ARSONIST TARGETS CLASSROOM FACILITIES EARLY-MORNING FIRE CAUSES $30,000 IN DAMAGE AT PARK VIEW CAMPUS.

Byline: KAREN MAESHIRO Staff Writer

LANCASTER -- An early morning fire Monday that officials suspect was arson caused $30,000 in damage to a portable classroom building at Park View Middle School.

Detectives from the sheriff's arson and explosives unit were investigating the blaze that broke out shortly before 3:30 a.m. at the school in the 800 block of West Avenue J.

``We had a deputy driving down Avenue J, smelled smoke, went to investigate and saw that an older portable classroom now used as storage was on fire,'' Sgt. Darrel Brown said.

Brown said the fire was intentional.

``You could see that it was started on the outside of the building, like they put something against the building and started a fire,'' Brown said. ``It's definitely a case of arson.''

Firefighters had the fire under control within 10 minutes, Los Angeles County Fire Department Capt. Ken Sotro said.

``It burned the outside of the classroom. It has plexiglass windows and the windows melted,'' Sotro said. ``It extended inside the building and burned some books on top of a file cabinet.''

Sotro said there was $30,000 in damage to the building. The damage to contents was unknown, he said.

Lancaster School District Deputy Superintendent Howard Sundberg said the damaged classroom is in the older part of the campus that was built in the 1940s.

The room was being used for storage and had things like folding chairs, tables, older computer equipment, books and a couple of TVs, Sundberg said.

The fire did not disrupt school on Monday, he said.

Sundberg said the room was in the northeast part of the campus, where there is no traffic.

karen.maeshiro(at)dailynews.com

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(color) An early morning fire that started in one classroom caused damage at Park View Middle School on Monday.

Gene Blevins/Special to the Daily News