Prosecutors: Arson Suspect in Los Angeles Palisades Fire Was ‘Pissed Off at the World’

Prosecutors reportedly said that Jonathan Rinderknecht, the 29-year-old arson suspect in last year’s deadly Los Angeles Palisades Fire, was “pissed off at the world.”

Rinderknecht was upset over not having any plans for New Year’s Eve, then ranted about being angry at the world before he started a fire on January 1, 2025, that burned undetected in root systems before flaring back up on January 7, prosecutors said, according to court documents obtained by CNN.

Witnesses said the arson suspect was driving erratically on his New Year’s Eve Uber routes, with his passengers describing him as “angry, intense, driving erratically, and ranting about being ‘pissed off at the world,'” prosecutors said in an April 29 pretrial memo.

WATCH — Start of the Palisades Fire on 1/7/2025:

Rinderknecht had also ranted to his passengers about UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson’s suspected shooter Luigi Mangione, capitalism, and vigilantism, according to court filings.

Moreover, the 29-year-old reportedly told investigators in a January 24 interview that someone might commit arson in the Palisades “out of resentment of the rich enjoying their money as ‘we’re basically being enslaved by them,'” referencing Mangione’s alleged crime, court documents added.

Prosecutors also said that Rinderknecht was distressed over a failed relationship and upset over his New Year’s Eve plans having been foiled.

The arson suspect has since pleaded not guilty to starting what became one of the most destructive wildfires in California history, which devastated the neighborhoods of Pacific Palisades and Malibu, killing 12 people.

His attorneys, meanwhile, argue that Rinderknecht is being used as a scapegoat for the Los Angeles Fire Department’s failure to extinguish the earlier fire.

“My client maintains his innocence, as he has from the beginning, and we look forward to clearing his name at trial,” Rinderknecht’s attorney Steve Haney said on Sunday.

“The offered motive that my client started a fire on [New Year’s] Eve because he did not have a date speaks for itself,” Haney added.

The attorney then cited a deposition in which a firefighter had testified that he noticed the ground was still smoldering from the fire on January 2, 2025, before telling his supervisor that there were hot spots.

A battalion chief also testified that he walked the perimeter of the burn area four times in one day, ensuring all hot spots were extinguished.

Fire Department Chief Jaime Moore said he is concerned about varying testimonies among firefighters and commissioned an independent report on how the initial January 1, 2025, fire was addressed.

As for Rinderknecht, his trial is set begin on June 8.