Dylann Storm Roof during a court appearance a year ago.
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A judge has set a November date for the federal trial of a man charged in the shooting deaths of nine black parishioners a year ago at Charleston’s Emanuel AME Church.
According to Gergel, jury qualification will begin November 7, and there could be 1,200 to 1,500 prospective jurors.
The anniversary of the shooting at the church, which is often called Mother Emanuel, is next week.
Prosecutor are seeking the death penalty in the trial. They said they expected the trial could take as long as six weeks.
Federal prosecutors announced in late May they would seek the death penalty against Roof following his indictment on 33 federal charges past year.
Roof faces numerous federal counts, including hate crimes, in the June 17 shootings at Emanuel AME Church. In addition to killing people due to their race, the indictment states, he attacked people who were exercising their religious beliefs.
The state solicitor who will prosecute a white man charged in the killings of nine black church members says the state is ready to go with its case whether it’s before or after the federal government. Roof “demonstrated a lack of remorse”, they argued in a filing, and targeted the church’s Bible study group to “magnify the societal impact” of the rampage.
Days after the massacre, authorities said they determined that Roof had posted a racist manifesto on his Web site, filled with racial stereotypes and diatribes against black, Jewish and Hispanic people. Roof had previously posed for photos with a rebel flag.
It remains unclear how Roof will ultimately plead in the federal case. Ninth Circuit Solicitor Scarlett Wilson is the lead prosecutor in the state cases for both Roof and former North Charleston police officer Michael Slager, who is scheduled to face trial October 31 for the shooting death of Walter Scott. A “not guilty” plea was entered by a judge at a hearing last summer.
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That’s about two months before Roof’s state death-penalty trial.
