Jonathan Rinderknecht, a 29 year old Uber driver, has been arrested in Florida for starting the Pacific Palisades fire in Los Angeles that killed 12 people and destroyed more than 6,000 homes in January.
Rinderknecht was a former resident of Pacific Palisades, living one block away from the Skull Rock Trailhead, where he allegedly started the fire. He moved to Florida after starting the fire.
Two passengers rode with Mr Rinderknecht earlier on New Year's Eve. One passenger told investigators he remembered the driver had appeared agitated and angry. On his phone they found videos that Mr Rinderknecht had taken of firefighters trying to put out the flames.
President Donald Trump has promised to execute the CEO of Edison International responsible for starting the Eaton Fire in Alta Dena and the person, now known, who was responsible for starting the Pacific Palisades Fire.
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In July 2024, five months before Rinderknecht allegedly set the Pacific Palisades fire, he asked ChatGPT to create an image of a "dystopian painting" that included a burning forest and a crowd of people running away from a fire.
His prompt to the AI tool included the text: "In the middle [of the painting], 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 conglomerate of the richest people.
"They are chilling, watching the world burn down, and watching the people struggle. They are laughing, enjoying themselves, and dancing." |
