Forest Fire Suspect Faces 35 Years, $4.8-Million Fine

The 19-year-old son of the Cypress police chief faces up to 35 years in prison and a possible $4.8-million fine if convicted of starting a huge forest fire in Cleveland National Forest last month.

A federal grand jury Tuesday indicted Robert Edward Lowenberg on three felony counts of arson, setting forest lands on fire and destruction of government property. He had already been charged with arson. The charges stemmed from a Sept. 9 fire that blackened 5,000 acres and took 1,100 firefighters nearly two weeks to put out.

Controlling the blaze cost the government $2.2 million, according to Asst. U.S. Atty. Stephen G. Wolfe. Wolfe said the fire itself caused $175,000 damage to the forest.

Wolfe said that as he studied the federal statutes relating to Lowenberg’s case, “it got to be a bigger and bigger crime.”

Because several firefighters were injured, Wolfe said Lowenberg could be sentenced to 20 years in prison, in addition to the 15-year maximum sentence for the arson charges. He declined to say how many firefighters were hurt, but a Forest Service official previously said a least seven were hurt fighting the blaze in the Silverado Canyon area.

Under a provision of federal law, the judge who sentences Lowenberg could impose the maximum $4.8 million fine by doubling the total loss incurred by the government. However, Wolfe said if the judge does not choose to use that formula the maximum fine would be $750,000 on the arson charges.

“We’ll be in court on Monday, and my client will enter a plea of not guilty at that time,” said Anna Ho, Lowenberg’s court-appointed attorney.

“I have not received a copy of the indictment, so there is not much I can comment on,” said Ho, a member of the federal indigent defense panel who said she replaced Lowenberg’s former attorney a few days ago.

Released on $10,000 Bond

On Sept. 30, after spending nearly two weeks at Terminal Island federal prison, Lowenberg was released on a $10,000 bond and placed in the custody of his parents.

Lowenberg, the son of Cypress Police Chief Ronald E. Lowenberg, was ordered to check in three times a week with a pretrial services officer, restrict his travel to Los Angeles and Orange counties and return home each night. He was also ordered to refrain from drug and alcohol use.

A federal magistrate had initially ordered Lowenberg to be placed in a drug and alcohol treatment program, but he was later convinced that it was not necessary and modified the order.

Tom Barham, Lowenberg’s former attorney, said Lowenberg was intoxicated at the time he is accused of starting the fires. Forest Service officials said Lowenberg and a friend, Richard Anthony Tafoya, 18, were the first to call officials and report the fires.

After his arrest on Sept. 18, Lowenberg admitted setting the blaze, according to Tommy Lanier, a special agent with the Forest Service in San Diego.

Tafoya, who federal prosecutors said will be a witness in the case, has not been charged.

Forest Service investigators arrested Lowenberg on Sept. 18 outside the Garden Grove electronics store where he had been working for about six months. Friends and family members expressed surprise after his arrest because Lowenberg appeared to be an “all-American boy.” Friends said “Robbie” Lowenberg, the eldest of six children, had been an altar boy in a Roman Catholic church and had played high school football.

According to an affidavit filed in federal court by Forest Service investigator Nancy R. Ehmann, Lowenberg and Tafoya were in the woods Sept. 9 to “relax and shoot Lowenberg’s BB gun.”

Reported by Pair

That afternoon, when Ehmann arrived at the Silverado Canyon fire, she was told that the fire was first reported about 2 p.m. by Tafoya and Lowenberg.

She later visited a second fire, started near Maple Springs, about a half-mile south of the first fire.

That was where Ehmann met Orange County Fire Investigator John McMasters as he was interviewing Lowenberg and Tafoya. The two young men tried to pin the blame on two other men who were driving “purplish blue Toyota pickup.”

According to the affidavit, Ehmann later found the two men in a truck that matched that description given by Lowenberg and Tafoya.

Those men, however, told her that they saw two young men in a blue Toyota truck with a “rifle sticking out the passenger window” near the Maple Springs fire. Lowenberg and Tafoya had been in such a truck.

She and agent Lanier later determined that both fires were caused by arson.