Firefighters immediately arrived at the scene of a call
The police inquired as to what Patriarchy belongs to the Church, did not interview witnesses at the scene and threatened the priest with a fine.
9 December 2018 at the Holy Trinity Church in the city Rzhyshchiv there was arson, said the outreach Department of the UOC.
The fire completely destroyed the temple door and damaged the painting.
Cleric, priest Georgy Gig said that he had noticed the fire in the morning, when they came to serve the Liturgy. He immediately called the fire Department and the police.
According to the priest, the operator of the police in the first place was to clarify what the temple burn.
“When I said that not mosque, not synagogue, and the temple of God, said to me: You don’t understand what the Patriarchy temple? <…> This is absurd but fact is fact. The police were more interested in not the testimony of witnesses and the person of the suspect, and what we of the Patriarchate”, – said father George.
The priest said that firefighters arrived on the scene on time and immediately began to douse the door and the right side of the temple, where the fire spread further. Later, the members of the fire service joined the congregation.
But the police arrived only after the fire was extinguished. She did not interrogate witnesses, and later George called my father in for questioning as a witness. He “advised” not to focus on that set on fire the temple is a monument of architecture of XIX century, because otherwise the state may recover from the UOC penalty for damage.
Initiated a criminal case under two articles: “Violation of established by legislation requirements of security” and “Arson”.
Father George saw the alleged suspect: the man on the eve stole from the Church of metal and the priests made a remark to him. But the police said that the arson was “unintentional” because “the person was in a drunken state.”
The suspect in the priest admitted to “stirring paper” at the door of the temple, which, according to the fire Department, the fire started.
At the moment pyro paper is under house arrest for “petty crimes”. Father George added that the man previously attacked the Holy Trinity Church: he stole the donations of parishioners, the police, however, refused then to initiate a criminal case due to “lack of documents on donations”.
We will remind, earlier the SPM reported that on the night of 4 to 5 November in Odessa perpetrators committed the attempted arson of the bell tower of the Church in honor of the icon of the mother of God “Support to the humble”.