Bus Accident Lawyer

Overview

Bus Accident Lawyer in Los Angeles

Two things make a bus injury case different from a car accident case, and both of them work against you if nobody moves quickly.

The first is who operated the bus. If it was Metro, a municipal line, or a school district, you're dealing with a public entity, and the deadline to take the first required step is generally six months from the date of injury rather than the two years most injury claims allow.

The second is where the evidence lives. Nearly everything that decides a bus case — the onboard cameras, the driver's records, the maintenance history, the prior complaints about that route or that driver — is held by the party you would be making a claim against. None of it is volunteered, and most of it is on a retention schedule that erases it while you're still in treatment.

There's also something working in your favor, and most injured passengers don't know about it.

Common Carrier Duty

Bus Operators Owe You More Than an Ordinary Driver Does

Every driver on the road owes you reasonable care. A bus operator owes you considerably more than that.

Under California Civil Code section 2100 (opens in new window), a carrier of persons for reward must use the utmost care and diligence for their safe carriage, must provide everything necessary for that purpose, and must exercise a reasonable degree of skill to that end. This is the common carrier standard, and it's one of the highest duties California imposes on anyone.

The practical effect is significant. Against an ordinary driver, you must show they failed to act as a reasonably careful person would. Against a common carrier, even slight negligence can establish liability. The California Supreme Court applied this standard to a transit district in Acosta v. Southern California Rapid Transit District (1970) 2 Cal.3d 19.

The duty covers more than driving. Under Civil Code section 2101 (opens in new window), a carrier must provide vehicles that are safe and fit for their purpose, which reaches maintenance, inspection, and equipment. It extends to hiring, training, and supervising drivers. In some circumstances it reaches a carrier's obligation to protect passengers from harm caused by other passengers.

Civil Code section 2103 (opens in new window) goes further still for passengers who are disabled, ill, or minors, requiring the carrier to give regard to those needs and use the highest degree of care for their safety.

Who counts as a common carrier

The category includes Metro and municipal bus lines, school buses, charter and tour buses, shuttle services, and paratransit operators.

What the standard does not do

It does not make the operator automatically liable. A common carrier is not an insurer of passenger safety. You still have to prove negligence, causation, and the extent of your injuries. What the standard changes is how little negligence it takes.

Public Agency Deadline

If a Public Agency Operated the Bus, You Have Six Months

This is the single most time-sensitive fact on this page.

Metro, municipal transit operators, and school districts are public entities. Before you can sue one, California's Government Claims Act requires that a written claim be presented to the agency, and for injury claims that generally must happen within six months of the date of injury. That is not the lawsuit. It is a prerequisite to being allowed to file one, and missing it usually ends the case regardless of how strong it was.

The full process, the exceptions, and what to do if the deadline has already passed are covered on our government liability page.

If the bus was operated by a private company — a charter service, a tour operator, a private shuttle — the ordinary two-year period for personal injury claims generally applies instead. Which one governs your case depends on who actually operated the bus, and that's not always obvious from the outside. It's worth confirming rather than assuming.

Potential Defendants

Who Is Actually Responsible

Bus cases have more potential defendants than car cases, and identifying all of them early matters for two reasons: each may carry its own deadline, and under California law the ability to collect certain damages depends on who is in the case.

The transit agency or bus company.

Directly, for how the vehicle was operated and maintained, and for the hiring, training, and supervision of the driver.

The driver.

A claim against a government employee still requires a claim against the entity.

A maintenance contractor.

Many operators outsource maintenance, and a brake or door failure may lead to a private company rather than the agency.

Another motorist.

Where a third-party driver caused the collision, they're a defendant alongside the operator, and they carry separate insurance.

A manufacturer.

Where a defect in the vehicle, a component, or a passenger restraint contributed to the injury.

A property owner or the entity responsible for the roadway.

Where a boarding-area condition, a defective bus stop, or a dangerous roadway condition played a role.

