Dueling ads on firefighter's death become referendum on the truth

OLYMPIA — In what has become a bitter sideshow in the costly battle over Referendum 67, there is only one thing that insurance companies and trial lawyers agree is fact: David Potter is dead.

Potter, a career firefighter for the city of Puyallup, died of cancer last year at age 53.

The sad circumstances of his death now are being rehashed in dueling television and radio ads for and against Referendum 67, which would ratify a new law allowing consumers to sue for triple damages if an insurance company "unreasonably" denies a legitimate claim.

Like so much in the contentious Referendum 67 debate, voters are left wondering which story behind Potter's death is true.

It all started last month when the Approve 67 campaign — funded almost entirely by trial lawyers — began airing a television ad featuring Potter's daughter, Tiffany Forslund. In the ad, Forslund talks about how her father's insurance carriers balked at paying for the treatment that could have cured him.

"My father would have given his life in the line of duty," she says. "Turns out the insurance company took it instead."

The insurance industry, which is bankrolling the Reject R-67 campaign, went on the attack. After trying unsuccessfully to persuade broadcast stations to pull the ad, the insurers last week began airing TV and radio spots refuting Forslund's account of her father's death.

"It's wrong to lie," an unnamed woman says in the TV ad. "Truth is," she adds, "the firefighters' city-provided benefits paid for all the medical care his doctors ordered."

The insurance company ads accuse trial lawyers of exploiting a tragic death to win support for Referendum 67, a measure they contend wouldn't apply to Potter's case because health insurance is not covered by the legislation.

Potter was diagnosed in the summer of 2005 with T-cell lymphocytic leukemia, a rare and aggressive cancer that might have been caused by exposure to chemicals he dealt with on the job. He died less than a year later, on June 1, 2006.

What happened between Potter's diagnosis and his death has become the focus of a heated, high-stakes dispute.

Potter's family is suing Puyallup and its insurers, in essence accusing them of causing his death and inflicting emotional suffering on his family. The city is self-insured but had backup coverage through two private insurers for especially expensive claims.

In their lawsuit, the family says Potter might have survived had he been able to undergo an expensive bone-marrow transplant that his doctors recommended. But Potter couldn't come up with the $100,000 needed to begin the treatment, and the city and its insurers delayed coverage for the treatment by disputing that his illness was job-related, the lawsuit contends.

The judge in the case recently dismissed the claims alleging "insurance bad faith" but has allowed the family to push a wrongful-death case against the city and its insurers.

City officials would not comment on the lawsuit or the Referendum 67 ads. But earlier this year, after Potter's death came up during a legislative hearing, Puyallup Mayor Michael Deal sent a letter to lawmakers saying the city stood by the firefighter to the end.

According to the mayor's account, there was never a question about whether Potter's treatment would be covered — only about whether it would be covered as a work-related claim or through the city's health plan.

"He never went without coverage or treatment — ever," Deal wrote.

Deal said Potter couldn't undergo the bone-marrow transplant until chemotherapy drove his cancer into remission. But that, Deal said in his letter, never happened.

Forslund did not return a phone call Tuesday.

But Dennis Lawson, another Puyallup firefighter, said he and co-workers recall Potter talking about his insurance delays and not being able to come up with the money for the transplant.

"We all heard it," Lawson said. "We had intimate knowledge of what he was going through."

Lawson is vice president of the Washington State Council of Fire Fighters, a statewide union that supports Referendum 67. The union held a news conference in Seattle on Tuesday to decry the insurance industry's latest ads calling Forslund and the trial lawyers liars.

"It's offensive," Lawson said. "They have someone on the TV who doesn't know a thing about [Potter] or his situation."

Dana Childers, spokeswoman for the Reject R-67 campaign, defended the ad. "We needed to set the record straight," she said.

Regardless of who is right or wrong in the dispute over whether Potter's treatment was delayed, Childers said, Referendum 67 would not apply to the family's wrongful-death lawsuit.

"It's very, very sad, but that doesn't mean we have to just brush over the facts," Childers said.

Referendum 67 applies to nonmedical policies that cover such claims as auto, home, business, property and long-term care — not most health insurance.

But attorneys for Potter's family argue that he, like many firefighters and law-enforcement officers, had unusual insurance that would be covered under Referendum 67.

State Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler, who supports Referendum 67, agrees.

As to whether the city and its insurers wrongly delayed Potter's treatment, Kreidler said, "that's a matter for the courts to decide."

Ralph Thomas: 360-943-9882