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Charleston church shooting

Coordinates: 32°47′14″N 79°55′59″W / 32.78722°N 79.93306°W / 32.78722; -79.93306
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"2015 Charleston shooting" redirects here. For the shooting by a North Charleston police officer, see Shooting of Walter Scott.

Charleston church shooting
A white-painted church at sunset.
The Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in 2008
Charleston church shooting is located in South Carolina
Charleston church shooting
Charleston church shooting (South Carolina)
LocationEmanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, Charleston, South Carolina, United States
Coordinates32°47′14″N 79°55′59″W / 32.78722°N 79.93306°W / 32.78722; -79.93306
DateJune 17, 2015 (2015-06-17)
c. 9:05 p.m. (EDT)
TargetAfrican American churchgoers
Attack type
WeaponsGlock 41 .45-caliber handgun[2]
Deaths9[1][3]
Injured1[4]
MotiveRacism

On the evening of June 17, 2015, a mass shooting took place at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in downtown Charleston, South Carolina, United States. The church is one of the United States' oldest black churches and has long been a site for community organization around civil rights. Nine people were killed, including the senior pastor and state senator, Clementa C. Pickaniny. A tenth person was shot and survived.

Police arrested a white suspect, later identified as 21-year-old Dylann Roof, in Shelby, North Carolina the morning after the attack. The United States Department of Justice is investigating the possibility that the shooting was a hate crime or an act of domestic terrorism, among other scenarios. The Federal Bureau of Investigation considers it a hate crime, but not an act of terrorism. Roof has been charged with nine counts of murder by the State of South Carolina.

Background

The 208-year-old church has played an important role in the history of South Carolina, including the slavery era, the 1960s Civil Rights Movement, and the Black Lives Matter movement in the 2010s.[6] The church was founded in 1816 and it is the oldest African Methodist Episcopal Church in the South, often referred to as "Mother Emanuel".[7][8] It is the oldest historically black congregation south of Baltimore. When one of the church's co-founders, Denmark Vesey, was suspected of planning a slave rebellion in Charleston in 1822, 35 people, including Vesey, were executed and the church was burned down.[9][10] Charleston citizens accepted that a slave rebellion was to begin at the stroke of midnight on June 16, 1822, and to erupt the following day; the shooting occurred on the 193rd anniversary of the thwarted uprising.[11] The rebuilt church was formally shuttered with other all-black congregations by the city in 1834, meeting in secret until 1865 when it was formally reorganized, acquired the name Emanuel ("God with us"),[12] and rebuilt upon a design by Denmark Vesey's son.[11] That structure was badly damaged in the 1886 Charleston earthquake.[13][14] The current building dates from 1891.[11][12]

The senior pastor, the Rev. Clementa C. Pinckney, had held rallies after the shooting of Walter Scott by a white police officer on April 4, 2015, in nearby North Charleston, and as a state senator, he pushed for legislation requiring police to wear body cameras.[15] Several observers noted a similarity between the massacre at Emanuel AME and the 1963 bombing of a politically active African-American church in Birmingham, Alabama, where the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) killed four black girls and injured fourteen others, an attack that galvanized the 1960s Civil Rights Movement.[14]

A number of scholars, journalists, activists, and politicians have emphasized the need to understand the attack in the broader context of racism in the United States, rather than seeing it as an isolated event of racially motivated violence. In 1996, Congress passed the Church Arson Prevention Act, making it a federal crime to damage religious property because of its "racial or ethnic character", in response to a spate of 154 suspicious church burnings since 1991.[16][17] More recent arson attacks against black churches included a black church in Massachusetts that was burned down after the day President Barack Obama was inaugurated in 2009.[18][19][20][21]

Shooting

At around 9:05 p.m. EDT on Wednesday, June 17, 2015, the Charleston Police Department responded to calls of a shooting at Emanuel AME Church.[9] A man described as white, with sandy-blond hair, around 21 years old and 5 feet 9 inches (175 cm) in height, wearing a gray sweatshirt and jeans, opened fire with a .45-caliber handgun on a group of people inside the church at a Bible study attended by Pinckney. The shooter then fled.[22][23][24] The shooting was the largest mass murder at an American place of worship, alongside a 1991 mass shooting at a Buddhist temple in Waddell, Arizona.[25]

