If you suffered injuries as a passenger, while your friend or acquaintance was behind the wheel, you’re probably entitled to compensation from their insurer.

This is sometimes known as a “passenger vs. driver” case. And as with any other collision case, it takes proper planning to get maximum compensation for your injuries and treatment. We recommend that you consult an experienced attorney before negotiating with anybody.

Whose insurance will cover your injuries?

Generally, your compensation will come from the policy of the liable driver(s).

Washington law affirms that drivers owe due care to you, the passenger. That means they’re legally responsible for maintaining a safe speed, avoiding hazards, and doing whatever they reasonably can to keep you and others safe.

When a driver causes harm by breaching this duty, it leaves them liable to everyone who suffers as a result. Consequently, if your friend contributed to the car accident, then your friend’s policy is expected to cover your injuries. The same goes for any other driver who played a role in the collision, too.

Determining liability for passenger injuries

Determining liability can be complicated, since Washington law espouses comparative negligence. That means each driver’s liability is proportionate to their role in causing the accident.

Let’s say your friend was 30% responsible and another driver was 70% responsible. Theoretically, you would receive 30% of your due compensation from your friend’s insurer and the remaining 70% from the other driver’s insurer. Of course, this becomes more complex when multiple vehicles are involved, but the basic principle is the same.

(Note that Washington no longer recognizes the principle of last clear chance. If your friend and the other driver share responsibility, then it does not legally matter who had the last opportunity to avoid a collision. Compensation depends solely on their comparative negligence.)

All this means you will not receive compensation until fault is established. Sometimes it’s straightforward; other times it’s nuanced, and hotly contested. Our personal injury team can help you move toward compensation as quickly, smoothly, and fairly as possible.

Do you have to sue the driver?

If the collision hasn’t strained your friendship enough, then the prospect of suing the driver certainly could. Fortunately, you can receive compensation without suing your friend. Working with an attorney does not necessarily mean you’re suing.

That said, just because you needn’t sue your friend doesn’t mean you can’t. In fact, there are situations in which it’s helpful or even necessary.

The most common is if the driver’s policy is withholding your rightful compensation. We can limit the claim to the policy amount, so you’re not obligated to go after your friend’s personal assets. It’s often more of an administrative affair than an acrimonious, personal one. In fact, this sort of suit might serve everyone’s best interest by forcing a quick and final settlement.

Another scenario is if your injury expenses exceed your friend’s policy limits (or if they lacked a policy altogether). Some accidents entail months or years of delayed injuries, treatment expenses, ongoing therapy, and lost productivity. If the driver’s insurance and your medical coverage don’t suffice, then it may be worth exploring a lawsuit to recover further compensation. This requires particular care and planning to avoid forcing your friend into bankruptcy.

A far rarer situation is if you suspect the driver actually intended to harm you. This raises completely different legal matters from a standard accident-injury claim. It is not something to explore lightly. Still, if you suspect your (former) friend set out to harm you, then it’s essential to share that information with your legal team.

Whatever the details, our personal injury experts can help you decide whether a lawsuit is worth considering in your individual circumstances.

What if your friend was uninsured or underinsured?

If you carry uninsured/underinsured motorist coverage, then your own policy may compensate you for your injuries. If you didn’t have such coverage at that time, then your options are limited. 

Compensation may still be available through other avenues, up to and including a suit, as discussed above. Your legal team will help you evaluate and pursue these options if necessary.

Can you be liable as a passenger?

It’s highly unlikely that you’d be found liable as a passenger. Within the bounds of normal, rational behavior, there is not much that could cause an accident without the driver breaching their duty of care.

However, it’s not impossible.

For instance, if the driver argues that your actions made them lose control or overlook a hazard, then you may be held at fault. This would require markedly aggressive or abnormal behavior, so it’s not a common scenario. But if you believe your own actions could have contributed, then it’s critical to discuss this with your legal team.

However, you may receive less or no compensation if you weren’t wearing a seat belt when the accident happened, or if you willingly rode with an impaired driver. Those factors do not make you legally responsible for the accident, but may still have a significant financial impact.

(Keep in mind that personal responsibility for seat belt use applies from age sixteen and up. If you were under sixteen, then the driver—not the passenger—is on the hook.)

Getting legal help for your injuries as a passenger

Bridge Law specializes in quickly obtaining rightful compensation for car accident injuries. 

Before talking to insurers, and before attempting to “take care of it” informally with your friend or any other parties, reach out to our legal team.

