Hit by something thrown at your car in New York: two defendants, two very different deadlines

Attorney Answer

Being struck in the face by an object thrown from outside your car does not automatically excuse the collision, but it puts a second and entirely separate defendant into the picture — the person who threw it — and the claim against that person runs on a one-year clock rather than the three-year clock that governs the collision.

Start with the collision. Liability between two drivers is decided by ordinary negligence: whether the driver acted reasonably in the circumstances. New York courts have long recognized a doctrine that measures a driver's reaction to a sudden and unexpected emergency, not of the driver's own making, by what was reasonable under those conditions rather than by hindsight. That doctrine is judge-made, and whether it fits what happened to you is exactly the kind of question that gets decided on the specific facts — how far you had moved, what you could see, and whether the egg strike genuinely deprived you of control. It is a real argument, not a guarantee.

What that argument affects is your share, and in New York a share is not a bar. CPLR 1411(a) provides: "Except as provided in subsection (b) of this section, in any action to recover damages for personal injury, injury to property, or wrongful death, the culpable conduct attributable to the claimant or to the decedent, including contributory negligence or assumption of risk, shall not bar recovery. The amount of damages otherwise recoverable shall be diminished in the proportion which the culpable conduct attributable to the claimant or decedent bears to the culpable conduct which caused the damages." Fault can be apportioned among more than two people, and the person who threw the egg is one of them.

The deadlines diverge sharply, and this is the part most easily lost. A claim over damage to the other car — or to yours — falls under CPLR 214(4), which places an action to recover damages for an injury to property in the three-year list, measured from the date of the incident. But throwing an object at a person is an intentional tort, and CPLR 215 requires that an action to recover damages for assault or battery be commenced within one year. A person who spends two years arguing with insurers about the collision and only then looks for the egg-thrower may find the shorter period already gone. If a criminal case were ever brought against that person over the same event, CPLR 215(8) gives a civil claimant at least one year from the termination of that criminal action, which is a narrow lifeline and not a substitute for acting early.

One practical note: if a traffic ticket was issued to you over the collision, that proceeding is separate from any insurance or civil dispute, and how it is resolved can matter later in the civil case. Ask an attorney about it before disposing of it, rather than after.

What you can do

1. Report the incident to your own insurer promptly and describe it accurately, including the object that struck you — the sequence is part of the claim, not a detail.

2. Preserve anything that identifies who threw it: dashcam or phone video, nearby business or doorbell camera footage, and the names of anyone who saw it. That evidence disappears within weeks.

3. Photograph the interior and exterior of your car, including the residue, before it is cleaned or repaired.

4. Ask the police whether a report exists and get the report number; a thrown-object incident may be documented separately from the collision.

5. Write down the date, time and exact location while you still remember them — the one-year period for an assault or battery claim is measured from that day.

6. Have a New York attorney look at both claims together, because the shorter deadline belongs to the defendant who is hardest to find.

⏱ Time limits apply. A property-damage claim arising from the collision runs under CPLR 214(4)'s three-year period, measured from the date of the incident. A claim against the person who threw the object runs under CPLR 215, which requires an action for assault or battery to be commenced within one year of that same date. If anyone turns out to have been injured, a personal-injury action would run under CPLR 214(5) instead. Which of these applies to you depends on facts this page does not have, and none of them should be calculated from a page. Have a New York attorney check the dates against your own record now.