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Strange. The article says that he made the fire, called first responders, who put the fire out. The fire continued to smolder before reigniting in later winds.

by nusl 1y ago

Strange. The article says that he made the fire, called first responders, who put the fire out. The fire continued to smolder before reigniting in later winds. If you cause a problem, report it, then the authorities responsible for dealing with those problems take care of it and go home, what does it mean? Are the authorities then partially responsible for not ensuring the fire was put out properly before leaving the area? Is he even guilty at all given that he filled his duty and reported the problem after unintentionally causing it?

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
criley2 1y ago
[flagged]
- nashashmi 1y ago
  The question to ask is manslaughter or first degree murder.
- jvanderbot 1y ago
  Intent here will matter. If he's got a gun fetish and accidentally set it off, killing someone, that's different than shooting it at someone. He might have had a fire fetish, set one, extinguished it, and despite his intent it got out of control. Hard to say though. Either way, I can see a stiff penalty to prevent future use of the "oops I just like fire" defense.
  - wat10000 1y ago
    That matters in terms of what sort of punishment you're looking at, but I don't think it matters as far as whether the hospital's failures absolve you. If you accidentally shoot somebody and then the hospital screws up and they die, should you be on the hook for manslaughter, or just negligent injury or whatever it would be called? I'd argue it should be the former. Death is a foreseeable consequence of your negligence even if it wasn't inevitable in this particular case. This seems similar to the eggshell skull rule. Wikipedia describes a case where a person was successfully prosecuted for murder after stabbing someone who then refused a blood transfusion and died as a result.
    - jvanderbot 1y ago
      Oh I see. Yes that makes more sense.
pie_flavor 1y ago
This all hinges on the word 'unintentionally', which is not at all how the law sees it. Arson has a forty year maximum for a good reason, because fire tends to spread and cause a lot more damage than anyone predicted. You are not exonerated of responsibility just because emergency services showed up. You are, to a first approximation, responsible for all damage done.
- bdowling 1y ago
  Arson is also an inherently dangerous felony, which is why when someone dies because of arson, the arsonist can be charged with murder.
  - javier123454321 1y ago
    I'd imagine manslaughter would be more applicable in the situation above.
    - tialaramex 1y ago
      The requirement for murder is typically: 1) You intended serious harm to a person 2) The person died. So yeah, "I wanted to start a big fire" != "Intent of serious harm". Negligent sure, but that's not enough for Murder. However many US states have a "felony murder rule" which as I understand it says if you did something that resulted in death, and it was in the course of a felony then it can be tried as murder. Most of them rule out some felonies (felony assault + death => murder is a stupid way to apply such a rule and so is usually ruled out) and some only rule in a handful like rape and prison escapes, but felony arson + death => murder might play.
      - btilly 1y ago
        Not according most states. The distinction between murder and manslaughter is malice aforethought. For first degree murder, you must have intended the death of a particular person. For second degree murder, you need only have known that you could kill someone, and did it anyways. This specifically includes things done with extreme recklessness. So to prove second degree murder you need to show 1) you intentionally did something, 2) you knew (or should have known) it could kill someone, and 3) someone died. These can be proven for arson. You have to prove the intent to start the forest fire. Everyone knows (or should know) that forest fires can kill people. You have to prove that someone died from the fire. That is why arson qualifies as second degree murder. Just like, say, failing to maintain the brakes on a fleet of trucks. (True story. My nephew was the unlucky driver of such a truck whose brakes failed...)
Spivak 1y ago
To add to this, even the government isn't sure they can get the case that he intentionally / maliciously started the fire to stick which is why their official complaint is going for recklessness / negligence. The case for malicious intent is extremely flimsy and based entirely on circumstantial evidence. The strongest piece of evidence they have for arson is that he threatened to burn down his sister's house but here's the thing, it would be extremely unusual for an arsonist to switch from targeted arson based on anger or revenge to thrill seeking arson setting unmotivated fires.
- ratelimitsteve 1y ago
  >it would be extremely unusual for an arsonist to switch from targeted arson based on anger or revenge to thrill seeking arson setting unmotivated fires This is all pet theories and silliness for purposes of discussion. I freely admit that I haven't built a case here that's strong enough to withstand even a gentle poking by an opponent. I don't know as much about arson but I did go through the same serial killer phase as every morose teen and one of the things that stuck with me is the way that some offenders escalate from simple peeping and stalking all the way up to murder. Another thing that stuck with me is how in some cases when there is an intended victim, esp for revenge, an obsessed mind will often hone in on a single characteristic of the intended victim then transfer victimhood to strangers based on that characteristic. The woman who "wronged" you is a skinny blonde who smokes cigarettes so you go out looking for skinny blondes who smoke cigarettes to victimize in her stead because in your unconscious brain that matches the pattern of behavior that would soothe the wounded entitlement of the offender. Given these facts about the nature of obsessive, vengeance-oriented crime and the fact that the serial killer/arsonist crossover is so common that arson is one of the mcdonald triad of behaviors common to serial killers there's a non-zero possibility that we're seeing a revenge fantasy transferred to another victim. There's also the fact that obsessed criminals tend to want to roleplay or practice and a lot of times their first "serious" crime is one of these roleplay/practice sessions getting out of control. This feels like that to me though I can't prove it. It's like he wanted to see what