What This Guide Covers
- The problem: there is no driver to sue
- Who can be held liable after an AV crash
- The four legal theories that apply
- The $5 million insurance requirement
- Evidence: the car recorded everything
- What to do in the first 72 hours
- If you were a passenger in the robotaxi
- Deadlines that can destroy your claim
- What your case may be worth
- Frequently asked questions
The Problem: There Is No Driver to Sue
Every ordinary Los Angeles car accident claim begins the same way: the police report names a driver, and that driver's insurer becomes the party you negotiate with. California personal injury law is built around a human being behind a steering wheel.
Autonomous vehicles break that machinery. When a driverless vehicle strikes a pedestrian in Santa Monica, changes lanes into a motorcyclist on Sunset, or fails to yield in Koreatown, there is no driver to cite and often no human at the scene who can explain what happened.
That does not mean nobody is responsible. Responsibility shifts from an individual to a set of companies — companies with well-funded insurers and exclusive control over the data proving what the vehicle did. The playing field is steeper, and the first 72 hours matter more.
The short answer: In California, an autonomous vehicle company is generally responsible for the conduct of its driverless vehicles. The entity holding a driverless deployment permit must carry substantial liability coverage and accept responsibility for the vehicle's operation. You do not lose your right to compensation simply because no human was driving.
Who Can Be Held Liable After an AV Crash
Because the cause is unknown until the vehicle's data is analyzed, experienced counsel names each viable party early and narrows the case later.
1. The autonomous vehicle operator
This is the company that owns the fleet, holds the state permits, dispatches the vehicles, and maintains them — Waymo being the most visible example in Los Angeles. It can be liable for negligent operation, maintenance, software deployment, or supervision of its remote assistance team. Under respondeat superior, it is also liable for the negligence of its employees, including remote operators and roadside technicians.
2. The manufacturer of the vehicle or the autonomous system
The car and the self-driving system are often made by different companies than the fleet operator. If a sensor, braking system, or the perception software was defective, California product liability law applies — strict liability for manufacturing defects, design defects, and failure to warn. A claimant need not prove carelessness, only that the product was defective and caused injury.
3. Another human driver
Many AV collisions are caused in whole or part by a human motorist who ran a red light or made an illegal turn. Ordinary rules then apply and that driver's policy is in play — and the driverless vehicle's sensor recordings often become the strongest evidence against that driver.
4. A public entity
If a malfunctioning traffic signal, obscured sign, or dangerous roadway condition contributed to the crash, the City of Los Angeles, the County, or Caltrans may share responsibility. These claims carry a much shorter deadline, discussed below.
5. A maintenance or fleet services contractor
AV fleets are charged, inspected, and repaired by contractors. A negligent brake service or improperly recalibrated sensor array can shift fault onto a company most claimants never knew existed.
The Four Legal Theories That Apply
| Theory | What you must show | Typical target |
|---|---|---|
| Negligence | The company owed a duty of care, breached it, and caused your injuries. Every person is responsible for injury caused by want of ordinary care under Civil Code §1714. | AV operator, other driver, contractor |
| Strict product liability | The vehicle or its driving system contained a manufacturing defect, design defect, or inadequate warning that caused harm. No proof of carelessness required. | Vehicle and software manufacturers |
| Negligence per se | The vehicle violated a Vehicle Code provision designed to protect people like you — failure to yield, unsafe speed, unsafe lane change — creating a presumption of negligence under Evidence Code §669. | AV operator |
| Common carrier liability | You were a paying passenger. Carriers of persons for reward must use the utmost care and diligence under Civil Code §2100 — a standard higher than ordinary negligence. | Robotaxi operator |
A well-built AV case pleads several of these in the alternative, forcing the operator and the manufacturer to explain on the record which of them controlled the decision that led to the collision.
Comparative fault still applies. California follows pure comparative negligence. If a jury finds you 30 percent responsible — for stepping outside a crosswalk, say — you still recover 70 percent of your proven damages. Unlike many states, California never cuts you off entirely. Expect the defense to press this hard, because reducing your percentage is the cheapest way to reduce the payout.
The $5 Million Insurance Requirement
The single most important practical fact for an injured claimant: California does not let AV companies operate on minimum-limits insurance.
An ordinary California driver need only carry the state minimum — which, following SB 1107, rose to 30/60/15 for policies issued or renewed on or after January 1, 2025. For a catastrophic injury, that ceiling is often exhausted within days.