For nearly an hour prior to the attack, the shooter had been present and participating in the Bible study.[26] A total of thirteen people attended the Bible study, including the shooter. According to the accounts of people who talked to survivors, the shooter asked for Pinckney and sat down next to him, initially listening to others during the study. He started to disagree when they began discussing Scripture. Eventually he stood up and pulled a gun from a fanny pack,[24] aiming it at 87-year-old Susie Jackson. Jackson's nephew, 26-year-old Tywanza Sanders, tried to talk him down and asked him why he was attacking churchgoers. The shooter responded, "I have to do it. You rape our women and you're taking over our country. And you have to go." When he expressed his intention to shoot everyone, Sanders dove in front of Jackson and was shot first. The suspect then shot the other victims, all the while shouting racial epithets. He also reportedly said, "Y'all want something to pray about? I'll give you something to pray about."[27] He reloaded his gun five times. Sanders' mother and his five-year-old niece, both attending the study, survived the shooting by pretending to be dead.[28][29][30]

Dot Scott, president of the local branch of the NAACP, said she had heard from victims' relatives that the shooter spared one woman (Sanders' mother)[31] so she could, according to him, tell other people what happened.[32] He asked her, "Did I shoot you?" She replied, "No." Then, he said, "Good, 'cause we need someone to survive, because I'm gonna shoot myself, and you'll be the only survivor."[33] According to the son of one of the victims, who spoke to that survivor, Roof allegedly turned the gun to his own head and pulled the trigger, but only then discovered he was out of ammunition.[34] Before leaving the church, he reportedly "uttered a racially inflammatory statement" over the victims' bodies.[24]

Several hours later, a bomb threat was called into the Courtyard by Marriott hotel on Calhoun Street, complicating the investigation and prompting an evacuation of the immediate area.[9][35]

Victims

The dead, six women and three men, were all African American. Eight died at the scene; the ninth, Daniel Simmons, died at MUSC Medical Center.[36] They were all killed by multiple gunshots fired at close range.[30][37] One unidentified person was wounded but survived. Five individuals survived the shooting unharmed, including Felicia Sanders, mother of slain victim Tywanza Sanders, and her granddaughter, along with Polly Sheppard, a Bible study member. Pinckney's wife and daughter were also inside the building during the shooting.[4][38] Those killed were identified as:[39][40]

  • Cynthia Marie Graham Hurd (54) – Bible study member and manager for the Charleston County Public Library system; sister of Malcolm Graham
  • Susie Jackson (87) – a Bible study and church choir member
  • Ethel Lee Lance (70) – the church sexton
  • Depayne Middleton-Doctor (49) – a pastor; who was also employed as a school administrator and admissions coordinator at Southern Wesleyan University
  • Clementa C. Pinckney (41) – the church pastor and a South Carolina state senator
  • Tywanza Sanders (26) – a Bible study member; nephew of Susie Jackson
  • Daniel Simmons (74) – a pastor who also served at Greater Zion AME Church in Awendaw
  • Sharonda Coleman-Singleton (45) – a pastor; also a speech therapist and track coach at Goose Creek High School
  • Myra Thompson (59) – a Bible study teacher

Suspect

Main article: Dylann Roof
Mugshot of Roof taken by the Charleston County Sheriff's Office, June 18, 2015

Dylann Storm Roof[41] was named by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) as the suspected killer after his father and uncle contacted police to positively identify him upon seeing security photos of him in the news.[42] Roof was born in Columbia, South Carolina, and was living in largely African-American Eastover at the time of the attack.[30] Roof had a prior police record consisting of two arrests, both made in the months preceding the attack.[43][44]

