Birmingham, USA - Two young men have been arrested and a third person is being sought in the string of church arsons that destroyed or damaged nine rural churches in Alabama last month, a federal law enforcement official said Wednesday.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the formal announcement is to be made later, said the two are being charged with conspiracy and individual counts in the arsons at five Bibb County churches and four in west Alabama.
All nine churches are Baptist and mostly located in isolated areas. The five in Bibb County, south of Birmingham, burned early Feb. 3. The four in west Alabama were found ablaze early Feb. 7.
A 10th rural Baptist church fire in Lamar County has been ruled arson but is not believed to be connected to the others. It was discovered on Feb. 11.
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives made the Alabama church arson case its top priority as scores of agents joined state and local law officers in the probe. The FBI had said earlier it was looking for two men, based partly on witness accounts.
Investigators have said they don't know a motive, but there is no racial pattern. Five of the churches had white congregations and five black. All were Baptist, the dominant faith in the region, and mostly in isolated country settings.
Five of the churches were destroyed and four were damaged, including one in which congregants, alerted during the night that churches were afire, arrived just as the apparent arsonists were leaving. That fire, quickly put out, had been set in the sanctuary near the altar - a pattern in the other church arsons in Bibb County and west Alabama.