starting a fire would be like, assumed that the local VFD would get it under control and in doing so would also give him an idea of what the response looked like so he could optimize for escape, then either it got out of control or he tried to inject himself into the emergency response (another common thing among obsessed criminals, many like to relive the crime by being part of the investigation, like to tease investigators by being right under their nose or believe that by injecting themselves into the investigation they can steer it away from them). Again, does any of this hold up in a court of law? Of course not. Does it hold up in a court of a thread on a post on HN? Maybe, we're here to talk and I'm of a mind that we didn't do anything to fix w/e it was that made people serial killers but there aren't really any serial killers anymore so something must have happened to that behavior. Perhaps stranger arson is a way that the same drivers that led to serial murder before the ~~panopticon~~internet are driving new behaviors now. Intuitively I'm highly confident that the stranger spree killings we see now are driven by those same pressures in a lot of perpetrators and the change in MO is about taking advantage of lag time in law enforcement's ability to correlate facts. Before the internet you could drive a few hours' down the road and start using a new name and unless your old name was already in the system there was basically no way for anyone to know. Obsessed criminals could offend, disappear and wait it out. Nowadays we're really good at ID'ing an offender so obsessive murders have to be one and done, but another strategy could be crimes that are small enough that they don't trigger the kind of dragnet response that involves things like checking all the CCTV cameras in a ten mile circle around the crime and things like that. edit: everyone seems focused on the "serial killer phase" line that was really intended to be a throwaway. I just mean that I read a lot about them and thought it was shocking and cool to have a "favorite". Gross shit, but I assure you no one was ever in any amount of physical or psychic danger beyond declaring me a pizza cutter (all edge and no real point).
ratelimitsteve 1y ago
two things: 1) this whole case hinges on intentionality and the gov't intends to prove that he set the fire intentionally. part of the chatgpt history is images he generated of fires and people running from fires. If he intentionally set a fire in a wildfire-prone area it doesn't matter that he didn't intend it to be a wildfire or anything he did after he set the fire. 2) If you'd like to have emergency services that are either prohibitively expensive or simply nonexistent, one great way to do that is to make first responders responsible for not doing a good enough job in their responses. I'm honestly not sure what we'd do in cases of blatantly neglectful behavior by a first responder during an emergency response, but beyond intentional malpractice we generally extend an assumption of good faith to anyone who bothers to show up and help during an emergency like this. The first time I get sued for not putting a fire out fast enough or completely enough is the last time I put out a fire.
throwmeaway222 1y ago
I mean everyone sees this stuff differently. In my opinion everyone is allowed to carry a gun (above 18, not crazy, etc..). If you take a loaded gun and aim it at someones head and force them to empty a cash register into a bag, I personally believe that person should NEVER be allowed in society ever again in their lifetime. (Yeah that's not how it all works). But you were willing to let that person be within strands of their life not existing. If they reacted in the wrong way - not even intentionally, the gunman will shoot. If they try to fight back because they didn't agree to empty the cash register, the gunman shoots. That's an extreme situation that the gunman put someone in. Imagine it being YOU. Now if you could be the LAST person that gunman ever put in that situation, would you allow them to go to jail forever? Because if that's the case, the number of people in that situation ever again goes from millions to a few thousand over the next 1000 years. And many of those people will REACT and die. So when someone starts a fire, they were like the gunman. They were willing to let a lot of people die. Then realizing they were wrong, calling the cops, and having them put the fire out, that's the same as the situation as going into 7-11 and aiming the gun, but then putting it down and walking out. But they still risked someone else's life! What if they accidentally slipped their finger? Employee DEAD. So it's really the same thing. All that being said, I do grant that the waters are muddied at this point with the legal system. The person still deserves to be separated from civil society. He is not CIVIL! And even though the legal system's waters are muddied, his original actions resulted in 12 people dying. The firefighters that were incompetent are not originally responsible for those 12 deaths. The reason I want maximum punishment is that it works, it does deter. In this legal system of course there's a 50/50 those 12 people will have died without being avenged at all (and their families - all that are affected), and a 90% chance (if he is found responsible) those 12 people will get this guy in jail for 10 years. And because of those chances, people decide, that fuck even if I'm caught, it seems like in the last 10 years there is a VERY low chance of punishment. Punishment is very important in this world and life. I'm not talking about capital punishment. A lot of people disagree with all of this, I personally think they have suicidal empathy. They have no empathy to the thousands of people that died from other peoples intentional actions - actions those people KNEW they might end up killing. They have too much empathy for the attacker. It's massive victim blaming.
- kayodelycaon 1y ago
e40 1y ago
The controlled burn in 1991 turned into the firestorm of 1991 that took out almost 3,000 homes and killed 25. It seems firefighters are not conservative enough when it comes to putting out fires, at least in these 2 cases. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oakland_firestorm_of_1991 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oakland_firestorm_of_1991
- zymhan 1y ago
  Odd conclusion to draw from only two data points over 30 years apart.
  - e40 1y ago
    The devastation those two fires cost is quite large, though. And, those are just the two I know about, the latest because of the linked article and the earlier one because I lived very near the fire line and know multiple people who lost homes.

