Thousands Attend Funeral for Slain Officer; Las Vegas Officer Recovering After Attack.
SCIUTTO: Welcome back. Tonight, police are searching for a motive after one of their own was shot and injured by a gunman. This attack taking place in Las Vegas. According to investigators, two officers were in their patrol car at a red light when the suspect approached and fired several rounds with a semiautomatic handgun hitting and injuring one of them. This was the second time in just three days that Las Vegas police officers had been shot in the line of duty. Nick Valencia is OUTFRONT.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shots fired.</s>NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A gunman ambushed his two Las Vegas police officers sitting in their mark cruiser at a stoplight. The attack leaving one officer injured, his partner able to chase down and arrest the suspect. In Fox Lake, Illinois, hundreds bid farewell to a fallen veteran police officer, shot and killed. The hunt for the suspects continues. A sheriff's deputy is laid to rest after being shot execution style 15 times while filling up his vehicle at a gas station near Houston, Texas. That's just in the last two weeks. This year, at least 24 officers across the country have been shot and killed in the line of duty. By comparison, as of this date last year, 36 officers had been shot and killed. According to the non-profit officer down memorial page. While the numbers are down, officers are feeling increasingly vulnerable says, CNN law enforcement analyst Cedric Alexander.</s>CEDRIC ALEXANDER, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: There's some real challenges out there in this country right now. It's a very tough time to be a police officer at this moment.</s>VALENCIA: Deaths at the hands of police like this shooting in San Antonio where the suspect appears to have his hands in the air and the death of Freddie Gray in Baltimore have led to the creation of groups like Black Lives Matter.</s>DERAY MCKESSON, BLACK LIVES MATTER ORGANIZER: The only charged rhetoric of the movement has been about, I'm holding officers accountable. It has been about fair police contracts and independent investigators and body cameras.</s>VALENCIA: Activists and organizer DeRay McKesson says, blaming the Black Lives Matter Movement is only misdirected anger.</s>MCKESSON: It has been specifically about ending violence.</s>VALENCIA: Even so, chants like this from a march last month in Minnesota --</s>BLACK LIVES MATTER DEMONSTRATOR: Pigs in a blanket, fry 'em like bacon.</s>VALENCIA: And ominous graffiti like this in Arkansas and Texas are putting more and more cops on edge.</s>SHERIFF RON HICKMAN, HARRIS COUNTY, TEXAS: We have heard black lives matter. All lives matter. Well, cops' lives matter, too. So, why don't we drop the qualifier and say lives matter?</s>VALENCIA: Many police departments across the country are changing their tactics going from one police officer in a patrol car to two, even still cops everywhere are feeling the risk. And while the rhetoric from the Black Lives Matter movement may not be to blame for the recent wave in police killings, certainly, cops across the country are starting to notice the current climate -- Jim.</s>JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: Nick Valencia in Atlanta. OUTFRONT, CNN political commentator Van Jones, and in New York, former NYPD officer Bill Stanton. Bill, I wonder if I could start with you. Two Las Vegas officers shot in just the past week, two, in fact, in three days. You have other shootings in the line of duty in Texas and Illinois. We have heard from police officers. You heard it there in Nick's piece, police do feel under assault. In your view, do they have the right to feel -- do they have the data to feel they are a target?</s>BILL STANTON, FORMER NYPD OFFICER: Not only is there data, but they are watching with their eyes and they're listening with their ears. Pigs in a blanket don't shoot. There's a growing culture of anarchy and violence, hate crimes towards cops. So, yes, all law enforcement personnel need to be a little bit more careful.</s>SCIUTTO: Van, I want to ask you, because you saw this anti- police chant in Minnesota. You see graffiti in Arkansas. We also know there's a lot of emotion here after cases of Michael brown and others. But you do see groups that seem to be justifying, even instigating violence against police. And I wonder if you see that as well. Is that a danger?</s>STANTON: Are you speaking to me?</s>SCIUTTO: I'm speaking to Van, I'm speaking to Van.