Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Terrorist kills 11 worshipers in Pittsburgh synagogue: What can prevent these attacks?

Episode Date: October 29, 2018

The murders of 11 worshipers at a Pittsburgh synagogue is the most deadly antisemitic attack in USA history. Nancy Grace visits with Jon Pushinski, a member of Dor Hadash congregation that was meetin...g in the Tree of Life synagogue when Robert Bowers allegedly launch his shooting rampage. Others on the panel include Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate & Extremism, forensics expert Joseph Scott Morgan,  psycho analyst Dr. Bethany Marshall, terror expert Bruce Alexander, and reporter Art Harris. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 This is an iHeart Podcast. something that matters. And what matters the most? Protecting your child. What do you love the most in the world? Your children. I do. And I will do anything to protect my twins. Go to crimestopshere.com. It is a five-part series with action information that you can use to change your life and protect your child's life. Payment starting at $6.99. Give that as a gift, not another onesie or a plastic toy. Give them something that matters. Find out how to protect your child out and about at the mall, at the store, at the grocery store, in the parking lot, at home. Find out about protection regarding babysitters and daycare, even online cyber security. Oh yes, my children are online
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Starting point is 00:01:55 For those of you watching with young children in the room, you may want to ask them to leave right now. There has been a shooting at a synagogue. At least one caller sounded like they may have been shot. They had agonal breathing. Several calls of persons sheltering in place within the structure. I got one alive. Three back in one right now. Still alive.
Starting point is 00:02:19 We have at least four down in the atrium. DOA at this time. Working the problem. Tall white male, short hair, light blue shirt, jeans. I'm going in. The chilling words of the synagogue shooting suspect posted online, online before this evil man opens fire with an AR-15 on a child, an infant's naming ceremony, yelling,
Starting point is 00:02:50 all Jews must die, killing 11, injuring six, including four police officers, while the victims are praying. Here in America, this evil hate crime has happened. Can you even imagine? I was thinking back to Sunday morning when I was sitting there with John David and Lucy and my 87-year-old mother and my husband praying. I was thinking about my dad, as a matter of fact. in that moment of silence, can you imagine gunshots breaking out? I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. We are live and taking your calls in the aftermath.
Starting point is 00:03:37 The most deadly worship shooting in recent history. Listen. Moments ago, police reporting there are multiple casualties with three officers shot. The suspect is in custody. This all happening at the Tree of Life Synagogue in the area of Wilkins and Shady Avenues in Pittsburgh's Squirrel Hill neighborhood. Multiple law enforcement agencies now responding. Police are telling people in that area to avoid the area. They are also telling people who live in that neighborhood to stay in their houses and lock their doors, saying it is not safe to be out. You're hearing from our friends at ABC. Joining me right now is a very special guest. In addition
Starting point is 00:04:14 to Emmy Award-winning investigative reporter Art Harris, Brian Levin, Joe Scott Morgan, Dr. Bethany Marshall, Bruce Alexander, joining me right now, is a member of the congregation. His wife scheduled to be there that morning, but something occurred for her not to attend. His friends were victims. Joining me right now, John Pashinsky. John, thank you for being with us. Tell me what happened that morning. It's a morning my wife normally would have attended service. She goes almost every Saturday
Starting point is 00:04:50 morning. We had a chore to run, and so she did not go. And we got in the car to drive to run our chore. And she was driving. I received text, actually from one of our close Muslim friends, asking if we were okay. I read the message to my wife and said, what's he talking about? So I called him, and he told us what was happening, and he had contacted us to make sure we were okay. Moments later, I got a text from a close friend in Israel asking if we were all right. So they knew in Israel before my wife and I knew. At that point, we decided to abandon our tour and we tried to drive to the synagogue, even though we were told it was still an active shooting scene. We did not want to abandon their synagogue
Starting point is 00:05:47 in its time of need of course we were stopped at the police lines and we parked the car and actually tried to hike in but uh we came again onto police lines and we're stopped from going forward very close friends were in there one One of our close friends was killed, and another is seriously injured. What was, Mr. Pashinsky, the service that was going on? Was it a breast? The building is very large, and there are three different congregations that meet and use that building. So our congregation was going to hold its regular Saturday morning service. But one of the other congregations was holding a bris, which is the ritual circumcision ceremony for a baby boy on the eighth day of life.
