DYLANN ROOF

Roof was convicted in 2016 of killing nine in a racist attack on a South Carolina church's Black congregation.

Roof shot participants at a 2015 Bible study session at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina. A panel of appellate judges had previously upheld his conviction and death sentence.

WASHINGTON — (AP) — The Supreme Court has rejected an appeal from Dylann Roof, who challenged his death sentence and conviction in the 2015 racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation. Roof had asked the court to decide how to handle disputes over mental illness-related evidence between capital defendants and their attorneys. Roof shot participants at a Bible study session at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina. A panel of appellate judges had previously upheld his conviction and death sentence. Roof, 28, is on federal death row at a maximum-security prison in Terre Haute, Indiana.

The Supreme Court has rejected an appeal from Dylann Roof, who challenged his death sentence and conviction in the 2015 racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation.

Baynard Woods should be familiar to readers of Orlando Weekly for his political column "Democracy in Crisis," which launched at the beginning of 2017 and...

The recent surge of mass shootings in America has led to debates in faith communities over what is “pro-life.”.

Returning to an old debate after the horrific killings in Uvalde, Texas.

The suspects in the shootings at a Uvalde, Texas, elementary school and a Buffalo, New York, supermarket were both just 18 when authorities say they bought the weapons used in the attacks.

The suspects in the shootings at a Uvalde, Texas, elementary school and a Buffalo, New York, supermarket were both just 18 when authorities say they bought the weapons used in the attacks.

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Authorities say a gunman was motivated by political hatred against Taiwan when he chained shut the doors of a California church and hid firebombs before shooting at a gathering of mainly of elderly Taiwanese parishioners.

The shooting at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, is the latest example of something that's been part of U.S. history since the beginning: targeted racial violence.

The history of racial violence in the U.S. is the backdrop as President Joe Biden signs the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act into law.

The history of racial violence in the U.S. is the backdrop as President Joe Biden is expected to sign the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act into law.

Attorneys for convicted Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to decide how to handle disagreements over mental illness-related evidence between capital defendants and their attorneys, an issue that has played a role throughout his case over the 2015 racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation. When a capital defendant who has been ruled competent to stand trial and his attorneys “disagree on whether to present mitigating evidence depicting him as mentally ill, who gets the final say?” Roof's appellate team wrote in their petition, filed late last month with the high court. Roof's self-representation and desire to block any evidence potentially portraying him as mentally ill — even if it could have helped him avoid the death penalty — has been a constant part of his case.

States and the federal government carried out 11 executions this year.

The 14 settlements equate to a total of $88 million.

Charleston Church Shooting Bakari Sellers, the attorney for the families of victims killed in the 2015 Mother Emanuel AME Church massacre, speaks with reporters outside the Justice Department, in Washington, Thursday, Oct. 28, 2021. Months before the June 17, 2015 church shooting, Roof was arrested on Feb. 28 by Columbia, South Carolina police on the drug possession charge. But a series of clerical errors and missteps allowed Roof to buy the handgun he later used in the massacre. After trying the separate West Columbia Police Department and being told it was the wrong agency, the examiner did nothing more. Authorities have said Roof opened fire during the Bible study at the church, raining down dozens of bullets on those assembled.

Lawsuit settlement Bakari Sellers, the attorney for the families of victims killed in the 2015 Mother Emanuel AME Church massacre, speaks with reporters outside the Justice Department, in Washington, Thursday, Oct. 28, 2021. (AP Photo/Cliff Owen) (Cliff Owen/AP)The families of the victims and survivors of the 2015 Charleston church massacre have reached an $88 million settlement with the Justice Department. >> Read more trending newsThe settlement is the largest individual civil rights settlement in the country’s history, WSOC reported. The settlement will be split among the survivors of the shooting and the families of those killed. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond affirmed Roof's conviction and sentence in the shootings at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston.

A neo-Nazi group member has been sentenced to nine years in prison in a case that highlighted a broader federal crackdown on far-right extremists.

An $88 million deal includes $63 million for the families of the slain and $25 million for survivors.

Survivors and families who lost loved ones in the June 2015 attack said the FBI's negligence allowed Dylann Roof to buy the gun he used in the attack.

A botched FBI background check enabled Dylann Roof to buy the gun he used to kill nine people and injure three.