One image from his Facebook page showed him wearing a jacket decorated with the flags of two nations used as emblems by American white supremacists, those of Rhodesia and apartheid-era South Africa.[45][46][47] Roof reportedly told friends and neighbors of his plans to kill people, including a plot to attack the College of Charleston, but his claims were not taken seriously.[48][49] On June 20, a website that was registered to a "Dylann Roof" on February 9, 2015, The Last Rhodesian (www.lastrhodesian.com),[50] was discovered.[51][52] The website included what appeared to be an unsigned manifesto filled with Roof's racist diatribe about blacks, Jews and Hispanics,[53][54] as well a cache of photos, including an image of Roof posing with a handgun and a Confederate Battle Flag.[51] According to web server logs, Roof's website was last modified at 4:44 p.m. on June 17, when Roof noted, "[A]t the time of writing I am in a great hurry."[51]

An unidentified source said interrogations with Roof after his arrest determined he had been planning the attack for around six months, researched Emanuel AME Church, and targeted it because of its role in African-American history.[24] One of the friends who briefly hid Roof's gun away from him said, "I don't think the church was his primary target because he told us he was going for the school. But I think he couldn't get into the school because of the security ... so I think he just settled for the church."[55][56]

After the shooting

Manhunt and capture

The attack was treated as a hate crime by police, and officials from the FBI were called in to assist in the investigation and manhunt.[23]

At 10:44 a.m., on the morning after the attack, Roof was captured in a traffic stop in Shelby, North Carolina, approximately 245 miles (394 km) from the shooting scene. A .45-caliber pistol was found in the car during the arrest, though it was not immediately clear if it was the same one used in the attack.[57][58] Police received a tip-off from a civilian, Debbie Dills, from Gastonia, North Carolina. She recognized Roof driving his car, a black Hyundai Elantra with South Carolina license plates and a three-flag "Confederate States of America" bumper decoration,[59][60] on U.S. Route 74, recalling security camera images taken at the church and distributed to the media. She later recalled, "I got closer and saw that haircut. I was nervous. I had the worst feeling. Is that him or not him?" She called her employer, who contacted local police, and then tailed the suspect's car for 35 miles (56 km) until she was certain authorities were moving in for an arrest.[61]

Roof waived his extradition rights and was flown to Sheriff Al Cannon Detention Center in North Charleston on the evening of June 18.[29][62][63] At the jail, his cell-block neighbor was Michael Slager, the former North Charleston officer charged with first-degree murder in the wake of his shooting of Walter Scott.[64][65] According to unconfirmed reports, Roof confessed to committing the attack and said his purpose was to start a race war.[28] He reportedly told investigators he almost didn't go through with his mission because members of the church study group had been so nice to him.[27]

On June 19, Roof was charged with nine counts of murder and one count of possession of a firearm during the commission of a violent crime.[63][66] He first appeared in Charleston County court via videoconference at a bond hearing later that day. At the hearing, shooting survivors and relatives of five of the victims spoke to Roof directly, saying that they were "praying for his soul" and forgave him.[24][67][68][69]

The judge, Charleston County chief magistrate James "Skip" Gosnell, Jr., caused controversy at the bond hearing with his statement that, alongside the dead victims and their families, "there are victims on this young man's side of the family [...] Nobody would have ever thrown them into the whirlwind of events that they are being thrown into."[70] In 2005, the South Carolina Supreme Court reprimanded Gosnell for using a racial slur while on the bench in 2003.[71] Gosnell set a $1 million bond for the weapons possession charge and no bail on the nine counts of murder.[72]

Governor Nikki Haley has called on prosecutors to seek the death penalty for Roof.[73]

Aftermath

A prayer vigil at Morris Brown African Methodist Episcopal Church

Heidi Beirich, the director of the Intelligence Project for the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) in Montgomery, which tracks the activity of American hate groups, said that at this point in the investigation, it is unclear whether the suspect had any connection to hate groups, although Beirich says such groups have been growing over the past decade, and "for several years South Carolina has been the place with the highest density of hate groups."[74]

At Morris Brown African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, numerous people of different races and religions attended a ceremony commemorating the victims and proclaimed that the attack would not divide the community.[29] Another such ceremony occurred at the TD Arena in the College of Charleston.[37] On June 21, four days after the shooting, Emanuel AME Church reopened for its Sunday worship service.[75]

Reactions

Officials

Charleston Mayor Joseph P. Riley, Jr. denounced the attack and said, "Of all cities, in Charleston, to have a horrible hateful person go into the church and kill people there to pray and worship with each other is something that is beyond any comprehension and is not explained. We are going to put our arms around that church and that church family."

