The US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit on Wednesday affirmed mass shooter Dylann Roof’s conviction and death sentence. The court released a 149-page opinion detailing its affirmation. The judges emphasized that they chose to affirm Roof’s conviction “not as a product of emotion but through a thorough analytical process.”

Roof was convicted of myriad federal charges and sentenced to death in 2017 for the 2015 massacre of nine African American churchgoers in Charleston, South Carolina. Throughout his arrest and trial, Roof “expressed his virulent racist idealogy” and explained that he planned his mass shooting at a primarily African American church in order to start a race war. In January 2020, Roof appealed his conviction and sentence from the US District Court for the District of South Carolina.

Roof raised four main issues on appeal. He argued that he was not competent to stand trial, the district court should not have allowed him to represent himself, and the district court erred during both the penalty and guilt phases of his trial.

After an extensive review of competency proceedings, the appeals court found that the government’s expert “was qualified and the district court was well within its discretion to rely upon his testimony” and find Roof competent to stand trial. The appeals court also ruled that the trial court correctly allowed Roof to represent himself during several stages of his trial and resolved Roof’s challenges to the trial court’s evidentiary and witness rulings.