The uncle of Dylann Roof, the 21-year-old man suspected in the deadly shooting at a historic black church in Charleston, S.C., on Thursday denounced the crime allegedly committed by his nephew.
“I’d be the executioner myself if they would allow it,” Carson Cowles told Washington Post.
Cowles was angry as he discussed his nephew with the Post in Gaston, S.C.:
Back in Gaston, even as he described Roof as a quiet young man who kept out of trouble, Cowles shook with anger at the thought that his nephew could have carried out the crime with which he is accused.
Roof was arrested on Thursday during a traffic stop in Shelby, N.C. He is suspected of opening fire at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal church in Charleston, killing nine people.
Cowles described Roof to the Post as quiet and said he “did stay a lot to himself.”
“The whole world is going to be looking at his family who raised this monster,” Carson Cowles told the Post.
He said that Roof’s mother “never raised him to be like this.”
Cowles told the Post that he wasn’t aware that Roof had issues with black people. However, an expert on domestic extremism told TPM on Thursday that Roof appears to have white supremacist leanings, based on images Roof posted of himself on social media.
This post has been updated.
