South Carolina police have released the identity of the suspect in the church shooting Wednesday night as Dylann Storm Roof, 21. Local media report he was arrested Thursday morning.
A law enforcement source told WLTX that Roof has been arrested in
Shelby, North Carolina, almost 250 miles (400 km) – about three
and a half hours’ drive – away from Charleston. The arrest was
reported shortly after shortly after 11 am local time, and
confirmed by US Attorney General Loretta Lynch at a press
conference.
Charleston police chief Greg Mullen said the suspect was
“cooperative” with the officer who stopped him.
#Update: Shelby City Police caught Dylann Roof as he was passing
thru on HWY 74 @ Plato Lee Rd.Posted by Catawba County Weather on
Thursday, June 18, 2015
The gunman had attacked
parishioners at Charleston’s historic Emanuel African Methodist
Episcopal Church, killing 9 people.
Sylvia Johnson, cousin of Pastor Clementa Pinckney who was killed
at the church, told NBC News that one of the survivors told her
the gunman reloaded five times and told a victim, “I have to
do it. You rape our women and you’re taking over our country. And
you have to go.”
Witnesses say the suspect attended a prayer meeting for an hour,
before he began shooting. Three men and six women were killed.
There were three survivors.
AG Lynch on Charleston: “acts like this one have no place in
our country and no place in a civilized society.” @GreenvilleNews
— Mary Orndorff Troyan (@orndorfftroyan) June
18, 2015
Police are describing the shooting as a hate crime.
Outside of Dylan Roof’s home in Eastover. Officer on scene, but
no frantic movement going on. #CharlestionShootingpic.twitter.com/Zu56uc9pTI
— Cynthia Roldan (@CynthiaRoldan) June
18, 2015
A Facebook photo shows Roof wearing a jacket with two flag
patches: one of Apartheid-era South Africa, and the other of
Rhodesia, before it became majority-ruled Zimbabwe.
Roof’s uncle, Carson Cowles, told Reuters in a phone interview
that the 21-year-old received a .45-caliber handgun as a birthday
present from his father in April.
Breaking: Suspect named in #CharlestonShooting
Dylan Storm Roof pic.twitter.com/2IeffUCfGV
— SPLC (@splcenter) June
18, 2015
Arrest records indicate that Roof was detained on charges of
felony drug possession in March, and misdemeanor trespassing in
April of this year. He had no prior criminal record.
Roof lived in in Lexington, SC, about 120 miles northwest of
Charleston, where he attended White Knoll High School.
“I did have a couple classes with the guy in middle and high
school,” tweeted Lexington resident Kimberly Taylor,
“But he wasn’t my best friend or someone I kept in contact
with.”
Dylann use to be a super emo, with long blonde hair and he was
pretty quiet
— Kimberly Taylor (@Ms_Michele_T) June
18, 2015
His MySpace page contains only a music track from the
Christian death metal band “A Thousand Times Repent.”
Help police find the suspect in the shooting @ 110 Calhoun St
pic.twitter.com/92GW7fMCTA
— Charleston P.D. (@CharlestonPD) June
18, 2015
A “Dylann Storm Roof” was arrested in South Carolina on April
26 for trespassing http://t.co/niwiMty35g
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) June
18, 2015
The FBI, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives
and several other agencies have joined in the manhunt, police
chief Gregory Mullen said.
A memorial on my seat mate’s State Senate desk, Clementa
Pinckney. RIP my friend. #EmmanuelAMEpic.twitter.com/mTyipyQfNL
— Vincent Sheheen (@vincentsheheen) June
18, 2015
According to the police, six women and three men were killed in
the shooting, including Reverend Clementa Pinckney, the church’s
pastor, who was a Democratic member of the State Senate. Eight
people were killed inside the church and one more died at the
hospital soon after the incident.
At a press conference Thursday morning, Charleston Mayor Joseph
P. Riley called the shooting “the most unspeakable and
heartbreaking tragedy.”
“The only reason that someone could walk into a church and
shoot people praying is out of hate,” Riley said. “It is
the most dastardly act that one could possibly imagine, and we
will bring that person to justice. … This is one hateful
person.”
READ
MORE: 9 people killed in S. Carolina church shooting, police
investigating ‘hate crime’
Three people survived the attack, although police have not
revealed their identities yet. The president of the Charleston
NAACP, Dot Scott, said the gunman told one survivor he would let
her live so that she would tell others what happened in the
church, local newspaper The Post and Courier reported.
Early Thursday, Charleston police released photos of the suspect
as well as of the black sedan car he was leaving in, obtained
from security cameras.
According to police chief Gregory Mullen, the suspect is a
clean-shaven white man with sandy blond hair and slender build,
who was wearing a gray sweatshirt with blue jeans and Timberland
boots.
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