{"id":73790,"date":"2025-11-29T00:42:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-29T00:42:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/73790\/"},"modified":"2025-11-29T00:42:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-29T00:42:07","slug":"smoking-gun-newsoms-plant-police-linked-to-deadly-la-fire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/73790\/","title":{"rendered":"Smoking gun: Newsom\u2019s ‘Plant Police’ linked to deadly LA fire"},"content":{"rendered":"

Eleven months after the Palisades Fire destroyed thousands of Los Angeles homes<\/a>, we may finally have the smoking gun linking Gov. Gavin Newsom\u2019s administration<\/a> to the deadly blaze.<\/p>\n

A newly discovered \u201cWildfire Management Plan,\u201d quietly issued by California State Parks just weeks before the Jan. 7 wildfire, states Newsom\u2019s policy bluntly: \u201cUnless specified otherwise, State Parks prefers to let Topanga State Park burn in a wildfire event\u201d \u2014 disregarding the park\u2019s proximity to residential neighborhoods.<\/p>\n

The document, prepared in December 2024, was unearthed this week through legal discovery in a civil lawsuit against the state.<\/p>\n

Attorney Alexander \u201cTrey\u201d Robinson, who represents thousands of Pacific Palisades residents, says the manual outlines new procedures for fire management.<\/p>\n

Those procedures could have barred local firefighters from fully extinguishing\u00a0an earlier blaze that later re-ignited in high winds.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Federal investigators say the Palisades Fire was rekindled from the much smaller Lachman Fire on Jan. 1, which was started by alleged arsonist<\/a> Jonathan Rinderknecht, 29, of Florida.<\/p>\n

The Lachman Fire began \u201con land owned by the local Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority . . . and spread onto land owned by California State Parks (Topanga State Park),\u201d according to a federal indictment against Rinderknecht.<\/p>\n

Local firefighters put out that fire in the wee hours of New Year\u2019s Day, and came back on Jan. 2 to make sure it was fully extinguished.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But according to text messages<\/a> first unearthed by the Los Angeles Times, they were ordered to leave \u201ceven though they complained the ground was still smoldering and rocks remained hot to the touch.\u201d<\/p>\n

That was likely a fateful decision.<\/p>\n

Investigators from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives later determined that the fire continued within the root structure<\/a> of plants \u201capproximately 20 feet south\u201d of the original blaze.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the extreme winds of Jan. 7 \u2014 a seasonal Santa Ana wind, made stronger by a jet stream at high altitude \u2014 the conflagration reignited and spread from the chaparral of the park to nearby homes.<\/p>\n

Locals have wondered for months why the firefighters left on Jan. 2, given the high risk that the fire could start again and spread from the state park to homes in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Highlands, just a few hundred yards away.<\/p>\n

Some residents \u2014 notably reality TV star Spencer Pratt<\/a>, who lost his home and has been investigating the fire ever since \u2014 have claimed that State Parks officials told firefighters they could not use heavy equipment to clear the perimeter of the fire, because doing so would harm engendered plant species.<\/p>\n

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Newsom has denied any state responsibility for the blaze. <\/p>\n

His office has even called residents who are suing the state \u201copportunistic plaintiffs.\u201d<\/p>\n

But one local citizen took a photograph of a California State Parks employee \u2014 wearing a jacket with the department\u2019s logo \u2014 talking to firefighters working on the Lachman Fire.<\/p>\n

And the \u201cWildfire Management Plan\u201d provides a key piece of evidence linking the disaster to the state\u2019s apparent negligence.<\/p>\n

The document defines \u201cAvoidance Areas,\u201d which contain \u201call sensitive Natural and Cultural Resources,\u201d and where \u201cno heavy equipment, vehicles, and retardant are allowed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shockingly, the document says the public should not be told where these areas are: \u201cAvoidance Areas should be shared with the Incident Command, but measures should be taken to keep the information confidential.\u201d<\/p>\n

The document also advises firefighters to use \u201cmodified fire suppression\u201d techniques in these areas. <\/p>\n

When performing a \u201cmop-up\u201d of an extinguished fire, firefighters are told to \u201cconsider allowing large logs to burn out.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

It adds: \u201cNo mop-up techniques are allowed in avoidance areas without the presence of an archaeologist.\u201d<\/p>\n

Robinson, who obtained the Wildfire Management Plan on Tuesday thanks to a judge\u2019s order, alleges that the Wildfire Management Plan prevented the Los Angeles Fire Department from fully extinguishing the Lachman Fire.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe believe this is the reason LAFD was restricted from performing a normal mop-up of the Lachman Fire,\u201d he told The Post. \u201cI suspect State Park \u2018Resource Advisors\u2019 shared the avoidance map with the Lachman [Incident Command] and LAFD was forced not to mop up\u201d in those designated areas.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy personal opinion is that we will learn this is why the fire rekindled,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Plant Police prevented LAFD from doing their job.\u201d<\/p>\n

That \u2014 and the lack of an archeologist.<\/p>\n

Joel Pollak is The California Post\u2019s Opinion Editor. The California Post, a sister publication to The New York Post, will be launching early in 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Eleven months after the Palisades Fire destroyed thousands of Los Angeles homes, we may finally have the smoking…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":73791,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8,3936,11330,457,28249,975,43125],"class_list":["post-73790","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-california-wildfires","tag-disaster","tag-gavin-newsom","tag-la-fires-2025","tag-opinion","tag-spencer-pratt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73790"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73790\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}