Accused arsonist in Los Angeles’ deadly Palisades fire returns for federal retrial

Jury selection began Monday in the federal retrial of a man prosecutors say deliberately set a blaze that grew into one of the deadliest, most destructive wildfires in Los Angeles history.

Jonathan Rinderknecht, 30, whose initial three-week trial ended in a hung jury in late June, was slated to return to U.S. District Court in downtown Los Angeles to face a scaled-down version of the charges previously leveled against him.

Rinderknecht, a former Uber driver of dual U.S.-French citizenship, was cast by prosecutors as a dejected loner who harbored deep anger at society, particularly the wealthy, and channeled his rage into an act of arson.

He is accused of “maliciously” starting a brush fire on January 1, 2025, that was quickly extinguished but smoldered in the roots of dense scrub before re-igniting days later, whipped by fierce winds into a conflagration that laid waste to the seaside enclave of Pacific Palisades.

Defense attorneys have maintained that Rinderknecht was wrongly accused. They asserted the hilltop New Year’s Day blaze was triggered by holiday fireworks, not their client, and that the massive Palisades inferno that killed 12 people and destroyed thousands of homes a week later was a separate fire set by…

Original source: https://www.nbcnews.com/health