Los Angeles Arson Fires:

[speeder]

The police have arrested a suspect in the 55 arson fires in Los Angeles over the weekend. Most prolific serial arsonist in modern history, based on number of fires set. (But certainly not the size of them). They were virtually all set in cars parked in car ports, with the hope that they would spread to the structures. All were put out pretty quickly, the worst damage I believe was Jim Morrison's former home in Laurel Canyon which sustained significant, (but not fatal), damage. I was just pointing that house out to Mr. Kaisen one night before.

Arsonists are sick fks but I would like to think that if I was one, I'd set a really big fire as opposed to a million little ones. I'm just a little more ambitious than that. Virtually 100% of the big brush/wildfires that you read about every year in CA. are intentionally set. The rest are accidents, people starting bonfires in the forest that get out of control.

The police finally arrested a good suspect this AM. He was driving a Dodge minivan full of fire-starting supplies near several of the fires. He apparently is in an "immigration dispute" w/ the federal govt. Take a wild-ass guess where he's from...















Wait for it......













Germany.

[pwd72s]

The arsonist has been making the local news up here. Good to know they have a suspect in custody. Especially good to know there was no loss of life.

[Hugh R]

Hope its him and they nail the fucher.

[speeder]

Oh he is in a heap 'o trouble. Probably plead it down to 120 years or so in prison.

[Noah930]

One local news story claimed that even after he was captured there still were fires set.

[speeder]

Copycats.

There are a certain number of arsonists out there at all times in a city and they have been emboldened by this guy. (Not to mention been given cover by him and the police and fire depts. are busier than a whore on payday).

[Noah930]

Well, it's good to see the men in blue out there in force. I took the motorcycle out on some errands this morning and saw about 5 LAPD cruisers in 10 miles. Not exactly sure how a heavy daytime patrol will help catch nocturnal arsonists though.

[RWebb]

they are out looking for people in German cars

[sammyg2]

Wouldn't surprise me if he's some wacko who took a stupid cause too far, tied to occupy or earthfirst or something like that. We'll have to wait and see.

[Noah930]

Well, that would surprise me, sammy. He's hit mainly apt carports. An Occupy whacko would hit Bel Air or Brentwood, or at least a BMW car dealership lot.

Whacko, yes. Politically-motivated, I'd be surprised. I'd guess he's just some loser. Probably who lives/lived in Hollywood, even.

[Rapewta]

We are a very vunerable country. Sabotage and chaos will come easy.
It wouldn't take much at all to down our big electrical transmission lines.
Why our Justice system doesn't remove people like this off of the planet, I can't understand.
Peace & Love brothers and sisters. Coexist. It is all good.
Sympathy please for all the wack-jobs.

[Jared at Pelican Parts]

Germany or Florida. Everytime.

[fingpilot]

Whack jobs get sympathy in prison.

A one night pass.

Last night.

[RWebb]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

wouldn't surprise me if he's some wacko who took a stupid cause too far, tied to tea party.

i agree

[EarlyPorsche]

Originally Posted by sammyg2

Wouldn't surprise me if he's some wacko who took a stupid cause too far, tied to occupy or earthfirst or something like that. We'll have to wait and see.

I know you didn't mean to make it "political" or whatnot but I am really curious how you came to the above conclusion. Doesn't seem like there is anything in the fact pattern that would allow a reasonable person to come to that conclusion...but that is just my opinion and I care to know more about your reasoning there.

[5String43]

Tea party? Occupy? From what I've heard so far, he apparently has an issue with the immigration folks. Or maybe not. All will unfold in due course, one suspects.

[Heel n Toe]

Heard this on the news earlier tonight:

According to ABC News sources directly involved in the case, the "prime suspect" under arrest told authorities upon his detention, "I hate America."

That suspect, at the time not publicly identified, was believed to be a German national who may have been motivated by a deportation hearing against his mother that took place in Los Angeles County about a week and a half ago, the sources told ABC News exclusively.

Police seized flammable materials during the search of the man's minivan that matched the materials used in the blazes, according to sources. Police arrested the man following 11 fires ignited overnight, the latest in a series of vehicle and carport fires around Hollywood and West Hollywood, Calif., since Dec. 29.

The suspect was being uncooperative and was to be asked to sit for a polygraph as part of the investigation, sources said this afternoon. Warrants for a search of the suspect's residence were in the process of being executed.

LA Arson Suspect Identified as Harry Burkhart, Possibly Motivated by Deportation Battle - ABC News

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Originally Posted by Jared at Pelican Parts

Germany or Florida. Everytime.

This.

Wasn't there a spot on the Adam Corolla radio show about that?

