“Of course, asking Dorner wouldn’t have yielded much better either.”
No, probably not, but they could have taken other steps to make sure he was the only one they were lighting on fire. Get the thermal imaging equipment down there to check the building, for example.
Me, I would have pumped the place ful of tear gas, pepper bombs, and brought in one of those tracked robots and sent it in with a plate of brownies and a note reading something rude.
Oh, and then the teletubbies tunes would have started playing on loudpseakers aimed at the building.
But I’m a sick SOB like that who would have gone the length to drag that out and torment the guy until he gave up or offed himself.
Heck, maybe even throw some really awful smelling stuff in a box and have the robot bring that in too.