By admin 
Gershom Slonim is a Cal Fire arson and bomb investigator who has publicly criticized his agency’s handling of the Esparto fireworks warehouse explosion that killed seven workers on July 1, 2025. He says he is a whistleblower who tried to prevent the tragedy in Esparto.
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He sat for an emotional interview at The Sacramento Bee, and talked about his role, leading to our story about how he tried to prevent the deadly blast.
Here are details about who he is:
Background
Slonim, 38, grew up on Maui’s north shore in the town of Paia and began his law enforcement career as a Maui police officer. He said he is Jewish and part Kickapoo. “My last name ‘Slonim’ is a town in Belarus that my family used to disguise their Jewish last name, ‘Debruxelle,’ when they were fleeing Nazi occupation.”
Slonim added that he was inspired to serve by his grandfather Morris. J. Slonim, an Air Force colonel. “He was so grateful for the United States taking our family in,” Slonim said.
Service
He joined the Maui police in 2010 and the U.S. Air Force in 2015, where he became a senior airman and an explosives and bomb disposal expert. He still serves in the reserve. While on active duty, Slonim earned a master’s degree in arson and explosives investigation from Oklahoma State University. In 2018, while assigned to anti-terrorism duty during the first President Donald Trump administration, he received an achievement award from the Navy stating that his “technical prowess armed the Emergency Operations Center with vital counter-improvised explosive device data to make informed decisions.”
For the last five years, Slonim has been one of four arson and bomb investigators at the state fire marshal’s office — the unit that investigates arson on state property and polices California’s multibillion-dollar fireworks trade, both legal and illicit.
Jason Stocklas, a former ATF senior special agent and bomb technician, has worked with Slonim. He called him a “one of a kind investigator.” The two originally met in 2019 at the FBI’s Hazardous Devices School in Huntsville, Alabama, and served as co-case agents on a 2024 domestic terrorism case — the firebombing of a police car near the UC Berkeley campus and the attempted firebombing of a federal building.
Stocklas said Slonim connected the Berkeley and Oakland incidents, establishing Casey Goonan as a serial arsonist. Goonan pleaded guilty, admitting his attacks were inspired by Hamas’ Oct. 7 assault on Israel, and was sentenced to more than 19 years. “He’s a very passionate, very dogged investigator,” Stocklas said. If there was a problem, he is not the type to just give the easy answer.”
Commendations
Slonim received commendations for heroism and investigative prowess in Maui as a cop, in the military and at Cal Fire, where he was most recently awarded the Director’s Award in 2025.
As a 24-year-old rookie officer in Hawaii, Slonim was awarded the Bronze Medal of Valor after observing thick smoke streaming from the front door of a residence while on patrol. He rescued 12 people in the residence, according to news reports, leading several to safety through thick smoke.
Slonim provided The Bee with several letters of thanks Cal Fire received related to his service for solving complex cases and for his professionalism and dedication. In August 2023, Chief Thomas Hoy of the Tulelake Police Department wrote to State Fire Marshal Daniel Berlant with the subject line “Attaboy.” Describing Slonim’s role in an arson and attempted murder case in the small Siskiyou County town near the Oregon border, Hoy wrote that he “saw nothing but a true professional,” an investigator willing “to jump right in and get dirty.“ He said he was crucial to the investigation.
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“I do not see these types of scenes often,” Hoy wrote.
Actions taken prior to Esparto
Weeks before the May 21, 2025, raid on a Commerce warehouse tied to Devastating Pyrotechnics, Slonim sent colleagues a memo titled “Operation Devastating Consequences,” warning the company was “hemorrhaging product onto the streets” across seven counties. He said his push to raid the Esparto compound was “repeatedly shot down.”
Consequences
Slonim received a letter from Cal Fire notifying him his peace officer status had been suspended. He said he assumes it’s because he spoke without authorization after posting “The Truth about Esparto Fireworks explosion” on LinkedIn. Cal Fire spokesperson Ricardo Coronado said the agency “stands by its investigatory and regulatory efforts relating to the Esparto explosion” and declined to comment on confidential personnel matters.
What he says about that
“I don’t have regrets, I made a pledge to protect the people of California, not officials at Cal Fire,” Slonim said after being notified he had been suspended.
Others’ views
Stocklas said for Slonim to go public with his concerns showed just how much Esparto was weighing on him.
“Gershom is pretty good at being a rule follower,” he said. “He might want to change things for the better, but he still follows the rules. If there’s something that he has concerns about, he will express them. I’ve never seen any instance where I felt he was insubordinate or went over the line on anything.”
Janice Haugan of Richmond, a member of the fireworks safety group Residents Against Illegal Fireworks, called Slonim a hero.
“Slonim deserves a medal for the work he did in Esparto after the explosion last summer, searching for bodies while families of the victims were crying, all in 100-degree heat,” she said.
Repercussions
Slonim spent 10 days at the Esparto scene. He went on disability leave in August for PTSD symptoms and now uses a service dog, Daisy, to help with panic attacks.
In his words
“I was working 16-plus hours a day in 100-degree heat, and the smell of the bodies and the family screaming and crying. And I just put my head down to get answers for them the best that I could. Esparto broke me.”
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