Car and Pickup Truck Crashes in Texas

How fault works after a Texas crash

Texas is an at-fault state. In general, the driver whose negligence caused a crash, and that driver's liability insurance, is the starting point for paying for the damage and injuries that result. That usually means a claim turns on evidence of what happened and who was responsible, not simply on who was hurt.

Your own policy may also matter. Personal injury protection (PIP) is coverage under your own policy that can help with certain medical and related costs regardless of who was at fault, and uninsured and underinsured motorist (UM/UIM) coverage can apply when the at-fault driver has no insurance or too little. Texas insurers generally must offer both, and a policy may include them unless they were declined in writing, so whether and how they apply depends on your policy and the facts.

Cars and pickup trucks differ in size, weight and height, which can affect where the vehicles make contact, how the damage looks and how a crash is reconstructed. For example, a taller pickup and a lower car may meet at different points on their bodies, so photos that show the damage on both vehicles can matter. If the other driver was working at the time, for example driving a company pickup, an employer may also be responsible in some situations, depending on the facts.

Evidence to gather: photos, medical records and repair estimates

What you collect soon after a crash can be hard to recreate later, and what matters most often depends on how the crash happened. In an intersection or left-turn crash, photos of the traffic signals, lane markings and final vehicle positions can matter, and so can nearby camera footage, which may be overwritten after a short time. In a rear-end crash, photos of the damage to both vehicles and any skid marks may matter more.

Getting medical care promptly matters for your health first. It also creates a record that connects injuries to the crash, which insurers and others may look at when a claim is evaluated. Many people find it helpful to keep everything in one place, in order by date.

• Photos and video of the vehicles, scene and visible injuries
• Name, phone number and insurance details for the other driver, and for any witnesses
• Medical records, bills and notes about symptoms, including ones that appear days later
• Repair estimates, towing and rental receipts
• Records of any work you missed
• Your CR-3 crash report and your claim number

Shared responsibility and deadlines in Texas

Texas uses proportionate responsibility rules (Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code, chapter 33). Each person involved may be assigned a percentage of responsibility for a crash, which can come up in a left-turn or failure-to-yield crash where each driver blames the other. In general, a person found more than 50 percent responsible cannot recover damages, and a person found 50 percent or less responsible may see the damages reduced by that share. How these rules apply depends on the facts, so it is usually unwise to assume you are or are not at fault before the evidence is reviewed.

Time limits also apply. Many Texas personal injury lawsuits generally must be filed within two years under Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code section 16.003, but exceptions exist. For example, notice requirements can be much shorter in some claims involving government vehicles, and an insurance policy can have its own deadlines to report a crash or claim. Each case is different, and living in Mexico now does not automatically change a deadline.

Because deadlines and coverage depend on the case, you can start with Perales Legal's virtual assistants, who answer first: Diego by phone and Lola on WhatsApp. They are not lawyers, so they cannot give legal advice about your case.