A federal judge declared a mistrial Friday in the case of Jonathan Rinderknecht, the man accused of deliberately igniting the Palisades Fire on New Year’s Day 2025, after a jury deadlocked 10-2 in favor of acquittal following more than 13 hours of deliberations.
Rinderknecht, 30, faces charges of destruction of property by means of fire. He pleaded not guilty. The fire burned through Pacific Palisades and surrounding neighborhoods, killing 12 people and causing an estimated $35 billion to $45 billion in damage, making it the deadliest wildfire in Los Angeles history.
United States Attorney Bill Essayli said the government will retry the case. “The evidence is strong that Jonathan Rinderknecht is responsible for igniting the fire on January 1, 2025, which eventually became the Palisades fire,” Essayli wrote on X. “We fully intend to retry this case before a new jury and obtain guilty verdicts on all charged counts.”
Jurors told the judge Thursday afternoon they had reached a verdict, then returned 30 minutes later with a contradictory message: they had not. When the judge asked whether additional instructions or re-reading of testimony could break the deadlock, jurors replied there was “nothing the court can do to assist the jury in their deliberations.”
Prosecutors argued Rinderknecht was inspired, at least in part, by Luigi Mangione, the man accused of killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in New York City in December 2024. Court filings show Rinderknecht searched the phrases “free Luigi Mangione,” “lets take down all the billionaires,” and “reddit lets kill all the billionaires” in December 2024, weeks before the fire.
Behavioral analyst Kevin Kelm testified that Rinderknecht showed signs of what Kelm described as “societal revenge,” a pattern where suspects fixate on personal grievances tied to finances, relationships, or social standing. Kelm said Rinderknecht used ChatGPT to generate a dystopian image depicting a divide between wealthy and lower-income individuals.
“In the months leading up to the fire, he had become increasingly angry with his life and society at large,” prosecutors wrote in court filings. When investigators asked Rinderknecht why someone might commit arson in the Pacific Palisades, he said it would be out of resentment of the rich, comparing it to a form of “desperation” similar to the killing Mangione allegedly committed.
Rinderknecht was arrested in October 2025, more than nine months after the fire. The prosecution has not announced a retrial date.
