WASHINGTON
Nine people are dead after a lone gunman entered a black church in South Carolina and opened fire on those inside.
Dylann Roof, 21, of Lexington, South Carolina, was arrested by police Thursday morning during a traffic stop in Shelby, North Carolina, in connection with the shootings.
A law enforcement official said Roof told parishioners at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church that he was there “to shoot black people”, U.S. media reported.
"You rape our women and you're taking over our country. And you have to go," Roof allegedly said before opening fire on the Wednesday night prayer group that he was sitting with for roughly an hour before opening fire, according to a survivor's account relayed by local resident Sylvia Johnson to NBC affiliate WIS-TV.
The church is the oldest African Methodist Episcopal house of worship in the U.S., and, like many other black churches at the time, served as a rallying point during the civil rights movement of the 1960s.
An undated picture of Roof found online shows him wearing a jacket with patches depicting the flags of Apartheid-era South Africa, and Rhodesia, the name of the white-controlled African country that changed its name to Zimbabwe in 1980, following the overthrow of the government.
Another picture shows him posing on a car with a “Confederate States” license plate – an apparent reference to the American confederacy, which fought against the Union in support of slavery during the American civil war.
Court records show that Roof is facing a pending felony drug-related case and a misdemeanor trespassing charge, according to reports.
Six women and three men were killed in the attack, law enforcement officials said.
Among the victims were Rev. and state Sen. Clementa Pinckney, 41, and his cousin, state Sen. Kent Williams. Pinckney was the youngest person elected to the state House when he won election at age 23.
“I don’t need to be constrained about the emotions that tragedies like this raise,” President Barack Obama, who personally knew Pinckney, said at a press conference at the White House. “I’ve had to make statements like this too many times. Communities like this have had to endure tragedies like this too many times. We don’t have all the facts but we do know that, once again, innocent people were killed, in part, because someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting their hands on a gun.
“Now is the time for mourning and for healing, but let’s be clear, at some point we as a country will have to reckon with the fact that this type of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries. It doesn't happen in other places with this kind of frequency,” he added.
Attorney General Lorretta Lynch previously called the shootings an “egregious crime,” as she announced that the Justice Department has opened a hate crime investigation into the shootings.
“Acts like this one have no place in our country and no place in a civilized society,” she said.
