Vehicle Owner Liability When Someone Else Was Driving

Attorney Answer

He may. Not being behind the wheel does not end your exposure, because Texas recognizes a claim against the owner who let someone else drive. It is called negligent entrustment, and whether it works against you depends far less on the crash itself than on what you knew about your son's driving before you handed him the keys.

The Texas Supreme Court set out what that claim requires in Schneider v. Esperanza Transmission Co., 744 S.W.2d 595 (Tex. 1987). As the court described it, the injured person must show that the owner entrusted the vehicle to a driver who was unlicensed, incompetent, or reckless; that the owner knew or should have known that; and that the driver's own negligence proximately caused the collision.

Read that list against your facts and you will see where this case actually lives. If your son is a licensed adult with an unremarkable driving history, an entrustment claim against you is generally a weak one, and the meaningful defendant is the driver. If he has a suspended license, a history of crashes or citations, a substance problem, or anything else you knew about, the claim becomes much more serious — and it is a claim against you personally, not only against the policy.

A few other points worth knowing. The injured person's refusal of help at the scene does not defeat a later injury claim; it is a piece of evidence about how hurt he was, not a legal bar. If shared fault is in play, Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 33.001 bars a claimant whose percentage of responsibility is greater than 50 percent from recovering anything, and § 33.012(a) reduces a non-barred claimant's damages by that claimant's own percentage. Under § 33.013(a), each liable defendant is generally responsible only for its own percentage, with the narrow exceptions in § 33.013(b). And Tex. Transp. Code § 601.072(a-1) sets Texas's minimum limits at $30,000 per injured person, $60,000 per crash and $25,000 for property damage — your own policy may carry more, but a demand above your limits is the reason personal exposure is a real question here rather than a theoretical one.

What you can do

1. Send the lawsuit papers to your auto insurer today, and keep proof of when you sent them. Policies require prompt notice, and the insurer ordinarily provides the defense.

2. Do not try to answer the lawsuit yourself. A suit carries a deadline to respond and missing it can produce a judgment against you by default. Confirm with your insurer, in writing, who is filing the response and by when.

3. Preserve everything that already exists: the policy and declarations page, all claim correspondence, the crash report, photographs, and any text messages about the crash or about your son's use of the car.

4. Ask a Texas attorney whether your policy limits cover the demand, and what your exposure looks like above them. If the insurer's assigned lawyer is defending you, you may still want your own attorney looking at the excess question.

5. Do not discuss the crash or your son's driving history with the other side, its lawyer or its insurer.

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

⏱ Time limits apply. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.003(a) requires suit for personal injury and for damage to property to be brought not later than two years after the day the cause of action accrues. The deadline that presses on you right now, though, is the response date in the papers you were served, which is set in that case and is not something to work out from a page like this. Get them in front of a Texas attorney immediately.