Hall church arson 'cold case' may get warm

GAINESVILLE - Hall County Fire Marshall Scott Cagle said Friday he's hoping ten year old finger print evidence could lead to the arsonist who torched a Gainesville area church.

The Gainesville based National Coalition for Burned Churches held an information and education briefing at Montgomery Memorial Baptist Church on West Ridge Road, burned by an arsonist in 2000.

Cagle, at the briefing, said the arsonist left behind a finger print on the church back door and the GBI crime lab has the print. Cagle wants to see if it matches prints from a man he arrested in another Hall County arson case, a man who lived near the church at the time.

"We're going to look at that print with two people I've arrested in the past and see if any of that matches back up," Cagle said. "It's an ongoing thing, it happened in 2000, there's been no arrest, but it's not over with, it's something we continue to look at."

Briefing topics included the impact of burned churches on the community, church arson prevention and church rebuilding. National Coalition executive director, Rose Johnson-Mackey, estimated that from 15 to 20 church fires of suspicious origin occur every month across the nation as she called for Gainesville area volunteers to assist in the restoration and reconstruction of four recently destroyed churches in Georgia, South Carolina and Mississippi.

Cagle and former Atlanta Fire Chief Winston Minor stressed preparation and planning as the best tools to avoid destruction and possible loss of life from church fires.

Hall County Deputy Seargent Steve Wilbanks said his department has set up a church watch program in which a one on one relationship is formed to help churches improve building security.

"We'll do a security assessment of your church," Wilbanks said. "We'll come out and we'll walk through it and look at your lighting, your locks, your alarm system and how the money handling is done. There might be some ways we can improve the way we can do things in that respect."

Wilbanks said church watch also deals with physical security of people attending church to prevent or head off incidents involving possible violence in the church.

Montgomery Memorial deacon Floyd Wilson and NCBC board member Cathleen Traylor both spoke of the feeling of devastation and loss caused when fire destroys a church; both experienced the loss of their churches to arson. Mackey added that many small churches especially located in rural areas, don't have the funds and cannot muster the community support needed to rebuild.