Personal Injury
After a loved one’s death, ask who can bring a claim and what must be proved. Keep death, event and family records.
Updated 11 sources
See If You Qualify
Free · No obligation · About 2 minutes
Updated 11 sources
This may apply to you if
The process
You answer a few questions
About two minutes. Nothing is sent until you agree on the last step and press submit.
A lawyer looks at it
A lawyer at the firm reads your answers and checks them against the current case criteria.
The firm decides and gets in touch
If the firm takes your case, you get the terms in writing to read before you sign. You can always say no.
Who qualifies
These are cited sources. Their inclusion does not imply that they endorse People’s Justice or reviewed this page.
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics · U.S. Department of Labor · Issuer of the dated fatal occupational injury release
Finding: The agency reported 5,070 fatal work injuries for 2024 using a defined census and verification process; it did not determine individual legal responsibility.
BLS: fatal occupational injury census2024, released2026 (opens in a new tab) · Feb 19, 2026 · Checked Oct 3, 2026
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics · 2026
Read the source: National Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries in 2024 (opens in a new tab) · Checked Oct 3, 2026
Not covered by this case
Ask about first contact and costs you may owe if the claim loses.
Source: ABA Model Rule 1.5: fees · as of Oct 3, 2026
Keep records you already hold about the death, event and family or estate roles. Ask how to obtain missing papers lawfully.
Source: California CCP377.60: persons who may assert death claim · as of Oct 3, 2026
Give a lawyer your dates and locations. Ask which law and claim apply before choosing a filing date.
Source: Southern District of New York: time limits · as of Oct 3, 2026
Ask about the next step, the firm handling the case, fees, expenses and privacy terms before you agree.
Source: ABA Model Rule 1.5: fees · as of Oct 3, 2026
If you lost a loved one, ask who may bring a claim. Keep family and estate records. A lawyer must check the law and what caused the loss.
A wrongful death claim concerns a death said to result from another person’s wrongful conduct. The right person and the legal grounds still need checking. Texas and California statutes describe specific conditions; neither means every death or relative qualifies.
Texas names surviving spouses, children and parents under its death-action rule. California uses its own family, dependency and succession categories. New York places the action with a duly appointed representative. These are local examples, not one national family checklist.
Tell the reviewer about family relationships, any estate appointment and a case already filed. Mark a status you do not know. Ask which person can act and whether other people must be included before signing papers for the matter.
Check the latest paper for the actual matter. Ask who may act and which issue is pending. A first inquiry does not mean a court case was filed.
A general guide cannot show whether an estate has a representative, a complaint was accepted or a particular defendant answered. Bring the most recent document you actually hold. Ask who can explain the requirement and when a response is needed.
California separates the deceased person’s surviving claim from the family death action. A change in representation may concern one route rather than every family right. Ask the lawyer to identify the claim and the people affected by a proposed step.
Tell the reviewer about earlier releases, offers or proceedings. Save the actual terms and dates. Ask how they affect a new review rather than assuming that an ongoing investigation or another person’s claim resolves your matter.
No amount is promised for this loss. Ask which claim and losses the law allows. Check who may receive money and which deductions apply.
Prepare the financial and event records you have, such as funeral costs, work history and care bills. Keep an estimate separate from an amount paid. Ask which loss belongs to which claimant and what proof is needed. These preparation questions do not set a damages value.
Texas’s chapter describes damages and their allocation among people entitled to recover. A separate provision preserves the deceased person’s personal injury action. The two routes should not be collapsed into one payment promise for every family member.
Ask about fee terms, expenses and any other interests before accepting an offer. This page does not value your loss or make a blanket statement that Texas, Florida or another state has no damages limits. An award from a different case does not value your own matter.
Ask for the actual scope, fee and expense terms. Check who signs the agreement. Ask what may be owed if the claim brings no money.
The ABA model fee rule addresses terms for an outcome-based fee, including percentages and expenses. It does not verify a particular firm’s price. Request the proposed agreement and ask which legal work it includes.
Ask whether the work includes checking family status, estate papers, records, expert issues and court steps. If more than one claim needs review, ask what each part costs. Do not assume a website’s free-review statement covers all later services.
If a representative or lawyer already handles the estate or another claim, bring that agreement. Ask how the proposed work would relate to it and who has authority to approve it. Keep the actual signed terms rather than a remembered verbal description.
Ask about the actual claim, law and dates. Keep event, death and filing records. Do not use one time limit for every family or estate claim.
New York’s statute states a general two-year period for the death action and includes specific additional rules. It also addresses a related criminal action. That local text should not be turned into a national cutoff or used to calculate every reader’s filing date.
A separate survival claim carries its own legal questions. Keep the injury, death, appointment and prior filing dates distinct. Ask which dates matter and whether another notice or exception must be checked before choosing a step.
California’s current survival-damages text refers to a defined filing-date window before January 1, 2026 for one exception. That is not a declaration that every claim after a death must be filed by that date. Ask about the actual section and claim.
