Drunk Driving Accident Lawyer in Encino, CA

When a drunk driver hits you in Encino, two legal cases start at once. The state may prosecute the driver for DUI. Separately, you have the right to bring a civil claim for your medical bills, lost income and pain. The criminal case will not pay your bills, and the prosecutor does not work for you. If you are looking for an Encino drunk driving accident attorney, you want someone who will track the criminal case and still build your claim on its own evidence. Moe Abdallah Law, P.C. handles motor-vehicle injury cases only, and Moe takes your call himself. The first conversation is free at any hour, and you pay nothing unless we win. This page covers how these cases move in Encino: who investigates, how the report reaches you, what the law adds in DUI cases, and who besides the driver might be responsible.

Where impaired-driver crashes get investigated around Encino

Encino's main roads are Ventura Boulevard, Sepulveda Boulevard, Balboa Boulevard, Burbank Boulevard and Victory Boulevard, with the US-101 and the I-405 running alongside. A drunk driver can hit you on any of them. We have no published count of alcohol-involved crashes for Encino, so we will not invent a number. What we can say is that the evidence about drinking starts to disappear within hours, whatever time the crash happened. Receipts, bar tabs, camera footage from restaurants and parking lots, and rideshare or phone records can all vanish quickly. If the driver came from a place along Ventura Boulevard, that place may have video and payment records, and we send a preservation letter right away. Officers who respond may note slurred speech, an odor of alcohol, field sobriety results and breath or blood tests. Those notes matter in your civil case, even if the criminal case ends in a plea. Write down what you saw and heard before the memory fades, and tell us which officers spoke to you.

LAPD West Valley, Valley Traffic and the report that may come by mail

LAPD's West Valley Community Police Station, at 19020 Vanowen St. in Reseda, serves Encino. LAPD's Valley Traffic Division, at 7870 Nollan Place in Panorama City, handles traffic investigations in the Valley. Here is a detail that catches people. LAPD says collision reports can be requested online, and you should allow at least 45 days, but a report that involves an arrest must be requested by mail. So a DUI arrest at the scene moves your report into the mail process: you send LAPD's request form with a $19.00 check or money order payable to LAPD to the Document Processing Unit, P.O. Box 30158. Reports that involve a fatality go the same way. We handle that request for clients so the paperwork does not stall your claim. The report names the driver, the insurer and the officer's observations, and it tells us whether any witnesses gave statements. Check it for errors in the location, the vehicles and your injuries. Also, if the crash caused injury or more than $1,000 in damage to one person, an SR-1 report is due to the DMV within 10 days. If you were hurt in a crash with an impaired driver, send us the report number and we can pull the file.

Two cases at once: the DUI prosecution and your civil claim

A DUI is a crime under Vehicle Code section 23152, and causing bodily injury while driving under the influence is a separate crime under section 23153. Prosecutors handle those charges, and their goals differ from yours. A plea deal might end the criminal case in a way that says little about your losses. Your civil claim runs on its own track and uses its own standard of proof. A felony conviction can be offered in the civil case to prove the facts that conviction required, under Evidence Code section 1300. A misdemeanor no-contest plea cannot be used against the driver as an admission. Without any conviction, you can still prove negligence with the LAPD report from West Valley or Valley Traffic, the test results, witness accounts and the driver's own words. Stay off social media, and do not talk to the driver's insurer about fault or your injuries. If you are asked to speak with a prosecutor or a victim advocate, you can still call us first. We follow the criminal calendar and use it, but we never wait on it to protect your claim. Send us any court notices you receive.

Punitive damages and the longer deadline after a felony conviction

Most injury claims seek compensation for what you lost. A drunk driving case can also support punitive damages, which punish conduct and warn others. California allows them when a plaintiff proves malice, oppression or fraud by clear and convincing evidence under Civil Code section 3294. Malice includes despicable conduct carried on with a willful and conscious disregard of other people's safety. In Taylor v. Superior Court in 1979, the California Supreme Court held that a drunk driver's conscious disregard of safety can support a punitive claim. Punitive damages are not automatic, and each case depends on the facts, such as the driver's blood alcohol level, prior DUI history and behavior at the scene as the LAPD officers recorded it. Deadlines matter too. The usual limit to sue is two years under Code of Civil Procedure section 335.1. If the driver is convicted of a felony for the crash, section 340.3 can give you until one year after the criminal judgment, when that is later. Do not count on that extension. Call early and we will protect the earlier date. Moe walks you through which of these rules might apply to you, in plain words.

Insurance limits, bars, restaurants and hosts: who else may be liable

California's minimum auto liability limits are $30,000 per person and $60,000 per accident for bodily injury on policies issued or renewed since January 1, 2025. A serious injury can exceed that in days. Your own uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage may add more, and we review your policy first. A driver with no insurance creates a harder case, though Proposition 213 has an exception that lets an uninsured owner recover non-economic damages when the other driver was convicted of DUI. California's dram-shop rule is narrow. Bars, stores and social hosts are generally not liable for injuries caused by an adult they served. There are two main exceptions. A seller who furnishes alcohol to an obviously intoxicated minor can be liable under Business and Professions Code section 25602.1. An adult who knowingly furnishes alcohol at home to someone under 21 can be liable under Civil Code section 1714. If the drunk driver was on the job, the employer may be responsible, but punitive damages against an employer have strict requirements. So if the driver had been drinking at a restaurant or bar on Ventura Boulevard, the business is usually not liable unless one of those exceptions fits. We check every one of these paths before we say a case is limited to one policy. Tell us where the driver had been drinking and we will look into it.

Treatment near Encino, a death in the family, and how Moe runs the case

Get medical care the same day. Encino Hospital Medical Center, at 16237 Ventura Blvd., is a general acute care hospital with a licensed emergency room, according to California's HCAI. Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center and Northridge Hospital Medical Center are nearby, though we could not verify their trauma levels. Serious DUI crashes often cause head injuries, broken bones and spinal injuries, and a rushed or incomplete record weakens the claim. If someone in your family died, the wrongful death claim has its own rules about who may sue, and we cover those with you directly. Moe Abdallah Law, P.C. handles drunk driving crashes on contingency, so you pay no fee unless there is a recovery. Moe takes your call himself, keeps you updated by call and text, and moves quickly on evidence. Our results include a $105,000 recovery for an uninsured client and several policy-limit recoveries. Past results do not promise a similar outcome. Call (323) 716-1992 at any hour. Se Habla Español. We also follow up with your doctors for records.

Talk to a Encino drunk driving accident lawyer

Call (323) 716-1992 for a free, no-obligation case review. You pay nothing unless we win, and we'll handle the insurance companies for you. Learn more about our drunk-driving crashes representation →

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