Charleston Shooter Found Guilty of 33 Counts, Sentenced to Death

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In June 2015, Dylann Roof entered the Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina and opened fire, killing nine black parishioners attending a Bible study there. He has since made it clear that this shooting was racially motivated.

There has never been any real question of his guilt, though there has been question of whether or not he could receive a fair trial, since there are very few people who have no opinion about the case.

Roof faced 33 charges in a federal trial, which recently concluded and found him guilty of every single count, including “hate crimes resulting in death and obstruction of exercise of religion resulting in death.”

Considering that Roof confessed and was apprehended without difficulty and with plenty of evidence against him, there was never a question in anyone’s mind as to whether or not he was guilty, and his trial was pretty much a foregone conclusion. The only way he wouldn’t have been found guilty was if he didn’t go to trial.

There was some concern about whether the trial would go forward. It was delayed several times because pamphlets appeared in parts of Charleston threatening violence against African Americans if Roof were to go to trial.

On January 3, Roof went back to court for the sentencing phase of the trial. After a week of testimony from the prosecution and from Roof, who was representing himself, the jury which found him guilty took less than three hours to deliberate before sentencing him to death.

Roof is now the 63rd person on federal death row. It will probably be years before he is put to death. The federal government has put executions on hold due to concerns about lethal injection drugs. Appeals could delay the execution even further.

Roof faces a second state trial next year, which also carries the potential for the death penalty. That trial has not yet been scheduled.