Judge orders competency hearing before sentencing for Dylann Roof
CHARLESTON, S.C. — A month after U.S. Judge Richard Gergel found now convicted killer Dylann Roof competent to stand trial, Gergel has ordered another mental competency hearing for him on Monday.
That Monday hearing is at the request of Roof’s legal team, whom Roof has currently sidelined by telling the judge he wants to be his own lawyer in the second, or penalty, phase of the trial. Roof has said he will present no witnesses.
The penalty phase is set to begin Tuesday. The jury that will determine whether Roof should be executed or given life without parole earlier this month found Roof guilty in the 2015 hate-crimes killings of nine African-Americans in a Bible study class at a Charleston church.
Roof has invoked his constitutional right to be his own lawyer in the penalty phase and made it clear he doesn’t want any evidence offered to the jury about his possible mental problems. That’s a position his attorneys, led by death penalty expert David Bruck, have indicated they believe is symptomatic of Roof ’s mental instability.
At a two-day closed competency hearing in November, Gergel heard testimony about Roof’s mental fitness to stand trial and ruled that he was. Being found legally competent to stand criminal trial basically means that a person understands the charges against him and can participate in his own defense.
In an order filed Thursday afternoon, Gergel said he has appointed Dr. James Ballenger, a Charleston forensic psychiatrist, to examine Roof over the weekend.
“The court intends to rule on the issue of competency from the bench on (Monday), with a written opinion to follow,” Gergel wrote in his Thursday order.
At Monday’s hearing, Bruck and his attorneys are expected to offer new evidence — developed in recent weeks — about Roof’s mental instability and try to convince the judge that he should commit Roof to a secure facility where he can be further examined. Federal prosecutors are expected to oppose the effort.
Monday’s hearing begins at 9 a.m. It will be closed to the public and press “to protect the defendant’s right to a fair trial and right to self-representation,” Gergel said.
However, Gergel said he will hold an open hearing at 8:30 a.m. to allow anyone to object to the hearing’s closure. But Gergel said that “at this point” he “finds no reason to cancel or delay the sentencing trial scheduled to commence” on Tuesday.
Roof ’s mental stability, which the defense has repeatedly suggested is open to serious question, is one of the looming publicly unaddressed questions of the trial.
During the trial’s first phase, which was about proving Roof carried out the crime, Gergel would not allow the defense to present any evidence about Roof’s mental state.