Car Accident Lawyer in El Monte

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

In the California Office of Traffic Safety rankings for 2023, where rank 1 is the worst in the group, El Monte placed 8th of 62 cities in its population group for people killed and injured in traffic collisions, with 553 victims, near the worst end of the list rather than near the best. The same table ranks El Monte 1st of 62 for hit and run collisions that killed or injured somebody, with 80 recorded, the worst rank in its size group statewide. Nighttime collisions ranked 10th of 62 with 59 and alcohol involved victims 10th of 62 with 74, while speed related collisions ranked 31st of 62 with 57, around the middle. The rankings weight counts against population and daily vehicle miles travelled, so they say El Monte is worse than comparable cities of its size and traffic volume, not that it has the highest raw counts in California.

That combination shapes a car claim here. Where a city is 1st of 62 for hit and run and 10th of 62 for nighttime collisions, a real share of crashes end with the other car gone, often in the dark, so the first job is identifying a defendant rather than arguing about fault. Nearby camera footage is usually overwritten within days, and your own policy has to be read for uninsured and underinsured motorist cover, because that is what the claim runs on if the driver is never found. The City’s Vision Zero Action Plan, published in February 2022 on collision data for 2008 to 2019, counted 1,543 collisions over those eleven years, 929 of them auto only, and an average of three deaths a year. Those are historic figures, not current counts.

Who investigates depends on the road. A collision on an El Monte surface street is an El Monte Police Department matter and the department holds the report. The City’s Vision Zero plan describes El Monte as bisected from east to west by Interstate 10 and surrounded by other major interstate and state highways, with large arterials branching off into slower local streets, so two crashes a short distance apart can involve different agencies and different owners of the road. Interstate 10 is a state highway, designated under state law as the El Monte Police Officer Donald Ralph Johnston Memorial Highway between Route 164 in Rosemead and Interstate 605 in Baldwin Park, and a collision there is normally a California Highway Patrol matter rather than a City one.

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

Two deadlines run at once, and the shorter governs. Against a private driver it is two years from the date of injury under Code of Civil Procedure section 335.1. If a public entity may be responsible, for a signal fault, a road defect or a City vehicle, Government Code section 911.2 requires a written claim within six months, and El Monte’s own form and City Clerk FAQ direct claims to the City Clerk’s Office at 11333 Valley Boulevard, City Hall E. California is a pure comparative fault state, so a share of blame reduces what you recover rather than ending the claim. 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 car accident practice page. El Monte’s other collision pages cover pedestrian, bicycle and motorcycle 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.