South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley said, "While we do not yet know all of the details, we do know that we'll never understand what motivates anyone to enter one of our places of worship and take the life of another. Please join us in lifting up the victims and their families with our love and prayers."[76]

President Barack Obama said in Charleston on June 18, "Once again, innocent people were killed in part because someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting their hands on a gun...We as a country will have to reckon with the fact that this type of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries."[77] At a Washington press conference later that day, he said, "Michelle and I know several members of Emanuel AME Church. We knew their pastor, Reverend Clementa Pinckney, who, along with eight others, gathered in prayer and fellowship and was murdered last night. And to say our thoughts and prayers are with them and their families, and their community, doesn’t say enough to convey the heartache and the sadness and the anger that we feel."[78]

FBI Director James Comey said the FBI would not investigate the shooting as terrorism, but as a hate crime, for its lack of an apparent political motive.[79]

Families

After Roof's appearance at his bond hearing, his family issued a statement, expressing their shock and grief at his actions.[80] During the bond hearing, several family members of the victims told Roof that they forgave him.[67]

Religious community

The World Methodist Council, an association of worldwide churches in the Methodist tradition, of which the AME Church is a part, said it "urges prayer and support for the victims' families and those members of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church who have been so gravely affected by this crime motivated by hate."[81] The President and Vice-President of the British Methodist Conference, also a member of the World Methodist Council, sent a letter of solidarity to the African Methodist Episcopal Church, saying, "The hearts of the members of the Methodist Church of Great Britain go out to the families and friends of those killed; to the Church; and to the wider communities in Charleston."[82]

The Council of Bishops of The United Methodist Church, also a member of the World Methodist Council and in full communion with the African Methodist Episcopal Church, called on its members "to support the victims of this and all acts of violence, to work to end racism and hatred, to seek peace with justice, and to live the prayer that our Lord gave us, that God's 'kingdom come, [and] will be done, on earth as it is in heaven'."[83]

The Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, also a member of the World Methodist Council and in full communion with the African Methodist Episcopal Church, shared its support with the presiding bishop, stating, "let us join with the AMEs in prayer for the healing of the families touched by this tragedy – the families of the victims and the family of the perpetrator."[84]

The Rev. Olav Fykse Tveit, general secretary of the World Council of Churches, stated: "We offer our prayers for healing to the wounded and traumatized, and solidarity and accompaniment to our sisters and brothers in the African Methodist Episcopal Church."[85] Archbishop Joseph Edward Kurtz, the president of U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, made similar remarks.[86]

Various national Jewish organizations, including the American Jewish Committee,[87] Union for Reform Judaism,[88] Jewish Federations of North America,[89] Anti-Defamation League,[89] and Orthodox Union[89] issued statements deploring the attack and expressing deep grief and horror. The Rabbinical Assembly, in its statement, quoted Leviticus: "'Do not stand idly by the blood of your neighbor.' Hateful, violent acts such as this have no place in our society, in a country known for its diversity and blending of various cultures."[89]

Others

See also: 2016 Presidential candidates reactions to the Charleston church shooting

At least eighteen candidates and prospective candidates for the 2016 U.S. presidential election expressed reactions through various media and addresses.[90] According to NPR, Democrats and Republicans candidates found different ways to address the incident, with Democrats seeing race and gun control as central issues, while Republicans pointing to mental illness and referring to it as tragic but random act.[91] Most Republican candidates eventually acknowledged that race was a motivating factor for the shooting. According to the Christian Science Monitor, the shooting has become a precarious subject for Republican presidential contenders, in particular in regard of the racial motivations behind it, as South Carolina holds primaries and the state's political importance have made some candidates "skirt[ing] around the clear racial motivations behind the attack".[92]

