Ex-employee arrested in Tuesday grocery warehouse fire
BATON ROUGE - A "disgruntled former employee" who reportedly threatened potential fires has been arrested for a blaze at an Airline Highway grocery store warehouse, according to an arrest warrant.
Trent Carter, 34, was booked with simple arson, terrorizing and unauthorized entry of a place of business in the fire that damaged Shoppers Value Tuesday morning.
Fire crews were called to the Shoppers Value on Airline Highway near Greenwell Street around 2 a.m. Tuesday. No one was injured and investigators found a one-gallon gas can next to paper towels just inside a broken window at the store, the warrant said.
Store owners provided a copy of texts they suspected were sent by a former employee complaining about a co-worker.
"Gm. Please fire (redacted) and (redacted) and make (redacted) the store manager or u will lose a store a week by fire," the message read. WBRZ has redacted the names of the employees mentioned in the text.
The message also said "Pandora's box has been opened," the warrant said.
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The fire caused about $50,000 in damage.