by nusl 1y ago

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

criley2 1y ago

[flagged]

nashashmi 1y ago
The question to ask is manslaughter or first degree murder.
jvanderbot 1y ago
Intent here will matter. If he's got a gun fetish and accidentally set it off, killing someone, that's different than shooting it at someone. He might have had a fire fetish, set one, extinguished it, and despite his intent it got out of control. Hard to say though. Either way, I can see a stiff penalty to prevent future use of the "oops I just like fire" defense.
- wat10000 1y ago
  That matters in terms of what sort of punishment you're looking at, but I don't think it matters as far as whether the hospital's failures absolve you. If you accidentally shoot somebody and then the hospital screws up and they die, should you be on the hook for manslaughter, or just negligent injury or whatever it would be called? I'd argue it should be the former. Death is a foreseeable consequence of your negligence even if it wasn't inevitable in this particular case. This seems similar to the eggshell skull rule. Wikipedia describes a case where a person was successfully prosecuted for murder after stabbing someone who then refused a blood transfusion and died as a result.
  - jvanderbot 1y ago
    Oh I see. Yes that makes more sense.

pie_flavor 1y ago

This all hinges on the word 'unintentionally', which is not at all how the law sees it. Arson has a forty year maximum for a good reason, because fire tends to spread and cause a lot more damage than anyone predicted. You are not exonerated of responsibility just because emergency services showed up. You are, to a first approximation, responsible for all damage done.

