Fires Break Out at 3 Churches in South; Arson Not Ruled Out

Early-morning fires destroyed a rural black church here Monday and heavily damaged the former sanctuary of a mostly white congregation in Georgia.

“This has got to stop,” President Clinton said in Washington, appealing for an end to the rash of arsons that have targeted congregations across the South in the last 18 months.

“This tears at the very heart of what it means to be an American,” Clinton said.

State and federal investigators brought in specialists and a trained dog to determine if the blaze at Hills Chapel Baptist Church in Rocky Point was arson. There wasn’t enough information yet to label the fire suspicious, but it fit the pattern of many of the other fires, said Mark Logan, an agent at the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

The Hills Chapel fire began about 1:20 a.m. Flames destroyed most of the building, leaving only parts of two sidewalls upright and leveling a dining hall. It was almost noon before the embers cooled enough to let investigators begin picking through shovelfuls of ash.

“We don’t have a racial problem here,” said Janice B. Hand, the church’s Sunday school secretary. “It is a close-knit community, a nice place.”

The small church, with an active membership of about 35, was insured for $200,000, said insurance agent Gene Jordan. The congregation was founded in 1876, and the building that burned Monday was erected in 1905.

Dogs trained for arson investigations also were used Monday in Pine Lake, Ga., 10 miles east of Atlanta, where fire gutted a former sanctuary of Pine Lake Baptist Church.

Pine Lake Baptist’s congregation is mostly white, with about a dozen blacks out of 1,000 members.

In other cases of church fires in the South:

* A storage shed was destroyed late Monday morning at Life Christian Assembly Church just outside North Charleston, S.C. Theater props and folding chairs were destroyed, and an outside wall was charred at the Pentecostal church, whose congregation of 120 is evenly divided between black and white members. Arson investigators were brought in.

* Congregations in Lake City, Fla., have been warned about a letter containing veiled threats that was sent to several black residents. The letter bore a swastika, references to the Ku Klux Klan and names of the churches.

* A man arrested in an arson at a predominantly black church last week in Enid, Okla., admitted to federal agents that he started the fire with gasoline, according to an affidavit filed in court Monday.

Christopher Harper, 35, described as mentally retarded, was charged Monday with second-degree arson. He did not enter a plea, and bail was set at $100,000.