FBI to release calls by shooter at club

Transcripts to be redacted, AG says

U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch addresses reporters following a meeting with Alaska Native leaders Friday, June 10, 2016, in Anchorage, Alaska.
U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch addresses reporters following a meeting with Alaska Native leaders Friday, June 10, 2016, in Anchorage, Alaska.

ORLANDO, Fla. -- U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said Sunday that the FBI will release redacted transcripts today of the phone calls between the gunman within the Pulse gay nightclub and Orlando police.

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AP

Seven-year-old Mekiha Thomas of Orlando, Fla., signs one of the 49 crosses at a makeshift memorial outside Orlando Regional Medical Center on Sunday. The crosses were erected by an Illinois man to honor each of the victims in the Pulse shooting.

"It's been our goal to get as much information about this investigation into the public domain as possible," Lynch said on CNN's State of the Union. "So people can understand, as we do, possibly what motivated this killer, what led him to this place and also provide us with more information."

Meanwhile, Orlando residents paused throughout the day -- at a bar in the early morning hours, at morning church services and at an evening candlelight vigil in the heart of downtown -- to remember the victims of the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history, exactly a week later.

"We are hurting. We are exhausted, confused, and there is so much grief," said Larry Watchorn, a ministerial intern, during a sermon at Joy Metropolitan Community Church in Orlando, whose congregants are predominantly gay. "We come to have our tears wiped away and our strength renewed."

Lynch said in interviews Sunday on several news shows that the FBI would release a partial, printed transcript of the conversations between gunman Omar Mateen and Orlando police negotiators. Armed with a semi-automatic weapon, Mateen went on a rampage at the club June 12 that left 49 people dead and 53 others seriously hurt. Mateen died in a hail of police gunfire after police stormed the venue.

She said on CNN that the transcripts will show when Mateen pledged allegiance to the Islamic State militant group, how he explained his reasoning for the attack and what he mentioned more broadly about U.S. foreign policy while holed up in a gay nightclub for at least three hours. FBI Director James Comey said Mateen had three phone calls with Orlando police during the attack.

Lynch said on CNN that the transcripts will be redacted "to avoid re-victimizing those people that went through this horror. But it will contain the substance of his conversations."

She told ABC's This Week that the top goal -- while intensifying pressure on the Islamic State -- is to build a complete profile of Mateen in order to help prevent another massacre like Orlando.

"As you can see from this investigation, we are going back and learning everything we can about this killer, about his contacts, people who may have known him or seen him. And we're trying to build that profile so that we can move forward," Lynch said.

She said the Justice Department is also looking into what could have been done differently to prevent the Orlando massacre. The FBI said Mateen was on its watch lists in years prior to the massacre but was later removed.

"You know, this is an ongoing investigation," she said. "We are going back and scrubbing every contact we had with this killer."

Lynch largely avoided discussing political divisions on terrorism, guns and gay rights. She did say that she supports Democrats' version of a bill to ban people on various terrorist watch lists from buying guns. The Senate is expected to vote tonight on two versions of the legislation, with the Democrats' proposal being more strict than the Republican version. It's not clear whether either bill has enough support to get through the Senate or the House of Representatives.

Lynch said she would be traveling to Orlando on Tuesday to meet with investigators.

Speaking to CBS' Face The Nation, she said that a key goal of the investigation was to determine why Mateen targeted the gay community. The victims were predominantly gay and Hispanic since it was "Latin night" at Pulse.

49 crosses

At the Parliament House, a gay club and resort near downtown Orlando, the music stopped as patrons paused for a moment of silence at 2 a.m., the time Mateen started shooting at Pulse just a few miles away.

Megan Currie, a Joy Metropolitan Community Church member, said during a Sunday morning sermon that Mateen's attack was an effort to put fear in the gay community.

"This was a hate crime and this happened because someone was homophobic," Currie said.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott described the attack as "devastating" while praying at the First Baptist Church of Orlando. He said the gunman targeted "two very vulnerable populations."

"But here is the positive out of it ... people have come together," Scott said. "There are so many people who have done so many wonderful acts."

An estimated 50,000 people came together in central Florida, holding up candles around a lake in the heart of downtown Orlando as the names were recited of each of the 49 shooting victims.

People chanted "We remember them!" Sunday night after the names were recited at Lake Eola Park.

The candles held by participants created a ring of fire around the lake.

At the end of the candlelight vigil, attendees chanted "One Orlando," "Orlando United" and "Somos Orlando," Spanish for "We are Orlando."

Earlier in the vigil, people cheered and took photos as a rainbow appeared over the park. Several people held signs offering free hugs.

Around the city, people left balloons, flowers, pictures and posters at a makeshift memorial in front of the city's new performing arts center and at Orlando Regional Medical Center where 49 white crosses were emblazoned with red hearts and the names of the victims.

The crosses were built by a Chicago carpenter with a history of constructing crosses for victims of mass shootings. Greg Zanis drove from Illinois to Orlando last week and installed the crosses at the medical center, where many of the 53 shooting victims who survived were taken for treatment.

He said Sunday that the crosses are a message for people of all faiths: "Quit judging and start loving."

Dozens of people waited several hours at Realm Tattoos to get one of the recently drawn "One Pulse" tattoos etched into their skin. The tattoos are free, but people are encouraged to leave a donation for the victims, which will be distributed by Southern Nights, another Orlando nightclub.

"We love to tattoo. This is what we live for. Come in, show your love," said Jonathan Betancourt, 36, the shop's owner. "You always got to pay it forward. This is my way to pay it forward."

On the other side of the country, hundreds of protesters chanted "love conquers hate" outside a Northern California church where last week a pastor said during his sermon that he was upset more people weren't killed in the Orlando attack.

More than 500 demonstrators held rainbow flags and signs that read "We are Orlando" and "Pride Over Prejudice" outside the Verity Baptist Church in Sacramento, Calif., to protest the sermon by pastor Roger Jimenez. He told his congregation on June 12 that he wished more people had been killed, calling the victims "sodomites" and "pedophiles." The sermon drew attention when it was uploaded to YouTube.

Protesters said they are also angry that the church is tax-exempt, chanting "Tax the hate."

Information for this article was contributed by Mike Schneider, Terrance Harris, Jason Dearen and Alex Sanz of The Associated Press; by Nicholas Fandos of The New York Times; by Miles Weiss and Ben Brody of Bloomberg News; and by Amber Phillips of The Washington Post.

A Section on 06/20/2016

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