Chatsworth, CA, September 15 – A collision between an SUV and a Los Angeles Metro bus in Chatsworth left two people dead and six others hospitalized on Tuesday evening, according to Los Angeles Metro. The crash occurred at approximately 5:02 p.m. on September 15 in the 20900 block of West Nordhoff Street, when a Metro Line 166 bus traveling eastbound on Nordhoff Street was struck by a vehicle traveling southbound on De Soto Avenue.
Chatsworth Crash Between SUV and Metro Bus Kills Two, Injures Six
At least two people were pronounced dead as a result of the collision, authorities said. Six additional people were taken to a hospital for treatment, though their conditions were not immediately known. It was not clear how many of the injured were bus passengers, motorists, or bystanders, and no further details about the victims were released.
The Los Angeles Fire Department responded to the scene along with other emergency crews to assist those injured in the crash. Authorities did not specify which additional agencies were involved beyond the fire department, nor did they describe the extent of damage to either the bus or the vehicle involved in the collision.
Authorities did not immediately provide further information about the circumstances that led to the collision. No cause has been publicly determined, and it has not been disclosed whether either driver is suspected of any traffic violation. The identities of those killed and injured, along with the conditions of the six people hospitalized, had not been released as of Tuesday evening.
Why evidence in a commercial vehicle case has a deadline of its own
A collision involving a commercial vehicle is not simply a larger car accident. The carrier holds records the other driver never has: electronic logging data, maintenance and inspection history, dispatch instructions and driver qualification files.
Those records are the best evidence of what happened and they do not last indefinitely. Retention periods are measured in months for some categories, so the window to preserve them can close long before the deadline to file a lawsuit does. A preservation demand sent early is the step that keeps them available.
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.
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.
