The news today was full of stories of wildfires racing down a steep hillside through tinder-dry canyons in the Santa Clarita Valley near Los Angeles, burning more than 22,000 acres as it ripped through bush withered by 100 degree temperatures and years of drought. The Sand fire, named for Sand Canyon, is the biggest blaze, but not the only one, to ravage LA country this year. And it's still July. October is normally when we SoCal residents worry about the possibility of fires, and so fire season appears to be getting a two month jump on things this year. Global warming, global fires, global destruction, what might be in store for the desert paradise in our part of the globe?
A week earlier the North Country news carried a story of the coming trial of a suspect accused of setting five brush fires in east and north SD county in 2014/15, deliberately setting the fires because he hated two Indian Casinos and wanted to see them burn to the ground. The suspect, Jonathan Cohen, 45, supposedly admitted to a fellow jail mate that he set the fires, according to the report. He is accused of setting five small fires, four along Lake Wohlford Road in Valley Center near Valley View Casino, and one along State Route 67 as he was returning from Barona Casino and Resort. Though Cohen has not been charged yet, prosecutors believe he also set three other fires near Wildcat Canyon Road near Barona. If convicted, he faces up to 11 years in prison.
The evidence is circumstantial, the informant a liar who has been paid for his testimony against other accused criminals in the past, much of what he claimed could have been learned from newspaper articles. A search of Cohen's home revealed matchbooks and lighters and a computer with searches of sites expressing extreme hatred of Indian casinos in San Diego County. The prosecutor pointed out that fires near Barona stopped last year after Cohen "self-expelled" himself - meaning he told the casino to ban him for his own good. You can read about what self-banning is HERE. The following spring Cohn started frequenting Valley View Casino - and fires began in Valley Center. The trial is expected to last about two weeks. We'll see how it all turns out. In the meantime, here's a film you might enjoy.
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