Jonathan Rinderknecht pleaded not guilty to a revised indictment that accuses him of igniting the first of two fires in the Pacific Palisades in January 2025
The man accused of causing the Palisades fire pleaded not guilty Wednesday to revised federal arson charges that allege he ignited a smaller fire days earlier that reignited in intense winds six days later.
Jonathan Rinderknecht entered the pleas in the 9th floor courtroom at US District Court in Downtown LA, the same courtroom that hosted his first trial on similar charges that ended with a hung jury earlier this summer.
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WATCH HERERinderknecht was dressed in a beige jail jumpsuit and stood at the lectern with his attorney, telling the judge he understood the new charges filed against him.
"And how do you plead to the charges?," asked US District Court Judge Anne Hwang.
"Not guilty," Rinderknecht said.
Judge Hwang set the retrial date for November 2.
"We believe the retrial is probably going to be shorter," Assistant US Attorney Mark Williams told the judge, and estimated it would take 5 to 8 days to present the prosecution's case.
A superseding grand jury indictment was made public last week.
It revealed prosecutors opted to drop one of the three arson charges from the first trial, and redefined the other two counts to separate the arson allegation from the first fire on January 1, 2025, called the Lachman fire, from the fire destruction caused by the devastating Palisades fire six days later.
At the first trial in June prosecutors characterized the two fires as a single, continuous event, and jurors reported they were deadlocked on all counts 10 to 2 in favor of acquittal.
"There is no direct evidence that establishing that he started a fire on January first," said Rinderknecht's defense attorney Steve Haney.
"There wasn't when they charged the case a year ago, there wasn't in June, there won't be in November. And that's the challenge they have, despite how they have changed, modified, turned upside-down the indictment," he told reporters outside court.
Rinderknecht remains in federal custody with no bail.
