With a suspect caught on surveillance tape, Raleigh, N.C., law enforcement officials are searching for the culprit behind a suspected arson at a Wal-Mart garden center. Firefighters ruled the fire suspicious because of its speed and high level of damage.
The store is open 24 hours a day, but the exterior garden department closed at 10 p.m. At about 1 a.m., a passerby reported the fire. A surveillance system captured an intruder in the garden center around that time.
“I would strongly suggest that whoever’s on that tape between midnight and one in the morning should come in to us and not wait for us to come to him,” Raleigh Fire Department Capt. Buddy Scarboro told the Raleigh News.
The fire was contained by the store’s sprinkler system but went unnoticed by employees inside the building, as smoke didn’t have enough time to reach the department’s ceiling and billow into the adjacent store.