Starting point is 00:06:40 Mr. Pashinsky, when you arrived, what did you observe? There were police lines about two blocks away. All the roads were blocked off, and they had police at each road turning people away and directing traffic around the area. What have you been told, Mr. Pashinsky, regarding what the victims, the ones that lived, observed, noticed, what happened inside the synagogue. One of our congregants did escape. He heard the, he was inside already. He heard the gunshots and was able to run out. He then stopped other
Starting point is 00:07:21 congregants who were arriving to attend the service from going into the building, but they were in the parking lot already. Our Jewish Community Center opened its doors Saturday and set up a gathering place for each of the three congregations, and we went there to be with some of the members from our synagogue, including the wife of our friend who, it turned out, was killed, and she was waiting there to hear word from the authorities. Of course, we were all very concerned because he was one of the people who were unaccounted for. And that in and by itself was a very dire news for us since we were able to ascertain who was safe. And so when there was someone we couldn't account for, that was very bad news. The gunman who opened fire on a Pittsburgh synagogue this Saturday morning murdered 11 people, injuring others. We now know him to be
Starting point is 00:08:34 46-year-old Robert Bowers, a longtime anti-Semite who often complained on social media about the, quote, infestation of Jews, to my longtime friend, Emmy Award-winning reporter Art Harris. Art, it hurts me to even repeat those words. And sometimes after one hate attack after the next, after the next, after the next on Jews. I don't understand it. I don't understand the hatred or where it came from. Everyone described him as a ghost, that he lived alone in this called Gab, his hatred just gushed out until it exploded that morning outside the synagogue. After he had seen apparently a video about the caravan of immigrants coming towards America and a Jewish group that welcomed people like that into the country and resettled them. He exploded, went to the synagogue with his gun.
Starting point is 00:09:45 He had 21 guns, Nancy, registered legally in his name. He had an AR-15 Colt rifle, and he had three Glocks, and he busted into the synagogue in the middle of the most sacred day of the week as people were getting ready. They were praying. There were some people in the kitchen getting food ready for another service. And he began opening fire with just gunning down whoever was in front of him. People were hiding in the closet, holding their breath.
Starting point is 00:10:18 This was a test of courage and endurance for those inside, Nancy. And as you hear about some of the individual acts of endurance, there was one man who was afraid his phone might be blinking red, and he was just praying the guy didn't have a flashlight. He opened the door to that room and couldn't see in, and he left. Another person was hiding in the closet. And the police finally busted in after the 911 call we've just heard, SWAT teams rushing to the gunfire, as they're now trained to do in an active shooter situation. And they engaged him on the third floor. By then, he had killed 11 people. And he got into a gun battle with the police. Three were injured. And one of the SWAT officers heard him say he wanted, quote, all Jews to die. 75-year-old Joyce Feinberg of Oakland, 65-year-old Richard Gottfried of Ross Township, 97-year-old Rose Malinger of Squirrel Hill,
Starting point is 00:11:17 66-year-old Jerry Rabinowitz of Edgewood, 59-year-old Cecil Rosenthal of Squirrel Hill, 54-year-old David Rosenthal. David and Cecil Rosenthal were brothers. 84-year-old Bernice Simon of Wilkinsburg, 86-year-old Sylvan Simon of Wilkinsburg. Bernice and Sylvan were husband and wife. 71-year-old Daniel Stein of Squirrel Hill. 88-year-old Melvin Wax of Squirrel Hill. And 69-year-old Irving Youngner of Mount Washington. You are hearing the names of those murdered gunned down at worship as they were praying on Saturday. With me, Bruce Alexander, terror expert, Art Harris,
Starting point is 00:12:06 investigative reporter, Dr. Bethany Marshall, psychoanalyst, Joseph Scott Morgan, forensics expert, Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism, and John Pashinsky, a member there at the congregation whose wife was scheduled to be there that morning. His friends were shooting victims. Mr. Pashinsky, again, thank you for being with us. Since this has happened, how has it affected your wife? We're all devastated. Of course, she's so relieved that she's here. Our children and their families who live in Philadelphia, actually, as soon as they heard the news, packed their cars and drove to Pittsburgh. So they've been with us. She talks already about experiencing some degree of survivor guilt because she felt that she should have been there or would have
Starting point is 00:13:08 been there. And everyone who survived has to ask or is asking themselves, why them and not me? And would things have been different if I had been there? So we've had a lot of discussions around those issues. Our congregation is a very tight-knit congregation. We met yesterday at local church. It was kind enough to give us space to meet for the first time together as a congregation. We expected on such short notice, maybe 50 to 60 people would show up. My guess is that we had between 300 and 350 people there. So the congregation is, of course, devastated. The man who was killed, Jerry Rabinowitz, and their congregant who was seriously injured were very active members. And so this hits us very hard. And of course, now we have to start planning on how we move forward. I want to follow up on something you said about your wife and feeling
Starting point is 00:14:25 guilt because she survived and was not there for the shooting. You know, Dr. Bethany Marshall is with me, a renowned psychoanalyst joining us from LA. The issue of survivor guilt, but also a false sense of complacency, Dr. Bethany, because I was just thinking back on this Sunday morning, you know, I need a lot of work, Dr. Bethany. And so I make sure that I have the twins front and center every Sunday morning to help me in my project called self-improvement. And I was just thinking about this past Sunday about how there were good smells coming out of the church kitchen and everything was toasty inside and chilly outside. And all of our church friends gathered together early in the morning. And that feeling, you feel like everything is okay.
