Pedestrian Accident Lawyer in Inglewood

What do Inglewood’s crash figures show for pedestrian accidents?

In the California Office of Traffic Safety rankings for 2023, where rank 1 is the worst in the group, Inglewood ranked 2nd of 62 cities its size for pedestrians killed or injured, with 63 victims. Pedestrians aged 65 and over ranked 7th worst of 62, with 9 victims, and pedestrians under 15 ranked 21st worst of 62, with 4. Across all road users the city ranked 5th worst of 62, with 634 victims. These rankings are rate based, adjusted for population and daily vehicle miles travelled, so they say Inglewood is worse than comparable cities, not that it has California’s highest raw counts.

What turns that into a specific risk for people on foot is the rest of the table. Inglewood ranked 1st of 62, meaning the worst in its group, for collisions between 9:00pm and 2:59am, with 80 of them. It ranked 2nd worst of 62 for hit and run, with 84, and 3rd worst of 62 for speed-related collisions, with 105. Alcohol-involved victims, by contrast, ranked 58th of 62, which is near the best in the group. So this is not a drink-driving city. It is a city where the danger to a pedestrian is speed, darkness and the chance that the driver does not stop, and those three things also decide what evidence will exist by the time anyone looks for it.

A pedestrian case usually turns on point of impact, crossing position, signal phase and sight lines rather than on speed estimates, and after dark it turns on street lighting as well. Collisions inside Inglewood city limits are investigated by the Inglewood Police Department, and the collision report sits with its records unit. This page does not state a fee or a procedure for that report, because the Department’s current records instructions could not be confirmed from a primary source, so ask the records unit directly. Footage from nearby businesses is often overwritten within days, which is why the first week matters more in these cases than in most. Where the crossing itself was the problem, through signal timing, missing markings or a lighting fault, the City may be a defendant, and which agency owns a given street should be established rather than assumed.

Where is an Inglewood pedestrian accident case filed, and what are the deadlines?

That changes the deadline. Against a driver it is generally 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, and the shorter deadline governs. A claim against the City of Inglewood is presented to the City Clerk’s Office at City Hall, One W. Manchester Boulevard, Inglewood, CA 90301. Walking to and from transit adds two further possible defendants: Metro, whose claims go to LACMTA Legal Services, and Torrance Transit, which serves Downtown Inglewood Station and whose claims go to the City of Torrance City Clerk rather than to Inglewood. California is also a pure comparative fault state, so crossing outside a marked crosswalk reduces a recovery rather than ending the claim. An unlimited civil case arising here is filed in the Southwest District, because Los Angeles Superior Court Local Rule 2.3(a)(1)(A) requires it to be filed in the judicial district where the incident arose. That district’s civil courthouses are the Inglewood Courthouse at One Regent Street and the Torrance Courthouse at 825 Maple Avenue.

More on local practice on the Inglewood personal injury page, and on the law itself on the Los Angeles pedestrian accident page. The other collision types with Inglewood’s own published figures: car accidents, bicycle accidents and motorcycle accidents. Mass tort claims are taken on for Inglewood residents as well, and those are set out on the mass torts page.