Companies that test or deploy autonomous vehicles on California public roads must maintain evidence of financial responsibility of $5 million — insurance, surety bond, or approved self-insurance — as a condition of their DMV permit, under regulations adopted pursuant to Vehicle Code §38750.
Against an ordinary driver, the fight is often about finding coverage. In an AV case the coverage is there, so the fight is about liability and damages — a better position for an injured person, though the defense will contest fault hard.
Hit by a driverless vehicle in Los Angeles?
The vehicle's data is already recorded — and the company controls it. The sooner a preservation demand goes out, the stronger your case. Free consultation, no fee unless we win.
Call (323) 372-1216 Now Contact Us OnlineEvidence: The Car Recorded Everything
An autonomous vehicle is a rolling evidence-collection platform. At the moment of your collision it was almost certainly capturing:
- Multi-camera video covering a full 360-degree field around the vehicle
- Lidar and radar point clouds showing position, distance, and velocity of every nearby object — including you
- Vehicle telemetry: speed, steering angle, throttle, and the exact millisecond braking began
- Perception and planning logs — what the software detected, how it classified it, and what maneuver it chose
- Remote assistance communications and vehicle fault codes and maintenance history
This is extraordinary evidence — far better than the eyewitness memories and skid marks that decide most crash cases. It is also entirely in the defendant's possession and subject to its own retention schedules.
That is why a spoliation letter — a formal demand to preserve all incident-related data — should go out within days. If data is destroyed after such notice, California courts can impose evidentiary sanctions, including instructing the jury it may infer the missing evidence was unfavorable. Without that letter, routine data rotation may lawfully erase the record of your crash.
Separately, operators face federal crash-reporting obligations to NHTSA, and California requires DMV collision reports for vehicles in autonomous mode — an independent paper trail to compare against the company's internal account.
What to Do in the First 72 Hours
- Get medical care immediately. Treatment gaps are the first thing an adjuster uses to argue you were not really hurt.
- Call 911 and insist on a report. Ask the officer to document the operator company, the vehicle or fleet number, and whether it was in autonomous mode.
- Photograph everything. The vehicle, its sensor pods, company markings and plate, the roadway, signals, debris, your injuries, and the intersection.
- Look for other cameras. Nearby businesses, doorbell cameras, and dashcams often capture the collision — and are typically overwritten within days.
- Get witness contact information before anyone leaves.
- Do not give a recorded statement to the other side's insurer; early statements are routinely used to argue comparative fault.
- Do not accept a fast settlement. Early offers arrive before the full extent of an injury is known, and they are final.
- Contact a personal injury attorney right away so a preservation demand goes out before retention windows close.
If You Were a Passenger in the Robotaxi
Passengers occupy the strongest legal position of anyone involved. A company transporting paying passengers is a common carrier, and under California Civil Code §2100 must use the utmost care and diligence — a materially higher duty than the reasonable-care standard applied to a private motorist.
A passenger also has essentially no exposure to comparative fault. The app's terms of service do not waive claims for personal injury caused by negligence; Civil Code §1668 makes contracts exempting a party from responsibility for willful injury or violation of law unenforceable.
Deadlines That Can Destroy Your Claim
| Claim type | Deadline | Authority |
|---|---|---|
| Personal injury (private company) | 2 years from date of injury | Code Civ. Proc. §335.1 |
| Wrongful death | 2 years from date of death | Code Civ. Proc. §335.1 |
| Property damage only | 3 years | Code Civ. Proc. §338 |
| Claim against a public entity | 6 months to file a written government claim | Gov. Code §911.2 |
| Injured claimant under 18 | Generally tolled until the 18th birthday | Code Civ. Proc. §352 |
The six-month government claim deadline quietly destroys otherwise strong cases. If a broken signal contributed to your crash, waiting a year means the claim against the City is gone — even though you still have a year left against the AV company.
What Your Case May Be Worth
California allows recovery of both economic and non-economic damages, with no cap in an ordinary personal injury case against a private company.
Economic damages
- Emergency treatment, hospitalization, surgery, imaging, and medication
- Future medical care, including therapy, injections, and revision surgery
- Lost wages, lost benefits, and lost earning capacity
- Property damage and out-of-pocket expenses
- Home modification and attendant care in catastrophic cases
Non-economic damages
- Physical pain and suffering
- Mental and emotional distress
- Disfigurement, scarring, and permanent impairment
- Loss of enjoyment of life and loss of consortium for a spouse
In a subset of AV cases, punitive damages may be available under Civil Code §3294 — but only on clear and convincing evidence of malice, oppression, or fraud. Case value otherwise depends on injury severity, permanence, the liability evidence, and the treating record.
