A young white man has been jailed for 25 years for burning down three historic black churches in the US state of Louisiana last year. Heavy metal musician Holden Matthews, 23, was also ordered to pay $2.7m (£2.1m) in restitution. He said he had burnt the churches to boost his reputation within his favoured music scene.

A judge found the attacks had not been racially motivated but said they evoked memories of a “dark time in history.”

White supremacists attacked black churches during America’s civil rights era. The three churches Matthews burnt were St Mary Baptist Church in Port Barre, Greater Union Baptist Church in Opelousas and Mount Pleasant Baptist Church in Opelousas, between 26 March and 4 April. Matthews, the son of a local sheriff’s deputy, admitted to posting photographs and video on Facebook of the first two churches burning. All three buildings were razed to the ground by the fires, but no-one was injured because they were torched at night. A judge cleared him of hate crime charges, which Matthews admitted to earlier this year. But he was found guilty of three counts of arson on religious buildings, and one count of using fire to commit a federal felony.(BBC)…[+]