American Terrorists:Dylann Roof & Payton S. Gendron

Two white domestic terrorists committing a racially motivated mass shooting.

By Gladys W. MuturiPublished 4 years ago • Updated 3 years ago • 5 min read

Dylann Roof and Payton S. Gendron

Two white dangerous domestic terrorists committing a racially motivated crime that involve in devastating mass shootings. On June 17, 2015, Dylann Roof enters Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church at Charleston, South Carolina during bible study shooting and killing nine African American church goers. Recently, on May 14, 2022, another domestic terrorist, Payton S. Gendron enters Tops, a grocery store at Buffalo, New York shooting targeting and killing ten African American shoppers.

Trigger Warning: These stories are extremely disturbing.

Dylann

Dylann Storm Roof was born on April 3, 1994 at Columbia, South Carolina to his parents Franklin Bennett Roof and Amelia Cowles. Franklin worked as carpenter and construction contractor and Amelia worked as a bartender. Dylann's parents were divorced until. According to GQ, Dylann Roof's father lives on a dead-end street at the edge of Columbia. Dylann is of his siblings. If you google search, there were photos of Dylann posing with guns, posing with Confederate flags and a video of him playing with his gun. His Facebook page included an image of Roof wearing a jacket decorated with two emblems popular among American white supremacists: the flag of the former Rhodesia (now known as Zimbabwe) and the flag of apartheid-era South Africa.

June 17, 2015

Around at 9 pm, Roof arrived at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church. A surveillance footage captures Roof entering the church building.

A surveillance footage captures Dylann entering the Emmanuel church building

Inside the church, 13 people were in attendance in the middle of bible study.

Roof joins in the where the Bible study was held. Everyone at church welcomed him with open arms. Roof pulls out a Glock 41 .45-caliber handgun and started shooting. He shot at the churchgoers including the pastor of the church. After the shooting, he points the gun to his head attempting to commit suicide until he realized he ran out of ammunition. Roof fled the church leaving the churchgoers in slain. Roof was arrested the following morning in North Carolina.

He confessed to the massacre shortly after he was arrested. He didn't testify at trial and no witnesses were called on his behalf before he was convicted of federal hate crimes. Nine people were dead. One was injured.

Charleston’s Church Victims ( The Emanuel Nine)

Clementa C. Pinckney, 41, pastor of and South Carolina state senator.
Cynthia Graham Hurd, 54, sister of former state senator Malcolm Graham.
Susie Jackson,87,Aunt of Tywanza Sanders.
Tywanza Sanders, 26, grandnephew of Susie Jackson before he was killed he asked Roof why. Roof points the gun and said, “I have to do it. You rape our women and you're taking over our country. And you have to go.”
Ethel Lee Lance, 70, church’s sexon
Depayne Middleton-Doctor, 49, a pastor who was also employed as a school administrator and admissions coordinator at Southern Wesleyan University.
Myra Thompson,59, Bible study teacher.
Daniel L. Simmons,74, a pastor who also served at Greater Zion AME Church in Awendaw.
Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, 45, a pastor; also a speech therapist and track coach at Goose Creek High School.

Payton

Payton S Gendron was born in hometown of Conklin, New York to his parents Paul and Pamela Gendron, both civil engineers with the state Department of Transportation. Gendron graduated from Susquehanna Valley High School. According to Gendron’s classmates interviewed by The New York Times said he was quiet and rarely attended in-person classes, and he exhibited a range of idiosyncratic behavior, including wearing a hazmat suit to class. Gendron enrolled at SUNY Broome Community College. Gendron was a worker at the local Conklin Reliable Market for about four months before he quit.

May 14, 2022

Around 2:30pm, Gendron arrives at the Tops Supermarket dressed in a army attire, bullet proof vest and helmet with a camera streaming the whole show on Twitch. Gendron exits out of his vehicle and pulls out a semi-automatic rifle shot four people outside of the grocery store, three fatally. He went inside the market started shooting eight more people and killing six. Security guard tries to stop until he was shot and killed by him. Gendron continues shooting and killing four more people. On video, the shooter was seen aiming at the frightened white shopper later apologized and continues to find African American shoppers. Unlike Dylann, Gendron was attempting suicide but he ran out of ammunition. At 2:36pm, Gendron gone to the front of the building, where patrol officers were able to talk him into dropping his gun after he reportedly aimed it at his neck. Many employees and customers used the store's break room to hide from the shooter and barricaded the door with a heavy desk. Other customers were hidden by employees in the milk cooler and said the shooter shot through the coolers but the milk cartons stopped the bullets.

Buffalo Victims

Aaron Salter Jr,55, a former Buffalo Police lieutenant who was working as a security guard.
Celestine Chaney, 65
Roberta A. Drury, 32
Andre Mackniel, 53
Katherine Massey, 72
Margus D. Morrison, 52
Heyward Patterson, 67
Geraldine Talley, 62
Ruth Whitfield, 86
Pearl Young, 77

Four of the victims were employees of the store, including Salter were killed.

Reasons of Insanity

After Roof confessed to the massacre, Roof had a reason. Sources say Roof reason for killing all the Charleston church goers was because of his research on Trayvon Martin and believing that “black people” are taking over. Before the Buffalo massacre, Gedron had threatened a school graduation shooting even threatened a classmate. Payton conducted extensive research into the demographics of the neighborhood in order to target a predominantly black community. “highest black percentage that is close enough to where I live."

Aftermath

After Roof's appearance at his bond hearing, his family issued a statement, expressing their shock and grief at his actions. Following the funerals of several of the victims in the shooting, they issued a second statement, expressing their condolences to the victims' families and announcing the temporary postponement of comments out of respect for them. During the bond hearing, several family members of the victims told Roof that they forgave him. Roof was sentenced to death and is currently serving his life sentences without the possibility of parole. Roof’s mother suffered a heart attack but she pulled through. No execution date has been made. In May 2018, Roof’s sister Morgan was arrested on weapon charges and drug charges.

The next several years would be marked by more horrific white nationalist violence in America, including the murder of Heather Heyer during a right-wing rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017 and a 2018 shooting at Pittsburgh's Tree of Life Synagogue that claimed eleven lives. Gendron is now indicted for the mass shooting.Someone shouted "Payton you’re a coward!" as he was led out. After the shooting, families of Buffalo shooting victims demands for gun reform and legislative action against anti-Black hate. But since the shooting, Communities across the states came together bringing the people of Buffalo: food, donations for the Buffalo victims funerals, and helping the community of Buffalo heal.