Bakersfield, CA, November 1 – A woman died early Saturday morning after she was struck by a Bakersfield Police Department patrol vehicle in the 7600 block of White Lane, according to police. Police said the woman walked in front of the vehicle at around 2:45 a.m. and was struck. She was pronounced dead at the scene, according to the Kern County Coroner’s Office. Her identity has not been released.
Bakersfield Woman Dies After Being Struck by Police Patrol Vehicle
The officer was responding to a call of service at the time of the crash, according to police. The Bakersfield Police Department has not released details about the nature of that call or where the officer was headed when the collision occurred. The department also has not said whether other vehicles or pedestrians were nearby at the time.
The Bakersfield Police Department has not announced any determination of fault in connection with the crash. The department has not said whether the collision is under investigation by an outside agency. The department has not released the name or assignment of the officer who was driving the patrol vehicle. No citations have been announced either.
Several details about the crash remain unconfirmed. The circumstances that led the woman into the path of the patrol vehicle have not been explained, and the Bakersfield Police Department has not said when or whether additional information will be released. Police have not said whether any witnesses have come forward since the crash was first reported.
What the at-fault driver is required to carry, and why it often is not enough
Vehicle Code section 16056 sets California’s minimum liability limits, and they changed recently. For a policy issued or renewed on or after January 1, 2025, the minimum is $30,000 for injury to or death of one person, $60,000 where two or more people are hurt, and $15,000 for property damage. Policies written before that date may still carry the older minimum of $15,000, $30,000 and $5,000.
Those are floors, not typical limits, and a single hospital admission can exhaust the lower figure before any other loss is counted. Where the at-fault driver carries the minimum, the uninsured and underinsured motorist cover on the injured person’s own policy is often the part that matters most, and it is worth checking early rather than after the other insurer has made an offer.
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.
Who is entitled to bring a claim when someone is killed
Code of Civil Procedure section 377.60 decides who may bring a wrongful death action. The first group is the surviving spouse, domestic partner, children and the issue of deceased children, or, where there is no surviving issue, whoever would take the estate by intestate succession.
A second group may bring the action only if they were financially dependent on the person who died: a putative spouse and their children, stepchildren, parents, and the legal guardians of the person who died where the parents are deceased. Parents are in that second group, which is the part families are most often surprised by, because dependency has to be shown rather than assumed.
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.
A claim against the City of Bakersfield is presented to the City Clerk at 1600 Truxtun Avenue, and the six months in Government Code section 911.2 applies to 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.
