![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Palisades-Fire-Arsonist-1-1.jpeg\")
AI imagery generated by suspected arsonist arrested by federal investigators last weekCredit: Department of Justice<\/p>\nJonathan Rinderknecht, 29, a former Ubee driver who lived in the Palisads, will be transported to Los Angeles in the coming weeks to face a federal judge<\/p>\n
The man federal prosecutors say hiked to a clearing in Topanga State Park where he allegedly sparked a wildfire on New Year\u2019s Eve, one that smoldered and then ignited the deadly and devastating Palisades fire, was hit with new charges by a grand jury. <\/p>\n
Jonathan Rinderknecht, 29, is expected to be transported by U.S. Marshals in the coming weeks from a federal lockup in Florida to face a judge in Los Angeles on charges contained in a three-count federal indictment: one count of destruction of property by means of fire, one count of arson affecting property used in interstate commerce, and one count of timber set afire.<\/p>\n
Rinderknecht was arrested on a single felony count on Oct. 7 in Florida, and the two additional charges were added this week. <\/p>\n
Agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms \u2013 who are leading the investigation into the cause of the Palisades fire \u2013 say the former Uber driver allegedly \u201cmaliciously set\u201d a blaze, which became known as the Lachman fire, in a clearing known as Hidden Buddha near the Skull Rock trailhead. He had lived near the trail, but was living in Hollywood at the time of the fire. <\/p>\n
Federal prosecutors say they spent months gathering witness statements, video surveillance, cellphone data, and analysis of fire dynamics and patterns, which led then to determine that Rinderknecht was responsible for that wildfire, which then became a \u201choldover fire,\u201d that sparked the Palisades fire. <\/p>\n
Rinderknecht has pleaded not guilty and has retained a new attorney, Steve Haney, who did not immediately respond to a request for comment. <\/p>\n
As part of the Palisades fire investigation, ATF agents found an AI-generated image of a burning city with people trying to flee on Rinderknecht\u2019s iPhone, created by a prompt that mentioned rich people, according to Bill Essayli, acting U.S. attorney for the Central District of California.<\/p>\n
AI imagery generated by suspected arsonist arrested by federal investigators last weekCredit: Department of Justice<\/p>\n
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During an interview with law enforcement on January 24, 2025, federal prosecutors say \u201cRinderknecht lied about where he was when he first saw the Lachman Fire,\u201d claiming that he was near the bottom of a hiking trail when he first saw the fire and called 911. \u201cBut geolocation data from his iPhone carrier showed that he was standing in a clearing 30 feet from the fire as it rapidly grew,\u201d prosecutors say<\/a>. <\/p>\n He is facing 45 years in prison if convicted. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jonathan Rinderknecht, 29, a former Ubee driver who lived in the Palisads, will be transported to Los Angeles…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":314212,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[126037,29414,1582,276,147964,2961,30999,224,5337,158200,17254,158201],"class_list":{"0":"post-314211","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-atf","9":"tag-bill-essayli","10":"tag-ca","11":"tag-california","12":"tag-jonathan-rinderknecht","13":"tag-la","14":"tag-lafd","15":"tag-los-angeles","16":"tag-losangeles","17":"tag-marshals-service","18":"tag-palisades-fire","19":"tag-u-s-attorneys-office-for-the-central-district-of-california"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115396939006284891","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314211","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=314211"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314211\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/314212"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=314211"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=314211"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=314211"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}