Oregon Supreme Court Weighs Reviving $1.25 Billion in Wildfire Awards Against Berkshire’s PacifiCorp

Berkshire Hathaway’s Oregon utility PacifiCorp could face tens of billions of dollars in potential wildfire damages, Reuters reported, over four 2020 fires that damaged more than 2,000 properties. A 2023 jury found PacifiCorp grossly negligent, reckless and willful, and the James jury verdicts have awarded $1,252 million to 201 plaintiffs to date; the Oregon Court of Appeals set the liability verdict aside on April 8 over one sentence jurors heard: “You may assume that the evidence at the trial applies to all class members.” The Oregon Supreme Court, which agreed in June to review that ruling, was set to hear the plaintiffs’ bid to restore the verdict on November 3, Reuters reported, and a decision is pending. PacifiCorp’s August quarterly filing reported $1,252 million in net jury awards to 201 plaintiffs to date from damages trials built on that verdict. For any company defending a class action, the live question is whether a single instruction can let jurors treat one fire’s evidence as proof for every class member.

PacifiCorp has denied negligence, Reuters reported, and said victims should not sue as a group because the fires were more than 100 miles apart. The company’s filing puts the $1,252 million figure after estimated insurance offsets of $35 million.

Four fires, one instruction

The dispute began with four fires around Labor Day 2020. According to Reuters, property owners alleged that PacifiCorp’s equipment and failure to shut down power lines during a windstorm caused the damage. At trial, the Court of Appeals recounted, jurors were instructed that plaintiffs alleged PacifiCorp failed to reasonably clear vegetation around power line infrastructure and failed to reasonably de-energize power lines during critical and extremely critical fire conditions. The jury’s 2023 finding covered 17 named plaintiffs and the wider class, according to the company’s April SEC filing on the ruling.

The trial court certified a single class and split the case into two phases: the first covered classwide liability and damages for the 17 named plaintiffs; later proceedings covered individual damages for other class members. Jurors were told they could treat the trial evidence as applying to every class member. The Court of Appeals held that the instruction was wrong in this case. The court reasoned that evidence about how one fire started, or how one property was harmed, did not necessarily establish how another class member was harmed.

The distinction was sharpest in the Santiam Canyon burn area. For the other three fire areas, plaintiffs’ theory at trial was that a particular, identifiable ignition started a wildfire; the Echo Mountain Complex was itself made up of two separate fires. For the Santiam Canyon, the appeals court wrote, plaintiffs “did not have a single, unified theory of causation” as to how they were harmed by PacifiCorp. They argued that PacifiCorp-caused fires directly destroyed some class members’ property. For others, their theory was that those fires forced firefighters to evacuate the canyon, leaving it defenseless when a lightning-caused wildfire already burning nearby swept through. The appeals court also found the instruction prejudicial to PacifiCorp: plaintiffs’ counsel had emphasized it in closing, increasing the chance that jurors would apply evidence from one place to everyone in the class. The court reversed the verdict on that ground. It said the trial judge could reconsider whether one class remained appropriate if the case returned.

The money behind the appeal

The overturned liability verdict was the foundation for a succession of individual damages trials. PacifiCorp reported $1,252 million in net awards to 201 plaintiffs to date in its August quarterly filing, including $910 million in noneconomic damages and $244 million in punitive damages. It had posted $719 million in bonds tied to judgments for 129 plaintiffs, then sought release of those bonds after the April reversal. That request was pending when the company filed its quarterly report.

The remaining claims explain why the instruction has financial force beyond awards already made. PacifiCorp reported that 1,760 class members filed nine mass complaints from April 2024 through January 2026. Those complaints seek, for each member, $5 million in economic damages, $25 million in noneconomic damages, additional punitive damages and doubled economic damages. Those figures are demands, not awards. Reuters characterized the potential exposure from the wildfire verdict as reaching tens of billions of dollars.

PacifiCorp’s filing recorded $2,853 million in cumulative estimated probable wildfire losses through June 30. Reuters separately reported about $2.3 billion in settlements with wildfire claimants outside the certified class through that date. P&L translation: For a claims organization, $1,252 million in awards, $719 million in bonds PacifiCorp has asked to release, and per-member demands of $5 million in economic and $25 million in noneconomic damages from 1,760 class members all trace back to one liability verdict and one jury instruction. The practical check this week for claims teams with a class action headed to trial is the instruction set: the Court of Appeals found prejudicial a sentence telling jurors to assume the trial evidence applies to every class member.

A verdict waiting on review

The property owners asked the Oregon Supreme Court to review the reversal in May, and the court accepted the case in June. Their lawyers said the appeals court was wrong to focus on a single sentence, citing evidence they said was common to the fires, Reuters reported. PacifiCorp countered that the instruction overlooked differences among the fires and excused proof of individual claims.

For now, the trial court has stayed the remaining scheduled damages trials pending an appellate judgment, while allowing some preparation and mediation to continue. It has set a trial for 21 plaintiffs from one geographic area to begin in September 2027. If the Supreme Court leaves the reversal in place, the liability verdict remains set aside and the trial court may revisit the class. If it reverses, the awards and the class trial structure may return to the litigation. Until the Oregon Supreme Court rules, $1,252 million in awards to 201 plaintiffs turns first on whether jurors could properly be told to assume that the trial evidence applied to every class member.

Sources

Oregon Court of Appeals, James v. PacifiCorp, A183140, opinion, April 8, 2026.

Oregon Supreme Court, James v. PacifiCorp, S072933, review allowed, June 25, 2026.

Berkshire Hathaway Energy and PacifiCorp, Form 10-Q, quarter ended June 30, 2026.

Berkshire Hathaway Energy and PacifiCorp, Form 8-K, April 8, 2026.

Reuters via Claims Journal, November 3, 2026.