Quantico Marine Base Shooting; Colorado Prison Chief Killing; Suspect Killed By Police; U.N. Launching Chemical Weapons Probe; Nearly 200 Air Traffic Towers Likely To Close; Communication Breakdown; Harvard Stuns New Mexico
ZORAIDA SAMBOLIN, CNN ANCHOR: We are beginning with breaking news this morning. A shooting at Quantico leaving three dead at the Virginia Marine Base including the suspected shooter who apparently took his own life after a standoff with police. It is believed all the dead are Marines. Shannon Travis is live from Quantico, Virginia, this morning. What is the latest here, Shannon?</s>SHANNON TRAVIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Zoraida. We're waiting for about an hour from now, at about 7:00 a.m. for Marine base officials to come out and brief us on what more they have learned. But here's what we have so far. The three that you mentioned, three dead, all believed to be Marines. Two of them, the shooter, and the first victim, believed to be male, and the second victim, gender unclear. Now here's what happened. About 11:00 last night, there was a dispatch put out, basically a 911, that there was a shooting on the base. It happened near the officer's candidate school. The dispatch went out and there was a public announcement made over the P.A. system basically on base telling everyone on base in their homes to stay in their homes, lock the doors, and the base was put on lockdown. From there, police officials began to look for this suspect. Basically apprehend the suspect. They learned that he had holed himself up, barricaded himself, in a barracks, which was obviously where the service members on base actually sleep, barricaded himself into a room. They tried to establish communications with the gunman. Unclear if the gunman was responsive, if they were able to establish those communications. But about two hours after the point where they got the call, the 911, that there was a shooting, and that they entered the room, there was about two hours later. Once they entered the room, Zoraida, more tragedy, the shooter dead of a self- -- apparently a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Another victim, in the room with the shooter, unclear how that person got in there, again, a lot of this is being investigated right now. Officials tell us that this is an active crime scene. One of the officials that we spoke with has a message, though, for anyone who's listening in the public.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just ask for everyone's prayers and thoughts for the families who are affected by this tragedy, and then we ask, also that you give us time to sort out the details and get you guys the accurate information that you guys want.</s>TRAVIS: Now, again, Zoraida, at about 7:00 a.m. we expect to hear some more information. We'll pose more questions to them. One question that we had to clear up, if there's any chance at all that there are any other victims that have yet to be found, officials tell us, no, that these victims, these casualties are limited to those three.</s>SAMBOLIN: I know, Shannon, that you have asked for more information on the shooter and perhaps a motive, as well and we don't have those details as of yet, right?</s>TRAVIS: Correct. We don't have those details as of yet. We hope to get them in this press conference that, as I mentioned, that we'll see at 7:00 a.m.</s>SAMBOLIN: All right, Shannon Travis reporting live for us. Appreciate it.</s>CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Police in Colorado are taking a, quote, "strong look" at whether a suspect shot debt by police in Texas is the same man wanted in the killing of Colorado's prison chief. The man was gunned down after a wild chase in a car that was similar to one seen leaving the Colorado home where Tom Clements was shot dead, as he answered his door. CNN correspondent Ed Lavandera joins us live now from Decatur, Texas. What's the latest on this, Ed?</s>ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, hundreds of miles away from where the director of the Colorado prison system was gunned down and killed at his front door, the focus is now on Texas. And specifically, the driver of a black Cadillac that ended -- that was killed after a wild high-speed chase yesterday afternoon.</s>LAVANDERA (voice-over): This is how a high speed chase across North Texas ended, a black Cadillac with two different Colorado license plates smashed by an 18-wheeler. But the crash didn't stop the driver from getting out of the car and firing away at law enforcement officers. He was shot and killed in the fire fight.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He wasn't planning on being taken alive. I mean, that's obvious that he was trying to hurt somebody and he was trying to hurt the police.</s>LAVANDERA: The chase started when a sheriff's deputy tried to pull the Cadillac over on a remote stretch of Texas highway. Deputy James Boyd was shot twice in the chest. But he was wearing a bulletproof vest, and is expected to survive. That triggered a long, high-speed chase.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He came by me. I was say going about 100 miles an hour. Had his left arm out the window and he was just shooting. He shot four times when he passed by my car parked in the median of the highway.</s>LAVANDERA: The "Denver Post" quoting federal and state officials reports the suspect is 28-year-old Evan Spencer Ebell, a parolee from the Denver area. The "Post" says Ebell is the focus of the investigation into the murder of Tom Clements, the director of Colorado's prison system. In a press release Thursday night, El Paso County investigators in Colorado did not deny the accuracy of the report but instead criticized the leak of the name by law enforcement sources.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I know there's a lot of rumors going around and people wanting to know if this is connected to the Colorado shooting of the director of the prison system. We don't know that it is or it's not.</s>LAVANDERA: And in another strange twist, Denver police investigators also say there's a strong connection between the driver of the Cadillac in Texas, and the murder of a 27-year-old pizza delivery driver last Sunday afternoon. Nathan Leon's body was found in a remote area outside of Denver. His family has struggled to figure out why anyone would want to kill a young father of three girls, who was delivering pizzas to earn extra money to support his family.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Since Sunday, we've just been a total wreck and just when you think you've cried your tears and you can't cry anymore, it's all you do.</s>LAVANDERA: So not one but two murders that Colorado investigators are now taking a much stronger look at, and trying to see, connect the dots possibly between those two murders. Colorado investigators from each of those different murder cases have flown down here to Texas and are meeting with the investigators that were involved in that high- speed chase yesterday. 