CHURCH ARSON TIED TO RACISM!!!

[Daanyeer]

Source: http://refreshingnews.blogspot.com/2009 ... acism.html
Saturday, January 17, 2009



Black congregation targeted, police say Three charged with conspiracy

Three Springfield men, bitter about the election of the nation's first black president and furious in their belief that minorities would gain more rights, torched the partially built church of a black congregation just hours after Barack Obama's landmark victory, authorities said yesterday.

The men - Benjamin Haskell, Michael F. Jacques Jr., and Thomas Gleason Jr., all of whom are white - poured gasoline inside and outside the mostly completed Macedonia Church of God in Christ in the early morning of Nov. 5., set it afire, and later boasted about destroying it, said authorities.

Four days after the fire, which sent a shudder of fear and anger through Springfield's black community, Haskell and Jacques drove to the burnt rubble with an unidentified associate and laughed, according to the affidavit of an FBI agent.

"We did it," Haskell allegedly told the associate, who later cooperated with investigators. When the associate asked why they set the fire, the affidavit said Haskell replied, "Because it was a black church."

Jacques asked the associate whom he had voted for, the affidavit said. When he replied that he had voted for Obama, Jacques uttered a profane racial epithet and predicted that Obama would be assassinated.

Haskell, 22; Jacques, 24; and Gleason, 21, were arrested this week after an investigation by federal, state, and local authorities and charged with conspiracy to violate the civil rights of the parishioners, a federal crime.

Each faces up to 10 years in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release. A spokeswoman for US Attorney Michael J. Sullivan declined to say why prosecutors did not charge the men with arson.

They appeared in US District Court in Springfield before US Magistrate Judge Kenneth P. Neiman yesterday afternoon. The men were ordered held until Wednesday, when the hearing is scheduled to resume.

Sullivan said the crime was deplorable and that he was "angered and saddened that the neighborhood has endured such cruel acts by those allegedly living in the same community."

The blaze started at 3:10 a.m., caused an estimated $2 million in damage, and sent two firefighters to local hospitals for treatment of moderate injuries. Investigators said at the time that the timing, just hours after Obama broke the highest racial barrier in politics, raised suspicions that it was a hate crime.

The fire touched off a raw fear that has lurked just below the surface in many black communities that Obama's breakthrough success would trigger a backlash against blacks. At yesterday's hearing, Bishop Bryant Robinson Jr., pastor of the Macedonia Church, recounted the horror of hearing the church was ablaze.

" I received a phone call: 'The church is burning to the ground; the church is burning to the ground,' " he said.



"It woke me out of sleep. I didn't know what time it was. I wanted to just pull the covers over my head and go back to sleep, but I got dressed and I went out. I observed with my own eyes the flames leaping into the sky, consuming the building that God had provided for us."


A host of federal, state, and local agencies investigated the crime, including the State Police, Springfield police and fire departments, the FBI, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the US attorney's office, the Hampden district attorney's office, and the state fire marshal's office. Authorities used K-9 dogs trained to sniff out accelerants.

Governor Deval Patrick said in a statement yesterday: "I am deeply troubled by the findings of the investigation. We have no room for hate in Massachusetts communities.

"I commend the State Police, the ATF, and other law enforcement agencies for bringing the perpetrators to justice. And I stand with this church community, as do all people of good faith, as they rebuild and heal."

Springfield police got a break in the case Nov. 9, five days after the election, when an informant who knew Haskell and Jacques told police that the men had bragged about setting the fire. This week a State Police undercover officer approached Haskell and proposed hiring him to set fire to a house for insurance money.

During the conversation, according to the affidavit, Haskell admitted setting a fire in his neighborhood and told the officer that "he had a $10,000 reward on his head," an amount equal to the reward offered in the church fire.

In a later conversation with the undercover officer, Haskell bragged that he was capable of burning large buildings and cited his role in the Macedonia Church fire, the affidavit said. He also allegedly implicated Jacques. Haskell told the officer the two of them had committed six arsons between them.

Haskell was arrested Wednesday night by State Police on an outstanding warrant, the affidavit said. While in custody, he admitted setting fire to the church and, at another time, a house. He said Jacques was angry that the country was going to have a black president and that blacks and Puerto Ricans would have more rights than whites.

He told investigators that hours after Obama's election, he, Jacques, Gleason and a fourth man identified only as Scott took two 5-gallon gasoline cans from Gleason's garage and walked through a wooded area to the back of the unfinished church, according to the affidavit. Gleason's house abuts the property.

Jacques was arrested Thursday and Gleason yesterday, after telling undercover officers similar stories. Christina DiIorio-Sterling, a spokeswoman for the US attorney's office, declined to say whether investigators are seeking the fourth man.

The Anti-Defamation League, New England Region, condemned the arson yesterday and praised the arrests.

"We are outraged by this alleged hate crime, which appears to have been a deliberate attack against an African-American house of worship, on the eve of Barack Obama being elected President," said Robert Trestan of the group. "This incident is a reminder that racism and hate are still a reality in America, and we must work together to build communities that are safe and respectful for all."

Bill Blatch, a retired State Police lieutenant and the president of Black Men of Greater Springfield, said he was heartened to see blacks and whites in Springfield pull together in the aftermath of the burning of the church.

"As President-elect Obama states, we can do this thing, but we can only do this thing together," he said.

The congregation has begun to remove the debris and start building a new church for the second time.