Electrocution Suit Settled for $2.8 Million

The family of a 27-year-old Westminster woman who was electrocuted when she bumped into a frayed Southern California Edison Co. power line agreed Monday to accept a settlement of just over $2.8 million from the power company.

Rebecca Lynn Hash was climbing a wooden ladder on Sept. 8, 1984, to fix the television antenna on the roof of her Jasperson Way home when “she contacted a bare service wire, a frayed wire that hadn’t been changed in 25 years,” said David L. Roark, the Hash family attorney.

Roark said “thousands” of homes in Orange County still have the type of wire that led to this death.

Debbie Van Ness, spokeswoman for Southern California Edison, said: “As far as how many places still have the wiring, I don’t know offhand.

“You can be assured that we would never knowingly leave a situation unattended that would endanger our customers.”

Edison serves about 662,000 customers in Orange County. San Diego Gas & Electric Co. supplies electricity in southern portions of the county.

William Falkenhainer, counsel for the power company, termed Rebecca Hash’s electrocution the only known death of its kind in the company’s history.

“It’s the only one anybody knows of,” Falkenhainer said.

Falkenhainer said of the settlement: “There is a question of liability, and it’s being settled on a compromise basis.”

The electrical charge from the frayed wire, which carried a standard 110 volts to the house, killed Mrs. Hash, Roark said. Harold Hash, 27 at the time, returned from his job as a shipfitter at Todd Shipyard six hours later to find his children--Richard, then 4, and Lisa, then 2--panicked and his wife of eight years dead, the attorney said.

Harold Hash subsequently filed a wrongful death suit against Southern California Edison, charging that company negligence contributed to his wife’s death.

Hash looked pale and shaken as he waited Monday for the settlement conference to end in Department 4 of the Orange County Superior Court. He refused to comment on the settlement.

The $2.8-million award was agreed upon Monday by attorneys for both sides after a two-day mandatory settlement conference. The money will be apportioned to Harold, Lisa and Richard Hash and paid over their lifetimes, with most of it going to the children, attorneys said.

Roark said Edison service representatives check overhead power cables by driving along the street and therefore do not spot worn cables such as those on the Hash family’s home.

The cable that killed Rebecca Hash was a “copper, three-wire system” that was waterproofed with a covering of double-braided, oil-impregnated, rope-like natural fiber, the attorney said. Roark said that power cable strung since 1963 has been made of aluminum with polyethylene insulation that does not fray and wear as easily as the old copper wire.

When worn cable is replaced, the aluminum wiring is used, he said, and new construction uses the more durable cable.

“Had they (Southern California Edison) replaced the wire, she (Rebecca Hash) would be alive today,” Roark said.