Keep the papers you already hold. Write down event and family details you know. Ask who may request records and which legal step needs attention.
Gather the death record, incident papers, earlier letters and any estate appointment documents. Mark what is missing rather than guessing. Ask what must be obtained and whether the person making the request needs formal authority.
The federal health-information rule recognizes a legally authorized representative for relevant deceased-person records, subject to its scope and exceptions. Being a relative does not alone certify that authority. Ask the provider what proof it needs and how the access rule applies.
You can ask for an explanation without knowing every legal term. Tell the reviewer what you want checked and request a clear next step. Keep records and agreements in a place where the appropriate representative can find them.
An agency count records deaths within its defined scope. It does not establish wrongful conduct in your case. Use the actual event records and appropriate professional review.
BLS reported 5,070 fatal work injuries in 2024 in its February 2026 release. That is an occupational injury census, not a total of all wrongful deaths or all illness-related deaths. Its national count excludes certain territories and uses defined inclusion rules.
The agency uses several sources to identify and verify events. It describes some cases without multiple-document confirmation and notes that rate calculations use sampled employment data. A census entry does not decide who breached a duty or what damages are due.
For an individual death, distinguish the record of the event, the medical cause and the legal question. Ask what an expert can assess and what remains unknown. This guide does not diagnose the cause of a loved one’s death or infer fault from a national count.
Ask whether the matter concerns the family’s loss or the deceased person’s own claim. Different people and rules may apply. Keep the roles clear in each agreement and filing.
Texas chapter 71 has a death-action part and a separate survival provision. The latter preserves specified personal injury claims despite a death. It is not simply another name for every surviving family member’s loss.
California likewise has separate sections for the family death action and the deceased person’s surviving cause. Section 377.30 addresses a representative or, where applicable, a successor. Ask a lawyer which role and papers apply to the proposed action.
List who is named in any existing claim and who handles the estate. Ask which person may receive an offer or sign a release. Do not assume authority to arrange a funeral is the same as authority to bind every claimant.
Ask about the claim type and current law. A limit may concern one kind of loss rather than every claim. Do not rely on a blanket statement about an entire state.
California’s current section 377.34 generally excludes pain, suffering and disfigurement from the deceased person’s surviving claim. It contains a specified exception for certain preferences or actions filed in a dated window before January 1, 2026. The section also preserves separate elder-law and medical-cap rules.
Those provisions concern a particular kind of action. They should not be described as a universal bar on the family’s losses or on every claim connected to a death. Ask about the filing date, legal route and any separate rule before assessing damages.
For a care-related, work-related or government matter, ask a lawyer which special duties, procedures or limits need checking. The source of the alleged conduct matters. This page does not certify a state cap table or promise punitive damages for every death.
Ask about the civil claim and any separate investigation. A death claim should not be assessed only by whether charges exist. Keep the actual notices and dates.
Texas chapter 71 says its death action is not precluded because the death was caused by a felony or because a criminal proceeding may exist. That is a local statutory statement, not a verdict that any accused person is liable in a civil case.
New York’s statute includes an additional timing rule when a related criminal action has begun against the same defendant. Ask a lawyer about the exact condition and dates. Do not assume an investigation or an informal report is the same as that legal event.
Keep any actual investigation notice or court document you hold. Ask which agency or lawyer can explain its role without interfering with the process. This guide does not declare an individual guilty or promise that one proceeding resolves the other.
Ask who read the papers and which questions remain. Request the next step and actual terms. A first contact is not a promise of representation or money.
Ask for a clear explanation of family roles, estate status, possible claims and missing proof. Tell the reviewer about a disagreement among relatives or a prior agreement. Ask what can be checked now and what needs another record or professional opinion.
Before sharing more papers, check the provider and privacy terms. Ask who is authorized to communicate and who will handle a dated notice. A public statute does not verify this provider’s response time or its promise of a free review.
If the proposed route does not fit, ask whether another claim or procedure remains and whether it needs prompt attention. Keep the explanation with the original papers. A careful review may identify unanswered questions without promising a legal result.
These answers use expressly local examples. They do not determine every relative’s legal rights. Bring actual family, estate and event records to the review.
The guide cites original statutes and bounded agency findings. The evidence box concerns occupational injury reporting only. No cited agency or expert reviewed or endorsed this PJ page.
Death resulting from a motor vehicle collision — including car accidents, truck crashes, motorcycle fatalities, and pedestrian fatalities — is the most common cause of wrongful death litigation in the United States. Fatal MVAs involve traumatic brain injury, traumatic spinal cord injury, blunt chest and abdominal trauma, and polytrauma. In many MVA wrongful death cases, the decedent survived the initial impact but died from injuries over hours or days, creating both a wrongful death claim (for the family's losses) and a survival action (for the decedent's pre-death pain and suffering). Texas alone recorded 4,150 traffic deaths in 2024 (TxDOT), and motor vehicle crashes are a common source of wrongful death claims.