Charleston Church Shooting FILE - In this June 19, 2015 file photo, police tape surrounds the parking lot behind the AME Emanuel Church as FBI forensic experts work the crime scene, in Charleston, S.C. Families of nine victims killed in a racist attack at the church have reached a settlement with the Justice Department over a faulty background check that allowed Dylann Roof to purchase the gun he used in the 2015 massacre. “We’ve given a big ‘F you’ to white supremacy and racism,” Sellers told AP. Months before the June 17, 2015 church shooting, Roof was arrested on Feb. 28 by Columbia, South Carolina police on the drug possession charge. Authorities have said Roof opened fire during the Bible study at the church, raining down dozens of bullets on those assembled.

Families of nine victims killed in a racist attack at a Black South Carolina church have reached a settlement with the Justice Department over a faulty background check that allowed Dylann Roof to purchase the gun he used in the 2015 massacre.

Dylann Roof wants the entire appellate court that recused itself from hearing his case to reconsider that decision.

Dylann Roof wants an entire appellate court to reconsider a decision to recuse itself from hearing his case, as the appeal of his death sentence and conviction in the 2015 racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation winds its way through the judicial system. Last week, Roof's attorneys made that request of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, writing that the judges who opted to sit out his case should reinstate themselves to consider his petition for a new hearing before the court. Without that move, or changing a court rule prohibiting judges visiting from other circuits from considering such requests, Roof's lawyers wrote, "no judges exist to consider" his rehearing petition, depriving him of “a critical level of appellate review.”

The group, which included three others who were injured, had welcomed him into their Bible study session 45 minutes earlier. “Dylann Roof murdered African Americans at their church, during their Bible-study and worship. “This is actually a medically defined term that multiple experts said applied to him,” Mirchandani said in court. His sentence made him the first person to be ordered executed for a federal hate crime, according to The Associated Press. Roof’s attorneys are expected to appeal Wednesday’s ruling to the Supreme Court, The Washington Post reported.

"His crimes qualify him for the harshest penalty that a just society can impose," an appeals panel wrote in its ruling.

Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond affirmed Roof's conviction and sentence in the shootings at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond rejected arguments that Roof should have been ruled incompetent to stand trial in the shootings at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston. In 2017, Roof became the first person in the U.S. sentenced to death for a federal hate crime. Roof's lawyers said his convictions and death sentence should be vacated or his case should be sent back to court for a “proper competency evaluation." If unsuccessful in his direct appeal, Roof could file what’s known as a 2255 appeal, or a request that the trial court review the constitutionality of his conviction and sentence.

Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond affirmed Roof's conviction and sentence in the shootings at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond rejected arguments that Roof should have been ruled incompetent to stand trial in the shootings at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston. In 2017, Roof became the first person in the U.S. sentenced to death for a federal hate crime. Roof's lawyers said his convictions and death sentence should be vacated or his case should be sent back to court for a “proper competency evaluation." If unsuccessful in his direct appeal, Roof could file what’s known as a 2255 appeal, or a request that the trial court review the constitutionality of his conviction and sentence.

Charleston Church Shooting FILE - In this April 10, 2017, file photo, Dylann Roof enters the court room at the Charleston County Judicial Center to enter his guilty plea on murder charges in Charleston, S.C. A federal appeals court on Wednesday, Aug. 25, 2021, upheld Roof's conviction and sentence on federal death row for the 2015 racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond affirmed Roof's conviction and sentence in the shootings at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston. (Grace Beahm/The Post And Courier via AP, Pool, File) (Grace Beahm)RICHMOND, Va. — (AP) — A federal appeals court on Wednesday upheld the conviction and sentence of a man on federal death row for the 2015 racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond affirmed Dylann Roof's conviction and sentence in the shootings at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston. In 2017, Roof became the first person in the U.S. sentenced to death for a federal hate crime.

RICHMOND, Va. — (AP) — A federal appeals court on Wednesday upheld the conviction and sentence of a man on federal death row for the 2015 racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond affirmed Dylann Roof's conviction and sentence in the shootings at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston. In 2017, Roof became the first person in the U.S. sentenced to death for a federal hate crime. Authorities have said Roof opened fire during the closing prayer of a Bible study at the church, raining down dozens of bullets on those assembled. Following his federal trial, Roof was given nine consecutive life sentences after pleading guilty in 2017 to state murder charges, leaving him to await execution in a federal prison and sparing his victims and their families the burden of a second trial.

A federal appeals court has upheld the conviction and death sentence of a man on federal death row for the racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation.

The judges who upheld Dylann Roof’s death penalty for the hate crime murders of nine African-Americans at a Charleston church said “his crimes qualify him for the harshest penalty a just society can impose.”

Activists widely expected Joe Biden to take swift action against the death penalty as the first sitting president to oppose capital punishment, but the White House has been mostly silent.

