Baltimore Police officers arrested Assadollah Hashemi on Saturday, accusing the 66-year-old of an Aug. 4 arson attack outside the Jewish Museum of Maryland, according to a statement that the Baltimore Police Department provided to JNS.
Hashemi, whom city SWAT officers arrested “without incident,” has “a history of fire-related crimes,” according to the department, which called the incident a “hate crime.”
Baltimore officers investigated an arson report at about 9:45 a.m. on Aug. 8, according to the initial incident report. An officer heard from a site superintendent, who said he found “what appeared to be burnt material on the ground in front of the front entrance gate” at about 6 a.m. on Aug. 5. The latter told police that he “later disposed of the burnt material.”
The museum’s deputy director told the officer that she and colleagues reviewed “on-site video surveillance, which showed an unknown individual exiting a vehicle” and walking “up to the front entrance gate” before placing “an unknown object on the ground.”
“This unknown individual is observed manipulating the object which then ignited into flames,” per the incident report, which the Baltimore Police Department provided to JNS. “The individual then returned to the vehicle and fled from the location.” A Baltimore City Fire Department engine had been dispatched to the site at about 10:45 p.m. on Aug. 4 to “extinguish a fire,” per the report.
The museum’s building has been closed to the public since June 12 and will be “until late 2024 for the first phase of a capital project,” per its website.
“It’s hard to believe someone would randomly light a small fire outside an institution that’s clearly labeled as Jewish between two historic synagogues that there’s not some antisemitic or anti-Israel intent,” said Howard Libit, executive director of the Baltimore Jewish Council, in an interview with WJZ.
The damage to the museum is reportedly larger than $1,000.