Long Beach Personal Injury Attorney

In 2025, traffic took more lives in Long Beach than homicide did: 53 fatal crashes compared with 29 homicides, the city’s worst year on the roads in more than a decade (Long Beach Post). The questions below are the ones a Long Beach personal injury attorney hears most from people hurt on these streets; each link jumps to a full answer.

• Why do state rankings put Long Beach first?
• Which corridors did the city choose for speed cameras?
• Can a speed camera help prove what happened?
• If the hit-and-run driver is never found, who pays?
• Is a port truck crash on the 710 different?
• What if I was walking, cycling or on a scooter?
• Who documents the crash, and which court hears it?
• Three deadlines and the cost of hiring us

Why do state rankings put Long Beach first?

Poorly. The state Office of Traffic Safety groups California’s 15 most populous cities together, adjusts for residents and daily vehicle miles, and ranks each city category by category. In 2023 Long Beach ranked 1st of 15 overall, which means no comparable city had more people killed or injured relative to its size (OTS 2023):

Those figures come from a city of roughly 450,469 people, by the Census Bureau’s count for mid-2025 (Census). None of these rankings decides who caused your crash. They do explain why insurers handling Long Beach claims see so many nighttime, alcohol and hit-and-run cases, and why those issues so often decide a claim here.

Which corridors did the city choose for speed cameras?

Long Beach adopted its Safe Streets Vision Zero plan in 2020 and mapped a High-Injury Network using collision data from 2017 to 2021. To place its first speed cameras, the city chose nine priority corridors from that network (City memo, Oct. 2025). The corridors named in city documents and news coverage include:

• Pacific Avenue, ranked the fourth most dangerous street for people walking and biking. A November 2024 speed study found that only 14% of drivers kept to the 25 mph limit, and the death north of PCH on September 14, 2026 was the city’s 27th traffic fatality of the year (Hoodline).
• 7th Street near CSULB, where five people died along a single mile in 2025 (NBC Los Angeles).
• Pacific Coast Highway, the site of a fatal crash at West PCH and Cedar in December 2025; the Willow and 21st Street crossings are camera locations.
• Artesia Boulevard, rebuilt for $44.2 million with protected bike lanes and new crosswalks, a project completed in May 2025.
• Long Beach Boulevard, Atlantic Avenue, Ocean Boulevard, Willow Street, Anaheim Street and Second Street in Belmont Shore complete the list.

If your collision happened on one of these streets, the city’s own plan already identifies it as a problem. That record is useful when a defense lawyer argues the crash was a freak occurrence.

Can a speed camera help prove what happened?

It may, and this is a recent development. Long Beach is one of six California cities in the AB 645 speed camera pilot program. The program allows up to 18 cameras, nine on High-Injury Network corridors and nine placed for geographic balance, and tickets go only to drivers traveling 11 mph or more over the limit. The cameras were scheduled to switch on in summer 2026, with full enforcement that fall.

Whether a particular camera recorded anything useful about your crash is a question to put to the city in writing, and promptly. Speed evidence matters because the physics often decides these cases. The city’s memo notes that a person struck at 20 mph has about a 13% chance of death or severe injury; at 40 mph, the figure rises to 73%.

Tip: Request any camera data in the same week you request the police report. Ask nearby businesses for their video as well; a shop’s camera on Anaheim Street or Pacific Avenue often has a better view than any city camera.

If the hit-and-run driver is never found, who pays?

Hit-and-run crashes are common in Long Beach. The city recorded 496 hit-and-run crashes with injuries or deaths in 2023, the second-highest figure among the large cities. In the September 2026 Pacific Avenue case, a man was struck by three vehicles, and two of the drivers left the scene.

If police never find the driver who left, the claim usually shifts to your own uninsured motorist (UM) coverage, which California extends to many hit-and-run crashes. Your insurer will expect a prompt police report and proof that another vehicle was involved. A pedestrian or cyclist who owns a car is usually protected by that same UM coverage, even though they were not driving at the time.

These steps help the most:

• Call LBPD from the scene, even if the car that hit you is long gone, and write down the incident number
• Photograph debris, paint transfer and any partial plate number you or a witness saw
• Write down nearby businesses with cameras before their recordings are overwritten
• Notify your insurer in writing that you intend to make an uninsured motorist claim

Is a port truck crash on the 710 different?

Yes. Together, the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles form one of the busiest port complexes in the world, covering about 7,500 acres, and much of their freight moves north on I-710 (FHWA). On March 18, 2026, two big rigs collided and caught fire on the 710, closing several lanes (Hoodline).

