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Roof must have jury in upcoming death penalty trial, judge rules

White supremacist Dylann Roof Judge Richard Gergel makes quick decision to deny Roof’s request for death penalty trial by a lone judge COLUM...

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Charleston shooting suspect Dylann Roof waives right to jury trial

07.23 Unknown 0

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0PghCEc7lIfVitXr27WOr89lBQ8TOMDJIsfqHAScBj-m2hLPckyUUIYzWl99HaEsZQeVebIEzaKbX3eIR-aAEN1QLf700kqj5TI8oBl9aKhRHJyQB4jz7wXSlEjifXF3q0XtlfAQLmNw/s1600/Dylann+Roof.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Dylann Roof" border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0PghCEc7lIfVitXr27WOr89lBQ8TOMDJIsfqHAScBj-m2hLPckyUUIYzWl99HaEsZQeVebIEzaKbX3eIR-aAEN1QLf700kqj5TI8oBl9aKhRHJyQB4jz7wXSlEjifXF3q0XtlfAQLmNw/s400/Dylann+Roof.jpg" title="Dylann Roof" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dylann Roof</td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;">Dylann Roof, the suspect charged with fatally shooting nine people at a historic black church in Charleston, S.C., last June, is seeking to waive his right to a jury trial, according to court papers.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Lawyers for Roof, 22, of Columbia, S.C., indicated the suspect's intent in a notice they filed Thursday in U.S. District Court. The move would leave Roof's future up to a judge.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"Pursuant to this order, the defendant hereby states that he is willing to waive jury, and to be tried and sentenced by the court," read the notice filed by Roof lawyers David Bruck, based in Lexington, Va., and Michael O'Connell, based in Mount Pleasant, S.C.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The notice also indicated, though, that a lawyer for the federal government has informed Roof's lawyers that that "the government will not consent to waive jury at either stage of this case."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Roof's trial is set to begin Nov. 7. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">On June 17, 2015, Roof staged a massacre at the Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church during a Bible study session. Among those who died were Pastor Clementa Pinckney. It is the oldest AME church in the South and was cofounded by slave revolt organizer Denmark Vesey.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Officials have said Roof targeted his alleged victims because they were black.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Source: USA Today, June 9, 2016</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><span style="font-size: large;">Dylann Roof Seeks Trial By Judge</span></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><i>Roof seeks to waive his Constitutional right, but federal prosecutors are objecting</i>.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Accused Charleston massacre suspect Dylann Roof wants to waive his Constitutional right to a trial by a jury of his peers, instead asking that his fate be determined by a federal judge.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The accused is a white supremacist who is alleged to have killed nine African-American churchgoers in Charleston, S.C. last June. President Obama eulogized the victims, and the Justice Department is pursuing the death penalty in the case. In addition to first-degree murder counts, Roof also faces hate crime charges. His federal trial is scheduled to begin in November, while his state trial is expected to begin in 2017.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In court documents filed Thursday, Roof and his attorneys asked to waive his right to a jury trail. Those same documents indicate prosecutors are objecting to his request. If forced to face a jury, Roof's attorney David Bruck said he may ask the judge to have jurors selected from the Charleston area and not statewide</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Roof is alledged to have entered the Emanual AME Church in downtown Charleston on June 17, 2016, took part in Bible study for an hour, and then opened fire on those there. When all was said and done, nine people -- including a state senator -- were dead, and three others were injured.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The incident has touched a nerve nationwide in the year since the shooting. South Carolina removed the Confederate battle flag from the grounds of its state capitol. Other states have debated removing the confederate flag from their state flag, it has been removed from U.S. Capitol grounds, and the National Park Service has stopped selling Confederate items at National Parks, notably Civil War battlefields. Most recently, Washington National Cathedral removed stained glass windows with the flag.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Source: US News, Curt Mills, June 10, 2016</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;">- Report an error, an omission:<a href="mailto:deathpenaltynews@gmail.com" target="_blank"> deathpenaltynews@gmail.com</a></span> <span style="font-size: small;"> </span> <span style="font-size: small;"> - Follow us on <b><a href="https://www.facebook.com/Death-Penalty-News-206848499362906/" target="_blank">Facebook</a> </b>and <b><a href="https://twitter.com/WebDPN" target="_blank">Twitter</a></b></span></div></div>

Charleston shooting suspect Dylann Roof waives right to jury trial

Dylann Roof Federal DP Hate crime Mass shooting Racism Right to a jury South Carolina USA White supremacist Charleston shooting suspect Dylann Roof waives right to jury trial

Dylann Roof Dylann Roof, the suspect charged with fatally shooting nine people at a historic black church in Charleston, S.C., last June, is...