'm told by local law enforcement officials here in Decatur, Texas, that there is evidence inside that black Cadillac that those investigators also be very interested in seeing -- Christine.</s>ROMANS: All right, Ed Lavandera in Texas. Thanks, Ed.</s>SAMBOLIN: New developments in the gun control debate this morning as well. The National Rifle Association says it will sue over the state's act, which strengthens the existing assault weapons ban in New York State. The NRA's New York affiliate claims the law was pushed through without committee hearings for public input. The new laws include a statewide gun registry, a uniform licensing standard and a seven-bullet limit in ammunition magazines. Vice President Joe Biden isn't throwing in the towel on the prospect of federal gun limits. Joined by Newtown families and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg yesterday he vowed to revive the battle to ban assault weapons. And he had a message for lawmakers, as well, including Senate Democrats who dropped the assault weapons portion of a gun regulation package. He said, quote, "Think about Newtown." Here's crime and justice correspondent, Joe Johns.</s>JOE JOHNS, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With a ban on so-called assault weapons all but dead in the senate, according to top Democrat Harry Reid, the vice president said he is not giving up.</s>JOE BIDEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I'm not going to rest, nor is the president, until we do all of these things, all of these things.</s>JOHNS: He told the family of a teacher killed protecting children in the Newtown, Connecticut, school shooting, that the country needs some political backbone.</s>BIDEN: You know, it's time for the political establishment to show the courage your daughter showed.</s>JOHNS: The father of a 6-year-old also killed at Newtown said shame on the Congress.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm really ashamed to see that Congress doesn't have the guts to stand up and make a change and put a ban on these types of weapons and universal background checks.</s>JOHNS: From New York's Mayor Bloomberg, a call for public pressure.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you want to make a difference, you've got to pick up the phone, call your congressperson.</s>JOHNS: But what happened was no surprise. Conservative Democrats in the Senate, up for re-election, risk riling up pro-gun forces in an election year if they vote for the ban. Democratic supporters like retiring Michigan Senator Carl Levin are frustrated. (on camera): Do you think it's worth just having a vote?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sure. I think it's important that people express their views and have a chance to vote those views and their people back home can judge whether they agree or disagree.</s>JOHNS: Bad for Democrats, though.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's not the politics that I want to get into. It's way beyond politics.</s>JOHNS: While the pressure from gun control advocates appears to be working, late Thursday Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid released a statement saying he wants to bring a gun safety bill to the floor after the upcoming recess including provisions on background checks. He said he also wants a vote on an assault weapons ban amendment. So there appears to be one last chance for the senate to vote on the ban after all. The NRA saying they've always expected there would be a vote on the ban, and they say they're prepared for a lot of pressure on senators to pass it. Joe Johns, CNN, Washington.</s>SAMBOLIN: Thanks to Joe, there. Later on "STARTING POINT," we'll talk with Aurora shooting survivor Steven Barton. He's been working with Newtown families in the wake of that massacre.</s>ROMANS: All right, the U.N. are ask being for unfettered access to Syria as it launches an investigation to find out whether chemical weapons were used in the country's bloody civil war. The Assad regime and rebel forces accuse each other of chemical warfare, but U.S. military officials tell CNN their intelligence suggests neither side has used those weapons.</s>SAMBOLIN: Nearly 200 air traffic control towers on the chopping block. Today, the ax will fall. The FAA is likely to announce that the vast majority of 189 are up for closing today. They will shut down. They're victims of the forced spending cuts. The towers to be closed handle low to moderate amounts of air traffic and use mostly contract workers.</s>ROMANS: An independent analysis of the blackout at this year's Super Bowl finds fault with both equipment and the lines of communication. The power was cut off to have the Mercedes-Benz Superdome causing a more than half hour delay in the game between the Baltimore Ravens and the San Francisco 49ers. A design defect in a recently installed relay device caused the power to trip, and then the utility had trouble reaching the manufacturer to solve the problem.</s>SAMBOLIN: So who had Harvard? The first full day of the NCAA tournament delivering the first big upset, 14 seed Harvard proving brains can beat brawn, pulling off a stunner in Salt Lake City by knocking off third seed New Mexico, 68-62. This happened last night. You know the Ivy League champs were dramatically undersized, but here size did not matter. The Crimson hitting three pointers all night captured their first tournament victory ever in just their third appearance at the dance. And a big scare for top seeded Gonzaga, the Bulldogs holding off southern to avoid becoming the first 1-seed in history to lose to a 16 seed. Check those brackets, folks. Other teams advancing, Louisville, Michigan State, Michigan, St. Louis, Marquette, Syracuse, Oregon, Memphis, Wichita, Arizona, Butler, California, Colorado State, And Virginia Commonwealth. And if you're competing against us on cnn.com, check this out. Who's in first place? John King!</s>ROMANS: What?</s>SAMBOLIN: Christine is second.</s>ROMANS: What?</s>SAMBOLIN: Berman is second to last. I love this. Where am I? I have no idea.</s>ROMANS: I'll get you, King. I will get you John King.</s>SAMBOLIN: Can somebody tell me where my bracket stands?</s>ROMANS: I love Berman is second to last.</s>SAMBOLIN: Count me down there. No, that is not good. I'm not going to say. I'm not -- I'm in the middle.</s>ROMANS: I did it just like I would pick stocks. I went through -- I don't know a lot about basketball. I analyzed these teams. One of my producers looked at the coach, the history. I picked them just like I would pick a stock portfolio.</s>SAMBOLIN: Let's see how you do. Maybe you're on to something.</s>ROMANS: Right now, President Obama wrapping up his mission to the Middle East and headed to his last stop as we speak. A live report coming up.