Campbell authorities investigate 3 fires

By Jeanne Starmack

CAMPBELL — A business and two vacant houses in the city burned — including the house where a girl was raped after being kidnapped on her way to school last month.

The girl, a 15-year-old sophomore at Campbell Memorial High School, had been walking to school around 7 a.m. Oct. 12 when a man walked up to her at Tremble Avenue and 13th Street. He grabbed her and put a knife to her throat. He walked her to the house at 117 Gordon Ave., walked her up to the second floor and raped her, police have reported. Charged in that crime is Charles E. Hudson, 55, a homeless man.

The Gordon Avenue house burned at 5:20 p.m. Sunday, said the city fire department. The fire is being investigated as arson, the department said. There are no suspects.

The house is not near either of the other two fires, at a business on McCartney Road and a vacant house on Coitsville Road.

Officer John Gulu of the city police department said that the loss of the house where the rape happened shouldn’t hurt the case against Hudson.

He said the police removed evidence from the house and have pictures.

He said that if a vigilante burned the house down on behalf of the girl, it didn’t help.

“If it needs to go to trial, we could have taken [the jury] to the place,” Gulu said. “It would have been good to have that.”

The other two fires were Friday night. A fire at Koval Garage Doors, 53 McCartney Road, at 8:35 did approximately $30,000 in damage, said the fire department. The cause is under investigation.

The fire at the vacant house at 185 Coitsville Road at 10:02 is under investigation as suspicious, the department said.

Damage estimates were not available for the houses.