Feds try again to convict Palisades Fire suspect after mistrial Play

The federal government will take a second stab at convicting the man accused of setting the blaze that grew into the deadly Palisades Fire, starting Tuesday.

Jonathan Rinderknecht is set to be arraigned Tuesday on charges contained in a revised indictment.

Earlier this year, a federal court jury deadlocked 10-2 in favor of acquitting Rinderknecht on three arson-related charges stemming from the 2025 firestorm. The judge declared a mistrial, but prosecutors vowed to retry the case.

The Palisades Fire killed 12 people, burned 23,448 acres, cost billions in damage and insurance claims, and ruined much of the exclusive Pacific Palisades community. 6,800 structures were destroyed. About 720 of those were houses in Malibu.

In the first prosecution, the U.S. Attorney's Office for Los Angeles made a serious legal error. They combined the two fires — which were five days apart — into three combined charges. The jury could not convict Rinderknecht for starting the first fire without convicting him for starting the second fire. And the jurors were leaning against convictions in the second fire — by a 10 to 2 vote, they felt the federal prosecutor had not presented a clear and convincing case that Rinderknecht had criminal liability for a fire that the City of Los Angeles allowed to break out.

The federal case was overseen by Bill Essayli, a Trump political appointee who has failed repeatedly to win confirmation in the Republican-dominated U.S. Senate.

Evidence shows that Rinderknecht likely started the first fire of 2025, the Lachman Fire. But the feds goofed and did not legally separate the Lachman Fire from the Palisades Fire, which grew out of the ashes of the first blaze after five days.

Essayli effectively runs the U.S. Attorney's Office in Los Angeles, and he was in charge of the botched trial.

And now comes news that a federal court of appeal has ruled a district attorney under a similar cloud ineligible to run the Justice Department office in this district. Monday, the Northern District Court of Appeals ruled that the president cannot keep a failed nominee running an office without Senate confirmation. The court said simply giving that person a different title, along with the full powers of the job, is not legal.

The administration says it will appeal.