Mistrial declared in Palisades fire arson case, a stunning blow to US prosecutors

LOS ANGELES - A mistrial was declared Friday in the federal trial of a 30-year-old former Uber driver accused of setting what would become the most destructive wildfire in Los Angeles history.

Jonathan Rinderknecht was on trial for destruction of property by means of fire, arson affecting property used in interstate commerce and timber set afire. But on Friday, the 13th day of trial, U.S. District Judge Anne Hwang declared a mistrial after the jurors said they were unable to reach a verdict on any of the felony charges, with a final vote of 10 to 2 for acquittal.

"The court finds there's a manifest necessity to declare a mistrial in this case due to a jury deadlock," Hwang said.

First Assistant U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli said on the social media platform X that his office would 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. We fully intend to retry this case before a new jury and obtain guilty verdicts on all charged counts."

Hwang ordered Rinderknecht to remain in custody and scheduled a new trial for Oct. 19.

Outside the courtroom, defense attorney Steve Haney said the jury "was not convinced beyond a reasonable doubt … and it wasn't even close."

"Ten to 2 is a pretty resounding indication of what the jury felt about this case," he said, "and we felt that way from the very beginning."

In a news conference later, he added that "a hung jury on a 10-2 verdict, to be frank, in most districts, you're not going to have a retrial. But you will in this district."

Rinderknecht's father, who attended the whole trial, said he was disheartened by the judge's decision to keep his son in custody.

"We know, from day one, our son is innocent," said Joel Rinderknecht, flanked by his two other children. "It feels like the government is just taking him as a scapegoat."

"Our family is really hurting because of this," said Leah Rinderknecht, the defendant's sister. "We wanted him to come home.

Juror No. 4, who identified herself only by her first name, Syrena, said her vote was "not guilty." She cited some of the points Haney had hit on during his defense, including a lack of cellphone data showing Verizon phones in the area, something that could have identified other potential suspects, and gaps of time in surveillance footage.

"There's just not enough proof ... a lot of holes," the 49-year-old said. "Without the proof, and all the doubts, I can't say for sure that he's guilty."

When asked about the government's plans to retry the case, Syrena called it a "waste of our American dollars."

Jurors first indicated that they were at an impasse on Thursday afternoon, after deliberating for more than 13 hours. The jury had initially indicated they'd reached a unanimous verdict, but in a follow-up note said they were at "a standstill" and "unsure how to proceed." Syrena said the foreperson thought the verdict form said "un-unanimous," which led to the earlier error.

During the trial, prosecutors called more than 30 witnesses, who painted a picture of a man spiraling mentally and seeking vengeance against the wealthy when he hiked to a clearing overlooking Pacific Palisades and allegedly used a lighter to set the Lachman fire on Jan. 1, 2025.

Prosecutors said the Lachman fire smoldered underground for a week before exploding into the deadly Palisades fire. Firefighters had thought they had extinguished the initial blaze and packed their equipment out the following day. The secondary inferno erupted on Jan. 7, 2025, killed 12 people, destroyed 6,500 structures across the Palisades and Malibu, and cost billions of dollars in damage and insurance claims.

Syrena questioned why Rinderknecht was being held solely responsible for the Palisades fire, given that it exploded after firefighters had left the scene of the initial fire while it was still smoldering. The judge had barred Haney from raising allegations of negligence by the Los Angeles Fire Department.

"This holdover theory just wasn't working for me," Syrena said. "Shouldn't the firemen have known? People were up there hiking and said they saw smoldering."

Syrena also criticized the prosecutor's focus on Rinderknecht's ChatGPT history, stating that she uses it herself. Prosecutors had read out Rinderknecht's prompts during the trial, telling jurors that he had previously asked ChatGPT to create images for him of a fire and expressed his anger "about wealthy people and his anger about society."

"He's a normal … this is embarrassing, I use ChatGPT," Syrena said. "So I got really sad. I talk to ChatGPT all the time, so it made me angry that they were putting his character down for just being human."

During the trial, Rinderknecht's defense attorney called several witnesses in an attempt to undercut the prosecution's theory of the fire. A Palisades resident said he saw several teens leaving the hill behind his house after the fire started, acting "boastful." A Los Angeles firefighter testified that he saw flashes of light and heard loud noises that sounded like fireworks around midnight near the neighborhood closest to where the blaze sparked. A defense expert told jurors the most likely cause of the blaze was fireworks and cast doubt on exactly where it originated.

"The government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the lighter ignited the fire, because that's what they claim happened here," Haney told the jury in his closing argument Tuesday. "They don't have any evidence at all that Jonathan started a fire on that hill with a lighter."

After the jury appeared deadlocked Thursday afternoon, Assistant U.S. Atty. Mark Williams asked the judge Friday morning to give an Allen charge, urging the jurors to continue deliberating. Haney moved for a mistrial, saying that "forcing continued deliberations through some instructive method … it has the potential to be coercive."

Hwang said she agreed with him regarding the Allen charge, but declined to grant a mistrial without further inquiry with the jury.

"Given the length of this trial, they haven't deliberated for an inordinate amount of time at this point," Williams argued. "There's no indication at this point that they cannot deliberate and continue to discuss the issues."

Hwang disagreed.

"In this case, the jury has deliberated for 13 hours over the course of two days, the notes are unequivocal and clear," Hwang said. "The foreperson stated that people are ‘Dead set, unwavering and unwilling to change their opinion.'"

Hwang called the jurors in for questioning after 9 a.m. One of them, who wanted a conviction, was crying.

"Is it your considered opinion that the jury is unable to agree on a verdict on any of the three counts," the judge asked the foreperson.

"Yes," he said.

"Is there anything at all that the court can do to assist the jury in its deliberations?"

"No," he said.

Outside the courtroom, Briana Jimenez, an alternate juror, said if she had been deliberating, she would have voted "not guilty."

"I think a lot of the witnesses that the defense brought really helped sway me," she said. "They brought in their own experts who didn't agree with the government's experts."

She questioned officials not having secured the scene of the Lachman fire, a point that Haney hit hard during the trial.

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This story was originally published June 26, 2026 at 12:53 PM.