Our client was riding his motorcycle home from work on a city thoroughfare in Ontario, California, when a driver making an unmarked left turn pulled directly into his path, inside a construction work zone that never should have let that turn happen. What followed became a $15,920,000 settlement and one of the clearest examples of what a state highway dangerous condition case looks like when a permitting process fails at every level.
$15.92M
Combined settlement reached at mediation
4
Defendants who shared responsibility for the hazard
6 months
California deadline to file a government claim
A utility agency needed to replace a sunken 30-inch manhole cover in the southbound lanes of Grove Avenue, just north of its intersection with G Street in the City of Ontario. The agency hired a construction contractor to do the repair and to obtain the necessary city permits. The job required closing the number one travel lane and the adjacent left-turn lane for southbound traffic, leaving only the far-right lane open. Before any work can close lanes on a city street, state and local rules require the contractor to submit a traffic handling plan showing exactly how the work zone will be laid out and how drivers will be guided through it. The contractor's submission did not match what was actually going to happen at the intersection, the plan pulled from a standard handbook did not show a closed left-turn lane at a signalized intersection at all, and the City issued the permit anyway. The permit required a no-left-turn sign to be posted where southbound drivers could see it, and it required a pre-construction inspection before work began. Neither the contractor nor the city ever arranged that inspection, and when the work began there was no turn-restriction sign at the intersection at all.
Our client was traveling northbound on Grove Avenue at a lawful speed when a driver, stopped at the intersection and unable to see any sign restricting left turns, pulled left from the far-right lane directly into his path. His motorcycle struck the front of her vehicle. He was ejected, struck the windshield, and continued past the vehicle, rolling across the intersection and onto the sidewalk. He was wearing a helmet. He was airlifted to a regional trauma center and placed in an induced coma for several days. His injuries included a pelvic ring fracture, a sacral fracture, fractures in his left hand, a ruptured bladder, acute kidney injury, nerve damage causing right foot drop, and a scrotal tear. He remained hospitalized for approximately two months. In the years since, he has undergone at least four additional surgeries to address non-healing fractures, including spinal-pelvic fusion procedures, and continues to experience chronic, debilitating pain. He has permanent nerve damage that has caused erectile dysfunction and urinary incontinence, and he has been unable to return to the physically demanding job he worked for years before the crash.
We built the case on two tracks that reinforced each other, a contractor's duty to the traveling public and a public entity's responsibility for a dangerous condition of public property, then proved both with the City's own records.
California law holds a contractor performing roadwork to a duty of reasonable care to protect the traveling public from hazards created by its work, a duty that exists independent of whether a third-party driver's conduct is the immediate cause of a crash.
The traffic plan attached to the permit application did not show the actual lane closures. There was no reviewing stamp, no reviewer initials, and no completed review section anywhere on the permit, and no pre-construction inspection was ever requested or conducted, even though the permit made one mandatory.
The City's principal traffic engineer admitted the submitted plan would not be applicable to the job and that his office would ordinarily have rejected it or told the contractor how to fix it. The driver who turned left testified she never saw any sign restricting left turns and would not have turned if one had been there.
Together the documentary gaps and the admissions established that the danger was created by the permitting chain and was foreseeable.
Construction work zones are everywhere on California roadways, and the safety of everyone driving near them depends on contractors and cities actually following the rules that exist to protect the public. California Government Code section 835 allows an injured person to hold a public entity responsible for a dangerous condition of public property, because the City's failure to properly review the traffic plan and inspect the work site before it began contributed directly to the danger that caused the crash. This case mattered because it held every layer of the permitting chain accountable: the contractor that submitted an inaccurate plan, the utility agency that hired the contractor and shared responsibility for compliance, and the City that stamped a permit it never properly reviewed. Families need to understand one more thing immediately. California's Government Claims Act imposes a strict deadline for cases against public entities, generally six months from the date of injury to file an administrative claim before a lawsuit can even proceed, far shorter than the two-year deadline for most private defendants, and missing it can permanently bar a claim.
The case settled at an October 2019 mediation, resolving claims against the construction contractor, the public utility agency that ordered the repair, and the City of Ontario, combined with a smaller contribution from the driver's auto insurer. The resolution came after the City's motion for summary judgment was denied and with trial set to begin the following spring in San Bernardino Superior Court. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Every case depends on its own facts and evidence. The Homampour Law Firm handles dangerous condition cases against public entities on a contingency fee basis, advancing the costs of the case, so clients pay nothing unless there is a recovery.
The breakdowns below cover state agency notice under Government Code section 835, dangerous condition of highway design, selecting and preparing the highway engineering expert, and the six-month government tort claim deadline.
State agency notice under GC 835
Dangerous condition of highway design
Choosing the highway engineering expert
The six-month government claim deadline
We try catastrophic dangerous condition cases against cities, counties, and state agencies as counsel or co-counsel and pay statutory referral fees.
Refer a caseOur client, an experienced motorcyclist, was riding northbound on Grove Avenue in Ontario, California, when a driver making a left turn from the far-right lane pulled directly into his path. He was ejected from his motorcycle, struck the driver's windshield, and rolled across the intersection onto the sidewalk. The crash happened inside an active construction work zone that had closed the number one lane and the left-turn lane without posting the turn-restriction signs required by the City's own permit.
Yes, in many circumstances. California Government Code section 835 allows an injured person to hold a public entity responsible when a dangerous condition on public property, including a botched traffic control setup around roadwork, contributes to an injury. In this case, the City issued a permit despite an incomplete traffic plan and never conducted the required pre-construction inspection.
Claims against California public entities are subject to strict, short deadlines under the Government Claims Act, generally six months from the injury to file an administrative claim before any lawsuit can proceed, far shorter than the two-year deadline for private defendants.