There is a technical point here with real consequences. In cases with multiple defendants, California treats the two categories of damages differently. Economic damages, meaning medical bills and lost income, can generally be collected in full from any defendant found at fault. Non-economic damages, meaning pain and suffering and loss of enjoyment of life, are apportioned — each defendant is responsible only for its own percentage share, under Civil Code section 1431.2 (opens in new window).

The practical translation: if a responsible party is never identified or brought into the case, their share of the non-economic damages does not shift to anyone else. It simply is not recovered. That is why identifying every defendant early is not thoroughness for its own sake.

Injured Person's Position

Passengers, Pedestrians, and Drivers Are in Different Positions

People arrive at a page like this from three different situations, and the law treats them differently.

If you were a passenger

The common carrier standard applies to you directly. This is the strongest position, and it applies whether you were injured in a collision, by sudden braking or acceleration, by a door closing, by a fall while boarding or exiting, or by a condition on the bus itself.

If you were struck by a bus as a pedestrian or cyclist

The heightened common carrier duty generally doesn't extend to you, because it runs to passengers being carried. The operator still owes you ordinary care, and you're still dealing with the same defendant and, if it's a public agency, the same six-month deadline.

If you were in another vehicle

The same is true. Ordinary negligence rules apply to how the bus was driven, but the operator's maintenance records, driver qualification file, and prior incident history are often more revealing than anything available in a typical two-car collision.

Evidence Preservation

The Evidence Disappears on a Schedule

This is the part that costs people cases, and it happens quietly.

Onboard video.

Most transit buses run multiple camera angles covering the driver, the interior, and the roadway. Retention cycles are frequently short — sometimes measured in days or weeks — and footage is overwritten automatically unless someone asks for it to be held.

Telematics and GPS.

Speed, location, braking, and door operation, second by second. This data often contradicts or corroborates the driver's account precisely.

The driver's records.

Hours worked, qualification file, training history, prior incidents, prior complaints.

Maintenance and inspection logs.

Whether a known problem existed with that vehicle, and how long it had been known.

Prior complaints about the same route, stop, or driver.

In a case involving a recurring hazard, this is often the most valuable material that exists.

The incident report the operator generated that day.

It exists, and it was written by the party you are making a claim against.

A written preservation demand in the first week is worth more than a strong argument in the eighth month. Once footage is overwritten, no amount of litigation brings it back, and the absence of it usually hurts the injured person more than the operator.

Comparative Fault

If You Were Partly at Fault, You May Still Recover

Bus operators and their insurers argue passenger fault as a matter of routine. That you were standing. That you moved before the bus came to a complete stop. That you were not holding a rail. That you were crossing outside a crosswalk. Expect it.

Here is the rule that matters. California follows pure comparative fault, adopted by the California Supreme Court in Li v. Yellow Cab Co. (1975) 13 Cal.3d 804. Fault is divided by percentage among everyone responsible, and an injured person's recovery is reduced by their own share rather than eliminated by it.

Being partly at fault does not bar a claim in California. Even a majority share does not bar it — someone found 60 percent responsible can still recover 40 percent of their damages. California is unusual in this respect, and many people assume the stricter rule from other states applies here.

Two things follow from that.

Being told you were at fault is not the end of anything.

It's an opening position in a negotiation about percentages, and it is frequently stated with more confidence than the evidence supports.

Fault percentages are evidence questions, not opinions.

Video, telematics, witness accounts, and the operator's own records determine them. Which is another reason the preservation issue above matters so much.

How injuries and losses are proven and valued, including future care and lost earning capacity, is covered on our traumatic brain injury page.

Representation

How We Handle Bus Injury Cases

Knarik Boyadzhyan served as a Deputy Public Defender, representing clients facing criminal charges at every stage. That matters in a bus case in a specific way: transit agencies and the firms that defend them handle these claims constantly and evaluate opposing counsel the same way private insurers do. A file being prepared for court is treated differently from one that is not.

You will also be working with the attorney handling your case rather than a case manager. At Boyadzhyan Legal Shield, from our office in Encino, that's simply how it works.

We send preservation demands in the first days.

Onboard video, telematics, driver records, maintenance logs, and the incident report. This is the first thing that happens, not something that waits for a retainer to be processed.

We identify every potential defendant and every applicable deadline.

