HOUSTON (AP) - A Houston man has been arrested after he was allegedly caught trying to plant explosives on a Confederate statue at a Houston park, authorities said Monday.
Prosecutors allege 25-year-old Andrew Schneck was caught on Saturday evening near a statue of Richard Dowling, a lieutenant in the Confederate army. A Houston park ranger found Schneck holding two boxes with duct tape and wires as well as a bottle and a small tube containing compounds that tests later revealed were explosive materials, according to a criminal complaint.
Schneck's arrest comes after events in Charlottesville, Virginia, where a white supremacist rally over the removal of a Confederate statue resulted in three deaths, and the removals of other statues nationwide, including at Duke University and late Sunday evening at the University of Texas at Austin.
Schneck was charged with attempting to maliciously damage or destroy property receiving federal financial assistance. He made his initial court appearance on Monday and was to remain in federal custody until a detention hearing on Thursday.
Philip Hilder, Schneck's attorney, declined to comment Monday.
The statue in Houston, located in Hermann Park, is of Richard W. "Dick" Dowling, an Ireland-born Houston saloon owner. His Confederate unit defeated a Union invasion force at the Battle of Sabine Pass in 1863. Dowling was hailed as a war hero in Houston, and the end of the war saw him resume his successful business career until his death in 1867.
"When asked by (the park ranger) if he wanted to harm the statue, Schneck responded that he did, and that he (Schneck) did not 'like that guy,'" according to the criminal complaint.
University of Texas removes Confederate statues
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) - The University of Texas quickly removed statues of Robert E. Lee and other prominent Confederate figures overnight from the main area of the Austin campus early Monday, just hours after the school's president ordered they be taken down.
University President Greg Fenves abruptly announced late Sunday that the statues would be removed, saying such monuments have become "symbols of modern white supremacy and neo-Nazism." Crews worked through the night amid a heavy police presence.
The school blocked off the area, and some arguments occurred among those gathered. But all the statues of Lee, Confederate Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston and Confederate Postmaster General John H. Reagan were successfully taken down.
By late morning, people walking by were stopping to gawk at the four pedestals, empty except for some construction debris and the bolts that once held the statues in place. Some snapped selfies, while a few climbed up the structures where the statues once stood.