A late-night blaze Feb. 23 at Pleasant Grove Baptist Church, Millport, in Lamar Baptist Association brought the total up to 12 churches in the state that have dealt with fire since Feb. 3, most of which were Baptist and in west Alabama.
Agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) were dispatched to Pleasant Grove Baptist where officials quickly ruled out arson, which could have linked it to the other 10 area churches torched during the month.
According to The Associated Press, Lamar County Sheriff Terry Perkins said the blaze only caused minor fire and smoke damage as it was put out a half hour after it began.
“It was not a set fire, it was accidental,” he said. ATF attributed the fire to a light fixture.
Three fires over the weekend of Feb. 17–19 were also thought to be unrelated to the string of church arsons, federal officials said.
Blazes just hours apart Feb. 17 destroyed a Tuscaloosa warehouse containing Christian apparel and caused minor damage to a Methodist chapel at the University of Alabama, but both appeared to be accidental, according to Jim Cavanaugh, the lead church arson investigator for ATF.
Another blaze Feb. 19 caused minor damage to Chapman’s Chapel, a Pentecostal church in Glencoe. Although two teens were arrested in connection with the fire, police said that it also was unrelated to the 10 church arson cases.
ATF investigators say progress has been made toward solving those first fires. About 350 federal and state agents have gone through more than 700 leads, issuing several subpoenas and conducting surveillance efforts, according to the Tuscaloosa News.
“We are doing a lot of things behind the scenes that we are not discussing in the public to ensure that we leave no stone unturned,” said Special Agent Carmen S. Adams of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Birmingham.
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