A single incident can involve a public agency on a six-month clock and private defendants on a two-year clock at the same time. Missing one while pursuing the other is a permanent loss.

We establish which standard of care applies.

Whether the common carrier duty governs, and to whom, changes what has to be proven. It is worth getting right at the outset rather than arguing about later.

We pursue the agency's own records.

Prior complaints, prior incidents at the same location, route safety histories, and internal reviews. Public entities hold a great deal of documentation about their own operations and don't produce it voluntarily.

We prepare for the comparative fault argument before it is made.

It is coming in every one of these cases, and the answer is evidence gathered early rather than argument offered late.

Immediate Steps

What to Do Right Now

Record the bus number, route number, and time.

The bus number is usually on the exterior and inside near the front. Without it, identifying the specific vehicle weeks later is much harder.

Photograph everything while you're still there.

The interior, where you were sitting or standing, what you were holding, the condition of the floor or a handrail, the exterior, the scene, and your injuries.

Get names and phone numbers of other passengers.

They scatter within minutes and become unreachable. Passenger witnesses are the most valuable evidence in these cases and the hardest to recover later.

Report the injury and get a report number.

To the driver, the operator, or the agency. Ask for the number of the report they create.

Do not give a recorded statement.

Not to the operator, not to a risk management office, not to an insurer. You are not required to, and these are taken early for a reason.

See a doctor now, even if you feel able to walk away.

This is medical advice only in the sense that a gap between the incident and treatment becomes an argument later that you weren't really hurt.

Do not wait on the deadline.

If a public agency operated the bus, the six-month clock started the day it happened.

Frequently Asked Questions

Questions About Bus Injury Claims

If your question is not answered here, call (310) 877-7770 to discuss your situation.

It depends on who operated the bus. If it was a public agency such as Metro, a municipal line, or a school district, a written claim generally must be presented to that agency within six months of the injury, well before the ordinary deadline for filing suit. If a private company operated the bus, the ordinary two-year period for personal injury claims generally applies. Because the consequences of getting this wrong are usually final, confirm your dates with a lawyer rather than working from a general rule.

No. California follows pure comparative fault, which means fault is divided by percentage and your recovery is reduced by your share rather than eliminated. Even someone found mostly at fault can still recover a portion of their damages. Operators raise passenger fault as a matter of routine, and the percentages are decided by evidence — video, vehicle data, and witness accounts — not by what an adjuster asserts early on.

It can be. Bus operators are common carriers and owe passengers the utmost care and diligence under Civil Code section 2100, which is a higher standard than ordinary drivers are held to, and even slight negligence can support liability. Whether a particular stop was negligent depends on why it happened, and that is usually answered by onboard video and vehicle data rather than by anyone's recollection — which is why preserving that material quickly matters.

Not automatically, and not if it no longer exists. Onboard footage is often overwritten within days or weeks on an automatic cycle, and no one at the agency has any obligation to hold it because you were hurt. A written preservation demand changes that, and it needs to go out early. This is the most common reason a strong bus case becomes a difficult one.

Somewhat. The heightened common carrier duty runs to passengers, so as another motorist or a pedestrian you are generally owed ordinary care rather than the utmost care standard. You are still dealing with the same defendant, the same evidence, and, if a public agency operated the bus, the same six-month claim deadline. The operator's maintenance records and the driver's history are often more revealing than what is available in a typical collision between two private vehicles.

Knarik Boyadzhyan speaking on the phone in the firm's Encino office.

Consultation

Talk to Knarik Boyadzhyan About Your Bus Injury

Boyadzhyan Legal Shield represents people injured on and by buses throughout Los Angeles and San Bernardino Counties from our office in Encino. Whether you were a passenger, a pedestrian, or in another vehicle, we can talk through who was responsible, what deadline applies, and what evidence needs to be preserved now.

How fees and costs work is set out in a written agreement we go through with you before you sign anything.

Initial consultations are free and confidential.

Request Consultation Call (310) 877-7770

This page is general legal information, not legal advice, and does not create an attorney-client relationship. California statute references link to the official California Legislative Information site.