ST. LOUIS, MO (KTVI-FOX2now.com)—
St. Louis police have a 50 year old man in custody, in connection with a break-in and arson inside the campaign headquarters of U.S. Rep. Russ Carnahan, a Democrat from St. Louis. It is a story reported first on Fox 2. The police report says witnesses heard glass break and then smelled smoke coming from the rear of the offices around 2:20 a.m. Tuesday.Firefighters put out a small fire and ruled it an arson. They turned the case over to the St. Louis Police Department's Bomb and Arson Unit. Investigators quickly arrested the suspect, but had not filed applications for arrest warrants by late Tuesday night. A police spokeswoman says that could happen Wednesday.
"At this point it's a that is matter up to the authorities. We're definitely thankful no one was hurt and we're doing all we can to give them any information that they are asking for," said Angela Guyadeen, press secretary for the Russ Carnahan campaign.
Carnahan is running for re-election in November.
Tuesday afternoon, workers from a security firm were at the office headquarters, located at 7000 Chippewa, near River Des Peres Boulevard. They installed at least two new surveillance cameras on the outside of the building and one inside.
Campaign staff said the room that was targeted is the finance office. They would not allow Fox 2 cameras inside, saying there is too much sensitive campaign and financial information on display. They did allow a reporter to look around. There were charred documents, some burned electronic equipment, and the walls and ceiling were gray from smoke damage. There is a strong smell of smoke in the back half of the office, but the front offices were not at all impacted. Campaign staff also released a photo of the damage, snapped by one of them.
Guyadeen say Carnahan knows what's happened, and is thankful the office was empty when the arsonist struck.
"We've been in contact with him, he's aware of the investigation and we're updating him as we hear of anything. We're just looking at the facts right now, and leaving the rest to the authorities," she said.
