Residents question retry after Palisades arson acquittal

retry of – After a federal jury acquitted Jonathan Rinderknecht in the Palisades fire arson case, prosecutors said they will retry him. Residents and attorneys for fire victims say the focus should shift to what went wrong during the Jan. 1 Lachman fire response—not to p

The courtroom outcome came down quickly, but the anger has not.

Within days of a federal jury failing to reach a verdict in the trial of a man accused of starting the Palisades fire. First Assistant U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli said his office would retry the case. The announcement landed as a severe blow to Essayli’s team: the jury voted 10-2 in favor of acquitting Jonathan Rinderknecht.

To many people who lived through the fire. the prospect of a second criminal trial feels like the wrong kind of persistence. “They don’t have the goods. ” said Lisa Sweetingham. a longtime Palisades resident and journalist who attended the trial in federal court after losing her home in the fire. “Ten jurors saw that, and a lot of people in the audience saw that. They really don’t have the evidence to bring it home.”.

Sweetingham’s frustration centers on what she described as gaps in the prosecution’s theory—particularly whether Rinderknecht deliberately started the Lachman fire on Jan. 1, 2025, which later reignited on Jan. 7 into what became the Palisades fire. That later blaze killed 12 people and destroyed thousands of homes.

Defense witnesses pointed to alternative explanations and raised doubts about the chain of events between Jan. 1 and Jan. 7.

One Palisades resident testified that he saw several teens leaving the hill behind his house after the Lachman fire started. and that their behavior felt “boastful.” A Los Angeles firefighter testified that around midnight he saw flashes of light and heard loud noises that sounded like fireworks. A defense expert also told the jury that the most likely cause of the blaze was fireworks.

Sweetingham added a detail that she said complicates the prosecution’s timeline: she said Rinderknecht called 911 more than a dozen times on Jan. 1. In her view. it stretches the evidence to hold him accountable for the rekindling six days later. especially after what she described as failures to put out the earlier blaze.

That sentiment was echoed by a juror who spoke publicly after the trial. “We’d like to see the government put that much focus and money and human capital into examining the institutions and the infrastructure. and the various departments that failed us. from Jan. 1 through Jan. 7, rather than retry a 30-year-old Uber driver who may or may not have started this fire at all,” Sweetingham said.

At the heart of that institutional critique is a civil lawsuit that fire victims brought against the city and the state. In that case, Los Angeles firefighters testified about alleged communication failures and questionable decisions by higher-ups that led crews to leave the area prematurely.

Fire crews were ordered to roll up their hoses despite complaints that a more thorough mop-up was needed. One firefighter picking up hoses on Jan. 2 found crackling red-hot coals in the dirt. A captain cautioned his chief that it was too soon to pick up the hoses. Crews also did not walk the entire perimeter of the burn scar after a report of smoke in the area on Jan. 3.

And when Jan. 7 brought dire warnings of extreme winds, fire commanders failed to pre-deploy engines in the area.

Los Angeles Fire Department spokesperson Stephanie Bishop said internal and outside investigations into the Lachman fire response are ongoing. “This department’s commitment to accountability and operational improvement is unchanged,” she said.

For many victims, the legal fight that offers a direct path to rebuilding homes remains the civil case. Alex Robertson. one of the attorneys handling that lawsuit. said the criminal prosecution did little for the people who lost everything. “The prosecution of this defendant did nothing to help them rebuild their homes,” he said. Robertson added that the state and the city have repeatedly pointed to the arson case as what he called an attempt to distract from their own liability. “Of course. our position is we don’t care what ignited the Lachman fire — our case is all about what happened starting on Jan. 2,” Robertson said.

Even legal experts who expected prosecutors to pursue a second try said the key issue is how convincingly prosecutors can connect Jan. 1 to Jan. 7.

Neama Rahmani. a former federal prosecutor now in private practice. said the plan to retry a high-profile criminal case is not surprising. Prosecutors. he said. now know how witnesses will testify. what the defense will argue. and how evidence landed with the jury. “I think they need to do a better job rebutting the fireworks theory,” Rahmani said. “They really need to establish that causal link between Jan. 1 and Jan. 7 in a much more persuasive way.”.

Rahmani also said the “overwhelming vote to acquit is ‘a clear sign’ that the case should be dropped and Essayli should move on.”

Laurie Levenson. a former federal prosecutor who teaches at Loyola Law School. said prosecutors will need better evidence—or a more convincing presentation—on the second attempt. “Every aspect of this has to be closely examined. and done so from a position. frankly. of humility. realizing that it’s not a slam dunk. ” she said. “It wasn’t the first time, and it will not be the second time.”.

Levenson pointed to juror criticism of the prosecution’s focus on Rinderknecht’s ChatGPT history. The juror, who identified herself only as Syrena, told reporters that she uses the chatbot herself and was angered “that they were putting his character down for just being human.”

During the trial, prosecutors read aloud Rinderknecht’s prompts to ChatGPT. They told jurors that he had asked the chatbot to create images for him of a fire and expressed negative feelings “about wealthy people and his anger about society.”

Levenson said that may not be enough to carry a conviction. “I don’t think you’re going to win this case just by attacking his character,” she said. “He does seem like a really troubled individual that could do a crime like this. but the jury wanted evidence that he did do the crime. And that comes back to things like physical evidence, eyewitness testimony, expert testimony.”.

Essayli, for his part, criticized jurors for what he said were deliberations that went beyond the trial. In comments to KFI on Friday, he said that “regardless of how competent or negligent L.A. Fire was in responding. it does not absolve his guilt in starting the initial fire.” He added. “We will redo this trial. and hopefully get better jurors.”.

But Syrena said jurors were troubled by something that. in her view. never fully made it into the record after a judge’s ruling. “There was so many people up there that said they did see smoldering. so why wasn’t it taken care of?” she said. Robertson described that absence as an “elephant in the room” that bothered jurors.

E. Randol Schoenberg. an attorney who lost his Malibu home in the fire and represents victims in the civil case. said accountability is the central issue for him as a resident. “As for the civil case against the State, it makes no difference what caused the fire on January 1,” he said. “The only thing that matters is that the State knew it was dangerous and failed to do anything about it.”.

As the government prepares to bring the case back to court. residents and attorneys are left with the same question—what should get the focus now. In Palisades, the insistence is not just about whether Rinderknecht started the initial blaze. It is about whether the system that responded before and during the critical days of Jan. 1 through Jan. 7 will finally face the kind of scrutiny victims say they were promised.

Palisades fire Lachman fire Jonathan Rinderknecht Bill Essayli arson case retry Los Angeles Fire Department Stephanie Bishop Syrena juror Lisa Sweetingham civil lawsuit Jan. 1 2025 Jan. 7 extreme winds