A photo on the Instagram for Rash, the Brooklyn gay bar, shows some of the damage caused in an arsonist walked in, poured gasoline on the floor and set it on fire. Two people were injured.
UPDATE: John Lhota, 24, has been arrested in connection with an April 3 arson fire at a Brooklyn LGBTQ bar called Rash that caused extensive damage to the bar injured two people. Lhota is also accused of assaulting a woman in his apartment building three days prior to setting the fire at Rash.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, there is video of Lhota buying a red gas canister at a service station and filling it with gasoline on the evening of Apr. 3, and then going to the bar. Video from the bar shows the arsonist pouring the gasoline on the floor and then tossing a lit cigarette into the gasoline to try and ignite it. When the gasoline did not ignite, the suspect leaned down and lit the gasoline with a cigarette lighter, causing the gasoline to burst into flame and causing an explosion.
If convicted, Lhota faces a mandatory minimum sentence of seven years’ imprisonment or a maximum of 40 years.
ORIGINAL POST: A recently-opened gay bar in New York “suffered substantial damage” over the weekend when an unknown suspect walked into the bar, poured gaslone on the floor and then let a match, according to a report on Queerty.com. Two people were injured in the attack at Rash, which opened five months ago in the Bushwick neighborhood in Brooklyn.
According to the bar’s Instagram account, the suspect was wearing a dark hoodie and carrying a backpack. After lighting the fire that “caused an explosion that set the bar in flames,” the suspect “immediately ran from the scene.” The Instagram post also notes that “Everyone inside made it out,” but that two people were taken to a hospital and were “in stable condition.”
The bar has, the Instagram post states, in the past five months been “privileged to become home to such a talented and vital community of artists. It breaks our hearts than anyone would seek to threaten that for any reason.”
The Instagram post asked that anyone with information about the attack “please share it with us directly,” but urged potential informations to only “share information that is reputable and verified to be true. There is a lot going around. We’ll make any details available as soon as we can safely do so.”
The bar has established a GoFundMe page to pay for repairs and to help the staff who will be out of work while the space is being repaired.
A police investigation into the attack is underway.
— Tammye Nash
