California Burning by Katherine Blunt

Author:Katherine Blunt [Blunt, Katherine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2022-08-30T00:00:00+00:00

* * *

Hours after the fire started, PG&E filed a short report with the CPUC noting that it had recorded an outage on the Caribou-Palermo at 6:15 a.m. The company disclosed that it had discovered damage to the line during a midday aerial patrol. “This information is preliminary,” the report said. Investors read between the lines. By the end of the following week, shares in PG&E had fallen by nearly half, their steepest plunge since the company filed for bankruptcy protection after the California energy crisis. Its stock was in free fall for five days straight.

PG&E told investors that it had exhausted its lines of credit and warned that its $1.4 billion of insurance coverage might not be enough to cover claims against the company if it were found liable for the fire. Analysts estimated that the company’s total liability, including the 2017 fires, could reach $30 billion. That was nearly triple its market value, which had fallen to about $9 billion during the sell-off. In mid-October, it had been $25 billion.

At the end of November, Alsup typed up an order and filed it to the docket. Like everyone else, he could see that PG&E was going to have to answer for the Camp Fire.

“What requirements of the judgment herein, including the requirement against further federal, state, or local crimes, might be implicated were any wildfire started by reckless operation or maintenance of PG&E power lines?” he asked. He gave the company until the end of the year to respond. He invited the federal prosecutors to weigh in, too.

On New Year’s Eve, the day that Marc Noel, Butte County’s deputy district attorney, boarded a helicopter and flew the Caribou-Palermo in search of criminal evidence, PG&E filed its reply. Its attorneys stated the obvious in a vague, circular response.

“If it were determined that a wildfire had been started by reckless operation or maintenance of PG&E power lines, that would, if the specific circumstances gave rise to a violation of federal, state, or local statutes, implicate the requirements of Special Condition of Probation #1 of the judgment, which provides that while on probation, PG&E shall not commit another federal, state, or local crime,” they wrote.

Hallie Hoffman and Jeff Schenk, two of the prosecutors who had led the San Bruno trial, responded on behalf of the United States. They were quick to say that any judgment was premature. But they explained the potential charges PG&E could face if it were found to have acted with criminal intent. San Bruno had exposed the company’s “knowing and willful” violation of federal pipeline laws. Perhaps electric division employees had acted with that same state of mind.

“At criminal negligence, PG&E could have committed involuntary manslaughter,” the prosecutors wrote. “And at malice, PG&E could have committed murder.”

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.