Southern California Gas Company has pleaded not guilty to misdemeanor charges stemming from a ruptured well in LA County that leaked for weeks

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

Southern California Gas Company pleaded not guilty on Wednesday to misdemeanor criminal charges stemming from a weeks-long leak of gas from a storage well that spewed record amounts of global warming pollution and led to the relocation of thousands of nearby residents.

The utility’s attorneys entered the pleas in Los Angeles County superior court in suburban Santa Clarita.

A single gas well leak is California's biggest contributor to climate change Read more

“We do not believe a criminal prosecution is warranted here,” SoCalGas spokesman Mike Mizrahi said outside court.

The complaint brought by the county district attorney includes three counts of failing to report the release of a hazardous material and one count of discharge of air contaminants.

If convicted, the company could be fined up to $1,000 per day for air pollution violations and up to $25,000 for each of the three days it didn’t notify the state office of emergency services of the leak.

The company said it discovered the leak on 23 October 2015 in the upscale Porter Ranch community in Los Angeles and notified state regulators.

But it failed to let state emergency officials know until 26 October, California attorney general Kamala Harris said in one of more than two dozen lawsuits filed against SoCalGas.

Residents of Porter Ranch began complaining of symptoms ranging from nosebleeds to nausea. Some 6,000 families have reportedly applied for temporary relocation to short-term housing such as hotels and rental houses, and thousand have already moved.

On 6 January 2016, Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency, and ordered state agencies to make sure SoCalGas plugged the leak.

The leak was stopped last week, but the families won’t start moving back until state authorities have certified that cement pumped into the well has permanently plugged it.



The well that ruptured was more than 60 years old and was originally drilled to pump oil from deep underground. It was reused in the 1970s to pump natural gas into the empty oil wells for storage and withdraw it when demand spiked.