</s>VAN JONES, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, first of all, any time anybody loses their life, whether it's a police officer or a young unarmed African-American or anyone else, the whole country should mourn. We do. But I think it's really unfortunate and ridiculous to say that people who are going around killing police officers have anything at all to do with these protests. First of all, numbers should matter. Statistics should matter. We actually have fewer police officers shot this year than last year.</s>SCIUTTO: Van, to be fair -- to be fair, I wasn't identifying the violence against police with Black Lives Matter. I was just showing that in this very emotional environment, you do have groups who are taking it a step further. They are talking about violence against cops.</s>JONES: What did you say?</s>STANTON: Isn't it interesting that you made that correlation?</s>JONES: Because you made it.</s>SCIUTTO: Bill, I will come back to you. I want to hear from you. Let Van answer.</s>JONES: Because we have an officer specializing now and just smearing this non-violent movement anytime he gets on the air. But my point is simply this. There is zero correlation between people who are speaking out saying they want less violence. You can be and this movement is against police murdering civilians and civilians murdering police. That is a consistent position. The problem that we have right now is that now numbers don't matter. We have fewer police officers being shot. Also, that one little segment of those protesters who said that despicable thing, there have been thousands of protesters where nothing like that was said. And so, I think we have to not smear the entire movement because of one tiny part of a march where people said something despicable. That's not representative of the movement for police reform.</s>SCIUTTO: Bill, I want to ask you, nationally you look at the numbers and the fact is despite this impression of danger, police deaths are down. They are down 16 percent from this time last year. Does that show you -- don't the numbers show -- you can argue the numbers show that those fears are on the statistics, that those fears are overblown.</s>STANTON: Yes, all right, Jim and Van, let's talk numbers, shall we? Yes, those numbers show a lower amount of police murdered. But never have I seen in many, many, many years where the public has -- there are certain fringe groups have a vitriol, a hate for cops where the whole -- we will go back to Ferguson. The whole "hands up, don't shoot" was actually based on a lie. We're seeing it in New York, in Chicago, in Texas, where cops aren't killed in the line of duty. Cops are killed by execution. That's what's changing the narrative here, at least from my optic.</s>SCIUTTO: Van, I want to give you a chance to respond. To be clear, it's not to tar the brush of the Black Lives Matter movement. It's to say, you know, are the emotions so raw right now that you do have this danger that that inspires some groups, granted, you know, at the extreme, to push back and feel that they -- to push back and call for violence against cops?</s>JONES: There may be some of that unfortunately in our country, we have had that for a long time. You can go back to Al Capone. You can go back to Bonnie and Clyde. You can go back to a lot of people, criminals, extremists who have targeted our police. And they are wrong for doing that. I want to be clear. To the extent there's emotion, it's not because of the marches. It's not because of the so-called rhetoric. It's because of the videotaped evidence of some of our police officers doing things that are shocking to people. I hope we're not saying that people should see shocking things on TV and not protest. You are saying we don't have the First Amendment right to petition for redress the grievances? I hope you are not going that far.</s>STANTON: No, Van, don't worry your hopes will not be fulfilled. I don't look -- if a cop does a bad shooting or does excessive force, guess what, in my opinion, he is not a cop. He's a criminal. He will be arrested. We have seen cases where there are bad shootings. And those cops are arrested and become criminals. So, if we're going to go to numbers -- I mean, the numbers of bad cops and bad shootings is below 1 percent. That's a big brush that people are painting when they say cops are bad. Cops every day go out, save lives, millions of contacts, no bad reports.</s>SCIUTTO: We're going to have to leave it there. I think what we do see -- there is common ground in this emotional issue. There's certainly common ground there. We will keep the conversation up. Bill Stanton, Van Jones, thank you for joining us tonight. And OUTFRONT next, neighbors described the people in this Atlanta home as a model family. So, why are two brothers accused of trying to it kill their parents and burn down their own house? And they were both raised by successful parents in the national spotlight. Ahead, our report on Ivanka Trump and Chelsea Clinton's unique friendship.