The scenario where two off-duty police officers don’t walk past the childhood home of Martin Luther King Jr. is too terrible to contemplate. It would have been the destruction of a piece of American history.
Last Thursday, in Atlanta, Georgia, two off-duty police officers spotted a woman dumping gasoline all over the home where the civil rights leader was born. A five-gallon gas can was emptied on the residence's porch. The two officers asked the woman what she was doing, and she never responded. She wasn’t aggressive, just deadest in destroying the home where MLK Jr. was born. Atlanta authorities said the house could’ve been engulfed in flames within seconds. The two off-duty cops detained the woman until Atlanta police arrived (via NYT):
BREAKING UPDATE: Woman charged with pouring gasoline, trying to burn down Martin Luther King Jr.'s Atlanta birth home, according to police.
— WSB-TV (@wsbtv) December 8, 2023
Here's what we know: https://t.co/4jdq6B3r8l pic.twitter.com/x7JpHQNAzK
This woman attempted to burn down the birth home of Martin Luther King Jr 😳 pic.twitter.com/wif1AbzcaP
— ATL Uncensored (@ATLUncensored) December 8, 2023
Bystanders stopped a 26-year-old woman from setting fire to the home where Martin Luther King Jr. was born after she poured gasoline on it, the authorities said.
Two visitors from Utah interrupted the woman as she was pouring gasoline on the porch and on the door of the home, Darin Schierbaum, the Atlanta police chief, told reporters on Thursday.
Two off-duty New York Police Department officers who had been visiting the house then chased her down and detained her until the officers from the Atlanta Police Department arrived, he said.
“That action saved an important part of American history tonight,” he added.
Zach Kempf, 43, a filmmaker from Salt Lake City who was there with his co-worker, said he first thought she was simply watering the shrubs in front of the house. Suddenly, she rushed up the stairs and began yanking on the screen door, trying to get in the house.
[…]
Mr. Kempf said she had a “nervous energy” about her. “But she wasn’t aggressive.” She relented eventually, turned around and quickly walked away, down the street.
“And I yelled at the two guys down the street that she was trying to set the house on fire and to follow her,” he continued.
Those two men, the police officers from New York, restrained her, he said. After local officers arrived, an older man approached, appearing “very distraught,” along with three women. They turned out to be the woman’s father and sisters, who had been looking for her using the location signal from her phone.
Mr. Kempf said the relatives described her as a veteran who was experiencing mental distress.
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The would-be arsonist was identified as Laneisha Henderson, who has a history of some bizarre posts on social media. She was denied bond on Saturday. Ms. Henderson is obviously experiencing some serious mental health problems, given the aberrant posts and the emotionless reaction to being arrested for attempting to destroy a significant landmark.
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