Charleston church shooting
| Charleston church shooting | |
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| Part of Terrorism in the United States | |
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The Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in 2008
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 Charleston
Charleston church shooting (South Carolina)
Charleston church shooting (the US)
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| Location | Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, Charleston, South Carolina, United States |
| Coordinates | 32°47′15″N 79°55′59″W / 32.78750°N 79.93306°WCoordinates: 32°47′15″N 79°55′59″W / 32.78750°N 79.93306°W |
| Date | June 17, 2015 c. 9:05 p.m. – c. 9:11 p.m. (EDT) |
| Target | African American churchgoers |
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Attack type
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Mass shooting,hate crime, domestic terrorism |
| Weapons | Glock 41 .45-caliber handgun |
| Deaths | 9 |
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Non-fatal injuries
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1 |
| Perpetrator | Dylann Roof (sentenced to death) |
| Motive | White supremacy |
The Charleston church shooting (also known as the Charleston church massacre) was a mass shooting, hate crime, and act of terrorism that took place at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in downtown Charleston, South Carolina, United States, on the evening of June 17, 2015. During a prayer service, nine people (including the senior pastor, state senator Clementa C. Pinckney) were killed by gunman Dylann Roof, a 21-year-old white supremacist. Three other victims survived. The morning after the attack, police arrested Roof in Shelby, North Carolina. Roof confessed to committing the shooting in hopes of igniting a race war. The shooting targeted one of the United States' oldest black churches, which has long been a site for community organization around civil rights.
Roof was found competent to stand trial in federal court, and in December 2016 was convicted of 33 federal hate crime charges stemming from the shooting. He faced a potential death sentence in that case. Separately, Roof has been charged with nine counts of murder in the State of South Carolina state courts.
Roof espoused racial hatred in both a website manifesto published before the shooting, and a journal written from jail afterwards. Photographs posted on the website showed Roof posing with emblems associated with white supremacy and with photos of the Confederate battle flag. The shooting triggered debate on its modern display, and following the shooting, the South Carolina General Assembly voted to remove the flag from State Capitol grounds.
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Wikipedia