Starting point is 00:15:20 And to have that ripped apart in this manner by this man. as a matter of fact, listen to this, Bethany. Alleged synagogue shooter Robert Bowers grew up in this area, attending a local high school. In recent years, leaving an unremarkable impression on his neighbors. Quiet, though not unfriendly, they say. A truck driver who kept odd hours a stark contrast to what we know about him tonight. I saw his photo and I said, that's my neighbor. Neighbors say Bowers offered no hints about the bloodshed he's accused of unleashing. Kerry Owens was his next door neighbor for the past two years.
Starting point is 00:15:55 How upsetting is it to know that you live next door to the guy who's being charged with this? It's very upsetting knowing that someone that had that much hate was on the other side of my wall. Officials suggested a possible motive in the horrific attack. There's no indication that he's working with anyone else. And so we have charged it and are treating it as a hate crime, but continue to investigate. Dr. Bethany, even his neighbors were lulled into a sense of security and complacency. Well, we all have to have a sense of false safety to get through our day. Otherwise, we would all be anxious and panicky as we go to school and as
Starting point is 00:16:29 we go to our jobs. But, you know, I'm not so sure synagogues or churches are such a safe place. My dad is a Baptist minister, and I grew up in the church. And my experience is that congregants of a church or a synagogue are essentially a very good, loving group of people, and that attracts a lot of envy and a lot of hatred, despite what your religious persuasion is. And I'll tell you what I mean. These mass murderers are envious. They have a grudge to hold against society. They feel that everybody's against them. One of the ways to look at it is that the mass murderer is an injustice collector who spends a great deal of time feeling resentful about real or imagined rejections and ruminating
Starting point is 00:17:21 on past humiliations. He has a paranoid worldview with chronic feelings of social persecution, envy, and grudge holding. He's tormented by the beliefs that privileged others are enjoying life, all-you-can-eat buffet, while he must peer through the window, an outside loner, always looking in. Dr. Bethany, just stop for a moment, because you're actually giving me
Starting point is 00:17:47 chills on my arms thinking of this. I mean, it's all I can do to raise the twins and work all day, work into the night. And I don't even think about what other people may or may not be doing. I'm just trying to keep the bus in the middle of the road. But, you know, are you hearing what she is saying? To Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism, is that striking a chord with you regarding these hate crimes? Absolutely. One of the things we know about symbolic violent perpetrators is they come in three types, and there's a combination.
Starting point is 00:18:30 The first is ideologically motivated. Second is psychologically dangerous, and that's across a spectrum that goes from sociopath to some kind of instability, even to cognitive impairment. And the third is personal benefit or revenge. It goes right on what we've heard from our prior guests. And with respect to hate crime offenders, my friends Jack Levin and Jack McDevitt, two of the best academics in this business, they came up with a typology. And the first is a thrill offender.
Starting point is 00:19:03 That's a young person often acting in a group. They're seeking peer validation and some kind of in-group identity. So the out-group that they're attacking doesn't really matter that much as long as they're an out-group, because it's for some kind of in-group bonding. The second type is a retaliatory or defensive offender. That person might be responding to a terror attack or might be responding to a change in neighborhood demographics with a new family moving in. And the third type is the mission offender. And unlike the others who have a switch turned on, which then has the negative stereotypes bubble to the top.
