Prosecutors say Darin McFarlin admitted killing Marissa N. Divodi-Lessa, her 7-year-old son and trying to kill another child.

CAMERON PARK, Calif. — A former Cal Fire captain has pleaded guilty in the August 2025 shooting deaths of his girlfriend and her 7-year-old son at a Cameron Park home, ending the trial phase of a case that stunned Northern California during a nearby wildfire response.

Darin McFarlin, 47, changed his plea in El Dorado County after first denying the charges, according to court records and prosecutors. The case now turns from who did it to how the killings will be punished and what more the public may learn about the motive. Prosecutors have said McFarlin admitted not only two first-degree murders, but also attempted murder and child abuse tied to another child who was inside the home and survived.

Deputies were sent to McFarlin’s home on Oakwood Road in Cameron Park at about 9 p.m. on Aug. 21, 2025, after a report of a shooting. They found 29-year-old Marissa N. Divodi-Lessa dead at the scene and her son, Josiah Divodi-Lessa, badly wounded. He later died at a hospital. Another juvenile was found alive inside the house. McFarlin, a resident of Cameron Park, was detained in Mono County just after midnight. In an earlier public statement, Cal Fire Director Joe Tyler said the arrest left the department “heartbroken and shocked,” underscoring how the case cut through an agency known mainly for wildfire work.

The charges filed after the killings laid out an unusually severe theory. Prosecutors alleged that McFarlin killed both victims to prevent testimony and said mother and son were witnesses to a crime. The records made public did not explain what crime that was, and that remains one of the biggest unanswered parts of the case. Court papers also said McFarlin injured Divodi-Lessa in a bedroom before she left, used her cellphone and was later shot in the dining room. Prosecutors added a count accusing him of trying to kill the second child in the house, along with a felony child abuse charge. By the time he entered his guilty plea, prosecutors said he admitted those counts as well as special allegations tied to multiple murders, firearm use causing great bodily injury and corporal injury to a cohabitant.

The case drew wider attention because of when it happened. On the night of the shootings, firefighters from the same regional system were helping battle the Coyote Fire in El Dorado County, a blaze that had grown to about 624 acres and drew a response of more than 1,000 personnel. McFarlin had worked as a captain in Cal Fire’s Amador-El Dorado unit, the same broad region handling wildfire pressure that week. The contrast helped turn a local homicide into a statewide headline: a senior public safety officer accused of deadly violence at home while fellow firefighters were deployed to protect nearby communities. Cal Fire said after the arrest that McFarlin had been taken into custody while off duty and placed on unpaid administrative leave.

Those early court filings also showed how much was at stake before the plea. Prosecutors said the special-circumstance murder charges could have exposed McFarlin to the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole if he had been convicted at trial. Instead, the guilty plea collapsed the fact-finding fight that would have come with testimony from investigators, surviving witnesses and forensic experts. It also narrowed the next major legal step to sentencing. The court has scheduled sentencing for April 13, 2026. Whether prosecutors or the judge publicly fill in more detail about the “witness to a crime” theory before then is still unclear.

Outside the courtroom, the case has also been measured in smaller losses. Divodi-Lessa was described by relatives as a mother of two who loved her children, and Josiah was remembered as “JoJo,” a second grader whose death shook his school community. Those details did not change the legal posture, but they helped explain why the case has stayed in public view long after the first arrest bulletin. The surviving child has remained largely out of public discussion, a reflection of the protections that often surround minors in violent crime cases. That silence has left a gap between the court’s language and the family’s grief: a file full of charges on one side, and the absence of a mother and child on the other.

Currently, the case stands at sentencing, with McFarlin having admitted the killings and related charges and the court set to decide his punishment on April 13, 2026. The next milestone is whether that hearing reveals more about the still-undisclosed crime prosecutors say the victims witnessed.

Author note: Last updated April 9, 2026.