Judge orders single court for pretrial in PG&E suits
In a setback for Pacific Gas and Electric Co., a judge has ordered pretrial proceedings to be held in a single court, preferably in San Francisco, for more than 50 lawsuits accusing the utility of causing the Wine Country wildfires.
PG&E had sought to divide the proceedings among courts in five counties where the fires broke out, a move that might have improved the company’s chances of getting some of the suits dismissed before trial. But San Francisco Superior Court Judge Curtis Karnow ruled late Thursday that the cases should be coordinated in one court, at the initial stages, because they have many things in common.
Each lawsuit blames deaths, injuries and property losses from one of the fires on “PG&E’s alleged lax maintenance and failure to prepare for a foreseeable weather event,” Karnow said.
State investigators have not determined the cause of the
October fires and have not set a date for announcing a cause.
Karnow said that although specific facts differ among the blazes, “all of the fires started in the same region under the same or similar (high wind) conditions.” The suits will also delve into PG&E’s maintenance and training practices and its policies on keeping power lines energized during high winds, evidence common to all of the cases, Karnow said.
Handling the cases in a single court would also improve the chances of settling some of the suits, Karnow said. He noted that San Francisco is PG&E’s hometown and said its courts, which accommodate electronic filing and have a department reserved for complex litigation, are best equipped to handle a coordinated proceeding.
A final decision on the location of the pretrial proceedings will be up to the state Judicial Council, the policymaking body for the courts. Karnow noted that plaintiffs can still seek to have their cases tried in the counties where they live.
The fires started Oct. 8 and 9 in Napa, Sonoma, Solano, Yuba, Lake and Mendocino counties. They burned out of control for more than a week, consuming more than 245,000 acres, destroying nearly 9,000 homes and commercial buildings, and killing 44 people. Damage has been estimated at more than $9 billion.
Karnow cited 56 lawsuits filed so far, 36 of them in San Francisco, 16 in Sonoma County and four in Napa County. Attorney John Fiske, whose San Diego firm represents several hundred plaintiffs, said Friday that more than 900 individuals have joined the suits against PG&E and the number will soon be in the thousands.
Coordinating the cases in one court is both practical and fair to all parties, Fiske said. “Somebody in Napa should be treated the same as someone in Mendocino,” he said.
After the pretrial proceedings, which include gathering evidence and sworn statements from opposing sides, hearings on admissibility of evidence and motions to dismiss individual cases, the suits should be ready for trial in 12 to 18 months, Fiske said.
PG&E declined to comment on the ruling and instead reissued an earlier statement: “Nothing is more important to us than the safety and wellbeing of our customers and communities we serve. We're focused on doing everything we can to help these communities rebuild and recover.”
While the lawsuits accuse PG&E of carelessness in the maintenance and operations of its power lines, the company could be required to reimburse property owners for economic damages if state investigators find that the power lines started the fires, regardless of whether any rules were violated.