Starting point is 00:19:48 You have to have that switch turned on first, either the thrill or the defensive or fearful response. The mission offender, like the one we saw in Pittsburgh, the hardcore neo-Nazi, those folks, the switch is always turned on, and they represent the smallest cadre of hate crime offenders. But when they do act, they're the most violent, and they tend to take up about 30 to 50 percent of the rather narrow sliver of hate crime homicides that we see every year. Do you know another parent or a soon-to-be parent and expecting mom or dad? Please don't give them another onesie or another toy that you know is going to end up in the garage or at the Goodwill. Give them something that matters. And what matters the most?
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Starting point is 00:21:53 Crimestopshere.com. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. The calls started coming in around 40 minutes ago that there was an active shooter. We were told that there were multiple possibly injured and that there was a shooter who was shooting outside of the front of the building towards officers. We heard them yell for officers to get back. We heard the officers yelling to use their vehicles as a shield in order to retreat back to Murray Avenue for them to be in a safe area. You are hearing our friend at KDKA-TV Pittsburgh, Megan Schiller, reporting on one of the worst shootings ever in a place of worship that has just gone down, killing 11, many others wounded.
Starting point is 00:22:43 As these people were praying praying they were gunned down i'm nancy grace this is crime stories thank you for being with us but what do we know was there a warning what can we glean from learning about the shooter listen authorities raided bauer's apartment in the southern pittsburgh suburbs sweeping for any signs of explosives. Bowers' social media activity also will be heavily scrutinized. He used the social media site Gab.com and in one post, uploading a picture of three handguns. It's unclear if they are the same guns used Saturday. Bowers also visited this home in a nearby community so often, some thought he lived here and say he kept to himself.
Starting point is 00:23:22 It's sickening. It really is sickening. He'd come out and smoke and that would be about it. There was no highs, no buys. You are hearing from our friends at NBC. That was Ron Mott reporting. What do we know about him? We know that he claimed the lies of 11 over pure hatred, hatred of the Jewish community, hatred of Jews, screaming out all Jews must die before he unleashed a hail of bullets. To Bruce Alexander, terror expert, joining us with a career in counterterrorism, intelligence, security, homeland security for over 30 years.
Starting point is 00:23:56 Also from the executive protection details of several cabinet members. Bruce, thank you for being with us. What do you make of the current suggestion that armed guards be at the synagogue? to strike back with or protect ourselves with. The reason why I say that that, unfortunately, is a limited answer is that, look, identifying these particular threats and preventing them from occurring is the desired course of action. The armed guard is a great reactionary tool, and that means you're confronting and you're stopping this at the doors of the synagogue. The challenge there is this. Today, it's one gunman, but what do you do when you have a Columbine type of situation
Starting point is 00:24:49 where you've got a pair of gunmen who come in and attack the synagogue or another soft target? The reality is that while there may be a place for armed security there, we need layers of protection, defense in depth that seeks to identify the threats far out, harden the target, meaning the synagogue, at the doors, and then internally we've got policies and procedures that all of them work in concert. Relying on a lone armed security officer, assuming they're trained to the standards to counter an active shooter, means you've also got a single point of failure there that a determined aggressor could overcome. So it may be part of the debate. It may be part of the solution. But it's not the only solution. To John Pashinsky, joining me, a member of the congregation that was under a deadly attack.
Starting point is 00:25:38 His wife, scheduled to be there that morning, but as fate would have it, she did not attend. Their friends were victims of the synagogue shooting johnny would be very difficult for me to have armed guards posted at our place of worship i appreciate the good intentions but that would be i i i don't know what to think how's the congregation responding to that? Well, we haven't discussed it yet, and I cannot speak for the congregation, but personally, having armed guards as a routine matter at a place of worship is anathema for the goal of what occurs inside our synagogues, our mosques, and our churches. Those are places of peace.
Starting point is 00:26:48 And to say that people can only engage in the peaceful activity of communing with their God in the way that they choose has to be under armed guard is a very poor statement about the condition of this country. What we need to do is figure out a way to ratchet down the type of rhetoric and the environment that makes people like this gunman feel empowered and able to go to do these activities we have to start teaching tolerance not hate or most of us do that but it has to be more of a societal thing we have to stop the killing and the mental attitude that creates an us versus them mentality well you know what? I agree with you completely, but I wonder, is that possible? I mean, murder and hatred goes all the way back to Cain and Abel and for absolutely no reason. There doesn't have to be a reason. And Art Harris, investigative reporter, you and I have been together in so many murder trials. We know that very often we say, why, why, why did this happen?
