Palisades Fire Trial Heads to Jury to Consider Accused Arsonist

Jurors retreated to a private room in a downtown Los Angeles federal courthouse Tuesday after eight days of testimony in the case of Jonathan Rinderknecht, who is accused of setting a fire that ultimately destroyed large portions of the California county.

Assistant US Attorney Danbee Kim told the court that the 30-year-old’s anger and distaste with society festered, culminating on Jan. 1, 2025, when he lit a fire that ignited the catastrophic Palisades Fire almost a week later. Kim told the jury they could return a conviction for only the land burned during the initial fire.

“As the rest of the world rang in the New Year, the defendant lit a fire in the brush,” Kim said in her closing argument. “When it resurfaced six days later on Jan. 7, it devastated the city. It spread to houses. Neighborhoods. People’s businesses. It destroyed thousands of people’s livelihoods.”

Rinderknecht’s defense attorney, Steve Haney of Eastpointe, Mich., said the government stitched together “fragmented” evidence and attacked his client’s character when they couldn’t prove their case.

“When the government can’t prove, ladies and gentlemen, what a man did, they go to work on who he is,” Haney said.

Twelve individuals will now decide whether Rinderknecht committed three counts of arson. If he is found guilty on all charges, he could face 45 years in prison.

The Palisades Fire, which he is accused of igniting, destroyed almost 7,000 structures and killed 12 people.

Prosecutors presented evidence that they say links Rinderknecht to the hillside where the Lachman Fire erupted in the early hours of New Years Day. Witnesses testified that he grew angry in the months and days before, as prosecutors attempted to show his bubbling frustration at the world motivated him to set the blaze.

Rinderknecht traveled into the area that evening while working as an Uber driver, dropping someone off. Two passengers testified that he drove erratically and made disturbing statements. One of them, Brennan White, testified that he thought Rinderknecht had “incel energy.”

Hillside Flames

Cell tower data also placed Rinderknecht in the area that evening, agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Explosives and Firearms told the court. Images taken from a University of California San Diego camera perched on a nearby water tank captured Rinderknecht just before midnight walking up the switchbacks of the hill, using his iPhone as a flashlight.

One camera also caught flames that burst on the same hillside at 12:12 a.m. Phone records show that Rinderknecht placed 17 calls to 911 after the flames appeared in the footage. Each call recorded his latitude, longitude, and altitude, at first placing him in the direct proximity of where ATF investigators determined the fire began, and then tracking him as he walked down the hill.

Flames spread south along the ridge, said Derek Hill, who led the ATF analysis on the origin and cause of the fire. ATF concluded that after authorities put out the flames, an ember lodged itself in a tree root structure, allowing hurricane force winds on Jan. 7, 2025, to ignite the Palisades Fire, Hill said.

Haney, the defense attorney, criticized the investigation, questioning how the area where the Lachman Fire burned was left unsecured for more than a week, allowing passersby to grab potential evidence that would vindicate his client. He also raised concerns that fire retardant and water used to put out the initial blaze could wash away remnants of a potential culprit for the ignition of the fire.

He showed a presentation during his closing argument that read, “Evidence washed away. Evidence blown away. Evidence burned away.”

Prosecutors said the condition of the burn scar was normal for an investigation.

Haney also noted in his closing argument that the government was unable to retrieve Verizon data for the initial blaze, which he argued could place someone else on the hill that evening. He argued that a firework could have started the New Year’s Day fire, an assertion that the government sought to rebut, by attempting to discredit witnesses who testified to pyrotechnics, examining government experts, and relying on the words of Rinderknecht, who told law enforcement that he did not see any such explosions that evening.

Rinderknecht did not take the stand in his own defense.

Societal Anger

Government lawyers attempted to persuade the jury Rinderknecht was driven by anger at society. Former FBI and ATF agent Kevin Kelm testified about a behavioral analysis he performed, concluding that Rinderknecht set the fire because he sought “societal revenge.”

Rinderknecht used ChatGPT as a journal in which he conveyed his frustration with wealth disparity and climate change, ATF Agent Michael Montevidoni testified. In the days before New Year’s Eve, he used the chatbot to craft messages to a former partner, sending her increasingly angry and vulgar texts as New Year’s Eve approached.

During an interview with law enforcement weeks after the fire, Rinderknecht lied about his whereabouts on the hill that evening, ATF agent Matthew Beals testified, saying he was lower on the hill than where phone data places him when he said he first saw the flames.

“I didn’t think he was being honest with me,” Beals previously told the court.

Jurors will resume their deliberations on Wednesday morning.

The case is United States v. Rinderknecht, C.D. Cal., No. 2:25-cr-00833, closing arguments 6/23/26.