Fire-Bombing Investigation – Incendiary Coachella Valley Man Sentenced

COACHELLA VALLEY – Carlos Espriu (24), of Palm Desert, has been in federal custody since his arrest in September 2020, for firebombing the Republican Club in La Quinta nearly one year ago. During the wee hours of the last day of May 2020, the Riverside County man carried out a drawn-out project of incendiary wreckage.

First, Espriu smashed the front windows of the East Valley Republican Women Federated (EVRWF) headquarters.  Next, he tossed a lighted Molotov cocktail – made of three bottles that he’d taped together – multiple times.

But he didn’t stop, there.  “Several minutes later, surveillance video shows Espriu returning to the EVRWF office, smashing more windows with the bat and reaching into building to retrieve the Molotov cocktails before walking away with the device,” said Ciaran McEvoy, Department of Justice – United States Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California.

Next, “Espriu returned to the EVRWF office about 30 seconds later, this time without a mask,” added McEvoy, “and threw the set of bottles into the facility, which immediately caused a fire to start.”

 Law enforcement executed search warrants on Espriu’s residence and car, and recovered a dash camera, among other items. The FBI’s Inland Empire Joint Terrorism Task Force investigated this incident.

Of particular evidential value was a recording from nearly a month after the destruction, on June 28, 2020. Stored on the dash camera – was Espriu speaking to a woman in great detail about lighting the fire at the EVRWF.”He described his planning, his attempts to recruit others to help him,” said  McEvoy, “and the steps he took to start the fire.”

The fire-raising man, who was arrested in September 2020,  has been in federal custody since his arrest for the violent crime. The Prosecutor in this federal case was Assistant United States Attorney Sara B. Milstein of the Violent and Organized Crime Section.

Espriu pleaded guilty on March 15, 2021 to one count of attempted arson of a building. He was sentenced this week in Los Angeles by United States District Judge Percy Anderson.

The Molotov-cocktail-hurling man who’d used incendiary means in an attempt to destroy the  East Valley Republican Women Federated (EVRWF) office in La Quinta was sentenced May 24, 2021 to 60 months in federal prison. In addition to those five long years, Judge Anderson also ordered Espriu to pay $5,426 in restitution to the victim for the damage caused by the firebombing.