Starting point is 00:27:48 A lot of times there's not a why. Hold on, Art. Quick question to Joseph Scott Morgan, professor of forensics, Jacksonville State University, and author of Blood Beneath My Feet on Amazon. Joe Scott, right now, what is the purpose of the forensic collection of evidence? I mean, I know this guy is going to go to trial, but there are eyewitnesses. There are his posts on Gab.com, which is a whole other can of worms, Bethany. But there's overwhelming evidence.
Starting point is 00:28:17 So what are they doing right now, Joe Scott? They're going over the scene with a fine-tooth comb, documenting his movements. We can do that relative to, say, for instance, the disbursement of spent ammunition, those concentrations of those areas. They're also reconstructing the actual shooting itself, the dynamics of the shooting, the trajectories of the bullets. And at the end of the day, Nancy, the reason we spend so much time at the scene, working scenes, even though this guy has been caught, the threat at this moment, Tom, has been negated.
Starting point is 00:28:49 He is going to go to trial. We can't pick and choose those cases which we will and will not do thoroughly. We have to cover everything because no telling what kind of questions will come up in the event that this thing is going to go to trial. And I suspect that it will. Well, we know this. We know that there will be a trial. We know that it will probably be after a long period of time because it's going to be a complicated case forensically.
Starting point is 00:29:15 But what do we know about this guy? To Art Harris, Emmy Award-winning investigative reporter with CrimeOnline.com. Art, what do we know about him other than he talked incessantly on gab.com? I was thinking about gab.com when Dr. Bethany said he was a standout in his community or trying to be. Is that his community? And why do they allow the hate speech, number one, but more so, why didn't they report it? Nancy, this is not a Facebook or Twitter atmosphere. It is a website that was set up by defectors from that world so that people like white supremacists and others, a range of folks,
Starting point is 00:29:55 they don't discriminate, can say anything they want basically on this place. And so he felt that he was free to unleash his vitriol, his hatred, his venom, as many other in the white supremacy movement do online in their little enclaves around. And that was his place of expression. I was just getting ready for the day and I heard the gunfire. I heard what sounded like a semi-automatic weapon and I hollered down to Ken. He thought it might be construction.
Starting point is 00:30:22 But by the time I got downstairs and started to get my kids downstairs, there were already police officers on the scene and they were starting to draw their guns. And so I got everybody down into the basement. We heard five repetitive shots. I stepped on the porch. I heard three additional shots. And within minutes, police started to arrive. Police started to park in front of our house. They were shielding themselves with their car. So we realized the situation was pretty serious. You are hearing from the neighbors there near the congregation where 11 lost their lives in the last day because of hatred.
Starting point is 00:30:56 Straight out to Dr. Bethany Marshall, renowned psychoanalyst out of L.A. Weigh in, Dr. Bethany. Well, this guy had very poor social relationships you know I've been watching all the coverage and wow Bethany you really know how to put perfume on a pig poor personal relationships he was a nut that lived in isolation and was completely consumed with hatred his pretend friends were online on gab.com that I guess would respond to his hatred that he spewed about Jews you're absolutely right Nancy
Starting point is 00:31:32 I I guess where I was going with this is that people keep connecting this to the politics in our country and politics aside there's an individual psychology that leads to this kind of crime and there's nobody to blame but him and maybe have been exacerbated by hatred in our country. But this guy was a loner. He was envious. He had this perceived sense of injustice. He had a pathological chip on his shoulder. I wouldn't be surprised if we learned that he was rejected socially in many areas of his life other than on this stupid gab platform. Perpetrators gather on these social media sites just like, you know, pedophiles gather on these sites. I mean, people with certain types of pathologies tend to cluster together.