bdowling 1y ago
Arson is also an inherently dangerous felony, which is why when someone dies because of arson, the arsonist can be charged with murder.
- javier123454321 1y ago
  I'd imagine manslaughter would be more applicable in the situation above.
  - tialaramex 1y ago
    The requirement for murder is typically: 1) You intended serious harm to a person 2) The person died. So yeah, "I wanted to start a big fire" != "Intent of serious harm". Negligent sure, but that's not enough for Murder. However many US states have a "felony murder rule" which as I understand it says if you did something that resulted in death, and it was in the course of a felony then it can be tried as murder. Most of them rule out some felonies (felony assault + death => murder is a stupid way to apply such a rule and so is usually ruled out) and some only rule in a handful like rape and prison escapes, but felony arson + death => murder might play.
    - btilly 1y ago
      Not according most states. The distinction between murder and manslaughter is malice aforethought. For first degree murder, you must have intended the death of a particular person. For second degree murder, you need only have known that you could kill someone, and did it anyways. This specifically includes things done with extreme recklessness. So to prove second degree murder you need to show 1) you intentionally did something, 2) you knew (or should have known) it could kill someone, and 3) someone died. These can be proven for arson. You have to prove the intent to start the forest fire. Everyone knows (or should know) that forest fires can kill people. You have to prove that someone died from the fire. That is why arson qualifies as second degree murder. Just like, say, failing to maintain the brakes on a fleet of trucks. (True story. My nephew was the unlucky driver of such a truck whose brakes failed...)

Spivak 1y ago

To add to this, even the government isn't sure they can get the case that he intentionally / maliciously started the fire to stick which is why their official complaint is going for recklessness / negligence. The case for malicious intent is extremely flimsy and based entirely on circumstantial evidence. The strongest piece of evidence they have for arson is that he threatened to burn down his sister's house but here's the thing, it would be extremely unusual for an arsonist to switch from targeted arson based on anger or revenge to thrill seeking arson setting unmotivated fires.

ratelimitsteve 1y ago
>it would be extremely unusual for an arsonist to switch from targeted arson based on anger or revenge to thrill seeking arson setting unmotivated fires This is all pet theories and silliness for purposes of discussion. I freely admit that I haven't built a case here that's strong enough to withstand even a gentle poking by an opponent. I don't know as much about arson but I did go through the same serial killer phase as every morose teen and one of the things that stuck with me is the way that some offenders escalate from simple peeping and stalking all the way up to murder. Another thing that stuck with me is how in some cases when there is an intended victim, esp for revenge, an obsessed mind will often hone in on a single characteristic of the intended victim then transfer victimhood to strangers based on that characteristic. The woman who "wronged" you is a skinny blonde who smokes cigarettes so you go out looking for skinny blondes who smoke cigarettes to victimize in her stead because in your unconscious brain that matches the pattern of behavior that would soothe the wounded entitlement of the offender. Given these facts about the nature of obsessive, vengeance-oriented crime and the fact that the serial killer/arsonist crossover is so common that arson is one of the mcdonald triad of behaviors common to serial killers there's a non-zero possibility that we're seeing a revenge fantasy transferred to another victim. There's also the fact that obsessed criminals tend to want to roleplay or practice and a lot of times their first "serious" crime is one of these roleplay/practice sessions getting out of control. This feels like that to me though I can't prove it. It's like he wanted to see what starting a fire would be like, assumed that the local VFD would get it under control and in doing so would also give him an idea of what the response looked like so he could optimize for escape, then either it got out of control or he tried to inject himself into the emergency response (another common thing among obsessed criminals, many like to relive the crime by being part of the investigation, like to tease investigators by being right under their nose or believe that by injecting themselves into the investigation they can steer it away from them). Again, does any of this hold up in a court of law? Of course not. Does it hold up in a court of a thread on a post on HN? Maybe, we're here to talk and I'm of a mind that we didn't do anything to fix w/e it was that made people serial killers but there aren't really any serial killers anymore so something must have happened to that behavior. Perhaps stranger arson is a way that the same drivers that led to serial murder before the ~~panopticon~~internet are driving new behaviors now. Intuitively I'm highly confident that the stranger spree killings we see now are driven by those same pressures in a lot of perpetrators and the change in MO is about taking advantage of lag time in law enforcement's ability to correlate facts. Before the internet you could drive a few hours' down the road and start using a new name and unless your old name was already in the system there was basically no way for anyone to know. Obsessed criminals could offend, disappear and wait it out. Nowadays we're really good at ID'ing an offender so obsessive murders have to be one and done, but another strategy could be crimes that are small enough that they don't trigger the kind of dragnet response that involves things like checking all the CCTV cameras in a ten mile circle around the crime and things like that. edit: everyone seems focused on the "serial killer phase" line that was really intended to be a throwaway. I just mean that I read a lot about them and thought it was shocking and cool to have a "favorite". Gross shit, but I assure you no one was ever in any amount of physical or psychic danger beyond declaring me a pizza cutter (all edge and no real point).

