Police seek vandals of LDS Seminary building

Salt Lake police Monday were looking for the vandal or vandals who spray painted anti-LDS messages on the side of the LDS Church seminary building at Highland High School.

A maintenance worker discovered the graffiti about noon Saturday.

"Most of it was derogatory comments towards the LDS Church," said Salt Lake police detective Jared Wihongi. "It was quite a bit. There were five or six comments spray painted on the side of the building."

Some of the messages were threatening in nature, although none of them were direct threats, he said. A school resource officer assigned full-time to Highland, 2166 S. 1700 East, was helping detectives with the case. Wihongi said it was unknown Monday if students were responsible, if other juveniles were responsible or if the graffiti was a direct hate crime or a sick prank.

"All options are open right now," he said.

Because of the extent of the vandalism and the seriousness of the comments, Wihongi said the person responsible would likely be arrested for investigation of a felony charge. Wihongi said there had been no previous reports of vandalism or threats of that nature at the school in recent memory.