Car Accidents in San Jose: 2023 Data and How a Claim Works

The federal Fatality Analysis Reporting System records every fatal crash with its location, time, light condition, manner of collision and the people involved. For San Jose in 2023 it records 62 fatal crashes and 63 deaths. For a city of roughly a million people, that is a lower per-resident toll than Sacramento or Bakersfield, but the composition is the same California pattern: pedestrians.

Thirty-two of the 62 fatal crashes involved at least one person who was not in a motor vehicle, 52 percent, essentially the same share as Los Angeles. Forty-seven of the 62 were coded as not a collision between two motor vehicles in transport, which covers pedestrian strikes, single-vehicle crashes into fixed objects and rollovers. Only 5 were angle collisions, 3 head-on and 3 rear-end. San Jose's fatal crashes are, more than almost any other city's, a vehicle hitting a person or leaving the road rather than two vehicles colliding.

Forty-four of the 62 crashes happened after dark: 30 on lighted streets, 12 on unlit roads and 2 of unknown lighting. Twelve unlit-road fatal crashes is a high count for a California city and points to the expressways and the roads at the city's edges. Monday had 12 fatal crashes, Sunday and Friday 11 each, and Saturday 10; the Monday figure is unusual, since most cities' deadliest days are Saturday and Sunday. Twenty-one crashes were at or related to an intersection; 27 were away from any junction.

The data codes each crash to a trafficway as the state reports it. The roads with the most fatal crashes in San Jose in 2023 were:

• US-101, 7 fatal crashes, the Bayshore Freeway through the east and south of the city.
• I-680, 3 fatal crashes.
• Blossom Hill Road, 3 fatal crashes, the south San Jose arterial.
• Monterey Road, 2 fatal crashes, the old highway through south San Jose.
• State Route 87, the Guadalupe Parkway, 2 fatal crashes.
• Tully Road, 2 fatal crashes.
• Quimby Road, 2 fatal crashes.
• Capitol Expressway, 2 fatal crashes.

San Jose is a sprawling, car-oriented city with an unusual road type: the county expressways, Capitol, Almaden, Lawrence, San Tomas, Montague, built as limited-access arterials with 45-to-50-mile-per-hour limits and few crossings. Together with the freeways, they produce the unlit-road and single-vehicle fatalities in the data. The city's arterials, Monterey Road, Tully Road, Blossom Hill Road and others like them, are wide, fast and crossed on foot by residents of the dense neighborhoods of east and south San Jose, and they produce the pedestrian toll.

For a claim, California's pure comparative negligence rule is the central fact. A pedestrian assigned a share of fault for crossing mid-block or at night still recovers the remaining share; there is no bar. The driver's speed and attention and the lighting at the exact location are the questions, and the evidence is event data from the vehicle, camera footage from businesses and the city's traffic cameras, and witnesses. In an unlit-road crash, the city's or county's lighting decisions can themselves be a claim.

The road's ownership matters for that claim. US-101, I-680 and SR-87 are Caltrans; the expressways are Santa Clara County's, a distinctive San Jose feature; the arterials are the city's. A claim against any of them requires a written government claim within six months, and public entities are immune for approved design decisions, so these claims turn on dangerous conditions the entity knew about and did not fix.

Suppose your brother was walking home along Monterey Road at 10 p.m. on a Monday and was crossing at an unmarked intersection when a car traveling in the near lane struck him. He suffered a severe brain injury and a fractured pelvis, spent five weeks in hospital, and has lasting cognitive deficits. Medical bills were $410,000, paid by his health insurer, which holds a lien.

The driver's insurer accepted that its driver struck him but assigned him 60 percent of the fault for crossing at night outside a marked crosswalk. Under California's pure comparative rule, that left 40 percent of a large claim recoverable, and the fault split was the whole negotiation. An attorney obtained the vehicle's event data, showing 44 miles per hour in a 35 zone with braking only at impact, and the city's streetlight maintenance records, which showed the light at that intersection had been reported out six weeks earlier and not repaired. The driver's fault share rose to 65 percent, and a separate government claim against the city for the unrepaired light was filed within six months.

The driver carried a $100,000 policy, paid at the limit. Your brother's own auto policy's underinsured motorist coverage applied to him as a pedestrian. The claim against the city for the lighting resolved separately. All figures are hypothetical; the night-time arterial crossing with a disputed fault split and a lighting question is the usual shape of a San Jose pedestrian claim.

The steps are the same as anywhere, with a few specific to San Jose and California.

• Call 911 and get the San Jose Police report number; crashes on US-101, I-280, I-680 and SR-87 are handled by the California Highway Patrol, and the report comes from whichever agency responded.
• Photograph the scene, the lighting or its absence, the distance to the nearest crosswalk, and every camera on nearby businesses; in a pedestrian crash these decide the fault split.
• Have event data from the vehicle preserved; speed and braking in the seconds before impact are the evidence that moves a pedestrian claim in California.
• In an unlit-road crash, have the city's or county's streetlight maintenance and complaint records requested; an unrepaired light is a claim in itself.
• Get medical care the same day; a gap in treatment is used against the claim.
• Find your own policy's uninsured and underinsured motorist limits; they apply to you as a pedestrian or cyclist.
• If a city, county expressway, Caltrans or VTA road, crossing, light or signal contributed, calendar the six-month government claim deadline.

California is a fault state, not no-fault. The at-fault driver's liability insurer is the primary source of recovery, and medical payments coverage on your own policy, if purchased, pays early bills. California's minimum liability coverage is $30,000 per person, $60,000 per accident and $15,000 for property damage, raised at the start of 2025. Uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage must be offered and is on most policies unless rejected in writing, and it applies to you as a pedestrian or cyclist.

Fault follows pure comparative negligence: recovery is reduced by your percentage of fault with no cutoff, which is why a San Jose pedestrian claim survives a mid-block or night crossing. The injury deadline is two years from the crash under Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 335.1. Claims against a public entity, including the City of San Jose, Santa Clara County for the expressways, Caltrans and VTA, require a written government claim within six months under Gov. Code § 911.2 and a lawsuit within six months of the claim's rejection.

Crashes in Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, Milpitas, Campbell, Los Gatos and the rest of the county follow the same California rules, and a lawsuit is filed in Santa Clara County Superior Court. Workers' compensation for a crash on the job runs through the California Division of Workers' Compensation with a one-year claim deadline.

A San Jose crash claim is, in half of fatal cases, a pedestrian or cyclist claim on an arterial or expressway at night, where California's pure comparative rule sets the percentage rather than deciding whether there is a claim, and where the lighting and the road's owner may be part of it. The questions to answer early are what the speed and lighting evidence shows, what coverage exists beyond the driver's policy, and whether a six-month government claim applies. Most personal injury attorneys work on contingency.

Ask Legal Matters is a free claim-review request service, not a law firm. Requests may be shared with independent attorneys and legal services partners who handle inquiries in California, and an attorney must evaluate the facts before anyone can say what the claim is worth. If you or a family member were hurt in a crash in San Jose, you can request a free claim review.

• Car Accident Claims in the United States: The Complete Guide
• Pedestrian Accident Claims: Rights, Fault and Compensation
• Wrongful Death Claims: Who Can File, Deadlines and Damages
• Airbag Did Not Deploy in a Crash: Can You Sue, and Whom?
• At Fault in a Car Accident? Comparative Negligence Explained
• What Is the Average Car Accident Settlement? What Sets the Value
• Back and Neck Injury Settlement After a Car Accident: Factors
• Bicycle Accident Claim: Hit by a Car While Riding
• Broken Bone Car Accident Settlement: What Drives the Value

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