‘We come from a place of love, not hate,’ says pastor of Springfield church allegedly burned by arsonist
Updated 8:43 PM;
SPRINGFIELD — Mayor Domenic Sarno recalls surveying the still-smoldering ashes of the Martin Luther King Jr. Community Presbyterian Church on Dec. 28. He didn’t wonder about too many theories behind the apparent crime.
“I remember immediately thinking: This looks like a hate crime. Looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, walks like a duck — it’s a duck,” Sarno said on Thursday, hours after a federal hate crimes indictment against Dushko Vulchev was unsealed.
Sarno lauded state, local and federal authorities who investigated the case, which revealed Vulchev’s alleged long-standing hatred of Black people and other racial and ethnic groups.