Synagogue Fire Probe Stalls; Reward Offered

Two months after the local Jewish community was shocked by suspected arson incidents at two Fairfax-district synagogues, fire officials announced Monday that their investigation was at a virtual standstill and offered $20,000 to anyone who could help them.

“The investigation has come up against a lot of dead ends,” said Los Angeles City Fire Department Capt. Steve Ruda. “We’re not getting the success that we would like to have. . . . It’s frustrating.”

Confronted by the lack of progress, Councilman Mike Feuer and Fire Chief William Bamattre said at a news conference Monday that a reward would be given to anyone who could provide information leading to the arrest and conviction of those responsible for the Dec. 28 fires at Congregation Kehillas Yaakov and Congregation Shaarei Tefila, both on Beverly Boulevard between La Brea and Fairfax avenues.

“Somebody must have seen someone or something that will help,” Ruda said. “Arson is one of the most difficult crimes to prove. As of now, we still have no witnesses and no suspects.”

The fires, which blackened and damaged portions of the two Orthodox synagogues, occurred during Hanukkah, the eight-day Jewish festival marking the rededication of the temple in Jerusalem in ancient times.

Although the fires caused relatively minor damage, they angered and saddened many within the Jewish community--some of whom feared that the incidents were hate crimes.

Arson investigators, however, have found little evidence to suggest that the fires were motivated by anti-Semitism. To the contrary, fire officials said there were none of the scrawled epithets or discarded literature typical of such hate crimes. The absence of those materials led investigators to focus on the possibility that vandals or a transient may have set the fires.

Ruda said the fires are being investigated by the Los Angeles House of Worship Arson Task Force, which includes investigators from the Fire Department, the Los Angeles Police Department, the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

“They’ve exhausted multiple leads,” Ruda said. He added that investigators canvassed the neighborhood and interviewed transients in the area as part of their inquiry.

Ruda said fire officials hope the reward will motivate people to come forward with information.

It was a thought echoed by Yehoshua Berkowitz, the rabbi at Congregation Shaarei Tefila.

“We’re delighted that the council has agreed to put up a reward,” he said. “No one has been held to answer for this heinous crime. Maybe this will stimulate some new interest. We’re not looking for revenge, we’re looking for justice.”

Berkowitz said the damage at the synagogue has been repaired and new security measures have been adopted. “But this did not curtail our activities,” he added.

Feuer called the “desecration of synagogues . . . absolutely intolerable. . . . I’m determined that the perpetrators will not escape justice.”

Anyone with information on the case is asked to call the arson hotline at (213) 621-9967.