Accident claims are highly time-sensitive, so we encourage you to get in touch immediately.

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If you’ve experienced an accident or injury involving an electric vehicle (EV), it might feel like there are more questions than answers.

Like all new technology, electric vehicles are at the frontiers of the law. From batteries to autonomous features, entirely new kinds of cases are emerging all the time.

Of course, that’s on top of all the usual questions and stress around fault, liability, insurance coverage, and so forth.

So, if you’re dealing with the aftermath of an EV collision, our legal team will help you fight for rightful compensation while navigating the complexities of this cutting-edge tech.

Electric vehicle incidents & concerns

In a few short years, electric vehicles evolved from far-fetched concept cars to in-demand production vehicles.

But wide adoption doesn’t mean they’re free of issues. In fact, their batteries and numerous “smart” features create new kinds of problems—sometimes with devastating consequences.

Remember: EV-related claims may have little precedent and therefore lots of ambiguity. Insurers and manufacturers may try to use this ambiguity in their favor. If you or your loved ones suffered harm related to an electric vehicle, then it’s as important as ever to consult an experienced accident and injury attorney.

Batteries can ignite or explode

We’ve all seen EV battery fires on the news. Smoke or sparks may give way to flames, which seem to come from nowhere and quickly consume the vehicle. Not only are these cases deeply alarming, but sadly, some have been fatal.

Most of today’s EVs use lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries. Unfortunately, lithium is highly heat-sensitive and combustible. A severe temperature increase—whether from poor design, manufacturing errors, or extreme operating conditions—can ignite the battery and produce a frightening fire.

There are a couple of additional hazards beyond the obvious combustion risk.

For one thing, Li-ion batteries contain several substances that become volatile under heat. When exposed to fire, they may produce extremely harmful gases like carbon monoxide and hydrogen fluoride. These gases are potentially fatal on their own, let alone in combination with heat and smoke.

Consequently, rescuers may need to be especially cautious. The unique risks of EV batteries may mean slower aid and, potentially, worse outcomes for everyone involved.

Doors have trapped people inside

In rare but particularly tragic cases, the vehicle’s own doors have trapped drivers or passengers inside a burning vehicle. This isn’t inherent to EVs, but is a risk of the novel, automated features that some EV makers have adopted.

Most notably, some popular models have self-retracting door handles. These are intended to extend when someone approaches and retract when not needed. However, if damage renders the software or mechanisms inoperable, rescuers may not be able to open the doors quickly (or at all) to extract the occupants.

To be clear, this is an extremely rare event. But in combination with battery-related fire hazards, it’s a dramatic and dangerous occurrence that current laws may not clearly address.

Self-driving EVs raise new liability questions

Collisions with autonomous EVs (or ones temporarily in auto-pilot mode) raise a slew of legal questions.

Engineering quality standards, the role of artificial intelligence in self-driving software, and the operator’s decision to relinquish control are mostly uncharted territory. These factors, plus the human element of most collisions, make it uniquely hard to disentangle liability.

If you were in an accident involving a self-driving EV, then we urge you to contact a legal professional as soon as possible.

Getting legal help after your EV accident

In the US, electric vehicle sales seem to hit new highs with every passing month. And as EVs form a growing share of all cars, they also form a growing share of all car collisions.

As a result, we’ve already seen new and complex legal situations. Some, like batteries combusting or autonomous features misbehaving, involve tricky matters of product liability that may involve manufacturers directly.

Electric vehicle or not, you still need an advocate. Even accidents that seem straightforward can have serious implications for your finances and well-being. No matter the cause of your EV-related incident, it’s critical to talk to an attorney before dealing with any insurers.

At Bridge Law, our team has spent years helping others just like you get fair treatment and just compensation. To confidentially discuss your situation with an expert, please reach out today.

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Around 1:30 am on Tuesday, March 26th, the cargo ship Dali hit a pylon that supported Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge. The collision caused the bridge to collapse, claiming the lives of six construction workers and sending shockwaves through the country.

The Dali, a 985-foot container ship leased by Maersk and traveling under the Singaporean flag, was leaving Baltimore Harbor en route to Sri Lanka. In footage of the incident, the Dali appears to lose power twice, just seconds before hitting the bridge’s support structure at a relatively brisk 8 knots (about 9 mph). Of the eight workers on the bridge at the time, only two were rescued alive from the water. The ship’s crew was unharmed.

