hey, there, i m victor blackwell. welcome to cnn newsroom. i m alisonyn camerota. top officials are mourning a dozen of their own but not clear if the deaths are caused by an attack, an accident or something else. 14 people were killed after a helicopter crashed near a kindergarten in the kyiv suburb. the dead are a crew, child and nine government officials and staff including the ukrainian interior minister. last year cnn reviewed the minister 42 years old a lawyer and politics trying to reform and engine on the ground. the leaders and held a moment of silence for the victims frederick pleitgen is there. are investors closer to solving this? one thing they don t believe. they say and possibly pilot and fall here in the area speaking them rescue crews, search crews are finishing up the clearing operations. most of the debris is cleared from the area now. they do say the fog was very heavy but a witness i spoke to said we saw the chopper coming in. it didn t look as tho
shootings at the homes of local democratic officials. solomon pena faces a slew of charges including conspiracy, attempted aggravated battery for the attempted attacks. he lost by a margin of more than 50%. police say he visited the homes of at least three of the officials before the shootings. some of those visits were caught on doorbell cameras. cnn s josh campbell joins us now. what do we expect at the hearing? reporter: this hearing is starting just minutes from now there in new mexico. this will be the suspects a first appearance in court since he was arrested by albuquerque s.w.a.t. officers on monday. look it a these charges. they re obviously very serious. he s been charged with felony possession of a firearm, aggravated attempt with a deadly weapon, as well as conspiracy. we ve reached out to pena s attorney, but what police allege he was the ringleader in this conspiracy to target democratic officials in new mexico, shooting at four homes. this came after pena a
out your politics or election denying or whatever it might be with acts of violence, shooting firearms into homes, is unacceptable. we re going to do everything we can to bring all the individuals involved, including mr. pena to justice. reporter: this hearing is about to get under way. we expect it to be brief, but one key thing we re watching is whether the judge in this case determines if the suspect is an ongoing threat to the public, if he is remanded without bond. thank you. thank you, josh campbell. joining us is one of the officials targeted by pena. this is debbie o malley. ch commissioner, thank you so much for being here. can you describe what happened that night? it was december 11th. it was the middle of the night. you and your husband were asleep in your home, and what happened? well, we heard loud banging. we both sat up at the same time.
you follow the court s investigation and he s becoming more aggressive in the manner and asking them to do activities that clearly put lives in danger. it s unacceptable at every level. it doesn t matter if they re democrats or republicans. we re going to do everything we can to bring all the individuals involved including mr. pena to justice. this is exactly what law enforcement has been warning about, there are people out there receiving these election lies, believing them, internalizing them and can prove to be dangerous. we reached out to an attorney for pena for comment. we are waiting for the court hearing to begin any minute now. we ll wait and see whether this judge determines this individual remains a threat to the public whether he is issued no bail but again, very serious charges here and a very serious case. the area there, obviously, new mexico troubled by elected leaders apparently target in a politically motivated attack. josh campbell with the