A gathering of rights groups including the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) assembled on Friday to appeal for more help from the federal government in solving the recent burning of several Alabama churches. The SCLC, co-founded by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is calling for federal response similar to the 1996 task force set up by then-president Bill Clinton.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) has assigned more than 50 agents, including accelerant detection dogs, to investigate the recent suspicious spate of Alabama church fires. It is widely suspected that the fires were the work of arsonists.
The ATF specializes in training accelerant and explosive detection dogs for use by law enforcement and the military. ATF dogs have been deployed to the burned churches and have been successful in alerting officials to the presence of accelerants. Labrador retrievers are the preferred breed for the ATF K9 program. More than 550 ATF dogs are working in the United States and in 17 other countries.
Evidence has also been sent from the church fires to the ATF laboratory in Atlanta for analysis. A handprint, tire tracks, and other evidence not publicly disclosed have been found. Nine of the Baptist churches that were set afire were in remote rural areas of western Alabama, and were all active churches. The remote location of the churches suggests that the criminals are either local or did extensive research to find them, according to investigators.
The most recent Alabama church fire appears to have been set by a mentally disabled young man whose brother is a firefighter, according to Calhoun County Sheriff's Deputy Matthew Wade.
Twenty-one-year-old Jeffrey Watkins is suspected of setting fire to a former church that had been converted into a storage warehouse. Arson charges were filed against him, but Mr. Watkins is not a suspect in the other arsons.
The State of Alabama and the ATF are jointly offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of those involved. The hotline for information is: 1-888-ATF-FIRE.