FBI Opens Civil Rights Probe Into Store Fire : Thousand Oaks: Arson blaze destroyed Heroes and Legends comic book shop. Detectives are looking into possible links to other recent hate crimes.

The FBI has opened a civil rights investigation into an arson fire that destroyed a Thousand Oaks comic book store owned by a Jewish businessman, an official said Monday.

The FBI’s involvement came as the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department intensified its investigation into hate crimes in the city.

Authorities launched the investigations after last week’s arson fire and vandalism of the Heroes and Legends comic book store on Thousand Oaks Boulevard.

The store was spray-painted with swastikas, “SS” and “Die Jew” before being set ablaze in a pre-dawn attack Friday.

Special agent Larry Dick said the FBI has investigated other hate crimes in Thousand Oaks in recent years, including the desecration of Jewish synagogues and the defacing of a Jewish social service center two years ago.

Lt. Dante Honorico, who is heading the Sheriff’s Department investigation, said two detectives are looking into connections the fire may have to other hate crimes committed over the past year.

They include vandalism, graffiti and threatening letters and phone calls with racial or religious overtones. The investigation is the first time the department has looked into hate crimes in Thousand Oaks in depth, Honorico said.

“We’re looking at everything,” he said. “We’re not discounting anything.”

Comic store owner Myron Cohen-Ross said the FBI’s involvement is “good news. It helps.”

Since the fire, Cohen-Ross said he has been flooded with calls from children and adults willing to lend their support. He was asked to appear at a banquet given by the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith tonight at Temple Etz Chaim in Thousand Oaks.

“I’ve never experienced anti-Semitism before,” the 59-year-old businessman said. “I just don’t understand it.”

Meanwhile, Thousand Oaks residents continued to rally in Cohen-Ross support.

Thousand Oaks Mayor Robert E. Lewis said he plans to request that the City Council contribute to the $1,000 reward offered by the Ventura County Crime Stoppers program for information, and a Newbury Park businessman is collecting donations of furniture and money to help the Cohen-Rosses recover their losses.

Shalom International plans a rally and fund-raiser at 1 p.m. Sunday in front of the burned-out store at 1165 E. Thousand Oaks Blvd., said Randy Senzig, a Thousand Oaks resident and spokesman for the Costa Mesa-based group.

Senzig said he and others are alarmed at the growing violence in the Conejo Valley.

“It’s time for Christians to stand up next to their Jewish brothers,” he said.

Irving Cheslaw, a spokesman for Conejo-Ventura County chapter of the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, said Thousand Oaks residents were also alarmed when a Westlake Village couple’s house and car were spray-painted with swastikas and “Die Jew” in July.

Since then, another Jewish business owner received a threatening note, Cheslaw said. And he has noticed anti-Semitic graffiti cropping up on other buildings around town.

“These events of late may inspire (investigators) to move more quickly,” he said.

Rabbi Alan Greenbaum of Temple Adat Elohim in Thousand Oaks said he was pleased that authorities have intensified the investigation into hate crimes.

Jewish synagogues in Ventura County have long been the targets of anti-Semitic attacks. Temple Adat Elohim’s synagogue and religious school have been vandalized three or four times in the past 10 years, Greenbaum said.

The last incident was in December, 1990, when a vandal spray-painted Temples Adat Elohim and Etz Chaim in Thousand Oaks and Temple Beth Torah in Ventura with anti-Semitic graffiti. No one was arrested in those crimes.

Greenbaum said it may be difficult for sheriff’s investigators to find suspects in the burning of the comic book store because there were no witnesses.

“I think they do what they can, but it’s just one of those crimes that’s hard to trace,” he said.