Latest / DEEP INSIGHT / NYC incendiary device attack - Ex-FBI agent reacts to details

Transcript

NYC incendiary device attack - Ex-FBI agent reacts to details · DEEP INSIGHT

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Today, just before nine am, a man by the name
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: of Andrew Arabaca a A BA C arrived at twenty
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: six Federal Plaza just behind us on Worth Street at
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: the employee entrance to the building where he ignited gasoline.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: He poured gasoline onto the ground it ignited it with
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: a lighter and an insidiary device. That device was a firework,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: a large firework and a canister that proceeded to catch
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: on fire, pretty big flame as you've seen on the internet.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: He then pulled out an air soft rifle and fired
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: five to seven pellets, if you will, in the direction
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: of twenty six Federal Plaza at that time, Federal Protective Services,
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: two officers a gray suit, a contractor with ally that
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: is employed to guard this building. And those three people
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: and the two officers standing behind me in the blue
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: shirts are the officers that intervened and took mister Arabaka
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: into custody. Well, he had him on the ground and
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: FBI agent jumped in and they put handcuffs on him
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: and took him in the building. He is currently in
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: custody and he has been interviewed. Arabaka is a former
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: United States Army soldier. He was enlisted for approximately four years,
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: serving from two thousand and one to two thousand and five.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: He was a repairman or a mechanic on Patriot missile systems.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: He is forty three years old. There were injuries and
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: this three people were injured minor injuries, one civilian and
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: two government employees. Right now, our Evidence Response Team is
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: out working with NYPD in our New York Joint Terrorism
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: Task Force to collect evidence to conduct interviews. We have
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: located a vehicle of mister Arabaca's. We have seized that vehicle.
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: We are procuring or obtaining a search warrant. Mister Arabaka
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: came to armed with bad attentions. I will say that
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: twenty six Federal Plaza has long been a target of
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: extremists of terrorists, and today the extremism was brought here.
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: The abuilding was attacked. Mister Arabaka was looking to injure
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: people and harm people. He had two axes, a hammer,
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: a machete, and three knives fixed blade knives. He had,
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: as I said earlier, six incendiary devices or fireworks, and
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: he had some other destructive items. He had a cart
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: he had anti ice literature on it. When he was
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: being arrested. He yelled derogatory terms to Ice, used bad words.
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: Obviously, it pretty much gets the type of person we
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: kind of expected. It was going to be somebody who
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: had extremely strong views, strong and enough to where he
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: would commit violent acts on it, and that he had
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: literature that would explain it. I've seen reports of the
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: manifesto and things like that, and those are just it
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: almost becomes just the same type of pattern each time, Steve.
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: Notably from Commissioner Jessica Titch, she said that charges had
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: yet to be filed, that news on that was soon
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: to be coming forward. What would you anticipate are some
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: of the charges this individual might face.
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: He'll probably face domestic terrorism charges if he I mean,
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: he's a resident of Poughkeepsie, And domestic terrorism is not
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: so much on where it happens. It's the focus of
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: the terrorism itself. So that terror would be or the
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: violence would be againgainst a domestic agency, a US government agency.