Starting point is 00:32:20 And this gab site is somebody as a site that's going to to gather men with these types of pathologies. But this guy was envious. What more beautiful place is there than a church? People gathering to worship, enjoying each other. Everyone from a six-year-old baby, or I'm sorry, a six-day-old baby to a 97-year-old woman enjoying their relationships with each other and at the very very heart of it all he went in in some grandiose terroristic type of way to destroy that which he cannot have in his own life and it's love destroying the love that people have with each other he couldn't take it any took them
Starting point is 00:33:02 out today the Pittsburgh synagogue survivors are describing how a hero rabbi pushed them into a storage closet and saved their lives, turning out the lights so the government would not see them when he came stalking by, looking for more victims. It was Rabbi Jonathan Perlman who pushed four congregants into a closet when Bowers opened fire. He was leading the New Light congregation in the basement of the Tree of Life synagogue that day. The perp fatally opened the closet door, then went back into the room. What happened in those minutes they were hiding in the closet? Only they can tell us that, but we do know that Zach Weiss' father was inside the synagogue. My father was filling in, assisting the rabbi, doing various parts of
Starting point is 00:33:53 the service. He was under the weather, but both were present at the service. Just the first initial sound was described as a car crash, just a very loud noise, but there were a couple of congregants that investigated just to see if it was something else. Maybe a senior citizen had fallen, maybe a hard piece of equipment fell, so they went down. But the next multiple sounds were, they were unmistakable. And from there it was treated as an active shooter situation. And with the layout of the Tree of Life Orla Simcha congregation, there were actually three
Starting point is 00:34:22 synagogues that take up space. And there were actually three services simultaneously. There was not a bris as previously reported. There were three separate services that were going on at the exact same time. So from the Tree of Life aspect, since that's where my father is a member of, they were able to protect and go. Some of them were able to hide for cover. Some able or not or unable to do so they had just started to pray when they heard that crashing sound that zach weiss was describing to nbc they heard a crashing sound from upstairs they look out the door to see a body on the staircase we also know that the synagogue shooter due in court. Art Harris joining me. Why?
Starting point is 00:35:05 Why is he in court? This is the first time that we will see him and the charges were added. And I cannot imagine a defense. Joining me is John Pashinsky, a member of the congregation. Brian Levin, Joe Scott Morgan, Dr. Bethany Marshall, Art Harris, and Bruce Alexander. Bruce Alexander, I mean, I was speaking with john about stopping the hatred but the reality is hate is with us and people act on that hate i don't think we are ever it pains me to say it but the devil is here he is alive and working through people like this shooter and i don't think we're going to get rid of him
Starting point is 00:35:47 all we can do is fight him now i know that a lot of you on this panel are way too lofty and too much of an intellectual to admit there is a devil and there is evil but i'm putting it out there so you tell me bruce alexander you're the terror expert what are we going to do because I don't want to hear this again I don't want to know this happened again and see here's what we're going to do unfortunately the reality of it because I think you spoke to it evil exists and evil is going to exist and evil is going to continue to exist and in this in this lifetime for motives none of us can can understand the reality is is this first and foremost we must accept that these are the times that we live in doesn't
Starting point is 00:36:30 matter how we got here the source of that and you're absolutely right your previous comment very debatable how we got here but from the reality is we're here so what we have to do is learn to accept that we live in these particular times a sad indictment the best thing is learn to accept that we live in these particular times of sad indictment. The best thing from a security standpoint that we can accept in terms of addressing this situation is understanding that we're going to mitigate this. That's the desired outcome. one of these psychopaths, no matter what their ideology is, motive, whatever creatures are in their minds in the dark of the night, it's not going to be this guy, it's going to be another guy. I'm reminded of the similarities between this and the Birmingham bombing 40
Starting point is 00:37:18 years ago. No guns there, but a determined person, the attacker here, same bent ideology, used explosives here. So what we've got to do is understand we've got to mitigate this, but we've got to have a response. We don't have to accept this. There is a big difference. I'm not saying capitulate, but we have to understand that let's build a response, active response, that involves all the stakeholders here. Look, this is a larger problem than just what manifested here. We need to have all stakeholders, whether it's law enforcement, whether it's the FBI, whether it's the guests that you have on the show today, whether it's academic,
Starting point is 00:37:59 the psychological standpoint, the first responder, and of course, the community, the congregants that have to be involved in coming together with practical, workable solutions. Yeah, and to Brian, I hear you, Bruce. To Brian Levin, Director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism. Brian, I think the tolerance for hate talk, for hate speech that is waiting to bubble over. I mean, early Christians had to meet in secret or they would be killed. Jews to this day in parts of the world meet in secret. They had to hide during the world war. Is that what we're coming to? We have to have armed guards or we have to meet in secret to worship, Brian? I hope not, but, and well, well, I think that the on-guard answer is a bit simplistic. It may be part of a solution that includes many facets.
Starting point is 00:38:54 What we're learning in the last hours, prosecutors confirm they will seek the death penalty for the synagogue shooter. His court appearance happening, he's facing 29 counts. 22 of them carry the death penalty. Nothing will bring back these victims. Nancy Grace, Crime Stories, signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.

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