A man whose family's gender reveal photo shoot sparked a Southern California wildfire that killed a firefighter in 2020 has pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter, prosecutors said.

A man whose family’s gender reveal photo shoot sparked a Southern California wildfire that killed a firefighter in 2020 has pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter, prosecutors said Friday.

The El Dorado Fire erupted on Sept. 5, 2020, when Refugio Jimenez Jr. and Angelina Jimenez and their young children staged a photo shoot for their baby gender reveal at El Dorado Ranch Park in Yucaipa, at the foot of the San Bernardino Mountains.

A smoke-generating pyrotechnic device was set off in a field and quickly ignited dry grass on a scorching day. The couple frantically tried to use bottled water to douse the flames and called 911, authorities said.

  • fᵣₑfᵢ
    41•11 months ago

    Good. People need to get a grip on these over the top gender reveal parties/events. Social media clout just isn’t worth it.

    • @Zahille7
      11•11 months ago

      Right? Like just do a cake or some balloons or something easy. We don’t need an entire fireworks display to tell us that you’re new baby is a boy or a girl.

      • partial_accumen
        6•11 months ago

        Even worse, it was a photoshoot not a live event. They could have taken their static picture without creating any fire, and add in any visual smoke, fire, and sparks edited into the photo without any risk to the environment.

        • @Buddahriffic
          6•11 months ago

          The only winning strategy is to not play the big gender reveal game.

          • partial_accumen
            4•11 months ago

            I’m not advocating for gender reveal events. I personally don’t see the appeal. However, I recognize that people do all kinds of benign stuff that I don’t care about, but which interests them and doesn’t hurt anyone so I’m fine with it. They could have done this in a way that didn’t hurt anyone and still got the photo result they wanted. Instead they hurt people. That, or the risk of that, is where someone’s benign isolated interests become subject to us caring about it.

  • @[email protected]English
    11•11 months ago

    I hate to be a pedant, but he “pled” guilty.

    Saying “pleaded” is like saying that you “shitted” your pants.

    • @nature_man
      7•11 months ago

      It’s in the article.

      On Friday, the San Bernardino County district attorney announced that Refugio Jimenez Jr. had pleaded guilty to one count of involuntary manslaughter and two counts of recklessly causing a fire to an inhabited structure. He will be taken into custody on Feb. 23 to serve a year in jail. His sentence also includes two years of felony probation and 200 hours of community service.

      Angelina Jimenez pleaded guilty to three misdemeanor counts of recklessly causing fire to property of another.

      She was sentenced to a year of summary probation and 400 hours of community service. The couple was also ordered to pay $1,789,972 in restitution.

        • Bibliotectress
          12•11 months ago

          No one should get any time for abortion, but it’s not like this man and woman are hardened criminals. They bought into a fad, did what they saw LOTS of other people doing, and tried their best to put out a fire they couldn’t put out. They fucked up, someone died, and lots of lives are changed forever. Over a million dollars in fines, some jail time, probation, and lots of community service doesn’t seem inappropriate to me. I feel bad for the family of the guy who died doing his job, and I feel bad for all the people who lost their homes and probably some pets, but… I guess I don’t understand how much more you need to feel like justice was done.