Overview
Law360 covered Steptoe’s success for Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) in an article titled “PG&E Ducks Punitive Damages in Tesoro Outage Suit.” The article, published September 25, discusses plaintiff Tesoro Refining & Marketing LLC’s attempt to add a claim for punitive damages to a pending lawsuit against PG&E in the US District Court for the Northern District of California centered on a power outage at a refinery owned by Tesoro.
Tesoro asserted it should be granted leave to amend its suit seeking business interruption losses to add a punitive damages claim because PG&E’s alleged failure to prevent the outage at the refinery amounted to a conscious disregard of the refinery’s rights and safety. Steptoe argued that Tesoro’s motion, filed after the close of fact and expert discovery and on the eve of summary judgment, was far too late and would be unduly prejudicial to PG&E. The court agreed and denied the motion, ruling that Tesoro had “plenty of notice” of the court-mandated schedule for adding such claim and it was Tesoro's “own fault” for waiting “too long to do discovery” and “too long to file the motion.”
The Palo Alto and Chicago-based Steptoe team was led by Laurie Edelstein and Michael Dockterman, with Sarah Jackel and Seth Sias.
The full article can be read at Law360 (subscription required).