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Attorneys for Dylann Roof, the South Carolina man sentenced to death for killing nine people at a historically Black church in Charleston, asked an appeals court on Tuesday to overturn his conviction and sentence. Roof's death sentence could pose a challenge for the Biden administration. Roof received his death sentence after jurors returned guilty verdicts on 33 federal charges, CNN reported. “Is every neo-Nazi incompetent to stand trial?” the judge asked Roof’s attorneys. Given no reason to do otherwise, jurors sentenced Roof to death.

The S.C. Supreme Court heard arguments on Tuesday over the constitutionality of the Heritage Act, a 2000 law that was last debated in 2015 when lawmakers pulled the Confederate flag down from the State House grounds.

Possible hate crime charges are being investigated after the white driver struck the two pedestrians, who are Black, police say.

Inmates on federal death row tell The Associated Press that a leading topic of conversation through airducts they use to communicate is whether President Joe Biden will keep a campaign pledge to halt federal executions. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy, File)CHICAGO – On federal death row, prisoners fling notes on a string under each other’s cell doors and converse through interconnected air ducts. Everyone on federal death row was convicted of killing someone, their victims often suffering brutal, painful deaths. Some 40% of federal death row inmates are Black, compared with about 13% of the U.S. population. In December, 70% of the death row inmates had COVID-19, some possibly infected via air ducts through which they communicate.

Action to stop scheduling new executions could take immediate pressure off Biden from opponents of the death penalty. But they want him to go much further, from bulldozing the federal death chamber in Terre Haute, Indiana, to striking the death penalty from U.S. statutes entirely. In the 22 states that have struck the death penalty from their statutes, none succeeded in passing the required laws without bipartisan support. Q: WILL BIDEN GET PUSHBACK IF HE SEEKS TO END THE FEDERAL DEATH PENALTY? Biden may also feel an obligation to do something big on the death penalty, given his past support for it.

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. In Americas oldest city, a debate over history is looming, as residents and elected officials join the anguished reckoning over race that is now gripping much of the country. Over the years, the plaza has become home to public monuments, including the Confederate memorial. The Confederate memorial has been the subject of hand-wringing before, especially after a young white supremacist, Dylann Roof, opened fire on African American churchgoers in South Carolina three years ago. In the aftermath of that violence, there was talk of moving the memorial but city leaders declined. One of the plaques notes how Confederate imagery has been used as symbols of resistance to civil rights.

He also left behind pictures of himself holding the gun used in the killings, posing at historic Civil War and African American sites and holding the Confederate flag. Outraged political leaders came together and overwhelmingly voted to take down a Confederate flag that flew near a monument to Confederate soldiers on the Statehouse lawn. The law protects all historical monuments and names of buildings, requiring a two-thirds vote from the state General Assembly to make any changes. The president of the University of South Carolina wants lawmakers to let the school remove the name of J. Marion Sims from a women's dorm. The time has come to take down the monuments that honor the evil that was done in the name of Charleston, in the name of South Carolina," Rivers said Tuesday at the foot of Calhoun's statue.

(Reuters) - Dylann Roof, the white supremacist who killed nine black people at a South Carolina church in 2015, has appealed his conviction and death sentence, with lawyers arguing he was too mentally ill to stand trial or represent himself at sentencing. A jury found Roof guilty of 33 federal charges, including hate crimes resulting in death, for the shocking mass shooting at the landmark Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston in June 2015. Roof dismissed his defense attorneys just before trial and represented himself during jury selection. The 2008 decision Indiana v. Edwards allows judges to force a lawyer on defendants who lack mental capacity, they said. (This story corrects stages at which Roof represented himself)

(Reuters) - Dylann Roof, the white supremacist who killed nine black people at a South Carolina church in 2015, has appealed his conviction and death sentence, with lawyers arguing the mentally ill defendant never should have been allowed to represent himself at trial. REUTERS/Grace Beahm/PoolThis Court should vacate Roofs convictions and death sentence, says his appeal, filed with the 4th U.S. After the trial judge, U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel, allowed Roof to represent himself, the defendant elected not to present any evidence. The 2008 decision Indiana v. Edwards allows judges to force a lawyer on defendants who lack mental capacity, they said. The choice is not all or nothing, the lawyers said, citing the 2018 ruling in McCoy v. Louisiana.

The appellate attorneys also said Roof's trial lawyers told the judge that in their decades of experience, "none had represented a defendant so disconnected from reality." After he was arrested, Roof told FBI agents that he wanted the shootings to bring back segregation or perhaps start a race war. During a separate proceeding in state court, Roof was given nine life sentences in exchange for his guilty plea. They said the state quickly brought capital charges against Roof's "wholly-intrastate crime," but months later, federal prosecutors sought their own death sentence. "This Court should vacate Roof's convictions and death sentence," they wrote.

