WEST MELBOURNE, Fla. – Working in concert with ATF agents, West Melbourne police officers arrested Jonathan Rinderknecht after they conducted a traffic stop Tuesday morning, according to West Melbourne Police Chief Greg Vesta.
Chief Vesta told News 6 the arrest happened in a residential neighborhood near where Rinderknecht was living and officers took him into custody “without incident.”
News 6’s Mike Valente knocked on Rinderknecht’s door Wednesday, but no one answered. There were no vehicles in the driveway.
Several neighbors said they did not know Rinderknecht and had no idea that anyone had been arrested in connection to the Palisades Fire.
“It’s kind of scary,” said Christopher Andersen, who lives on the same block. “I don’t know what to think about it. It makes the world seem a lot smaller. It’s really, really surprising.”
[VIDEO: Man arrested in Florida for destructive Los Angeles wildfires appears in Orlando federal court]
News 6 confirmed Rinderknecht’s address when reviewing his recent traffic infractions.
Brevard County Court of Clerk records showed that Rinderknecht was cited for speeding in August and again in September. The dockets for each case indicated he was still contesting the citations.
News 6 is also still working to determine if Rinderknecht had a job in the area. We contacted Uber to learn if he was still driving for the company in Florida, as he had been in California in the hours before authorities say he set the fire.
In response to our inquiry, an Uber spokesperson told News 6 that Rinderknecht was not on the Uber app at the time of the fire, but that the company still worked closely with the ATF to help determine the driver’s whereabouts on and around Jan. 1.
The spokesperson said as soon as the company learned of Rinderknecht’s suspected involvement, the company removed his access to the Uber platform and continued to cooperate with the ATF on the investigation.
Rinderknecht also passed an initial background check in 2023 and yearly reruns, according to the spokesperson.