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: So I would see the Terrorism Task Force charging him
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: with domestic terrorism plus possible use of weapons of mass destruction,
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: not because they're nuclear, but because more than one person
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: can get killed by a fire. So those would be
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: the first things, assault on federal officers. They could really
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: wind this one up.
• 4:33
  Speaker 4: Well, questions do you have about the path that led
• 4:38
  Speaker 4: him here to this alleged extreme act. He is accused
• 4:43
  Speaker 4: of doing something that is really quite horrific here, and
• 4:47
  Speaker 4: yet learning of his background, I just wonder what you
• 4:50
  Speaker 4: think of sort of the path. They say he's a veteran.
• 4:54
  Speaker 4: He was elicted for four years from two thousand and
• 4:56
  Speaker 4: one to two thousand and five. Obviously key year after
• 5:00
  Speaker 4: nine to eleven, a repairman on Patriot missile systems.
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, that would you know. We're always trying to
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: balance individual freedoms with protection in society. It seems like
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: there were indicators in his life that should have that
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: could have tipped somebody off to his problems. I would
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: love to see what his record was in the military.
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: There is a point at which somebody who would join
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: the military after presumably after nine to eleven, somebody with
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: that mindset is going to turn rapidly at some point,
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: and whether it's an experience, a loss, whatever, we kind
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: of want to find out when that was and how
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: that was missed.
• 5:55
  Speaker 5: One thing that is notable is that if you look
• 5:57
  Speaker 5: at some of the items that this person brought to
• 6:00
  Speaker 5: this location. While they are they can be inherently dangerous.
• 6:04
  Speaker 5: We're not talking about someone, at least in my view
• 6:06
  Speaker 5: as we've been gathering reporting and then listening to officials,
• 6:09
  Speaker 5: that was simply trying to cause some type of indiscriminate
• 6:12
  Speaker 5: mass injury or loss of life. We're talking about airsoft guns.
• 6:16
  Speaker 5: Those are pellet guns. Law enforcement source told me that
• 6:20
  Speaker 5: actually had flammable liquid as well as fireworks that were there.
• 6:24
  Speaker 5: And so bottom line, this appears to be some type
• 6:27
  Speaker 5: of violent public political statement rather than just the indiscriminate
• 6:31
  Speaker 5: harm or killing of people outside. Again, that's not the
• 6:33
  Speaker 5: downplay it. We're talking about very dangerous bill there. But
• 6:37
  Speaker 5: that is notable whenever we first talk about emotive, because
• 6:40
  Speaker 5: there are other options available for someone, particularly in this country,
• 6:44
  Speaker 5: with the access to firearms, if their goal is just
• 6:47
  Speaker 5: to cause mass harm. And so again they're going to
• 6:49
  Speaker 5: try to identify what this person's past was. Authorities had
• 6:53
  Speaker 5: said that he had made some type of anti immigration,
• 6:56
  Speaker 5: anti ice enforcement messaging in the past, that they're with him,
• 7:00
  Speaker 5: and so it appears that as far as a question
• 7:03
  Speaker 5: of the motive, there isn't one here. And then again
• 7:06
  Speaker 5: looking to charges. Obviously, you have an attack on a
• 7:09
  Speaker 5: federal building that in self is a charge, the injury
• 7:12
  Speaker 5: of a federal employee, we might expect assault on federal
• 7:15
  Speaker 5: officer charges as well, injuring the bystander that is there.
• 7:18
  Speaker 5: This person is facing very serious criminal penalties. But you know,
• 7:22
  Speaker 5: although they have them in custody, thankfully no one was
• 7:25
  Speaker 5: killed here. They will try to obviously glean as much
• 7:27
  Speaker 5: as they can, and then the big question was this
• 7:29
  Speaker 5: something that this person had telegraphed ahead of time? Final
• 7:32
  Speaker 5: point all note is based on our sourcing law enforcement
• 7:35
  Speaker 5: sources I've talked to as well as some of our colleagues.
• 7:37
  Speaker 5: They are investigating whether mental health was a factor here,
• 7:41
  Speaker 5: which is obviously always a factor, and as we say
• 7:44
  Speaker 5: every single time when that comes up, that obviously means
• 7:47
  Speaker 5: that not everyone out there who faces mental health issues
• 7:50
  Speaker 5: will become violent. Almost none of them do that, we
• 7:52
  Speaker 5: have to note. But authorities are looking into whether that
• 7:55
  Speaker 5: was a factor here, which is notable when you look
• 7:58
  Speaker 5: at this manifesto and then the material that this person
• 8:01
  Speaker 5: brought in the action that took place, and then we
• 8:04
  Speaker 5: can see on one of the videos finally that it
• 8:06
  Speaker 5: didn't appear that there was some great escape plan that
• 8:08
  Speaker 5: this person had. You could see the fencing there that's
• 8:10
  Speaker 5: along twenty six fed from one of the videos you
• 8:13
  Speaker 5: actually see him almost running right towards an officer that
• 8:16
  Speaker 5: eventually arrested him as this all went down, so thankfully
• 8:20
  Speaker 5: again no one killed, but a lot of investigative work
• 8:23
  Speaker 5: ahead as authorities try to answer all the penning questions
• 8:26
  Speaker 5: that they might have