In response, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has initiated an investigation of the Dali’s electronics and the bridge’s structural integrity. The Coast Guard disclosed that the Dali underwent routine engine maintenance not long before the accident. So far, there is no indication of outstanding mechanical issues at the time of the incident.

The federal government recently announced an initial round of emergency funding, although it may take years before traffic and shipping routes will operate normally.

Despite media sensationalism and political maneuvering, it is first and foremost a story of human tragedy. We offer our condolences and deepest sympathies to the families of those workers who died in this bizarre and frightening event.

Legally speaking, infrastructure incidents are as nuanced as they are devastating. This is complex legal territory at the intersection of personal injury law, maritime law, construction regulations, and so forth.

Personal injury claims due to infrastructure failures involve a web of stakeholders. Eventually, multiple insurance companies, local public authorities, and the shipping firm could all be held liable to varying degrees. Those findings will not only affect the amounts of claims due to the families of the deceased, but will determine who must pay and in what manner. There may be avenues for prompt compensation, but full legal proceedings and/or settlements are likely to take years. Until then, we can only speculate as to who is liable for what.

Here in the Seattle area, we observe and mourn this tragedy from a distance, but many in our own community have also suffered harm due to others’ actions.

If that’s you, or someone you love, then Bridge Personal Injury Law Firm offers hope and support.

You may be staring down a long path to recovery—physically, mentally, and financially. Even if your compensation claim sounds straightforward, you need the support of a veteran legal team who knows the system and will navigate it for you.

At Bridge Law, we help people like you to get fair compensation for harm caused by others.

These cases—known as compensation claims—can involve anything from everyday negligence to egregious malpractice or wrongful death.

If you think you might deserve compensation, then here’s a general overview of what to expect.

We’ll show how your claim meets these criteria

To win a claim, you need to demonstrate that the other party harmed you by acting inappropriately.

More precisely, you (or rather your legal team) must show how:

1. The other party was obligated to maintain a certain level of care.
2. The other party failed to do so, either intentionally or negligently.
3. You suffered objective harm.
4. Your harm was the direct result of their lack of care (as opposed to some other event or coincidence).

More detailed criteria might apply to your specific situation. To give a few examples:

• A workers’ compensation claim requires showing that harm occurred in the course of doing your actual job.
• A product liability claim may depend on what safety guarantees the manufacturer made or implied.
• A public liability claim might revolve around what you were doing on the premises in the first place.

Once the details are clear and legally sound, your attorney will figure out exactly what the claim is worth.

Three types of compensation may be awarded

If the incident hadn’t happened, what physical condition would you be in? How much money would you have? What opportunities would be available? What good or experiences would you enjoy, and what bad ones would you avoid?

Courts can’t turn back the clock, but they can come up with numbers (“damages”) that compensate you (“make you whole”) for factors like these.

In practice, we think of damages in three different categories, corresponding to the kind of harm they address.

• Special damages cover monetary losses. They try to capture the expected lifelong cost of medical care, lost wages, property damage, and so forth.
• General damages cover non-monetary losses. They’re extremely difficult to calculate, since they try to account for psychological and social losses.
• Punitive damages are rarer. They’re primarily intended to punish the other party and to discourage them (or anyone else) from similar actions. Punitive damages are more arbitrary, but they’re typically capped at a certain multiple of special/general damages.

Your attorney might recommend outside experts who can explore and attest to the full extent of your harm. We understand how invasive and uncomfortable this can feel after a traumatic event. Even so, outside expertise is often the surest way to establish and win broader damages in complex cases.

Once damages are settled, the last major step is to negotiate payment terms.

You’ll be paid in one of two ways

If applicable, your insurer will directly pay expenses like medical and auto repair bills. These so-called “direct recovery” payments are deducted from the total compensation amount.

The remainder is subject to legal fees—conventionally 33%— after which the rest is paid out to you. It may come as either a lump sum (single payout) or a structured settlement (ongoing payments).

There are pros and cons to each.

Lump sums are simple. You get immediate resources to pay the bills, cover medical costs, and so forth. They often make sense for modest amounts.

Structured settlements, on the other hand, provide a steady income stream. But they’re more complicated to arrange, and they may not be enough to cover short-term expenses.

Both arrangements are usually tax-free, outside of unusual situations involving punitive damages.

For modest amounts, it’s often wise to settle for a lump sum. For larger damages, work closely with your legal team and with a financial planning professional. They’ll fight to ensure your needs are covered in a way that minimizes long-term financial worries.

Regardless, the most important part is to act quickly.

