Injury Law Attorney for Los Angeles County and Orange County

An injury claim is a dispute over money with a company that handles thousands of them a year, while you are handling your first. Fred Yadegar represents injured people throughout Los Angeles County and Orange County in injury law matters: collisions, falls, rideshare and pedestrian crashes, and the serious injuries that follow them. Fred has been a licensed California attorney since 2006 (State Bar #244184), and what follows reflects how these claims move through insurers and courts in Los Angeles County and Orange County.

What decides an injury claim

Very few injury cases are decided in a courtroom. They are decided by what was preserved in the first weeks, whether each deadline was met, and how much insurance can be located. An adjuster is trained to settle early, before the medical picture is complete, and to record anything you say that can later be read as doubt about your injuries or about fault. Our office treats each of those pressure points as something to manage from the first call: medical records organized, evidence requested in writing, and every policy that might respond identified before any figure is discussed.

Fault is measured in percentages

California follows pure comparative negligence (Li v. Yellow Cab, 1975). A court assigns each party a share of responsibility and reduces the injured person’s recovery by that share. Someone found one-quarter responsible for a collision still recovers three-quarters of their damages. The rule matters because the first thing many people hear from an insurer is that they contributed to what happened. Under California law, that is an argument about the size of the claim, not about whether one exists.

The six kinds of cases we handle

Each page below explains the rules for that situation, the deadlines, and what to do this week.

• Car accidents: freeway and surface-street collisions, drivers who carry the state minimum, and your own uninsured motorist coverage.
• Insurance company disputes: the deadlines insurers must meet, offers that ignore half your treatment, and bad faith by your own carrier.
• Slip and falls: premises liability, the question of notice, and getting the video preserved before it is overwritten.
• Uber or Lyft accidents: which of the rideshare company’s coverage periods applies, and how much is available under it.
• Pedestrian accidents: crosswalk rules, shared-fault arguments, and coverage when the driver cannot pay.
• Serious injuries: brain and spinal injuries, surgical fractures, burns, amputations, and wrongful death claims.

Why the shorter deadline catches people

Two years from the date of injury is the limit for most personal injury lawsuits (Code Civ. Proc. §335.1). The exceptions cause the problems. When a public entity is involved, a city bus, a defect in a county road, a police vehicle, a written government claim must be presented within six months (Gov. Code §911.2), and no lawsuit can proceed without it. Deadlines for minors and for injuries discovered later run differently. Exceptions exist in both directions, so call before you assume you have time.

What it costs

Injury matters are taken on a contingency fee. You pay nothing to start, there is no hourly billing, and the fee is a share of the recovery, paid when the case resolves. If you don’t get paid, we don’t get paid. How case costs are handled is explained in writing before you sign anything, so there are no surprises when the case ends.

How to begin

Call or send a message describing what happened, when it happened, and where you were treated. Our office reviews every inquiry and returns the call, in most cases the same business day, to explain what the claim involves and what to do next. There is no charge for that conversation and no pressure to sign. We serve clients throughout both counties, from Long Beach and Pasadena to Anaheim and Irvine, and we deal with the insurer directly so that your attention can stay on getting well.