Sued by the Car Ahead After Being Pushed Into It

Attorney Answer

Being named in the lawsuit is not the same as owing anything. Texas assigns fault by percentage, and a stopped car that was shoved forward by the one behind it is the textbook case for a zero. But the suit still has to be answered on time, and that is the part you cannot leave to sort itself out.

The duty at the center of a rear-end crash sits on the following driver. Tex. Transp. Code § 545.062(a) provides: "An operator shall, if following another vehicle, maintain an assured clear distance between the two vehicles so that, considering the speed of the vehicles, traffic, and the conditions of the highway, the operator can safely stop without colliding with the preceding vehicle or veering into another vehicle, object, or person on or near the highway." On the facts you describe, the force that carried your car into the one ahead was hers.

Then the statute that decides how a lawsuit like this comes out. Under Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 33.003, the jury assigns a percentage of responsibility, in whole numbers, to each claimant, each defendant and each settling person, based on who caused or contributed to the harm. Under § 33.013(a), "a liable defendant is liable to a claimant only for the percentage of the damages found by the trier of fact equal to that defendant's percentage of responsibility with respect to the personal injury, property damage, death, or other harm for which the damages are allowed." If the jury assigns you zero percent, you owe nothing. If it assigns you some share, you owe that share and not hers. The exception in § 33.013(b), where one defendant is held for the whole judgment, applies to a defendant found more than 50 percent responsible, which on these facts is the driver who hit you, not you.

You may also have a claim of your own. Your car was damaged and you may have been hurt, and the driver who struck you is the person responsible for that. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 33.001 provides: "In an action to which this chapter applies, a claimant may not recover damages if his percentage of responsibility is greater than 50 percent." Texas uses a modified system: a claimant whose share is 51 percent or more recovers nothing, and a claimant with a smaller share recovers a reduced amount. A stopped driver is rarely assigned any share at all, which is why your own claim against her is worth raising.

The practical center of all this is your own auto insurer. A liability policy carries the insurer's duty to defend the claims made against you, and it pays for the lawyer. Sending the suit papers to the insurer immediately is the single step that protects you most.

What you can do

1. Send the lawsuit papers to your own auto insurer today, in writing, and keep proof that you did. Ask it to confirm in writing that it is providing your defense.

2. Note the date you were served. A served defendant in Texas has a short deadline, measured in days, to file a written answer, and missing it can produce a default judgment. That deadline is printed on or calculated from the citation you received; do not estimate it yourself.

3. Gather what already exists: the crash report, photographs of both ends of your car, the other drivers' insurance information, any repair estimate and any medical records. Do not write out a new account of the crash for anyone but your own lawyer.

4. Do not speak to the plaintiff's lawyer, or the other driver's insurer, without your own lawyer.

5. Ask the lawyer defending you about bringing your own claim against the driver who hit you in the same lawsuit, and about how the two-year period in Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.003 applies to it.

6. If your insurer will not provide a defense, or you had no policy, contact a local attorney this week, before the answer deadline. Most lawyers offer a brief initial call at no cost, and a few minutes on your specific papers, and on how your county's courts handle an answer deadline, is worth more than any general guidance, including this page.

⏱ Time limits apply. Two clocks run here. The deadline to answer the lawsuit is the shorter one and is set by the citation you were served with, not by statute. Your own claim against the driver who hit you is governed by Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.003(a), which allows two years from the day the cause of action accrues. Whether either has already run depends on your dates. Take the papers to a Texas attorney now rather than after the insurer responds.