Wildfire Litigation
Eaton Fire Claims
Tollestrup Law, APC represents California claimants with claims arising from the January 2025 Eaton (Altadena) wildfire.
The January 2025 Eaton wildfire destroyed thousands of structures in and around Altadena and displaced an entire community. The legal aftermath has been coordinated as a Judicial Council Coordinated Proceeding (JCCP), with Southern California Edison as the principal defendant and other parties named in various configurations.
Tollestrup Law represents individual claimants — homeowners, renters, businesses, and people who suffered personal injury — in Eaton-fire matters. The firm files into the existing coordinated proceeding rather than starting separate stand-alone cases, which is how individual claimants typically participate in litigation of this kind.
How Eaton claims are litigated
Eaton-fire claims have been coordinated under California Code of Civil Procedure § 404 et seq., which centralizes common pretrial work in front of a single judge for cases that share common questions of fact. This includes discovery into the alleged ignition source, expert work on weather and fire behavior, motion practice on shared legal questions, and case-management decisions.
Coordination is not class certification. Each claimant has their own claim, with their own facts and their own damages. What coordination achieves is efficiency: the same liability and expert work is done once and used across all of the cases, while the individual damages story is handled claim-by-claim.
What we look at in an initial consultation
- Where your property, business, or residence was located in relation to the fire footprint and to evacuation orders
- The nature of your loss — total destruction, partial damage, displacement, smoke or ash exposure, evacuation expenses, business interruption, or personal injury
- Insurance coverage in place and the status of any insurance claim, payment, or coverage dispute
- Documentation you have or can reasonably reconstruct — deeds, leases, photographs, inventories, receipts, medical records, evacuation-expense records
- Whether any deadlines have already run or are approaching for the categories of claim relevant to your situation
- Any government-entity claims you may be considering, which carry their own pre-suit notice requirements
Frequently asked questions
Who can bring a claim arising from the Eaton fire?
Generally, individuals and businesses who suffered property damage, displacement, business interruption, smoke- or evacuation-related loss, personal injury, or wrongful death as a result of the January 2025 Eaton wildfire may have a claim. Eligibility depends on the specific facts — your status as an owner, renter, or business operator, the nature and timing of the loss, and how the fire affected your particular property or person. Whether a particular claimant has a viable claim is a fact-specific question that requires individual review.
How is the Eaton fire being litigated?
Eaton-fire claims have been brought against Southern California Edison and other parties and have been coordinated for pretrial purposes under California's Judicial Council Coordinated Proceeding (JCCP) framework. Coordination centralizes common work — discovery on the ignition source, expert work, and shared motion practice — without merging the cases into a class action.
Do I have to have lost my home to have a claim?
No. Property destruction is one category of claim, but claims also commonly arise from displacement and loss-of-use without a total loss, smoke and ash damage, business interruption, evacuation expenses, and personal injury. The specific theory and the documentation that supports it depend on what you actually experienced; an initial consultation works through those facts.
What deadlines should I be aware of?
Eaton-fire claims are subject to statutes of limitations and, for any claims involving government defendants, additional pre-suit notice and presentation requirements. The applicable deadlines depend on the claim type and the defendant. If you have not yet filed and are considering doing so, you should consult with counsel as soon as practicable; some deadlines run from the date of the fire and cannot be extended.
What does Tollestrup Law's Eaton representation look like?
The firm represents individual claimants in Eaton-fire matters on a contingency-fee basis under a written engagement letter. The firm participates as individual-claimant counsel within the coordinated proceeding's leadership structure rather than seeking a leadership role itself. Individual claimants get a single point of contact at the firm for the entire engagement.
What does an initial consultation cost?
Initial consultations on personal-injury and wildfire-related matters are free. There is no fee for the consultation itself, and the firm does not charge an attorney's fee unless and until there is a recovery on the matter, under the terms of the written engagement letter.
More on the blog
Background reading on the Eaton proceeding, the principal defendant, the JCCP framework, claim deadlines, and the kinds of claims claimants are bringing. These are general-information articles; they are not legal advice for any specific situation.
- The Eaton Fire, One Year On
- Southern California Edison and the Eaton Cases: A Defendant Snapshot
- How the Eaton JCCP Works
- Eaton-Fire Deadlines: What Claimants Should Watch
- What to Document for an Eaton-Fire Claim
- Eaton Fire: Property Claims vs. Personal-Injury Claims
- Loss of Use, Evacuation, and Smoke Claims in the Eaton Litigation