Suspect in federal custody after standoff

ST. LOUIS -- Federal marshals have taken into custody an Illinois man who, authorities said, set two homes on fire, killed his family dog and later hid inside the boiler room of a classic car museum, leading to a standoff with St. Louis police.

Jersey County, Ill., Deputy Sheriff Martin Andrews said Henry Hersman, 43, of Wood River, Ill., had been arrested on a federal parole violation, but offered no further information.

No one from the U.S. Marshal's Office was available Tuesday to discuss why the federal agency was holding Hersman.

Hersman was arrested Monday night by St. Louis police at the American Graffiti Auto Museum, in which he had invested.

He was later charged in Jersey County with aggravated arson and five counts of attempted murder.

Authorities said he crashed a burning car early Saturday morning into James and Sally Arbuthnot's rural Macoupin County, Ill., home, where his wife, Sally Hersman, was staying with the couple's two children.

Authorities also suspect Hersman of setting fire to his family's unoccupied house in Wood River, stabbing his family's dog to death and leaving its body on top of a car abandoned on a rural road near his in-laws' house.

Hersman had been shot in the foot several weeks ago during a dispute with an acquaintance but had never sought treatment for the injury, Andrews said.

"That leads you to draw conclusions about his stability," Andrews said. "If I got shot through the foot, I'd seek some treatment for it."

Last month, Hersman was charged with falsely threatening to use explosives and lying to the FBI. Prosecutors said Hersman told authorities about someone else's plans to crash a plane into the Gateway Arch and the Louisiana Superdome during the Super Bowl. Authorities said the person he named was someone with whom he was having a business dispute.