Glendale, CA, October 20 – A 33-year-old man was killed in a crash involving two work trucks on the northbound Glendale (2) Freeway on Monday afternoon. The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner’s Office identified the man as George Rangel Jr. The collision was reported at approximately 3:30 p.m. near Mountain Street and Glendale Community College, triggering a SigAlert that closed multiple lanes for several hours while crews worked at the scene.
Glendale Man, 33, Identified as Victim of Freeway Crash Involving Two Work Trucks
A witness told officers that a white truck rolled over several times immediately after the crash before coming to rest upright on its wheels. The truck’s occupant was trapped inside following the rollover. A second work truck was also involved in the collision, though the source of the initial impact and the sequence of events leading up to it have not been described in available reports.
Authorities issued a SigAlert at approximately 3:49 p.m., roughly 20 minutes after the crash was first reported. The alert closed lanes two through five of the northbound freeway, along with the Mountain Street on-ramp. Those closures remained in place for several hours as crews worked at the scene involving the two work trucks that had collided.
As of this report, the cause of the collision has not been publicly disclosed, and it is not known whether either driver was issued a citation. The condition of the occupant who was trapped in the white truck, and the status of anyone who may have been in the second work truck, have not been released. The investigation into the crash remains ongoing, and further details are expected to follow as authorities complete their review.
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 1 January 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.
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.