WTF constitutes "fire starting equipment" or "flammable materials" exactly and how is that enough to accuse much less indict someone? I'd like to think the PD got the right guy but isn't a motor vehicle inherently "flammable materials" (seats/upholstery, fuel, lots of electrical spark sources, etc...)?

There are some seriously effed up people in CA. Damn lucky nobody got killed. If someone tried it around here I can almost guarantee it'd be a footnote in the paper after some local hiker dragged the arsonists lifeless corpse down to the local police station and left it on the doorstep with a note. One thing I've noticed about this place is that (whether for better or worse) people here tend to be much more aware of surroundings and much more willing to intervene in situations than in most other places I've lived (including CA). Lots of volunteer FDs, people actually stop to help stranded motorists, say "hello" and converse with strangers, etc. It's a bit weird and jarring to get used to actually...

I just hope there aren't too many copycats...

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by EarlyPorsche

I know you didn't mean to make it "political" or whatnot but I am really curious how you came to the above conclusion. Doesn't seem like there is anything in the fact pattern that would allow a reasonable person to come to that conclusion...but that is just my opinion and I care to know more about your reasoning there.

Deductive reasoning and going after the most likey. Simple as that.
Whoever was doing it was definately not right in the head, and was pissed at something and acting out.
People like that often flock to extreme causes like moths to a flame.
The occupy-einsteins have been in the news allot lately and there are allot of wackos and anarchists involved in that group, that was an obvious possibility and ruling that out would be irrational and almost as dumb as suggesting he may be part of a group that stands for exactly the opposite. Like the tea party for instance.

The enviro-wacko groups have a track record of extremism with a total lack of any reasonable thought or responsibility, and they have a track record of burning cars (and houses).
Again, ruling that out would be silly. Always look at the most likely first. If they've done it many times before, there's a good chance they could be doing it again. That's called Logic as opposed to knee-jerk reaction and emotional defensiveness.

Note that I did not say he was a member of one of those groups, only that it would not surprise me if he was.

[sammyg2]

Ecoterrorism: Extremism in the Animal Rights and Environmentalist Movements --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

During the past two decades, radical environmental and animal rights groups have claimed responsibility for hundreds of crimes and acts of terrorism, including arson, bombings, vandalism and harassment, causing more than $100 million in damage.
While some activists have been captured, ecoterror cells - small and loosely affiliated - are extremely difficult to identify and most attacks remain unsolved. Although it has been overshadowed by Islamic terrorist threats since September 11, ecoterrorism remains one of the country's most active terrorist movements.


Origins: 1970s

Prominent Groups: Animal Liberation Front (ALF), Earth Liberation Front (ELF), Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC)
Influential Personalities: Craig Rosebraugh, Kevin Kjonaas, Rod Coronado, Robin Webb, Leslie James Pickering, Josh Harper, David Barbarash, Dave Foreman, Ronnie Lee
Aim: To end the exploitation of animals and the destruction of the environment, typically by causing damage to the operations of companies in related industries or terrorizing executives and employees of these and associated companies.

Media: No Compromise, Earth First! Journal, Green Anarchy, Bite Back Magazine, many Web sites
Influences: Mainstream animal and environmental welfare groups, anarchists
Criminal Activity: Arson, bombing, harassment, vandalism, animal release.

Introduction
In recent years, an increasing amount of terrorist activity in the United States has been carried out in the name of animal and environmental protection. Automobile dealerships, housing developments, forestry companies, corporate and university-based medical research laboratories, restaurants, fur farms and other industries are targeted across the country. Although no one has yet been injured in a domestic ecoterror attack, the increasingly violent nature of attacks suggests that someone will be hurt before long.

$50 Million Arson in San Diego, 2003
Since the 1970s, hundreds of groups in the United States have advocated for stricter legal protection for animals and the environment. Change has been incremental. Some activists on the fringes of these causes, frustrated by the pace of legislation, have become violent, creating an underground terrorist movement to combat companies and practices they consider abusive and immoral. During the past two decades, extreme animal rights and environmental activists, or ecoterrorists, have committed hundreds of arsons, bombings and acts of vandalism and harassment, causing more than $100 million in damage.

In recent years, fast-food restaurants have been firebombed and car dealerships and housing developments burned to the ground in the name of "ecology" and "animal rights." Increasingly, people that work for companies perceived as harming animals or destroying the environment are targeted as well.

Influenced to varying degrees by their English predecessors and by segments of the anarchist movement, ecoterrorists operate through autonomous cells, are unconstrained by geographic boundaries and are very difficult to infiltrate and stop. Unlike racial hate groups with established hierarchies and membership requirements, for example, an activist can become a member of the ecoterror movement simply by carrying out an illegal action on its behalf.

