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Reviewed by David Gammill, California trial attorney · Last reviewed: October 20, 2026
If you were hurt in a car crash in Santa Monica that another driver caused, California law lets you recover your medical bills, lost income, vehicle damage, and pain and suffering, and it puts a deadline on doing it. Gammill Law Accident & Injury Lawyers is a South Bay trial firm that represents people hurt in crashes in Santa Monica and across Los Angeles County. The firm has recovered more than $100 million for California clients across verdicts and settlements. Its results include a $21.1 million wrongful death verdict, a $16 million school sexual abuse verdict, and a $12 million whistleblower retaliation verdict; every case is different, and prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.
Call now or keep reading. The next few sections explain where Santa Monica crashes happen, what to do first, the deadlines that control your case, and how a claim is valued.
Santa Monica is a small city with a freeway running into the middle of it. The Santa Monica Freeway, Interstate 10, ends at the coast and turns north onto Pacific Coast Highway; both are state highways, so Caltrans maintains them and the California Highway Patrol writes the crash report. Everything else, Lincoln Boulevard, Ocean Avenue, Santa Monica Boulevard, Wilshire Boulevard, Olympic Boulevard and Pico Boulevard, is a city street, and the Santa Monica Police Department writes the report there. Lincoln south of the freeway was once part of State Route 1, but the state relinquished that stretch to the City, so for a road-condition claim it is a City street, not a Caltrans one. That does not make any one place responsible for a crash. It does decide which agency holds your report and which public entity a claim goes to if the road itself was part of the problem.
The state crash database, which counts every crash any agency reports inside the city, including the Highway Patrol on the freeway, logged 1,099 crashes in Santa Monica in 2025, in which 5 people died and 572 were injured. The year before it logged 1,313 crashes. Lincoln Boulevard had more reported crashes than any other street in the city in both years, 92 in 2024 and 76 in 2025, while Ocean Avenue produced the most injuries in 2025, with 49. The busiest crash intersections in that database were Lincoln and Olympic, with 18 crashes in 2025, and Lincoln and Pico; on the freeway, the Cloverfield Boulevard ramps led with 34 crashes in 2024, and the California Incline, where Ocean Avenue drops to Pacific Coast Highway, recorded 16. The City’s own staff report, which counts only crashes that killed or seriously injured someone, puts the same streets at the top: Ocean Avenue and Santa Monica Boulevard each had 26 serious crashes from 2021 through 2025 and Pico Boulevard had 22, and no single intersection had more than 3, which means Santa Monica’s problem is whole corridors, not one bad corner. That does not make any one place responsible for a crash. It does mean a crash on one of those streets often has a history behind it in the City’s own files, and that history is evidence.
Two more patterns matter for a Santa Monica case. The first is hit-and-run: by the state database, 562 of the 1,313 crashes reported in the city in 2024, about 43 percent, were hit-and-runs, and 437 more were reported in 2025. The second is darkness: the City’s 2022 roadway safety plan found that crashes after dark were about 22 percent of all crashes on its streets from 2015 through 2019 but about 75 percent of the fatal ones. Add the fact that, by the City’s September 2026 staff report, about 88 percent of the people who work in Santa Monica commute in from elsewhere, and the driver who hit you is likely a stranger to the city who may not stop. Each of those facts changes how the case is built from the first week.
Call 911 and get medical care, even if you feel fine at the scene; adrenaline hides injuries, and a gap in treatment becomes the insurer’s argument later. On a city street the Santa Monica Police Department writes the report; on the freeway or Pacific Coast Highway the CHP does. Either way, that report becomes the first document every insurer reads, so make sure it is written and get the report number and the agency’s name. Photograph the vehicles, the road, the signals and your injuries. Get the other driver’s license, insurance card and plate, and the names and numbers of witnesses; Santa Monica streets carry commuters, tourists, rental cars and rideshare drivers from everywhere, and a driver who is hard to reach next week is harder to find next year. Say nothing about fault, to the other driver or to anyone’s insurer, and do not give a recorded statement to the other side. Each of these steps is small on the day and large a year later.
