LEE COUNTY, Miss. (WTVA) -- Firefighters responded to a call about an abandoned house fire Wednesday afternoon.
"We do have an open investigation concerning that particular structure. There is some suspicion to it of why it burnt, how it got started. At this point, I can safely say that we haven't ruled it accidental. We're still looking into it," said Lee County Sheriff Jim Johnson.
The house that burned down dates back to around the Civil War era.
The historic home is not the only house to have burned down in the Shannon/Verona area recently.
"We have had two in the last month or so in the Green Tee area. One was an abandoned trailer and one was an unoccupied home. We have recently been asked to go and look at an unoccupied structure in the Shannon area. So, you're looking at four or five miles apart. We've had these three for sure and we're going to look into this fourth one to see if it's something that we can either scratch off the list or look into too," said Johnson.
So far, there is no hard evidence linking the fires together, according to Johnson, but there is one similarity.
"Right now, I can't say there is a common denominator, other than they're unoccupied. They're not structures that people have been living in," said Johnson.
"We have our share of them. That's why we have a full-time arson investigator. Because we have enough of them that the state not only mandates it, but he stays pretty busy. We work a lot, so I have all the confidence in the world that if there is something suspicious, we'll uncover it," added the sheriff.
The sheriff says it is uncommon for abandoned buildings to fully burn down.