The Animal Liberation Front (ALF) is the nation's most active extreme animal rights movement. Composed of anonymous underground cells that oppose any form of animal experimentation and perceived mistreatment, it aims to rescue animals from "places of abuse" and to "inflict economic damage to those who profit from the misery and exploitation of animals [sic]". ALF cells have claimed responsibility for hundreds of "direct actions," a euphemism for crimes that include freeing animals from their owners and property destruction.

Origins
ALF's origins trace back to a group of English activists in the late 1960s known as the Hunt Saboteurs Association. The Hunt Saboteurs disrupted fox hunts by blocking roads, protesting hunters with bull horns and confusing hunting dogs by spraying chemicals that eliminated the scent left by foxes. In 1972, according to the anonymously published ALF Primer, "after effectively ending a number of traditional hunting events across England, members of the Hunt Saboteurs decided more militant action was needed, and thus began the Band of Mercy."

Band of Mercy activists were willing to act more radically to protect animals. Two of its founding members, Ronnie Lee and Cliff Goodman, were jailed for firebombing a vivisection research center in England in 1974. Following the attack, Lee issued a statement saying that the firebombing was intended to "prevent the torture and murder of our animal brothers and sisters." Upon Lee's release from prison in 1976, the core followers of Band of Mercy re-formed as the Animal Liberation Front.1

Activities
It is difficult to identify exactly when ALF first acted domestically; a very early incident in 1979 involved vandals breaking into the New York University Medical School and releasing five animals. From this modest start hundreds of so-called liberations followed throughout the country on a larger scale. In a 1993 report to congress from the Departments of Justice and Agriculture on the "effects of terrorism on enterprises which use animals," investigators called ALF the most significant "radical fringe" animal rights group and reported more than 313 incidents of break-ins, vandalism, arson and thefts committed in the name of animal rights between 1979 and 1993.

Rod Coronado
ALF's crimes during that period included a 1987 arson at a University of California-Davis veterinary laboratory, causing damages of $3.5 million, and a 1992 firebombing at an animal research laboratory at Michigan State University. Rod Coronado, a veteran animal rights advocate, was convicted for his role in the firebombing and served a three and a half year prison sentence. Coronado was previously active in the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, a Vancouver-based group founded to protect marine mammals through various direct actions, including sinking whaling ships.

Coronado's violent act and prison stint solidified his reputation within the movement as a hard-core activist, and after his release he became one of ALF's public representatives. He has lectured dozens of times around the country on behalf of ALF and other radical animal rights and environmentalist groups. In an interview with a Michigan State University newspaper, Coronado defended his past activity. "I wish I could do it again," he said. "I have absolutely no regrets, and I hope the same thing continues to happen at MSU and every other college campus that does animal research."

Publicity
Although ALF has no official membership and operates under the "leaderless resistance" model of activism, several supporters - like Coronado - have volunteered to speak publicly for the movement. These representatives perform the essential tasks of publicizing communiqués from anonymous cells claiming responsibility for illegal actions and recruiting.

Before it established a press office in the U.S., ALF activities were frequently publicized by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), a Norfolk, Virginia-based animal rights organization whose controversial advertisement campaigns have generated substantial publicity since the group's founding in 1980. PETA has openly supported ALF: in 1995, the organization gave $45,200 to the legal defense of Rod Coronado, while co-founder Ingrid Newkirk applauds ALF's efforts in two of her books.

ALF began to handle its own publicity in the U.S. by the mid 1990s after activist Katie Fedor founded its North American press office in Osseo, Minnesota (a British office had been established in 1991). The office publicized the details of direct actions, which it received from anonymous cells via mail, fax and e-mail. In the summer of 1999, another well-known ALF supporter, David Barbarash, took over for Fedor and moved the office to Vancouver.


David Barbarash
Barbarash was an established figure on the extremist scene. He served four months in prison for releasing cats from a University of Alberta laboratory in 1992; in 1998, he and Canada-based activist Darren Thurston were charged in Vancouver with sending letters filled with razor blades to 22 hunting trip guides. The charges were later dropped because the prosecution did not want to jeopardize other investigations, according to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, but the incident helped establish Barbarash's bona fides in the ALF subculture.

In a 2000 interview with the San Francisco-based magazine No Compromise, Barbarash characterized his role as providing an "aboveground network of support for the ALF." He maintained that his only contact with ALF cells was "one-way" and that ALF "is not a group or a club you can join, but a concept which is only realized when an action takes place under that name."

There's lots more ot this story but I won't post it all here, anyone interested can go to this link and read it:

Ecoterrorism: Extremism in the Animal Rights and Environmentalist Movements