If the other driver left the scene, report it to the police immediately and tell them everything you remember about the car. A driver involved in an injury crash must stop and stay under Vehicle Code § 20001, leaving is a crime, and a prompt police report is usually a condition of the victim’s own uninsured motorist claim, which is often the policy that pays when the driver is never found. And download our free guide, Crash Course: A California Car Accident Guide (2026), to keep every deadline and first step in one place.
Most California car accident lawsuits must be filed within two years of the crash. Under CCP § 335.1, the clock starts the day of the crash, and courts rarely excuse a missed deadline. Our plain-English guide to CCP § 335.1, California’s two-year statute of limitations, covers the rule and its narrow exceptions.
Government cases move much faster. If a city vehicle, a malfunctioning signal, or a dangerous stretch of road played a role, Government Code § 911.2 requires a written claim to the right public entity within six months, before any lawsuit, and the two-year rule does not save a missed claim. In Santa Monica that entity is usually the City of Santa Monica for a city street, a signal, or a City vehicle, including Lincoln Boulevard south of the freeway; a crash on the Santa Monica Freeway or on Pacific Coast Highway north of it can point at Caltrans instead, because those are state highways; and LA Metro answers for its own trains and buses. Once an entity rejects the claim, Government Code § 945.6 gives six months from the rejection notice to file suit. Our guide to the California government claim deadline walks through the sequence. We identify the correct entity and file on time.
Where the case is heard. Most Santa Monica car accident lawsuits are filed in the Los Angeles Superior Court at either the Santa Monica Courthouse or the Beverly Hills Courthouse, the two courthouses the court’s own filing locator assigns to Santa Monica; the court assigns the courthouse by where the crash happened, and we confirm it at the first meeting.
California requires drivers to carry only minimum liability coverage of $30,000 per injured person, $60,000 per accident, and $15,000 for property damage (Vehicle Code § 16451, for policies issued or renewed on or after January 1, 2025). A single emergency room visit can exceed the per-person minimum. The real work in a Santa Monica car accident case is finding every source of coverage that legally applies: the at-fault driver’s policy, an employer’s policy if that driver was working, a rental company’s coverage if the car was a rental, a rideshare company’s policy if the trip was on the app, and your own uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage. That last policy matters here more than almost anywhere. In a city where roughly four in ten reported crashes are hit-and-runs, the driver who hit you is often never identified or carries only the minimum, and your own uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage is often the policy that pays; it has strict notice conditions, so get advice early. A pedestrian or cyclist struck by a car may claim on their own auto policy’s uninsured motorist coverage even though no car of theirs was involved. If the driver who hit you was working for Uber or Lyft, the coverage that applies depends on what the app showed at the moment of the crash, and we obtain that record.
California is a fault state: the driver who caused the crash, and that driver’s insurer, pay for the harm. Fault is proved with evidence: the police or CHP report, the physical evidence, the vehicles’ damage patterns, camera footage from City signals, buses and nearby premises before it is overwritten, and witness statements taken while memories are fresh. We build the case from that evidence before the insurer builds its own version. Speed is where many of these cases are won, because the basic speed law, Vehicle Code § 22350, makes a driver responsible for a speed that was unsafe for the conditions even when it was under the posted limit. Partial fault does not bar your claim. California follows a pure comparative negligence rule: your recovery is reduced by your percentage of fault, never eliminated by it. Insurers exaggerate your share for exactly that reason, and we push back with evidence. Where a drunk or grossly reckless driver caused the crash, punitive damages may be available on clear and convincing proof under Civil Code § 3294; they are never guaranteed, but they change how an insurer values the claim.
