Mecca, CA, October 29 – A 13-year-old boy suffered major injuries in a collision between a motorcycle and a Ford Fusion at an intersection in Mecca on Wednesday afternoon, according to California Highway Patrol incident logs. The crash was reported at approximately 3:46 p.m. on October 28 at Costa Mesa Drive and 69th Avenue. Emergency responders requested an air ambulance to transport the injured teen, who was identified as Zavia Jose.
Mecca Motorcycle Crash Leaves 13-Year-Old Boy Seriously Injured
According to California Highway Patrol incident logs, the crash involved a motorcycle and a red Ford Fusion. The boy injured in the collision was identified as Zavia Jose, age 13. He suffered major injuries as a result of the crash, the CHP reported. The collision occurred in Mecca, an unincorporated community in Riverside County.
Emergency responders requested an air ambulance to transport the injured teenager, according to California Highway Patrol incident logs. No further details about the emergency response, including which agencies responded or where the teen was taken, have been released. The CHP has not released additional information about the medical treatment he received.
The circumstances that led to the collision have not been disclosed. California Highway Patrol incident logs reviewed for this report do not identify who was driving the Ford Fusion, and it is not known whether any citations were issued. The current condition of Zavia Jose has not been made public. No additional information about the crash was available at the time of this report.
Lane splitting, and what the Vehicle Code actually says
Vehicle Code section 21658.1 defines lane splitting and authorizes the California Highway Patrol to develop educational guidelines for it. What matters after a crash is the distinction the section draws: lane splitting is not prohibited in California, and not prohibited is not the same thing as legal.
The practical effect is that a rider who was lane splitting has not broken a rule by doing so, and an insurer that treats lane splitting as automatic fault is asserting something the statute does not say. Fault still turns on how each party behaved, the same as in any other collision.
The deadline that applies to a claim like this one
Code of Civil Procedure section 335.1 gives two years for an action for injury to, or for the death of, an individual caused by the wrongful act or neglect of another. The same two years covers an injury claim and a death claim; there is no separate, shorter period because someone died.
If a public agency may be involved, the deadline is much shorter
Where a city, county, transit agency, school district or state agency is a potential defendant, Government Code section 911.2 requires a written claim to be presented to that entity within six months. The six months runs from when the claim accrues, and the claim is presented to the entity itself: a school district and a city are separate public entities with separate processes.
Two things follow that are easy to get wrong. The six months is the deadline to present the claim, not the deadline to sue, and it attaches to the public entity as a defendant rather than to the location of the crash, so a case with both a private and a public defendant is not entirely governed by it. Once the entity mails a written rejection, Government Code section 945.6 allows six months to file suit, which is shorter than the window that just closed. If no written rejection is ever sent, that period is two years from accrual.
Missing the six months is not automatically the end of it. Government Code section 911.6(b) requires the board to grant a late claim application on any of six grounds, including where the person was a minor, or was physically or mentally incapacitated, for the whole of the six months or for any part of it.
Talking to someone about it
Culver Legal represents people injured in collisions across California. A conversation about what happened costs nothing, and we work on a contingency fee, which means there is no fee unless we win. If we do not win, we do not pass the case costs on to you either.
Nothing on this page is legal advice about any particular case, and the facts of a reported collision often change as the investigation continues.
