PG&E, Sonoma County prosecutors may be near deal on criminal charges over Kincade fire

Pacific Gas and Electric Co. and Sonoma County prosecutors are nearing an agreement that could settle the criminal charges against the company over its role in the 2019 Kincade fire.

Sonoma County Superior Court Judge Mark Urioste paused Tuesday’s scheduled preliminary hearing until Monday to give the two sides more time to negotiate.

The hearing had been scheduled for 15 days. Tuesday would have marked the third day of testimony. The purpose of the hearing is to present evidence for Urioste to determine whether there is enough probable cause to bring the case to trial.

Sonoma County prosecutors are pursuing 30 felony and misdemeanor charges against California’s investor-owned electrical utility for its role in the fire, which scorched more than 77,000 acres, displaced nearly 200,000 people and destroyed 174 homes.

PG&E has denied criminal culpability but has accepted a finding from Cal Fire that its line sparked the flames. The company pleaded not guilty to the criminal charges and had pledged to fight them in court.

In statement released to The Press Democrat, company officials said both sides had asked for a continuance.

“Today the Sonoma County District Attorney and PG&E asked for a continuance of the preliminary hearing until next week while the parties engage in settlement discussions,” the statement says. “In the meantime, PG&E continues our work to make our system safer every day and make it right by working to resolve claims stemming from past fires.”

Prosecutors had begun laying out their evidence that PG&E was criminally responsible for the fire on Feb. 8 and 9, then had adjourned until Tuesday.

“We are having discussions with PGE to determine if there is an equitable settlement to the proceedings short of continuing through preliminary hearing, and ultimately a jury trial,” Chief Deputy District Attorney Brian Staebell wrote in an email.

“Settlement discussions are not unusual in criminal proceedings,” he said.

Testimony during the first two days focused on a utility tower left energized on an exposed ridge in the Mayacamas Mountains.

One of those who testified was Gary Uboldi, a former Cal Fire investigator who was among the first on the scene after the fire started on Oct. 23, 2019.

Uboldi testified that it was clear from the very beginning that the tower had sparked the blaze. He also testified the conditions were similar to the causes of 2016 blaze, the Sawmill fire, in the same area, which he also investigated.

Cables attached to the tower were “rocking back and forth like a pendulum” in the high winds the night of the fire’s start, he said.

During cross examination, PG&E attorney Jonathan Kravis identified a series of inspections of the transmission line, including one in February and one in May 2019, before the Kincade fire, in which utility employees had found the equipment in good condition. He argued the 2016 Sawmill fire, which began from a cable that came off the side of a wooden electrical pole, not a tower, had few similarities with the Kincade fire.

The Sonoma County District Attorney’s office charged PG&E with eight felony counts and 22 misdemeanor counts stemming from injuries and air quality damage from the fire.

Among the charges is a novel attempt to prosecute the utility for environmental crimes by holding it accountable for the emission of ash, smoke and particulate matter.

Prosecutors have held up firefighters, adults and an unnamed minor as victims who suffered great bodily injury.

In a brief filed Feb. 4, prosecutors announced they would present evidence of five victims who suffered respiratory and cardiac impacts from the wildfire smoke. Four victims were hospitalized and one died within months of the fire, the brief states.

The Kincade fire began Oct. 23, 2019, and grew to 77,758 acres, burning for two weeks and triggering the largest mass evacuation in county history at more than 190,000 people.

Flames threatened Geyserville, Healdsburg, Windsor and northeast Santa Rosa. The blaze destroyed 174 homes and a total of 370 structures, including winery and farm buildings.

Fire victims, utility reform advocates and legal observers saw the prosecution as an important step to hold PG&E accountable for its role starting devastating wildfires, and to continue to develop a public record of evidence of malfeasance or neglect by the company.

The Sonoma County trial began just after a federal judge in San Francisco released PG&E from a five-year federal probation stemming from the deadly 2010 San Bruno gas pipeline explosion. Advocates worried federal Judge William Alsup’s decision eliminated an effective tool for forcing transparency and change out of the utility.

Alsup found he did not believe he had legal authority to keep the company on probation, particularly after federal prosecutors did not pursue an extension. But in his closing remarks, he slammed the utility, saying its equipment continued to start wildfires.

“While on probation, PG&E has been blamed for at least 31 wildfires. Those fires burned nearly one and one-half million acres, burned 23,956 structures, and killed 113 Californians,” Alsup wrote in a Jan. 19 order.

“In these five years, PG&E has gone on a crime spree and will emerge from probation as a continuing menace to California,” he wrote. Alsup, and the federal prosecutors who declined to keep the company on probation, had highlighted the criminal case in Sonoma County and another case in Shasta County over the deadly Zoggs fire in their court filings.

On Tuesday, Will Abrams, whose Hidden Hills home burned down in the 2017 Tubbs fire and who has since become a vocal advocate for victims of utility-caused wildfires, said he hoped the county prosecutors would not accept a settlement in the Kincade fire case.

“It concerns me that courts keep settling and kicking the can down the road,” he said, “because what happens with that is that the evidence gets buried, and we are less safe in our homes because these things are not pursued.”

You can reach Staff Writer Andrew Graham at 707-526-8667 or andrew.graham@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @AndrewGraham88

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