Dylann Roof, the South Carolina man who shot nine people to death inside a historically Black church in Charleston, is staying where he has been for years: on federal death row at a maximum-security prison in Terre Haute, Indiana. The Supreme Court has turned away his latest appeal, and his death sentence stands.
Roof wanted the case thrown out because of the judge who ran his trial. He argued that U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel, the federal trial judge in Charleston who handled the case, should have stepped aside because another judge reportedly told an attorney that “Gergel really wants to do it.” The justices would not take up the claim.
Story Snapshot
- The Supreme Court rejected Roof’s appeal on Monday, October 5, leaving his conviction and death sentence in place.
- Roof argued his trial judge, Richard Gergel, was too eager to have the case and should have removed himself.
- A federal appeals court threw out the same claim in August 2025, saying it rested on hearsay.
- The high court also declined to hear an earlier Roof appeal in 2022.
- Roof killed nine worshippers at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in June 2015.
What The Order Means For His Sentence
When the Supreme Court declines to hear a case, it does not write a ruling of its own. The lower court’s decision simply stays in force. For Roof, that means the appeals court ruling against him is the last word on this claim, and the sentence a jury gave him is untouched.
This is the second time the justices have refused him. They declined to hear an earlier appeal in 2022. That one was a different argument, about how his trial handled evidence of his mental state. Monday’s order was about the judge alone.
The Argument About The Judge
Roof’s lawyers asked for recusal, which is the legal word for a judge removing himself from a case because he cannot be seen as fair. Their proof was a single secondhand remark. Another judge, they said, had told an attorney that “Gergel really wants to do it.” The defense read those words as an eagerness to convict and sentence Roof that crossed the line into taking a side.
Gergel had been on the case since the day after Roof was indicted. Roof’s attorneys filed their motion in April 2025, years after the trial ended, claiming the judge was biased against him.
The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, the federal court one step below the Supreme Court that reviews cases from South Carolina, rejected the claim on August 13, 2025. It said Roof had not shown “a clear and indisputable right” to what he was asking for, because his motion was built on hearsay, meaning a report of what someone else said rather than direct proof. The court added that even if Gergel had formed a low opinion of Roof, that would not be grounds to remove him.
The Night At Mother Emanuel
The crime behind all of this took place in June 2015. Roof walked into Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, known in Charleston as Mother Emanuel, and sat with a Bible study group. Then he opened fire. Nine Black worshippers died.
A federal jury convicted him in December 2016 on 33 counts. Nine of them were racially motivated hate crimes resulting in death. The same jury voted for death the next month, and Gergel imposed the sentence.
The Fourth Circuit upheld the conviction and the sentence in 2021. It found Roof was fit to stand trial and fit to act as his own lawyer during part of the sentencing.
More Than A Decade Of Appeals
Roof has now lost at every level on the question of his judge, as he did earlier on the question of his trial. Each time, the courts have left the jury’s work alone.
For the families of the nine people killed at Mother Emanuel, the order changes nothing about where things stand, and that is the point. The man who did it is still on death row, and the sentence handed down in January 2017 is still the sentence.
Sources:
justice.gov, deathpenaltyinfo.org, pbs.org
