Latest California Headlines
All the headlines from our California Topic Page, ordered by recency.
Woodruff Sawyer Restructures Northern California Management Liability Leadership
May 14 2019 // Woodruff Sawyer announced that Seth Pfalzer and Erin Stephenson have taken new leadership roles in the Northern California management liability practice. Pfalzer has been named Northern California management liability...
California Jury Blames Roundup for Couple’s Cancer, Awards $2 Billion
May 13 2019 // A California jury on Monday awarded more than $2 billion to a couple who claimed Bayer AG’s glyphosate-based Roundup weed killer caused their cancer, in the largest U.S. jury verdict to date against the company in...
California May Go Dark This Summer; Most Aren’t Ready
May 13 2019 // A plan by California’s biggest utility to cut power on high-wind days during the onrushing wildfire season could plunge millions of residents into darkness. And the vast majority isn’t ready for it. The plan by...
Unlicensed Insurance Agent in California Gets Jail Time for Theft
May 13 2019 // An unlicensed insurance agent in California has been sentenced in Fresno County Superior Court to 95 days in jail and five years of probation after pleading no contest to grand theft, the state insurance department...
$10B Fund for California Fire Costs May Dry Up by 2030
May 10 2019 // California has for months been weighing the idea of a fund that utilities could dip into when facing crippling costs tied to wildfires. On Wednesday, state lawmakers got a feel for how big that fund would have to...
Shootout with California Insurance Department Yet Another Headache for the NRA
May 10 2019 // Controversy has swirled around the National Rifle Association of late. Infighting that led to the ouster of Oliver North as the group’s president, its tenuous financial landscape and an investigation launched by the...
Insurance Department: Claims from Deadly California Wildfires Top $12B
May 9 2019 // Insurance claims have topped $12 billion for the November wildfires in California, making them the most expensive in state history. The figure released on May 8 by Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara covers the fire that...
Judge Tells PG&E’s Board to Tour Wildfire-Ravaged California Town
May 8 2019 // A federal judge has ordered board members of Pacific Gas & Electric to tour the Northern California town of Paradise, which was leveled by a wildfire that may have been caused by the utility’s equipment. The...
Insured Losses from November 2018 California Wildfires Top $12B
May 8 2019 // Insured losses from the most destructive wildfire month in California’s history climbed $614 million in the first three months of the year, pushing total claims over $12 billion as of April, the California Department...
Court Upholds California Department of Insurance $27.5 M Fine Against Mercury
May 8 2019 // A California Court of Appeal upheld a $27.5 million fine the California Department of Insurance issued against Mercury Insurance Co. for charging illegal fees that should have been disclosed as premiums, a violation of...
California Psychologist And Doctor Charged With Fraudulent Workers’ Comp Evaluations
May 7 2019 // A California psychologist and doctor have been charged for allegedly submitting fraudulent insurance claims for workers’ compensation medical legal evaluations in an attempt to steal tens of thousands of dollars from...
Alera Group Acquires Shomer Insurance Agency in California
May 7 2019 // Alera Group has acquired Shomer Insurance Agency Inc. in Los Angeles, Calif. Terms of the deal were not announced. Shomer offers insurance and risk management programs to clients throughout California. The firm specializes...
United Valley Adds Two New Members in Southern California
May 6 2019 // United Valley Insurance Services Inc. has added two new members in Southern California: PIASC Insurance Services of Commerce and Cal Overseas Insurance Services of Brea. PIASC provides business insurance products to the...
15 California Chiropractors Charged in $6M Auto Insurance Scam
May 6 2019 // Fifteen Southern California chiropractors have been charged with a $6 million insurance and kickback scheme involving phony car crash medical claims. Los Angeles County prosecutors announced that the chiropractors are...
California to Review Sex-Abuse Responses of 12 Dioceses
May 6 2019 // The California attorney general’s office will review how all 12 Roman Catholic dioceses in the state handled allegations of child sexual abuse that have resulted in payouts of hundreds of millions of dollars to...
A Case for Updated Insurance Licensing Exemption Regulations
May 6 2019 // Harken back to 2002 — a time when iPhones, Android phones, even Blackberries, had yet to be introduced. Facebook, Twitter and YouTube were years away from their debuts, and streaming content on Netflix was still a...
Recent Commission Ruling Highlights Need for National Workplace Violence Prevention Standard
May 6 2019 // A federal commission decision that an employer had a duty to protect a social services worker who was stabbed to death by a client, even though the company did not violate any specific safety standard, reinvigorated...
Telemedicine Takes Workers’ Comp Into the Future
May 6 2019 // The use of telemedicine may be in its nascent stages within the workers’ compensation system, but the starting line has definitely been crossed with employers and workers’ comp insurers embracing the ability to...
PG&E in California 1Q Earnings Beat Wall Street Expectations, Profit of $136M
May 3 2019 // Pacific Gas & Electric Co.on Thursday reported first-quarter profit of $136 million. The San Francisco, Calif.-based company said it had profit of 25 cents per share. Earnings, adjusted for non-recurring costs, were...
House Passes Climate Now Act, But What’s The Next Step?
May 2 2019 // The U.S. must take an active role in mitigating climate change on the global stage. So says the U.S. House of Representatives, which voted today on H.R. 9, the Climate Action Now Act. The bill, which passed 231-190,...
