9 life sentences in state case on Charleston church slayings
CHARLESTON, S.C. — With Charleston church shooter Dylann Roof getting nine life sentences in state court on top of a federal death sentence, his prosecutions are finally over — and some relatives of the nine parishioners he killed at a historically black church say they can finally begin to heal.
Nadine Collier, daughter of the slain 70-year-old Ethel Lance, wore a white suit to Roof’s sentencing Monday; a colour she said lets the world know a chapter in her life had closed.
“I will not open that book again,” she said to Roof, before he was sentenced. “I just want to say, have mercy on your soul.”
The 23-year-old avowed white supremacist said nothing in his own defence as he was sentenced Monday on nine counts of murder, along with three charges of attempted murder and a weapons charge. He was taken from court back to the Charleston County jail, where he’ll await transfer to a federal prison and, ultimately, the federal system’s death row in Terre Haute, Indiana.