California law allows injured people to recover economic damages, meaning documented losses like emergency care, surgery, therapy, medications, future treatment, lost income, and vehicle repair or replacement, and non-economic damages, meaning the human losses: pain, anxiety, lost sleep, and the activities an injury takes away. When a crash takes a life, California law lets the closest family members bring a claim for their loss, and it has its own rules and deadlines; our wrongful death page explains who can file and what the claim covers. For injuries that did not start in a car, our Santa Monica personal injury attorney page covers every case type we handle in the city.
Our office is in Torrance, on Del Amo Boulevard at Hawthorne Boulevard, in the South Bay, and our attorneys bring more than 40 years of combined legal experience to every case we take. We prepare every case for trial from the first meeting, because insurers price a claim differently when the lawyer across the table will finish the fight in front of a jury.
We work on a contingency fee: nothing upfront, no hourly bills, and a fee only out of the recovery, under a written contingency fee agreement that complies with California law.
Injured and unable to travel? We meet clients at the hospital, at home, or wherever recovery requires. Call 310-750-4149 any time, including nights, weekends, and holidays.
Start with trial experience, because the value an insurer puts on your claim depends on whether your lawyer is ready to try the case. David Gammill has tried over 100 cases to verdict. Every case is different, and past results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Before that, he spent seven years as a Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney, so he knows how the other side prepares. Two practical questions cut through the rest: will the lawyer who signs you up be the one who handles your case, and can the firm point to real results in cases like yours? The firm’s record is set out above.
Two years from the crash for most claims, under CCP § 335.1. If a public entity may be responsible, a written claim is due to that entity within six months under Government Code § 911.2, and the two-year rule does not save a missed claim; for a Santa Monica city street that claim goes to the City of Santa Monica, and for the freeway or Pacific Coast Highway it goes to Caltrans. Both guides are linked above.
Yes, in most cases. Report it to the Santa Monica Police Department right away, because the report is the foundation of everything that follows, and a driver who leaves an injury crash has broken the law by leaving. You are not alone in this: by the state crash database, 562 of the crashes reported in Santa Monica in 2024 were hit-and-runs. If the police find the driver, the claim runs against that driver’s insurer like any other. If they never do, your own auto policy’s uninsured motorist coverage is usually the policy that pays, and it requires prompt notice and a police report, which is why the report matters so much. Lincoln Boulevard is a place name here, not a cause; the driver’s choice to leave is what changes the case.
The California Highway Patrol writes the report on the freeway and on Pacific Coast Highway north of it, because both are state highways; the Santa Monica Police Department covers the city streets. If the road itself was part of the problem, the six-month government claim goes to Caltrans, not the City. The driver’s own liability does not depend on who owns the road, and most freeway cases are ordinary claims against the driver and the available insurance.
Not before you know what your claim is worth. An early offer arrives before your medical picture is complete, and signing a release ends the claim for good, including for injuries that show up later. Have an attorney review the offer against your treatment, your lost income, and the coverage that actually applies; the review is free, and the adjuster’s number rarely survives it.
Nothing upfront and nothing unless we win. We work on a contingency fee, paid only out of the recovery. The written contingency fee agreement linked above sets out the arrangement in detail.
Gammill Law represents people hurt in car crashes in Santa Monica and across the Westside, from Venice and Mar Vista to West Los Angeles and Brentwood, throughout the City of Los Angeles, and throughout the South Bay, including Torrance, Gardena, Inglewood, Carson, Hawthorne, Lawndale, El Segundo, Hermosa Beach, Manhattan Beach, Redondo Beach, Lomita, and the Palos Verdes Peninsula. For a crash inside the City of Los Angeles, see our Los Angeles car accident lawyer page.
Your free case review includes a real evaluation with an experienced attorney, a clear explanation of your options, and an honest assessment of what your claim is worth. No obligation, and everything you share is confidential.
Get your free case evaluation or call 310-750-4149 now. There are no upfront legal fees; a fee is collected only if we win.
This page is attorney advertising and general information, not legal advice for any specific situation. Deadlines and outcomes are fact-specific; consult a licensed California attorney about your own circumstances. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.
