In January, one of the most economically devastating fires in Californian history raged in the luxury Los Angeles coastal suburb of Pacific Palisades. Ten months later, a suspect has been arrested and charged with deliberately starting the fire.
This is becoming a familiar pattern: the media will point towards climate change when a devastating fire occurs, but the results of police investigations which show that arson was involved do not receive the same attention.
In the same way, the focus on climate change also distracts from the harm caused by ideologically driven, dysfunctional policies under progressive governance in California: such as the environmental management policy where controlled burns – burning dead brush in a controlled way so as to lessen fuel load in an area – isn’t practised in the region, in part because environmentalists argue native plants have difficulty recovering.
Gross mismanagement also meant that the fire hydrants were empty when needed; and the fire fighting department didn’t have the people, the right people, or the resources needed to respond to fires.
Now we know that it wasn’t climate change but arson that started the inferno. On October 8, Acting US Attorney, Bill Essayli, announced on a X post that a 29 year old suspect, Jonathan Rinderknecht, was “arrested and charged with maliciously starting what became the Palisades fire in January”
The announcement stated: “The complaint alleges that Rinderknecht’s started a fire in Pacific Palisades on New Year’s Day — a blaze that eventually turned into one of the most destructive fires in Los Angeles history, causing death and widespread destruction.”
Evidence collected from Rinderknecht’s computer included ChatGPT generated images depicting a burning city.
Essayli continued in his statement “While we cannot undo the damage and destruction that was done, we hope his arrest and the charges against him bring some measure of justice to the victims of this horrific tragedy.”
Federal investigators say the man they believe is responsible for the catastrophic Palisades fire, Jonathan Rinderknecht, asked Chat GPT last year to create a “dystopian” image.
He provided the following prompt: “A dystopian painting divided into two parts that blend together seamlessly. Next to it, a crowd of people is running away from the fire. Leading to the middle. In the middle hundreds of thousands of people in poverty are trying to get past a gigantic gate with a big dollar sign on it. On the other side of the gate and the entire wall is a big group of the richest people. They are chilling, watching the world burn down, and watching the people struggle. They are laughing enjoying themselves and dancing.”
Rinderknecht, according to evidence submitted in the filing, expressed the sentiments of a committed left-wing activist with anti-Christian and far left dystopian fantasies. He talked about burning a Bible and feeling so liberated before igniting the fire.
Reports allege that, on January 1, Rinderknecht lit the fire on a popular hiking trail in the Pacific Palisades area and then fled the scene and called 911 to report the fire. Fire fighters extinguished the fire, but omitted to monitor the area sufficiently for underground smoulders which are prone to reigniting the fire.
The fires were started on January 1 and were widely blamed on climate change by media and political figures. That focus should now be revisited given the charges against Rinderknecht – and the likelihood that careless utilities management and detrimental Green bush management policies could cause further harm.
It is estimated that the devastating Palisades Fire killed 12 people, wiped out 6,000 homes and buildings, and racked up a staggering $150 billion in damages.
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