The young white man accused of shooting dead nine black parishioners and injuring three others at a church in South Carolina has been ruled mentally competent to stand trial in one of America’s highest-profile hate crime cases.

Dylann Roof, 22, faces the death penalty for a deadly assault in the historic Mother Emanuel AME church during an evening Bible study class in June 2015. Jury selection is to commence on Monday. Lawyers for Roof had questioned whether he was mentally fit to stand trial, leading to a two-day closed door hearing that ultimately delayed the case for two weeks.

On Friday, following sealed evidence from a court-appointed psychiatrist who interviewed the accused murderer in prison, Richard Gergel, a federal judge, said in a sealed judgement that Roof was competent to stand trial.

Dylann Roof, in a 2015 handout booking photo. Photograph: Handout/Reuters

The ruling means that two trials of crimes that were major flashpoints in discussions about racism and race relations in the US will be held concurrently in the same city. The trial of the former North Charleston police officer Michael Slager, who is accused of murdering 50-year-old African American Walter Scott, continues into its third week on Monday.

Slager, who is white, has pleaded not guilty to the alleged murder in April 2015 despite video evidence showing the officer opened fired on Scott as he ran away unarmed.

Roof had indicated he was willing to enter a guilty plea in exchange for serving life in prison, but prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for the 33 federal charges, which include nine counts of hate crimes resulting in death and nine counts of murder. Roof is also charged with nine counts of murder by state prosecutors who are also seeking the death penalty in a trial due to begin in January 2017.

The federal indictment accuses Roof of wanting “to increase racial tensions across the nation” by attacking the church and seeking “retribution for perceived wrongs he believed African Americans had committed against white people”.

The murders led to an outpouring of grief across the country and compelled South Carolina governor Nikki Haley to remove the Confederate battle flag from the state house grounds. Photographs posted on a website depicted the 22 year-old holding the flag and a pistol he is alleged to have used to carry out the murders.

The nine congregants Roof is accused of murdering ranged in age from 26-year-old Tywanza Sanders to 87-year-old Susie Jackson, and also included 41-year-old Clementa Pinckney, the church’s pastor and a South Carolina state senator.



Some relatives of those killed during the massacre were frustrated by the delay to the start of the trial. Sharon Risher, who lost her mother, Ethel Lance, in the shooting, told the Charleston Post and Courier that waiting for the judgment on Roof’s competency over the Thanksgiving period had been particularly difficult.

“I have been on edge ever since it was deemed necessary for another competency hearing,” Risher said. “It was like waiting for a bomb to drop. For me it was very difficult.”

“I’m glad we can move forward and justice can prevail.”