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At Least 6 Predominately Black Southern Churches Burned Down Within A Week. Arson Suspected In At Least Three
In the week after nine people were shot dead at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in South Carolina, six, possibly seven, churches with predominately black congregations in five southern states have burned. Three of them were being investigated as arson. The seventh possibly being a fire at the Greater Miracle Apostolic Holiness Church in Tallahassee, Florida on Friday that destroyed the church and caused an estimated $700,000 in damage. Authorities suspect a tree limb that fell on electrical lines is what caused it, however they’re still investigating it further.
The FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives are working with local authorities to find those who set them.
“They’re being investigated to determine who is responsible and what motives are behind them,” FBI spokesperson Paul Bresson told BuzzFeed News. “I’m not sure there is any reason to link them together at this point.”
An arsonist set fire to the College Hills Seventh Day Adventist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee, on Monday. The following day, God’s Power Church of Christ in Macon, Georgia, was gutted by flames. And on Wednesday, Briar Creek Baptist Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, was deliberately set ablaze, and took more than 75 firefighters over an hour to get the fire under control. but by then, it had caused more than $250,000 worth of damage and demolished the church’s main building.
Other churches in South Carolina and Ohio have also caught fire, though it’s unclear if arsonists began the blazes.
Despite the cause, all the churches have predominately black congregations. The legal advocacy organization said that even if the events are determined to be arson, it takes additional proof to classify the acts as hate crimes. Since 1956, there have been at least 91 violent attacks on black churches.
The investigations are still ongoing.
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