Motorcycle Accident Lawyer in El Monte

What do El Monte’s crash figures show for motorcycle accidents?

In the California Office of Traffic Safety rankings for 2023, where rank 1 is the worst in the group, El Monte ranked 52nd of 62 cities in its population group for motorcyclists killed or injured, with 12 victims. Because rank 1 is the worst, 52nd of 62 is toward the better end of the list, and it is the best position El Monte holds anywhere in that table. The underlying count is low as well: 12 of the 553 people killed or injured in traffic in El Monte that year were on a motorcycle. There is no honest way to describe El Monte as a city with a motorcycle crisis, and this page does not try to. The rankings are rate based, weighting counts against population and daily vehicle miles travelled, so they say El Monte compares well with similar sized cities on this one measure, not that riding here is safe.

What the same table does show is an environment that is hard on anybody exposed. El Monte ranks 8th of 62 for total people killed and injured with 553, 1st of 62 for hit and run collisions with 80, which is the worst rank in its size group statewide, 10th of 62 for nighttime collisions with 59, and 10th of 62 for alcohol involved victims with 74. A rider has no structure around them, so a collision that bruises a driver can be catastrophic on a bike, and the risks behind El Monte’s worst ranks, a car that leaves the scene, poor light, a driver who has been drinking, are the ones a rider is least able to absorb. The City’s own Vision Zero Action Plan, published in February 2022 on collision data for 2008 to 2019, records an average of three deaths and 13.5 severe injuries a year on its roadways across all road users, against a target of zero by 2027. Those are historic figures, not current counts.

A motorcycle case is usually fought over two things: whether the driver looked, and how much of the outcome an insurer can put on the rider. Collisions on El Monte streets are investigated by the El Monte Police Department, which releases reports only through its Records Bureau, in person at the Police Lobby at 11333 Valley Boulevard, generally in about ten business days and at no charge. A collision on Interstate 10, which the City’s own plan describes as bisecting El Monte from east to west, is normally a California Highway Patrol matter instead, and that freeway is a state roadway rather than a City one. Road surface also matters far more to two wheels than to four, so a defect claim is a realistic line of enquiry on the arterials the City’s plan already names, among them Peck Road, Garvey Avenue, Valley Boulevard, Durfee Avenue, Ramona Boulevard, Tyler Avenue, Bryant Road, Magnolia Street and Lower Azusa Road.

Where is an El Monte motorcycle accident case filed, and what are the deadlines?

Where the City is a potential defendant the timetable shortens sharply. Against a driver you have two years from the date of injury under Code of Civil Procedure section 335.1. Against a public entity, Government Code section 911.2 requires a written claim within six months, presented to the City Clerk’s Office at 11333 Valley Boulevard, City Hall E, on the form the Clerk’s Office posts, which asks for a diagram of the place of the accident and must be signed under penalty of perjury. California is a pure comparative fault state, so an argument about your lane position or your speed reduces a recovery in proportion rather than ending the claim, and El Monte’s speed related collisions ranked 31st of 62 in 2023 with 57, around the middle of the group, so there is no local presumption that speed was the cause. An unlimited civil injury case arising in El Monte is filed in the East District, at Pomona Courthouse South, 400 Civic Center Plaza, Pomona, because the El Monte Courthouse has no civil division.

There is more on the city on the El Monte personal injury page and more on the law on the wider Los Angeles motorcycle accident practice page. El Monte’s other collision pages cover car, pedestrian and bicycle claims. If your matter is a drug, device or product claim rather than a collision, Broukhim Legal PC also takes on mass tort and complex litigation work for people living in and around El Monte. This site also has a Spanish version, reachable from the Español link in the menu.