A Long Beach truck accident lawyer approaches these crashes differently from a collision between two cars:

Carriers that haul port containers usually carry much higher liability limits than a family car, and their response teams arrive at the scene quickly. How federal driving-hour limits and stacked trucking policies apply to a 710 crash is covered on our truck accident page.

What if I was walking, cycling or on a scooter?

Thirty-two of the people killed in 2025 were not in a vehicle at all; they were on foot, on a bicycle or on a rented e-scooter. Between July 2024 and July 2025, the city had 215 crashes involving pedestrians.

Children are especially at risk. Long Beach ranked worst of the 15 large cities for pedestrians under 15 and second-worst for young cyclists, with 18 victims. Pedestrians 65 and older fared little better, with the city third on that list. These patterns appear near schools, along the A Line stations on Long Beach Boulevard and around the Cal State campus on 7th Street.

Fault is where these claims are most often disputed. A driver’s insurer may argue that the pedestrian stepped out mid-block or that the scooter rider was in the wrong lane. A jury that finds a walker 20% careless on Pacific Avenue still awards the other 80% of the loss (CACI 405). A Long Beach pedestrian accident attorney will gather walk-signal timing, lighting conditions and speed evidence to answer those arguments. Issues specific to scooters, such as the rental company’s app terms, are covered on our e-scooter page, and crosswalk evidence on our pedestrian page.

Who documents the crash, and which court hears it?

City streets: from Ocean Boulevard north to Artesia, LBPD documents the collision. The 405 and the 710: the report usually comes from the CHP’s South Los Angeles Area office, whose territory includes Long Beach (CHP-south-los-angeles)). Keep the exchange card from the scene; it shows which of the two departments has your report.

Paramedics often bring the most serious cases to MemorialCare Long Beach Medical Center, which the county designates as a trauma center. Memorial’s emergency service area also sends some patients to Dignity Health St. Mary Medical Center near downtown (LA County EMS).

Los Angeles Superior Court hears an injury case in the district where the crash took place, so a Long Beach case is generally filed in the South District at the Governor George Deukmejian Courthouse, 275 Magnolia Ave. (LASC local rules). We verify that venue against the court’s current rules before a complaint goes in.

Sources

1. Traffic deaths hit a decade high as Vision Zero lags — Long Beach Post
2. OTS 2023 city page — California OTS
3. V2025 estimates — U.S. Census Bureau
4. AB 645 speed safety pilot update, Oct. 3, 2025 — City of Long Beach
5. Man killed by three vehicles on Pacific Avenue — Hoodline
6. Deadly crashes of 2025 in Long Beach — NBC Los Angeles
7. San Pedro Bay ports freight case study — Federal Highway Administration
8. Big-rig fire on the 710 in Long Beach — Hoodline
9. Area 530, South Los Angeles-south-los-angeles) — CHP
10. Ref. 506.2a — LA County EMS Agency
11. LASC Ch. 2 — LA Superior Court
12. Gov. Code §911.2 — California Legislature
13. CCP §335.1 — California Legislature
14. CACI 405 — Justia

The figures and rules on this page are a summary for Long Beach readers, not legal advice; please seek advice on your own facts.

Three deadlines and the cost of hiring us

Three deadlines matter most:

1. Six months when a public agency is responsible, whether for a pothole the city ignored, a city truck or a Metro A Line train. A written claim must be presented first (Gov. Code §911.2).
2. Two years if the defendant is a 710 trucking company, a rideshare driver or another private party (CCP §335.1).
3. Three years when the crash damaged property but no one was hurt.

A child’s deadline is calculated differently, and a family that has lost someone faces separate wrongful death rules. Ask about both early.

Our clients here include longtime residents, people who work at the port and students at Cal State Long Beach, and The Law Offices of Jacob Emrani represents each of them the same way. In the first week, we obtain the Long Beach police or CHP South Los Angeles report and the records from MemorialCare or St. Mary, and we plan the case around the South District filing rule. Our Long Beach cases include container-chassis crashes near the port, Uber passengers hurt on Ocean Boulevard, motorcyclists and cyclists on the High-Injury Network, e-scooter riders in Belmont Shore, pedestrians struck on Pacific Avenue, a slip-and-fall on a downtown restaurant floor, dog bites in Bixby Knolls and wrongful death claims.

The cost is simpler than most people expect. Opening a case with Call Jacob costs nothing; our fee is a percentage of a settlement or verdict, and if there is no recovery, there is no fee. We can meet you in Bixby Knolls, North Long Beach or wherever you are recovering, and Spanish-speaking families can start at calljacob.com/es. Anyone weighing which Long Beach car accident lawyer to hire is welcome to a free consultation at (888) 952-2952, or through the short online case evaluator.