The morning after the attack, Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy questioned whether the shooting might have been motivated by anti-Christian sentiment, saying, "It was released earlier and extraordinarily, they called it a hate crime, and some look at it as, well, it's because it was a white guy, apparently, in a black church. But you made a great point just a moment ago about the hostility toward Christians, and it was a church. So maybe that's what they're talking about. They haven't explained it to us."[93]

The night following the attack, Jon Stewart delivered a monologue on The Daily Show discussing the tragic nature of the news, condemning the attacks as well as the media's response to it. Stewart argued that in response to Islamic terrorism, politicians declare they will do "whatever we can" to make America safe, even justifying torture, but respond to this mass shooting with "what are you gonna do, crazy is as crazy does".[94]

The Council of Conservative Citizens, whose website Roof cited as a source for his radicalization, issued a statement on its website "unequivocally condemn[ing]" the attack, but that Roof has some "legitimate grievances" against black people. An additional statement from the group's president, Earl Holt III, disavowed responsibility for the crime and stated that the group's website "accurately and honestly report[s] black-on-white violent crime".[95]

In an online forum, Charles Cotton, a lawyer in Houston and a national board member of the National Rifle Association, placed blame for the shooting on Pinckney for not allowing the churchgoers to hold concealed carry weapons inside the church. In 2011, Pinckney had voted against legislation that would allow concealed handguns to be carried into public places. Cotton also criticized the effectiveness of gun-free zones, stating, "If we look at mass shootings that occur, most happen in gun-free zones." Cotton's comment has since been deleted from the online forum.[96][97]

Jerry Richardson, the owner of the NFL's Carolina Panthers, donated $100,000 to the Mother Emanuel Hope Fund set up by Mayor Riley, specifically calling for $10,000 to each of the families of the nine victims to cover their funeral expenses, and the remaining $10,000 to be delivered to the Emanuel AME Church itself.[98][99]

Controversies

Confederate flag

The flag at the South Carolina Confederate Monument in Columbia, SC
The flag at the South Carolina Confederate Monument in Columbia, South Carolina
View of the South Carolina State House with the Confederate Monument in front
View of the South Carolina State House with the Confederate Monument in front

On June 18, the day after the shooting, many flags, including those at the South Carolina State House, were flown at half-staff. The Confederate battle flag flying over the South Carolina Confederate Monument[100] near the State House was not, as South Carolina law prohibits alteration of the flag without the consent of two-thirds of the state legislature.[101] Also, the flagpole lacks a pulley system, meaning the flag cannot be flown at half-staff, only removed.[101]

Calls to remove the Confederate flag from statehouse grounds, as well as debates over the context of its symbolic nature, were renewed after the attack[102][103] by several prominent figures, including President Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, Jeb Bush, and others.[104] On June 20, several thousand people gathered in front of the South Carolina State House in protest. An online petition at MoveOn.org encouraging the removal of the flag had received over 370,000 signatures by that time.[105]

At a statehouse press conference on June 22, 2015, Governor Nikki Haley, flanked by elected officials of both parties, including U.S. Republican Senators Lindsay Graham and Tim Scott, and former Republican governor Mark Sanford, called for the flag to be removed by the State legislature, saying that while the flag was "an integral part of our past, it does not represent the future" of South Carolina.[106] "We are not going to allow this symbol to divide us any longer," she said. The legislature, scheduled to meet the following day for a budget session, must vote by a two-thirds majority to extend debate to the flag issue, and by two-thirds to remove the flag from statehouse grounds,[107] although the legality of that provision has been questioned by some lawmakers.[108] Haley said she would call for a special session if the legislature did not act.[106]

"With the winds that started blowing last week, I figured it would just be a matter of time," said Ken Thrasher, speaking for the South Carolina division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, which opposes the flag's removal. "Whatever the Legislature decides to do, we will accept it graciously."[108] A number of prominent Republicans who had previously appeared to struggle with the issue immediately endorsed Haley's call to remove the flag, including Kentucky Senator and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus, and Governors and Presidential hopefuls Scott Walker and Rick Perry.[109]

