Investigators Use Sketches in Arson Probe

A composite drawing of an unidentified man was shown to Los Angeles Central Library employees on Friday, as federal and local investigators probed the cause of the fire that swept the historic structure on Tuesday, destroying thousands of books, documents and photographs.

Employees were shown several sketches, but investigators confirmed that they were looking for one man, whom they have yet to identify.

Battalion Chief Bill Bisson of the Fire Department arson unit said, “It is not fair to call that person a suspect.”

At the same time, he said the drawing would not be released yet, because “we’re not to that point.”

He added, “I don’t want to lose this guy,” suggesting that the publication of a drawing might cause the man to flee.

Arson squad Capt. Steve Cohee also declined to classify the drawings as necessarily those of suspects. He would say only that investigators were looking for people they wanted to talk to, but whose names they did not have.

Also late Friday afternoon, investigators removed from the blackened library interior a plastic bag containing a piece of physical evidence. The investigators indicated that they expected it to help them find the man they were seeking.

Sources closely involved with the investigation told The Times on Thursday that accidental causes had been virtually ruled out, but there has been no public confirmation that the stubborn fire was the work of an arsonist.

Growing Army

As the task force of city fire personnel and 14 agents of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms concentrated on the location where the devastating blaze apparently began, a growing army of volunteers labored side by side with city employees to salvage thousands of books from the charred interior.

Firefighters with extinguishers continued to douse occasional hot spots of smoldering books as late as Friday afternoon, three days after flames swept through the interior of the 60-year-old building, destroying an estimated 20% of the library’s massive collection.

More than 700 volunteers signed up to help answer phones, assemble boxes, pack books and carry them to trucks waiting to haul them to cold storage to ward off mildew and mold.

City Librarian Wyman H. Jones said the effort was going so well that officials hoped to have the library emptied by Sunday. Crews were working around the clock, and library employees from all branches were directed to stay on duty through the weekend.

Already Busy

Jones said he arrived at the library at 4:30 a.m. Friday and found 60 volunteers and staff people already busy. Volunteers, he said, had been showing up as early as midnight and 1 a.m.

To aid in the emergency operation, 250 members of the California Conservation Corps, who usually fight floods and forest fires, were dispatched to the library for duty through this weekend.

Corps spokeswoman Susanne Levitsky said Gov. George Deukmejian asked that the unusually large contingent be sent. Corps members were called in from San Pedro, San Bernardino, Camarillo, Chatsworth and Pomona.

Also on hand were members of the Tree People, an organization whose members usually plant trees and aid ecological projects, who were helping organize the volunteer effort. Volunteers manned a bank of 20 telephones, taking pledges of labor and donations at a special hot line, 486-BOOK.

Hard Pressed

Bisson said fire investigators were hard pressed to handle the job without help from the federal ATF team because they are also working on several condominium construction project blazes.

David Troy, assistant special ATF agent for Los Angeles, said investigators in the library fire were going through the time-consuming chore of interviewing employees. In addition to bringing in agents skilled in interview techniques, the bureau was employing special electronic and chemical equipment.

This included a gas chromatograph, capable of breaking down and identifying gases emitted by a fire, thus telling investigators whether a flammable liquid or other suspicious substance was present.

Troy confirmed that investigators were concentrating on a book stacking area adjacent to the library’s records room, “because that’s where the indicators are.”

He declined to say what they had found.

Troy said he was “confident that between our two organizations we can find it (the cause of the fire) if it exists.”

No Clear Suspects

Although library employees were being painstakingly interviewed, investigators made it clear that they did not necessarily suspect one of them was responsible for the fire. Fire Chief Donald O. Manning told the Fire Commission on Thursday that unauthorized people had been able to get into restricted areas.

“There are a lot of ways for anyone . . . to get into there,” he said.

City officials continued to try to explain the neglect of fire safety at the library.

Mayor Tom Bradley was asked Friday afternoon after the TV taping of a KCBS interview why nothing had been done to help prevent such a disaster, even though fire officials had warned of the dangers long ago.

“When that discussion took place 20 years ago,” he said, “the stacks were a danger and (fire officials) . . . thought they ought to put in some sprinklers. The library people were the ones who fought that.

Sprinkler Threat

“They said it would destroy or damage those books if the sprinklers went off in a false alarm or in a fire . . . as more damage would be done from that water than from the fire.”

The Fire Department, Bradley added, did not press the matter and it was dropped.

“I’m not trying to cast any blame,” the mayor said. “We did what we thought was necessary to protect human life.”

Staff writers Janet Clayton, Nieson Himmel, Jack Jones in Los Angeles and Carl Ingram in Sacramento assisted in this report.