CHARLESTON, S.C. – The Latest on court cases stemming from the June 2015 shootings of nine black members of a South Carolina church (all times local):
11:45 a.m.
The federal government has until July 26 to respond to lawsuits filed by families of some of the nine people killed in a South Carolina church.
Court papers including the deadline and proof the federal government had been served with the lawsuits were filed Wednesday in court.
The families sued the FBI last week, accusing the federal government of errors that enabled Dylann Roof to buy the .45-caliber handgun used in the June 2015 shootings at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston.
FBI Director James Comey has said Roof shouldn't have been able to buy the gun and promised a full review.
Lexington County Sheriff Jay Koon told The Associated Press last summer that a clerk entered incorrect information for Roof's prior drug arrest, which prevented an FBI examiner from finding the arrest details when Roof tried to buy a gun.
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9:55 a.m.
An attorney defending the man accused of fatally shooting nine black churchgoers says a South Carolina prosecutor's desire to go to trial before federal authorities is "reckless and shortsighted."
Public defender Ashley Pennington says that if Solicitor Scarlett Wilson wants justice, she should accept Dylann Roof's offer to plead guilty in exchange for a life sentence.
The arguments mirror statements in the 22-year-old's federal hate crimes case, where his defenders have tried to persuade prosecutors to drop the death penalty and accept a guilty plea.
Roof faces capital punishment in both state and federal courts in the June 2015 shooting deaths of the parishioners at Emanuel AME Church.
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