Los Angeles context matters. Driverless vehicles concentrate in dense corridors — Santa Monica, West Hollywood, Downtown, Mid-Wilshire, Koreatown, and routes toward LAX — precisely the areas with heavy pedestrian volume, aggressive merging, double-parked delivery vehicles, and complex signalized intersections. A Los Angeles County jury pool that encounters these vehicles daily brings real-world expectations about how they should behave.
How These Cases Actually Proceed
An AV claim follows a longer arc than a routine crash case. Because the decisive evidence is proprietary software data, these cases frequently require litigation rather than pre-suit negotiation. Discovery involves protective orders, robotics and reconstruction experts, and depositions of engineers and remote operations staff. That is a reason to involve counsel early, not to hesitate.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is liable if a Waymo hits me in Los Angeles?
Because there is no human driver to blame, liability usually falls on the autonomous vehicle company that owns and operates the fleet, on the manufacturer of the vehicle or its self-driving system under product liability law, or on a third party such as another motorist or a road maintenance agency. Most claims name more than one defendant until the vehicle's data reveals what actually failed.
How much insurance does an autonomous vehicle company carry in California?
California requires companies deploying driverless vehicles to maintain $5 million in liability coverage or an equivalent bond or approved self-insurance, far above the 30/60/15 minimum that applies to ordinary drivers. That significantly raises the ceiling on what a seriously injured claimant can recover.
Do driverless cars record video and sensor data of a crash?
Yes. Autonomous vehicles continuously record camera, lidar, radar, GPS, speed, braking, and software decision data. That evidence is controlled by the AV company, so a spoliation letter demanding preservation should be sent as quickly as possible after the collision.
How long do I have to file an autonomous vehicle injury claim in California?
The general personal injury deadline is two years from the date of injury under Code of Civil Procedure §335.1. If a public entity contributed to the crash, a written government claim is generally due within six months under Government Code §911.2. Wrongful death claims also follow the two-year rule.
Can I sue if I was a passenger inside a robotaxi?
Yes. Passengers injured inside a driverless vehicle can pursue the AV company as a common carrier, which owes the utmost care and diligence under California Civil Code §2100. Terms of service in the ride-hailing app do not waive your right to compensation for personal injury caused by negligence.
Does comparative fault reduce my recovery?
California uses pure comparative negligence, so your damages are reduced by your percentage of fault but you are never barred from recovering. Even a pedestrian found 40 percent at fault can still recover 60 percent of proven damages.
What if the driverless car was hit by another human driver and I was injured?
You may have claims against both. The human driver's liability policy applies, and the AV company may share fault if its vehicle could have avoided the collision. The vehicle's sensor record is often the best evidence of what the human driver did.
Sources and Authorities
- California Vehicle Code §38750 — authorization and regulation of autonomous vehicles on California public roads
- California Code of Regulations, Title 13, Article 3.7 & 3.8 — DMV autonomous vehicle testing and deployment rules, including the $5 million evidence-of-financial-responsibility requirement and collision reporting duties
- California Civil Code §1714 — general duty of ordinary care
- California Civil Code §2100 — utmost care and diligence owed by common carriers of persons
- California Civil Code §1668 — contracts exempting a party from responsibility for willful injury or violation of law are against public policy
- California Civil Code §3294 — punitive damages on clear and convincing evidence of malice, oppression, or fraud
- California Evidence Code §669 — negligence per se
- California Code of Civil Procedure §§335.1, 338, 352 — limitations periods and tolling for minors
- California Government Code §911.2 — six-month deadline for public entity claims
- NHTSA Standing General Order on Crash Reporting — federal reporting duties for automated driving systems
- California Senate Bill 1107 — minimum auto liability limits raised to 30/60/15 effective January 1, 2025
- Judicial Council of California Civil Jury Instructions (CACI) series 1200 — strict product liability
Talk to a Los Angeles Autonomous Vehicle Injury Attorney
Driverless vehicle claims are defended hard, but the principle is old: when a company puts a machine on a public street and that machine hurts someone, the company answers for it. You need someone who will demand the data before it disappears.
If you or a family member was injured by an autonomous vehicle anywhere in Los Angeles County, InjuryAllies offers a free, no-obligation case review. Call (323) 372-1216 or use the form below. There is no fee unless we recover for you.