Jury views photos of church massacre
Jurors at the South Carolina church-massacre trial viewed image after image Thursday showing the bloody aftermath left by white supremacist Dylann Roof, who gunned down nine black worshippers during an evening Bible-study session.
Nearly 20 gory crime-scene laser scans provided 360-degree views of the carnage wrought inside the basement hall of the historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston.
Images from the high-tech scanner showed the church’s pastor, the Rev. Clementa Pinckney — who had welcomed Roof and offered him a seat next to him for Bible study — lying in front of the altar with a three- to four-foot stream of blood flowing from his head.
A large pool of blood surrounded the head of another minister, the Rev. DePayne Middleton-Doctor, who had a burgundy Bible by her feet.
Victim Tywanza Sanders was seen in a blood-soaked shirt that had once been white, his left arm stretched out toward the body of his great-aunt, Susie Jackson.
The only victim not shown in the images was the Rev. Daniel Simmons Sr., whom authorities had rushed to a hospital in a failed attempt to save his life.
The packed courtroom remained silent throughout, except for soft sobs by relatives of the victims — and for one spectator, Gary Washington, who leapt to his feet and ran out crying after seeing the body of his mom, Ethel Lee Lance.
Roof, 22, who wore a charcoalgray sweater and gray chinos instead of his usual jailhouse stripes, kept his gaze glued to the defense table the entire time.
Earlier in the day, prosecutors played church surveillance video that showed Roof entering through a side door then slipping out while holding a handgun and wearing a blood-splattered shirt.
Before the start of testimony, federal Judge Richard Gergel refused to order a mistrial in the death-penalty case because a survivor called Roof “evil” in front of the jury on Wednesday.
Gergel ruled that defense lawyers should have objected immediately when Felicia Sanders blasted the self-avowed racist during testimony in which she described watching as he fatally shoot her son, Tywanza, and aunt, Jackson.
Court papers filed in connection with the defense motion also revealed that Roof’s mother, who collapsed after a prosecutor described her son’s attack, had suffered a heart attack..