Do you still have time to file a claim?

The clock is ticking on your compensation claim.

Generally speaking, Washington State lets you file a compensation claim for three years after the event. This is known as the “statute of limitations.” Once that period elapses, you are usually not permitted to file a claim.

(There are a few exceptions. Most commonly, you may have more time if the harm didn’t appear for some time, or if it was so severe that you were left incapacitated.)

Three years may sound generous, but it passes more quickly than you’d think. Dealing with insurers, coordinating outside experts, navigating court proceedings, negotiating a settlement—each can take months or years.

Take the first step toward compensation

Money can’t make up for what you’ve been through.

But if you act quickly, it can help with the financial burden or lost opportunities you may be navigating.

Bridge Law has a track record of winning full, fair compensation for people who have suffered from another’s actions.

People like you.

Whether we’re assembling overwhelming evidence, uncovering additional insurance, contesting unfair settlements, or even going to court, we fight for you—period.

Reach out today to discuss your claim confidentially.

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At a glance:

• Washington State saw 75,941 car crashes in 2023, a reduction of more than 26% from 2022.
• There was a record high of 694 fatal crashes, despite fewer overall incidents.
• The percentage of crashes involving drunk driving (6%) or a teenage driver (14%) did not meaningfully change.

Every crash represents not just statistics, but real people and real families—often impacted in life-altering ways. This annual report is our way of supporting and empowering our community with information.

We believe that understanding these trends helps us to fully appreciate and better handle the risks of driving. It reminds us to be more prudent and more defensive behind the wheel—even when others choose not to be.

Keep our collision checklist handy, and don’t hesitate to reach out for quick, confidential guidance.

2023 Washington State Car Crash Summary

The past year’s trends were cause for optimism, as total crashes and total injury crashes fell markedly from 2022 to 2023.

However, the crashes that did occur were slightly more likely to be severe. An injury or fatality occurred in 31% of crashes, compared to 29% in 2022. Most concerningly, fatal crashes increased both in count (694, up from 690) and as a percentage of total crashes (0.9%, up from 0.7%).

All data come from the WSDOT Crash Data Portal and are subject to adjustment by the agency.

Total crashes decreased over 26%

To begin with a bright spot, Washington saw a 26% drop to 75,941 total recorded crashes in 2023.

This is easily the lowest figure in the state’s current data set, which goes back to 2014.

Fatal crashes increased 1%

Despite the decrease in total crashes, a record 694 of them caused a fatality. That’s an increase of about 1% from the 690 fatal crashes observed in 2022.

This means about 0.9% of all crashes in 2023 were fatal, compared with under 0.7% in 2022.

If someone close to you was involved in a fatal collision, we offer our sincere condolences first and foremost. While nothing in the world can turn back the hands of time, we can offer compassionate and tireless legal support after such a tragic loss.

Serious injuries increased 6%

Suspected serious injuries rose to a record-high 2,822, roughly a 6% increase over the previous year’s 2,653. The proportion of crashes with serious injuries rose by nearly half, from 2.6% to 3.7% of all crashes.

The legal and financial repercussions of a major collision injury can play out over months or even years. Our team is here to fight for your rightful compensation while you focus on recovering and readjusting to regular life.

Lesser injuries decreased nearly 26%

Crashes with minor or possible injuries dropped to 20,033, down almost 26% from 26,955 in 2022, and in line with the drop in total crashes.

Keep in mind that injuries often emerge later—potentially multiple days following a collision. It’s essential to get checked by a doctor even if you don’t suspect an injury. Remember: if it’s not documented, then it may not be compensated, either.

Non-injury crashes remained the norm

In 2023, 52,392 crashes caused no apparent injuries. That figure is consistent with the overall decrease in crashes.

However, non-injury crashes accounted for about 69% of all incidents, a lower percentage than the previous year’s 71%. This indicates that, among those crashes that did occur, the injury rate rose to 31% (vs. 29%).

Even though most crashes aren’t severe, insurance and liability can still be complicated and overwhelming. Our auto accident specialists will navigate these stressful matters on your behalf.

Your trusted partner after a collision

At Bridge Law, we help Washingtonians win compensation, deal with insurance and medical challenges, and move forward with life.

If you or someone you care about has suffered personal or financial harm in a collision, then we’re here to offer you effective representation and a compassionate ear.

Reach out today to learn more about your options for fast, maximum compensation.

This article is intended solely for informational purposes and should not be construed as legal advice.

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