After a Fatal Crash: A Driver's Criminal and Civil Exposure

Attorney Answer

The single most important thing is that your son gets a criminal-defense lawyer before he talks to anyone — police, either insurance company, or the other family. A death in a crash the driver caused can be investigated as a crime, and the account he gives now is the account he will be held to.

California Penal Code § 192(c) defines vehicular manslaughter. It reaches a driver who causes a death while driving in the commission of an unlawful act not amounting to a felony, and it separates the gross-negligence version from the version without gross negligence. Whether any charge is filed, and which one, is a prosecutor's decision made on evidence gathered in the days after the crash — including statements. That is why the order of operations matters more here than anything else on this page.

The civil side runs alongside the criminal one. The family of the person who died may bring a wrongful-death claim. Code Civ. Proc. § 377.60(a) sets who may bring it: the decedent's surviving spouse, domestic partner, children and issue of deceased children, or, where there is no surviving issue, the people who would take the decedent's property by intestate succession. Code Civ. Proc. § 335.1 provides: "Within two years: An action for assault, battery, or injury to, or for the death of, an individual caused by the wrongful act or neglect of another."

If you own the car your son was driving, you have your own exposure. Vehicle Code § 17150 makes the owner of a vehicle liable for death or injury resulting from a negligent or wrongful act in its operation by anyone driving with the owner's permission. Vehicle Code § 17151(a) caps that particular owner liability at $15,000 per person, $30,000 per accident and $5,000 for property damage — those figures are still the law and were deliberately not raised alongside the insurance minimums. The cap does not apply where a separate theory such as negligent entrustment is proven, which is a question for a lawyer on your facts. Note also that for a crash before January 1, 2025, the minimum liability policy was $15,000 / $30,000 / $5,000 under Vehicle Code § 16056(a); in a fatality those limits are often exhausted immediately, and what sits above them is personal exposure.

What you can do

1. Have your son say nothing about the crash to anyone until he has spoken with a local criminal-defense attorney. That includes police, the other side's insurer, social media, and friends. Retaining that lawyer is the first call, not the last.

2. Notify your own auto insurer that a claim exists, as your policy requires — but ask the criminal-defense attorney before your son gives a recorded statement to anyone, including your own carrier.

3. Preserve everything that already exists: the vehicle itself if you still have it, phone records, dashcam or vehicle-data recordings, repair and maintenance records, and any photos already taken. Do not create a new written account of the crash.

4. Gather your insurance documents — the declarations page showing your limits, and any umbrella policy. A lawyer will need to know the coverage before advising on exposure.

5. Ask a local attorney about whether you, as the owner of the vehicle, are separately exposed and how Vehicle Code §§ 17150 and 17151(a) apply to your facts.

6. Most lawyers offer a brief initial call at no cost, and a few minutes on your specific facts is worth more than any general guidance, including this page.

⏱ Time limits apply. A wrongful-death claim against your son runs under Code Civ. Proc. § 335.1 and its two-year period, and Code Civ. Proc. § 377.60(a) governs who may bring it. Criminal charging deadlines are separate and are not the same clock. Which periods apply, and when they started, depends on the facts of this crash. Have a local attorney review the dates now — and get the criminal-defense lawyer in place today, regardless of any deadline.