REDDING, Calif. — On Monday morning, the kids at Igo Ono Elementary School clung strings holding purple balloons in honor of their classmate Feyla McLeod, 8, who died on this day a year ago.
One by one, each child shared a personal memory of Feyla and then released their balloon.
That same morning, the company accused of causing Feyla’s death in last year’s Zogg Fire made a release of its own.
"The Utility intends to vigorously defend itself,” PG&E wrote Monday in a regulatory filing disclosing to investors that Shasta County prosecutors filed 31 criminal charges against the company, including four counts of felony involuntary manslaughter.
Feyla died alongside her mother Alaina Rowe McLeod, 46, when their pickup truck was overtaken by the flames of the Zogg Fire.
“A little 8-year-old girl. My daughter. Our daughter. My wife. Running for their lives,” father and husband Zach McLeod said. “Someone needs to be held accountable. No family should have to go through this. No little girl and mother should have to face what they faced.”
In the small community of Igo, Karin King, 79, also died trying to escape. Kenneth Vossen, 52, suffered burns over 90% of his body and died in a hospital burn unit.
“They lost their lives in a very horrific and tragic fashion that was completely preventable,” Shasta County District Attorney Stephanie Bridgett said.
PG&E admits its power line sparked the Zogg Fire when a damaged 105-foot pine tree fell on the line in a windstorm on Sept. 27, 2020.
Utilities have a legal duty to cut trees that could cause a fire.
The arson investigation conducted by Cal Fire and Bridgett's office concluded that the safety problems with the tree were "obvious" and that PG&E was "reckless" by failing to remove the tree, which had been marked by a PG&E contractor.
In a video statement recorded the day before charges were announced, CEO Patti Poppe claimed the company did not commit a crime by failing to prevent the Zogg Fire, saying "we welcome our day in court."
Zach McLeod expressed gratitude for the criminal charges that were filed against PG&E, but something was missing that he had hoped to see: an arrest.
“It’s very frustrating. There’s more than one individual that should be held accountable,” Zach McLeod said. “It would be nice to see some laws be changed a little bit to make it easier to go after corporations like this when they continually do wrong and hurt people.”
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office didn’t respond when asked whether he’d support enacting stricter penalties on corporations convicted of crimes.
Political players to the governor’s right and left told ABC10 they want to see penalties stiffened.
MAXIMUM PUNISHMENT: $10,000 PER DEATH
PG&E decisionmakers could still be prosecuted in the Zogg Fire case. The statute of limitations allows prosecutors up to three years to file most kinds of felony charges.
“If there is an individual or individuals that made decisions that caused this fire to happen, then they'll be held liable and they would be arrested for that,” Bridgett said.
If that doesn’t happen, charges can still proceed against the PG&E corporation.
The families of Zogg Fire victims know what that would look like because it happened last year.
PG&E pleaded guilty to 84 counts of felony involuntary manslaughter and one more felony for starting the 2018 Camp Fire through criminal negligence.
The crimes were punishable by 90 years, but the judge pointed out corporations can’t go to prison.
Instead, PG&E paid the maximum fine under California law: $10,000 per manslaughter victim.
“The penal system needs to be changed,” Phil Binstock, whose father Julian died in the Camp Fire, said. “A $10,000 fine, that's what my father's worth in the criminal justice system.”
PG&E makes $10,000 in revenue every 17 seconds.
“$10,000 is nothing to PG&E,” Meriel Wisotsky, the daughter of Camp Fire Victim Ethel Colleen Riggs, said. “There's no motivation to solve the real problems. Because they can buy their way out of it.”
She bristles at the notion that the law is designed to treat corporations the same as people because it’s simply not true.
“Until you're going to lock up the company the way you lock up a person who's a criminal, then they're not being treated like people,” Wisotsky said. “And that's that's the truth.”
PROSECUTORS WANT CHANGE
Butte County District Attorney Mike Ramsey says it was important to put the killings from the 2018 Camp Fire on PG&E’s permanent record, arguing it’s important everyone understand that the company committed crimes.
“They're not a negligent corporation. They're a criminally negligent corporation,” Ramsey said. “And that has to change.”
Outside of the courtroom where PG&E pleaded guilty to the Camp Fire in 2020, Ramsey said state laws also need to change because the punishment didn’t fit the crime.
“We take some pride in the fact that we brought a major corporation to this point, but we take no pride in the fact that the punishment is so little,” Ramsey said. “Why do we have the same financial penalty for corporations we have for a person?”
RELATED: ABC10 Investigation: PG&E knew old power line parts had ‘severe wear’ months before deadly Camp Fire
“There should be something different. And I'm hoping that the legislature will do that,” he said.
Most California state lawmakers accepted political donations from PG&E even after the company was convicted of its first six felonies in 2016 for crimes in the San Bruno gas explosion case.
They have not yet moved to enact stricter penalties for corporate offenders.
NEWSOM SILENT, BUT TOUGHER PENALTIES HAVE SUPPORT TO HIS RIGHT… AND LEFT
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office claims to have passed “strict new safety requirements” for PG&E, yet the governor’s policies have allowed PG&E to overcome the financial consequences of its past crimes.
“No governor in California history has done more to hold PG&E accountable and force the company to make fundamental change,” the governor’s office said in a statement earlier this year.
When the Zogg Fire started, PG&E had an official safety certificate from the state government under a 2019 law written by lawyers working for Newsom’s office at taxpayer expense.
The certificate helps PG&E avoid having to pay for the damage done by large wildfires it causes.
PG&E was awarded another safety certificate early this year after the Zogg Fire burned.
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office did not respond when asked whether the governor supports enacting tougher penalties for crimes committed by PG&E.
When asked Friday whether the governor has anything to say to the families of the victims of the Zogg Fire, the governor’s office replied to ask ABC10 for a specific deadline but never provided a comment.
The idea of strengthening penalties has support from political operatives to Newsom’s right and left.
"PG&E has an established history of killing people, destroying communities, and polluting our environment due to purposeful negligence and willful neglect,” said Amar Shergill, the chair of the progressive caucus of the California Democratic Party. “California needs tough legislation to hold corporate executives criminally responsible, including jail time.”
Shergill wants to see PG&E broken up into smaller publicly-owned utilities similar to Sacramento’s SMUD.
Republican Assemblyman Kevin Kiley, who ran as a replacement candidate in this year’s failed recall election of Newsom, also supports the idea of tougher penalties for the kind of criminal conduct on PG&E’s rap sheet.
“The larger issue is that their political influence has shielded them from any measure of accountability,” Kiley said.
Zach McLeod shared similar sentiments when asked at a news conference last week to share his thoughts on how the state government responded to PG&E’s past crimes.
“What response? There wasn’t really a response,” McLeod said. “Everything continued as it was. I’m kind of baffled that they’re able to continue as they are.”
“The 84 counts that they were charged with in Paradise, I don’t even understand how they’re an operating company after that,” he added.
GO DEEPER: This story is part of ABC10's FIRE - POWER - MONEY reporting project. If you have a tip that could reveal more about California's crisis with utilities and wildfires, please contact investigative reporter Brandon Rittiman at brittiman@abc10.com.
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