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The Gratuitous Death Penalty Cases Against Dylann Roof

08.02 Unknown 0

<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgILpkrTUszCUcVSrQVSYE-9otH_XCMyPoCBCvLVutQ-rmnQex4f-chMz2CPISq0iDBF-5tg8R3WdOiy2OjjtMklMpecALHI4S3EFgIgoIdjQdY-8fLCN6ev_osKJ-SqnzmUtWkxeTUJ9E/s1600/Dylann+Roof_02.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Dylann Roof" border="0" height="248" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgILpkrTUszCUcVSrQVSYE-9otH_XCMyPoCBCvLVutQ-rmnQex4f-chMz2CPISq0iDBF-5tg8R3WdOiy2OjjtMklMpecALHI4S3EFgIgoIdjQdY-8fLCN6ev_osKJ-SqnzmUtWkxeTUJ9E/s400/Dylann+Roof_02.jpg" title="Dylann Roof" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dylann Roof</td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;">The federal government announced last week that it would seek the death penalty in its case against Dylann S. Roof, the man arrested last June for killing nine African Americans in a Charleston, S.C., church. It will be the 2nd death penalty trial that he is facing. The state of South Carolina is also seeking the death penalty in its murder trial of Roof.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Last year in July, a federal grand jury indicted Roof, then 21, for hate crimes, weapons charges and obstructing the practice of religion. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said upon announcing the 33-count indictment: "We think that this is exactly the type of case that the federal hate crimes statutes were, in fact, conceived of to cover. Racially motivated violence such as this is the original domestic terrorism."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It's not among the crimes he's charged with but terrorism it was. Roof has told investigators he was seeking to incite a race war. A website belonging to him called The Last Rhodesian showed photos of him wearing emblems of white supremacist movements. A manifesto Roof had posted on the website said the 2012 Trayvon Martin case had alerted him to the problem of black on white violence, which led him to begin researching white supremacy groups on the internet. The manifesto called for the subjection of black people to whites and the reimposition of slavery.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Citing the fact that more than 2 people were killed in the June 17, 2015, slayings, South Carolina prosecutor Scarlett Wilson announced in September she would seek the death penalty in Roof's trial for murder, now scheduled to begin in January. Roof has offered to plead guilty to the murders in exchange for a life sentence without parole. He's also offered to plead guilty to the federal charges, but his lawyers advised against his doing so until they knew whether the federal government would seek the death penalty in its case.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The pursuit of the death penalty will make both trials much more expensive. A 2014 study in Kansas found that cases without the death penalty cost an average of $740,000 while cases where the death penalty was sought cost $1.26 million. A 2010 study of federal death penalty cases found that they make the trial almost 8 times as expensive as cases where the death penalty is not sought. Imprisoning Roof for life would almost certainly cost taxpayers less than the cost of executing him. In California, a death row prisoner costs taxpayers $90,000 more per year to maintain than a prisoner in the general population serving a life sentence without parole. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the average time a prisoner spends on death row is 190 months, or about 16 years. Some spend far longer.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Do prosecutors seek the death penalty because they believe it acts as a deterrent? There's little evidence that it does. A 2012 report by the National Research Council, titled "Deterrence and the Death Penalty," stated that studies claiming that the death penalty has an effect on murder rates are fundamentally flawed and should not be used when making policy decisions. A 2009 survey by Professor Michael Radelet and attorney Traci Lacock of leading criminologists found 88 % of them did not believe execution deters homicide. Fewer than 10 % of the criminologists surveyed believed empirical data supports there being a deterrent effect to the death penalty.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There is probably even less deterrent value to the death penalty in terrorism cases than in criminal cases. Most terrorists are aware of the possible consequences to their acts and proceed anyway. Some terrorists want to be martyrs, and their execution can enhance their image and increase publicity and fundraising for their cause, if not in the country where their crimes are committed then abroad.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG-m_Zu1GhWwWMyBqL9xR6Xb97byVRWz8E9WYytQnnXgaj0-JO2x84xPJZrDixbTPNzPJASm69bntScThO4Vamnr_T9HzCkarKm0DDldZUWuaAuDvPL45PcMl2HThQ2OphE3byWROt02g/s1600/money.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG-m_Zu1GhWwWMyBqL9xR6Xb97byVRWz8E9WYytQnnXgaj0-JO2x84xPJZrDixbTPNzPJASm69bntScThO4Vamnr_T9HzCkarKm0DDldZUWuaAuDvPL45PcMl2HThQ2OphE3byWROt02g/s400/money.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Two death penalty cases going forward for Roof seem redundant and gratuitous. While the federal case may have been filed simply to ensure Roof doesn't escape punishment, there seems little chance of that happening. Hate crime statutes make most sense when they are applied to situations where local bias or bigotry would impede conviction of wrongdoers. When they are used simply to pile on further punishment, they can take on some of the aspects of show trials, with the longer sentences meted out appearing unjustified. Were the state and federal government not insistent on seeing Roof get death, accepting his offer to plead guilty would provide the quickest and most economical route to punishment.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">After the shooting, many of those who lost family and friends in the slaughter at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church offered forgiveness to Roof. Their simple example of Christian charity stands in stark contrast to the complicated legal measures predicated on the desire for his execution. If the murders at the historic African-American church reflect the dark, underlying power of racism in our society, the legal proceedings over those murders reflect the senseless and excessive costs of our system of justice, costs that go beyond dollars and cents.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As a society, Americans seem driven by the desire to punish and punish harshly. Excessive severity is repeated at so many levels, in so many ways, throughout the system. The government's decisions to try Roof twice on death penalty charges seems a literal example of the overkill that riddles our system and wastes both dollars and human life.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Source: America Magazine, June 8, 2016</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;">- Report an error, an omission:<a href="mailto:deathpenaltynews@gmail.com" target="_blank"> deathpenaltynews@gmail.com</a></span> <span style="font-size: small;"> </span> <span style="font-size: small;"> - Follow us on <b><a href="https://www.facebook.com/Death-Penalty-News-206848499362906/" target="_blank">Facebook</a> </b>and <b><a href="https://twitter.com/WebDPN" target="_blank">Twitter</a></b></span></div></div>