On June 23, 2015, the South Carolina General Assembly added discussion of the flag to its special-session agenda in a procedural vote that indicated broad bipartisan support to remove the flag from the Statehouse grounds.[110] The motion carried by a unanimous voice vote in the State Senate and by a 103-10 vote in the State House.[110] In the Senate chamber, the desk of Clementa Pinckney, the reverend and state senator who died in the attack, was draped in black cloth with a white rose atop it.[110] Among the legislators speaking in favor of removing the flag was Republican State Senator Paul Thurmond, the son of Senator Strom Thurmond, who ran as a segregationist candidate for president in 1948.[110][111]

On June 23, 2015, following the massacre at Charleston, three state governors—Terry McAuliffe of Virginia (a Democrat), Pat McCrory of North Carolina (a Republican), and Larry Hogan of Maryland (a Republican) announced plans to seek discontinuation of their state's Confederate-flag specialty license plates.[112] In addition to the Charleston killings, the governors cited the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Walker v. Texas Division, Sons of Confederate Veterans, issued days earlier, in which the Court affirmed that states are not constitutionally obligated to issue Confederate specialty plates.[112]

On June 23, 2015, retailers Wal-Mart, Amazon.com, Sears Holding Corporation (which owns Sears and Kmart), and eBay all announced plans to stop selling merchandise with the Confederate flag.[113] Similarly Warner Brothers announced that they were halting production of General Lee toys which prominently featured a Confederate flag on the roof.[114]

On June 24, 2015, Robert Bentley, governor of Alabama, ordered the removal of the Confederate flag from the state capitol grounds. A spokeswoman for Governor Robert Bentley told the Montgomery Advertiser on Wednesday that he did not want the flag to be a "distraction".[115] Bentley told AL.com it was his decision to bring the flag down, calling it "the right thing to do."[116]

Earl Holt political donations

Earl Holt, the leader of the Council of Conservative Citizens (whose website Dylann Roof credited in his manifesto for shaping his racist views) gave more than $74,000[117] to Republican candidates and committees in recent years including campaign donations to 2016 presidential candidates Ted Cruz, Rick Santorum, and Rand Paul, who have all condemned Roof's racist motives.[118][119][120] Following the shooting, and after a journalist contacted the campaigns with details about the donor's background, a spokesman for the Ted Cruz campaign said he would return an $8,500 donation to Holt;[120] the campaign later said it would be donating $11,000 to the Mother Emanuel Hope Fund, to assist the victims' families.[117] The Rand Paul campaign said that Holt's $2,250 donation would be given to the Fund,[119] and Rick Santorum said his $1,500 donation from Holt would be donated to the same charity.[121] Twelve other Republican office-holders also said they would be returning or donating Holt's contributions.[117]

"Terrorism" terminology

See also: Definitions of terrorism

While some media professionals, politicians, and law enforcement officials referred to the attack as domestic terrorism, others did not. This renewed a debate about the proper terminology to use when describing the shooting and other attacks.[122]

An article by CNN National Security Analyst Peter Bergen and David Sterman says, "By any reasonable standard, this is terrorism, which is generally defined as an act of violence against civilians by individuals or organizations for political purposes." "...deadly acts of terrorism by virulent racists and anti-government extremists have been more common in the United States than deadly acts of jihadist terrorism since 9/11."[123]

Some publications and analysis of the event posit that these naming discrepancies reflect forms of denial or outright racism.[124][125][126]

On June 18, professor and terrorism expert Brian Phillips offered his definition of terrorism and said, "...the massacre in Charleston, S.C. Wednesday was clearly a terrorist act." He based this conclusion on a racist political motivation that "seems likely" and his "intimidation of a wider audience" criterion was met when "...the shooter reportedly left one person alive to spread the message."[127]

FBI Director James Comey said, "Terrorism is act of violence done or threatens to in order to try to influence a public body or citizenry so it's more of a political act and again based on what I know so more I don't see it as a political act. Doesn't make it any less horrific the label but terrorism has a definition under federal law."[79]

See also

References

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