ratelimitsteve 1y ago

two things: 1) this whole case hinges on intentionality and the gov't intends to prove that he set the fire intentionally. part of the chatgpt history is images he generated of fires and people running from fires. If he intentionally set a fire in a wildfire-prone area it doesn't matter that he didn't intend it to be a wildfire or anything he did after he set the fire. 2) If you'd like to have emergency services that are either prohibitively expensive or simply nonexistent, one great way to do that is to make first responders responsible for not doing a good enough job in their responses. I'm honestly not sure what we'd do in cases of blatantly neglectful behavior by a first responder during an emergency response, but beyond intentional malpractice we generally extend an assumption of good faith to anyone who bothers to show up and help during an emergency like this. The first time I get sued for not putting a fire out fast enough or completely enough is the last time I put out a fire.

throwmeaway222 1y ago

I mean everyone sees this stuff differently. In my opinion everyone is allowed to carry a gun (above 18, not crazy, etc..). If you take a loaded gun and aim it at someones head and force them to empty a cash register into a bag, I personally believe that person should NEVER be allowed in society ever again in their lifetime. (Yeah that's not how it all works). But you were willing to let that person be within strands of their life not existing. If they reacted in the wrong way - not even intentionally, the gunman will shoot. If they try to fight back because they didn't agree to empty the cash register, the gunman shoots. That's an extreme situation that the gunman put someone in. Imagine it being YOU. Now if you could be the LAST person that gunman ever put in that situation, would you allow them to go to jail forever? Because if that's the case, the number of people in that situation ever again goes from millions to a few thousand over the next 1000 years. And many of those people will REACT and die. So when someone starts a fire, they were like the gunman. They were willing to let a lot of people die. Then realizing they were wrong, calling the cops, and having them put the fire out, that's the same as the situation as going into 7-11 and aiming the gun, but then putting it down and walking out. But they still risked someone else's life! What if they accidentally slipped their finger? Employee DEAD. So it's really the same thing. All that being said, I do grant that the waters are muddied at this point with the legal system. The person still deserves to be separated from civil society. He is not CIVIL! And even though the legal system's waters are muddied, his original actions resulted in 12 people dying. The firefighters that were incompetent are not originally responsible for those 12 deaths. The reason I want maximum punishment is that it works, it does deter. In this legal system of course there's a 50/50 those 12 people will have died without being avenged at all (and their families - all that are affected), and a 90% chance (if he is found responsible) those 12 people will get this guy in jail for 10 years. And because of those chances, people decide, that fuck even if I'm caught, it seems like in the last 10 years there is a VERY low chance of punishment. Punishment is very important in this world and life. I'm not talking about capital punishment. A lot of people disagree with all of this, I personally think they have suicidal empathy. They have no empathy to the thousands of people that died from other peoples intentional actions - actions those people KNEW they might end up killing. They have too much empathy for the attacker. It's massive victim blaming.

kayodelycaon 1y ago

e40 1y ago

The controlled burn in 1991 turned into the firestorm of 1991 that took out almost 3,000 homes and killed 25. It seems firefighters are not conservative enough when it comes to putting out fires, at least in these 2 cases. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oakland_firestorm_of_1991 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oakland_firestorm_of_1991

zymhan 1y ago
Odd conclusion to draw from only two data points over 30 years apart.
- e40 1y ago
  The devastation those two fires cost is quite large, though. And, those are just the two I know about, the latest because of the linked article and the earlier one because I lived very near the fire line and know multiple people who lost homes.