ATF agents say they’re a long way from knowing if two church fires and a church break-in are related.
The attempted break-in was at Spring Hill Baptist Church in Lauderdale County, and a few miles away in Lauderdale County, a fire was set inside Cowboy Church. Another fire destroyed Trinity Methodist Church in Haywood County.
Pastors of the damaged churches plan to rebuild, but they’ll have to wait for investigators to finish their jobs.
Friday morning, it was brick by brick and board by board as agents with the ATF and Tennessee State Fire Marshal’s Office combed through what was left of Trinity Methodist Church in Haywood County.
Michael Roland, ATF Resident Agent in Charge, said there’s a reason for crews to be so meticulous.
“ATF has high priority on any fires involving Houses of Worship,” he said.
Roland said all available resources are being used to find the cause of Wednesday morning’s fire.
“ATF trained accelerant K9’s to determine if there are any accelerants on-scene or samples that need to be collected. And evidence will be sent to the lab for analysis,” he said.
He stressed it’s too early to know if the fire at Trinity Methodist is linked to either a fire at Cowboy Church in neighboring Lauderdale County or a break-in at the Spring Hill Baptist Church, which is also in Lauderdale County.
“There were three incidences that did occur in close proximity. And so we’re looking into all those incidents,” Roland said.
There’s about $20,000 in damage to Cowboy Church, but Pastor G.K. Ballard said it could have been worse. He says the spirit moved him to stop by the church just a few minutes after someone set the fire.
Pastor Ballard noticed the front door busted in and smelled smoke.
“When I went in, it was burning. So I walked over and stomped the fire out, cause it was burning across the carpet,” he said.
Pastor John Bonson said the fire won’t dampen the faith if of the small and loyal congregation of Trinity Methodist Church.
“It’s a total loss, no question about that, it is a total loss. However, we will rebuild and we will begin again,” he said.
ATF agents have been interviewing people who live near the three churches, hoping they might recall seeing something suspicious at the time the fires were reported.
