember the central focus here is that the murder rate, the gun violence. why don't they have stop and frisk? why don't they have aggressive policing? why don't they have really conscientious. >> i guess the folks in louisiana aren't demanding it. >> you have to have responsibility. this sheriff, that's his jail. >> not indicted. he should certainly be rejected by the people of new orleans. >> dysfunctional city big sleazy. >> one minute there is a civil lawsuit going on filed by michael jackson's mother and his three children against the promoting company that was working with jackson when he d