(Reuters) - A 16-year-old high school student was arrested on suspicion of planning to attack black people at a predominantly African-American church in the southeastern U.S. state of Georgia, police said on Tuesday. The youth, who police did not identify, was charged with criminal attempt to commit murder and sent to a youth detention center in Georgia. Gainesville Police Department officials said the investigation indicated that the teenager was targeting the church based on the racial demographic of its members. A 2015 attack on a church in Charleston does appear to have played some type of role in this, the New York Times quoted a police officer, Sergeant Kevin Holbrook, as saying. The Georgia teen had assembled a collection of butcher knives and other straight-edged weapons and she had visited the church once when no one was present, the Times reported.

Police say a 16-year-old white girl was motivated by racism when she allegedly plotted to attack a historically black church in Gainesville, Georgia. "Our investigation indicated the church was targeted by the juvenile because of the racial demographic of the church members," Parrish said in a statement. Pastor Michelle Rizer-Pool told the publication the girl visited her church last Wednesday, but no events were scheduled that night. White supremacist Dylann Roof fatally shot nine black church members during their Bible study lesson at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, during the summer of 2015. More recently, the white son of a sheriff's deputy was arrested in April and accused of setting fires that destroyed three black churches in rural Louisiana.

Randall Hill - Pool/Getty Images(CNN) - The families of the nine people slaughtered in a South Carolina church in 2015 can sue the US government for negligence, an appeals court has ruled. The US Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a lower court's ruling that protected the government from liability under two federal laws. Roof had been arrested on a drug charge that would have blocked the gun sale had it been properly reported during the background check, the court found. Victims' families sued, alleging the government was negligent in its background check. If it had been performed properly, "no one disputes" it would have kept him from buying the gun, the appeals court wrote.

A trial date has been set for Dylann Roof, the suspected shooter in the Mother Emmanuel church massacre that left nine bible study attendees dead. CBSN's David Begnaud reports.

FBI Director James Comey says that South Carolina church shooting suspect Dylann Roof should not have been able to purchase the gun he allegedly used to kill nine people at the Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston

Dashcam video shows the arrest of Dylann Roof, the alleged gunman in the South Carolina church massacre. CBS News correspondent Jeff Pegues explains how Roof was found and apprehended.

Police have released dash cam video that captures Dylann Roof's arrest, as well as the 911 call that tipped off law enforcement to the mass shooting suspect's location. CBSN's Anne-Marie Green has more.

Investigators say so far there's no reason to believe that other individuals were involved in the church massacre carried out by Dylann Roof. CBS News correspondent Jeff Pegues reports on the investigation.

John Dickerson remarks on the forgiveness that victims’ families offered alleged murderer Dylann Roof and why that’s proof hate cannot destroy faith.

The latest on the investigation into alleged murderer Dylann Roof’s manifesto and a look at the services taking place today at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston

A website surfaced Saturday which appeared to offer new insights about alleged Charleston church gunman Dylann Roof. As Jeff Pegues reports, the online document included a racist manifesto and disturbing photos of the 21-year-old suspect.

A website surfaced Saturday which appeared to offer new insights about alleged Charleston church gunman Dylann Roof. As Jeff Pegues reports, the online document included a racist manifesto and disturbing photos of the 21-year-old suspect; New York Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez notched his 3,000th hit Friday night -- but the fan who caught it might not give it back. Steve Hartman interviewed Zach Hample a few years back and found out he plays hardball.

Caleb Brown and Dylann Roof were good friends from grade school until high school. Brown only knew his childhood friend to be a happy, normal kid, so he was shocked to hear what Roof had allegedly done. Vinita Nair reports.

Thousands turned out for a multi-faith prayer vigil to mourn the nine people killed in South Carolina’s church massacre. As the state and residents struggle to cope in the aftermath, accused killer Dylann Roof was arraigned on several charges, including nine counts of murder. CBS News correspondent Jeff Pegues reports from Charleston, South Carolina with the latest on this story.

Relatives of the victims killed in the Charleston church shooting spoke to the suspect, Dylann Roof, at his bond hearing Friday. They expressed their pain; and some said they forgave him.

Suspected gunman Dylann Roof is expected to appear in a South Carolina courtroom Friday to be charged with murder in connection with the Charleston church shooting. CBS News legal expert Rikki Klieman discusses Roof's potential court defense.

Dylann Roof, 21, is in police custody after police say he fatally shot nine people inside a South Carolina church on Wednesday night. CBS News correspondent Jeff Pegues details the sequence of events from the shooting to Roof's arrest.