Police and fire crews in responded to a fire at the community park on McClean Street Sunday afternoon after a resident reported smoke coming from the facility’s restrooms.
The call came in to the Nash County Communications Center around 12:15 p.m.
Crews arrived to find heavy smoke coming from inside the women’s restroom. The fire was reportedly started in a garbage can in the women’s room, and a fire had attempted to have been started in the men’s room using paper piled on the floor. Police have determined the case to be an arson investigation.
According to Detective Bell of the Spring Hope Police Department, a witness said she saw two youths, one wearing a red shirt, walking away from the area near the bathroom facilities just before she began smelling smoke in the air.
The locks to the restrooms were found to have been removed and were not located by town officials who responded after the fire was extinguished.