Lawyers for the man accused of fatally shooting nine people at a Charleston, South Carolina, church are arguing that the death penalty is unconstitutional. Most notably, a federal judge in Vermont just recently finished a nine-day hearing over issues raised by Donald Fell’s lawyers about the constitutionality of the death penalty in the federal stystem. The public defenders want U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel yank the death penalty from the table and allow the federal case to proceed as a non-capital case. He is accused of killing nine black worshippers at a Bible study in the Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina.
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Lawyers for Dylann Roof filed a motion Monday asking the court to declare capital punishment a violation of the Fifth and Eighth Amendments.
Roof’s attorneys filed the motion stating that they would drop the challenge if prosecutors dropped their pursuit of the death sentence in his case.
While the law provides that all citizens have the opportunity to sit on juries, juries willing to impose the death penalty don’t represent a cross section of the community, the filing said.
According to Reuters, while Roof faces several federal charges, he is also facing charges of murder and attempted murder by state prosecutors in SC.
Roof, a white male who is now 22-years-old, was indicted on 33 counts of federal hate crimes and firearm charges last summer. “The results of jurors’ good-faith grappling with the law-arbitrary, biased, and erroneous death verdicts-are intolerable as a matter of due process and proportional punishment”.
The lawyers also point out that the practice of selecting a jury that requires “death qualification” can not be controlled for prejudice. Roof faces the death penalty on both state and federal murder charges.
CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCBD) – The defense team for admitted Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof claims the death penalty is unconstitutional, according to a court filing.
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The Department of Justice now has a moratorium on executions during a review of federal death penalty policy and, the Washington Post reported a year ago, does not have enough lethal injection drug to execute anyone. Why the complication? The challenge comes from the prosecution’s unwillingness to accept Roof’s guilty pleas and multiple life sentences without parole.
