Authorities Arrest Man for Allegedly Starting LA’s Pacific Palisades Fire
Rinderknecht allegedly started the fire on January 1. It exploded on January 7 and ripped through the prestigious neighborhood of Pacific Palisades, killing 12 people.
Authorities have arrested Jonathan Rinderknecht, 29, for allegedly starting a fire that turned into the Palisades Fire in Los Angeles, CA.
Rinderknecht allegedly started the fire on January 1. It exploded due to intense winds on January 7 and ripped through the prestigious neighborhood of Pacific Palisades, killing 12 people. It also destroyed over 6,000 homes and buildings.
The authorities have charged Rinderknecht with destruction of property by means of fire.
Rinderknecht will appear in a federal court in Florida, where he resides, on Wednesday.
The complaint accuses Rinderknecht of starting “the fire on land owned by the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority (“MRCA”), an organization that received federal funding.”
The investigation reportedly revealed Rinderknecht’s proximity to the fire, which started late at night on December 31, 2024, while he was working as an Uber driver. He knew the area because he used to live there.
The complaint states that Rinderknecht admitted to walking up the Skull Rock Trailhead that night to the top of a hill known as Hidden Buddha.
Environmental sensing platforms picked up a fire at 12:12 AM on January 1.
Here’s an interesting tidbit! Rinderknacht attempted to call 911 two times:
RINDERKNECHT attempted to call 911 at approximately 12:12:31 a.m. The call did not go through, most likely because he was out of cellphone range. The GPS data obtained from RINDERKNECHT’s iPhone carrier for that attempted call placed his iPhone slightly below the Hidden Buddha clearing.
Approximately 19 seconds later, at approximately 12:12:50 a.m., RINDERKNECHT attempted to call 911 again, again unsuccessfully. The GPS data for that attempted call was more precise, and placed him in the Hidden Buddha clearing.
Acting US Attorney Bill Essayli wrote on X:
Today we are announcing the arrest of 29-year-old Jonathan Rinderknecht on a criminal complaint charging him with maliciously starting what became the Palisades Fire in January.
The complaint alleges that Rinderknecht’s started a fire in Pacific Palisades on New Year’s Day — a blaze that eventually turned into one of the most destructive fires in Los Angeles history, causing death and widespread destruction.
Among the evidence that was collected from his digital devices was an image he generated on ChatGPT depicting a burning city.
While we cannot undo the damage and destruction that was done, we hope his arrest and the charges against him bring some measure of justice to the victims of this horrific tragedy.
Rinderknecht’s initial appearance is scheduled for today at 1:30 p.m. EDT in U.S. District Court in Orlando. Rinderknecht is presumed innocent until proven guilty.
Today we are announcing the arrest of 29-year-old Jonathan Rinderknecht on a criminal complaint charging him with maliciously starting what became the Palisades Fire in January.
⁰The complaint alleges that Rinderknecht's started a fire in Pacific Palisades on New Year's Day –… pic.twitter.com/UzrFa0Lmrz— Acting U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli (@USAttyEssayli) October 8, 2025
DONATE
Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
Comments
Another extreme right-wing MAGA Nazi, no doubt.
Why not 12 counts of felony murder?
Mostly non-combustible…
https://x.com/rduke0071/status/1975943566141837726/photo/1
I believe the correct terminology here is “patsy”.
So, we are supposed to believe that this dude set a fire in a tinderbox-dry area that escaped control for a week before burning Pacific Palisades to the ground?
This guy can’t hold a candle to Newsom and Bass and their negligence in this mess.
“Never let a crisis go to waste”
– R. Emmanuel.
Agree. This was a land grab.
Wait, wait, let me play leftist logic games: his arrest predicated on his 911 calls is going to have a chilling effect on brown migrants and marginalized peoples and (of course) LGBTQ…from making 911 calls.
Calls that didn’t even connect
Make no mistake.
It didn’t take them NINE MONTHS to figure out this guy started the fires.
They wanted the BS narrative of ‘climate change’ nonsense starting fires. And losing your home to arson is a huge insurance difference to losing it to ‘natural causes’.
Now that all of the insurance payouts are over and the ‘climate change’ narrative is done, they’re finally arresting the guy they’ve known all along was responsible.
And make no mistake. Not a single leftist will ever hear about this guy’s arrest, they’re all going to ‘know’ that the fires were CLIMATE CHANGE.
Im suspicious about the delay myself but fire insurance pays for criminally caused fires, arson, as long as the homeowner is not involved. Similarly, fire insurance pays for “acts of god” fires, like “climate change,’ which is just another name for common lightning cause wild-fire. So the delay was not insurance based.
If he called 911 immediately and did it twice he might have started a campfire to commune with nature and it got out of control.
Sure. On the other hand he may have had second thoughts/guilty conscience or worse dialled to create plausible digital record to mask his guilt.
Sure. We just don’t know, yet.
Right.
I’m unsure how “maliciously” squares with him trying to call 911 twice.
Especially since even if he had connected, they wouldn’t have had any water to put it out anyway.
“Among the evidence that was collected from his digital devices was an image he generated on ChatGPT depicting a burning city.”
Evidence?
I’m glad I don’t have a reproduction of Guernica on my wall, they’d have me in a Hannibal Lecter outfit.
Just be glad you don’t have a “Saw” movie poster.
Olearys cow too.
He’ll self-identify as a woman and get two weeks in jail.
<>
he called 911? twice?
and california’s crappy phone system didn’t work?
just like their hydrants.
There’s plenty of ‘dead zones’ in the USA. Sometimes it is proximity to a tower, sometimes it is topography. Omnidirectional expectations with mountains, canyons, ridge lines, hills and valleys don’t mix well without lots of repeaters and economically that’s not viable or they’d have installed them.
I just spent 3 weeks at my place up north where there is no cell coverage.
The (attempted) calls show proximity to the initial fire – but i don’t see how that proves he started the fire – as opposed to just observing it. And trying to call it in to 911. Failing a manifesto or other sort of confession material or a history of being a firebug or even a motive on the face of it – it looks weak.
Wildfires occur in California wilderness exclusive of “Global Warming” or any sort of arson or accidental carelessness with a campfire. And even if this particular fire was man-made – what’s the evidence this guy is the man who made it? This could be another case of lazy investigators like with Richard Jewell and the Atlanta Olympic bombing.
Just because I’m standing in a bank lobby when it is robbed doesn’t mean I’m in on it.
His legal name is “Climate Change”.
IDK. Unless they can prove he started it with an eyewitness, his possession of arson material or he confesses to starting it they don’t have much. Cell phone pings place him there and he is familiar with the area but so what? He could have been hiking, came across the fire and tried to call 911 for help twice with no luck.
When I go hiking I always carry a little food and a fire starter among other things. That doesn’t mean I’m going to set the world ablaze.
The cops better have more than what they are currently telling the press.
It might depend on whether he had a lawyer or foolishly talked to the first policeman who asked him.