Vandals target church's head start building in Wayne

WAYNE, Mich. (WJBK) - A pastor at a Wayne church is working to build a new head start for preschoolers but says his church is the target of vandals - for the third time.

Virgil Humes is the pastor of New Hope Baptist Church in Wayne. His church is inside an old Burger King that he bought a year ago with plans to turn it into a head start program for preschoolers. On Tuesday, vandals took aim at the church, creating a major set back.

"Anger, bitter, as to why someone would want to inflict this kind of damage to a church," Humes said.

Seven windows and a doorway were smashed or kicked open in Tuesday's crime. The motive is unknown but Pastor Humes said he doesn't think this was a prank.

"They may want to discourage us or deter us. But we are not going to be discouraged."

Humes said back in 1998, the same congregation was targeted at a different location.

"We had two people that racially vandalized our church and they were caught and prosecuted," he said.

In 2009, he said it happened again.

"We had another racial incident that happened where they vandalized the front of our church with swastikas and so forth. We never caught those individuals," he said.

In response to Tuesday's crime, Humes said the church is adding extra security measures.

"The contractors are here today to install cameras at that building and we will put them in this facility as well," he said. "Whoever did this we want to let them know that we are a forgiving congregation but are not going to tolerate vandalism against us."

Wayne police are looking over surveillance cameras to see if the criminals were caught in the act so far no arrests have been made.