Redlands Personal Injury Attorney

Late at night, Redlands has the worst injury record among cities of its size. Its seventy-four fatal or injury collisions between 9 at night and 3 in the morning during 2023 placed it first among 103 Group C cities, and the same OTS table ranks this college-and-citrus town second for total victims (601), second for alcohol-involved victims (82) and second for speed-related collisions (100) (OTS). As a result, a Redlands personal injury attorney sees two kinds of case again and again: the late-night pedestrian strike near downtown or the campus, and the rush-hour collision on the 10.

Below, a hypothetical case of each type is traced in parallel, from the crash to its resolution.

Hypothetical example, two paths. Path A: Maya, a 20-year-old junior at the University of Redlands, is walking back to campus from a State Street restaurant at 1 a.m. when a speeding sedan driven by a man who had been drinking strikes her in a marked crosswalk. Path B: Dan, 38, is creeping west on I-10 toward San Bernardino at 7:45 a.m. when a box truck slams into his hatchback. Maya and Dan are fictional, and their outcomes predict nothing about yours.

Quick answers for campus families and commuters

Our daughter attends the University of Redlands but our family lives in Oregon. Which state’s law applies?

California’s. The crash happened here, so California’s filing deadlines and comparative fault rules govern, even though her auto and health coverage were issued elsewhere.

Is it known why Redlands leads the list for crashes after dark?

OTS publishes the rankings, not the causes. The 2023 figures do show the nighttime, alcohol and speed categories clustered near the top of the 103-city list, which is consistent with the two cases that follow.

Are many motorcyclists and cyclists hurt on Redlands Boulevard and the 10?

The 2023 rankings put Redlands 24th for injured motorcyclists (twenty-two) and 31st for injured cyclists (twenty-four). Redlands Boulevard, the old Route 99 alignment, carries much of that two-wheeled traffic, and our motorcycle accident page discusses disputes in rider cases.

A city officer for Maya, the CHP for Dan

Maya was hit on a city street, so city officers investigate, test the sedan driver and book him (Wikipedia). His blood-alcohol result will reappear in her civil case, obtained from the prosecutor’s file. Local DUI enforcement did not keep pace with the harm: 150 DUI arrests in 2023 ranked only 66th, while injuries caused by drinking drivers ranked second. Drivers aged 21 to 34 who had been drinking injured 44 people that year, fourth-worst in the group.

Dan never sees a city officer. The 10 has run through the center of Redlands since 1962, and freeway collisions there are handled by the CHP’s San Bernardino Area, which also patrols SR-210 across the north side of the city, I-15 and I-215 (CHP). Redlands has 74,128 residents (Census), and its large employers keep that corridor crowded at rush hour: Esri, the mapping-software company, employs 2,416 people here, and an Amazon fulfillment center employs 526 more (Wikipedia).

Where each of them is treated

Paramedics take Maya, who has a fractured pelvis and a concussion, to Loma Linda University Medical Center, a Level I trauma center for both adults and children; its Heart & Surgical Hospital sits on the Loma Linda–Redlands line (Wikipedia). Arrowhead Regional in Colton is the valley’s other Level I destination (Wikipedia).

Dan’s whiplash takes him to Redlands Community Hospital, which has 1,847 employees and is inside city limits. A neck strain does not show up on an X-ray as a fracture would, which is exactly why he tells the triage nurse about the numbness in his fingers. A symptom that is missing from the first chart often becomes the adjuster’s main argument four months later.

Insurance calls and evidence in the first week

Maya’s parents, reached at home in another state, receive a call from the sedan owner’s insurer asking to record their daughter’s account “while it’s fresh.” Dan’s voicemail holds a similar message from the trucking company’s claims office. Both calls can wait: no one is obliged to go on tape with an insurer before speaking to a lawyer.

Maya’s lawyer also considers who served the sedan driver, knowing that California sharply limits claims against businesses that serve alcohol to adults. Dan’s lawyer asks the trucking company to preserve its logs, a step described on our truck accident page.

Checking for public-agency claims before month six

Well before the sixth month, each case is reviewed under the Government Claims Act, which requires a written claim to a public entity within six months (Gov. Code §911.2):

• Maya: dim streetlights or a walk signal too short for a pedestrian at that State Street crossing would make the City of Redlands a second defendant.
• Anyone hurt near the Arrow line: since 2022, passenger trains have run from the University of Redlands station through downtown to San Bernardino over street-level crossings, with the restored 1909 Santa Fe Depot serving as a hub (Wikipedia). A crash at one of those crossings can involve a public transit agency.
• Dan: cones and a lane closure from a Caltrans project on the 10 that morning would shift part of the responsibility to the State.

Pedestrians in Redlands face real risk. Thirty were killed or injured in 2023 (21st of 103), four of them children under 15 (19th), and older pedestrians ranked 12th (OTS). Thirty-five drivers fled after injuring someone, which again placed the city 21st.

The losses in each claim

Losses like these explain why the two cases take different courses. Redlands’ composite OTS score of 338, a measure that combines several victim categories, ranked 3rd of 103, and local streets carry about 738,670 vehicle miles of driving each day, so local adjusters see both kinds of loss throughout the year (OTS). In Maya’s case, the largest items are still unknown when the claim opens, which is the main reason her lawyer waits for her doctors’ assessments before naming a figure.

How the two cases are resolved

Dan’s rear-end collision leaves little room for argument, and his three months of physical therapy produce a demand the insurer can evaluate. His case settles through negotiation.

Maya’s losses exceed the sedan owner’s policy limits: surgery, a lost semester, a campus job she could not work and a head injury whose effects are still being assessed. Her family’s own underinsured motorist (UM/UIM) coverage may extend to her as a member of the household, and her lawyer reviews the policy language to confirm it. If the sedan driver’s insurer will not pay its limit, a lawsuit is filed at San Bernardino’s Civil Division building (San Bernardino Superior Court) before the two-year deadline in CCP §335.1. If the defense argues that Maya stepped off the curb against a “don’t walk” signal, a jury would reduce her award by whatever percentage of fault it assigns her and leave the rest intact (CACI 405).

Reaching a Redlands personal injury attorney from campus or home

We represent University of Redlands students, I-10 commuters and longtime residents injured in Redlands, whether the crash happened downtown, at an Arrow crossing or on the freeway. Call Jacob files the government claim with the City of Redlands or the transit agency when a crosswalk or rail crossing is involved, and we also handle wrongful death and rideshare cases arising in the city.

Call Jacob, the trade name of the Law Offices of Jacob Emrani, can step into a case like Maya’s or Dan’s at any stage, from the first report request to the filing in San Bernardino. We write to State Street merchants and trucking companies before their recordings are overwritten, collect the Loma Linda and Redlands Community records, and deal with the adjusters so that you do not have to. There is no charge to consult us and no fee unless we win, and a representative can visit you in a dorm, an apartment near the Arrow station or a home in Crafton. Maya’s parents, calling from out of state, or Dan, calling from home, could reach a Redlands car accident lawyer the same day at (888) 952-2952.

If you would rather begin online, complete our case evaluator; families who prefer Spanish, including those calling from out of state, can start at calljacob.com/es.

Sources

1. Redlands rankings — OTS
2. Vintage 2025 file — Census
3. City overview — Wikipedia
4. Area 860 — CHP
5. LLUMC — Wikipedia
6. Trauma centers (US) — Wikipedia
7. Gov. Code 911.2 — Legislature
8. Civil Division — SB court
9. CCP 335.1 — Legislature
10. CACI 405 — Justia

Maya and Dan are composite characters, though the hospitals, agencies and court are real. Read their stories as general background, not as legal advice about your own crash.