Medical malpractice wrongful death occurs when a healthcare provider's deviation from the accepted standard of medical care causes a patient's death. Common malpractice deaths include surgical complications from preventable errors, delayed or missed diagnosis of heart attack, stroke, or cancer, medication overdose or contraindicated drug administration, anesthesia errors, and failure to monitor post-operative patients. Medical malpractice wrongful death cases are among the most technically complex in all of litigation, requiring detailed expert testimony from physicians in the same specialty as the defendant. These cases are also subject to pre-suit notice requirements and, in some states, damages caps on non-economic recovery. Florida's statutory caps (Fla. Stat. § 766.118) were struck down by the Florida Supreme Court for wrongful death in 2014 and for personal injury in 2017; California's AB 35 makes its caps rise each year (Civil Code § 3333.2).
Workplace fatalities — particularly in construction, manufacturing, oil and gas, and transportation industries — generate some of the nation's largest wrongful death verdicts. OSHA reports approximately 4,500–5,000 fatal work injuries annually in the United States, with construction accounting for roughly 20% of all workplace deaths (the 'Fatal Four': falls, being struck by an object, electrocution, and caught-in/between accidents). Workplace wrongful death cases are complicated by workers' compensation laws, which typically bar direct negligence suits against employers but allow third-party negligence claims against contractors, equipment manufacturers, and property owners. When employer gross negligence is established — as in cases involving deliberate safety violations or OSHA repeat citations — some states allow suits against the employer directly and permit punitive damages.
The statute of limitations for wrongful death lawsuits is set by each state's wrongful death statute and typically ranges from 1 to 3 years from the date of death. Tennessee has the shortest deadline at 1 year. Most states — including California, Texas, Florida, and Illinois — allow 2 years. A smaller number of states allow 3 years. Whether that time has passed depends on your facts, so don't rule yourself out. A lawyer can tell you. Some states apply a discovery rule that starts the clock when the family knew or reasonably should have known that negligence caused the death — relevant in medical malpractice deaths where the cause may not be immediately apparent.
In most wrongful death cases, the statute of limitations begins running on the date of death. However, in medical malpractice wrongful death cases and cases where the cause of death was not immediately apparent — such as delayed-onset occupational disease or nursing home neglect — many states apply a discovery rule. Under the discovery rule, the limitations period begins when the survivors knew or reasonably should have known that negligence caused the death. This is particularly important in nursing home wrongful death cases where the cause of death may initially appear to be natural and the negligence only becomes apparent upon medical record review. Regardless of the discovery rule, families should consult a wrongful death attorney.
Most states allow 2 years from the date of death; Tennessee allows 1 year. Whether that time has passed depends on your facts, so don't rule yourself out. A lawyer can tell you.
Your state
Deadlines vary by state and by case. A lawyer can confirm yours.
Not every relative can bring a death claim. State law identifies who may sue or whether a personal representative must act. A lawyer can check the governing law and estate role.
Source: California CCP 377.60 · as of Oct 7, 2026
No amount is promised here. Ask which losses and claimants the law recognizes and which records support them. Review actual fee terms and any proposed allocation before accepting an offer.
Source: California CCP 377.60: persons who may assert death claim · as of Oct 7, 2026
No. The cited Texas and California provisions distinguish the deceased person’s own surviving claim from the family death action. Ask which route, representative and rules fit the actual matter.
Source: California CCP 377.34 · as of Oct 7, 2026
No. Do not assume one rule covers every legal route and loss. California's survival-damages section has specific exclusions, exceptions, and savings clauses. Ask a lawyer about the actual claim and current law.
Source: California CCP 377.34 · as of Oct 7, 2026
No. The BLS census counts occupational injury deaths within its scope. It does not estimate a family’s award or determine individual fault. Keep national data separate from the evidence for the actual matter.
Source: BLS: Scope of the Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries · as of Oct 7, 2026
No national date is supplied here. New York’s statute has its own general period and added rules. Ask about the actual death action, surviving claim, notices and governing law before choosing a date.
Source: New York EPTL 5-4.1 · as of Oct 7, 2026
No. Criminal proceedings do not by themselves resolve a civil death claim. New York's death statute includes a separate timing rule when a criminal action has been commenced against the same defendant. Ask how the actual proceedings relate; this answer does not decide guilt or civil liability.
Source: New York EPTL 5-4.1 · as of Oct 7, 2026
Ask which firm, claim and work the agreement covers, who may sign, the fee and treatment of expenses. The ABA model rule does not verify the provider’s price or a promise that every service is free.
Source: ABA Model Rule 1.5: Fees · as of Oct 7, 2026
Checked against 11 primary sources by People's Justice editors · Updated
How we make moneyThe review is free and private. Asking for it doesn’t commit you to anything.
Register your interest