Primary Location
Phoenix Personal Injury Lawyers
2700 N Central Ave Suite 320, Phoenix, AZ 85004, United States
Phone: (602) 905-7766
Call us at (855) 855-8910
Call us at (855) 855-8910
You just got hit. Bike's wrecked, knee's bleeding, and the driver who clipped you is pulling over half a block up. Most people freeze here. Don't.
We give every cyclist who calls our office this same checklist. It works.
First thing, get out of the road and dial 911. You'd be amazed how many riders try to shake it off and pedal home. Adrenaline is a liar. Had a client walk around on a broken ankle for twenty minutes before the real pain kicked in.
Go get checked out at the ER even if you think you're fine. Concussions hide behind adrenaline for hours. Same with internal bleeding. St. Joseph's Hospital and Banner University Medical Center are both Level 1 trauma centers in Phoenix. They know bike crash injuries.
Pull your phone out while you're still at the scene. Snap everything: your bike, the car, road surface, intersection layout, bike lane markings if there are any. Grab the driver's insurance card, plate number, phone number. Any witnesses standing around? Get their info too.
Now the part most people mess up. Don't apologize. Don't say "maybe I should've been more careful." Don't even nod sympathetically when the driver says they're sorry. Every word you say becomes ammo for their insurer later. Talk to the officer, stick to facts, keep it short.
File that police report. You need it on record.
And when the other driver's insurance company calls? Because they will, usually within 48 hours? Hang up and call a bicycle accident lawyer instead. That adjuster is not your friend.
Why do so many cyclists get hit here? Because Phoenix was built for cars. Full stop.
Six-lane arterials. Speed limits of 45 mph. A painted stripe passing as a "bike lane" squeezed against the curb. That's your riding situation on roads like Indian School, Thomas, and Camelback. Drivers treat them like freeways. You get squeezed.
Right-hook collisions happen more than anything else. Driver cranks a right turn, barrels through the bike lane, never once checks their mirror. Roughly 40% of Phoenix bike crashes involve a turning vehicle [1]. But here's what really gets me: 80% of all bicycle crashes in this city happen within 150 feet of an intersection [1]. That's the one spot where drivers should be most alert.
Everybody's distracted. You know this. Driver glances at their phone for five seconds at 45 mph. In that window they've covered a football field, eyes down. You, on your bike, might as well not exist.
Dooring wrecks riders along Central Avenue and in downtown parking zones. Someone swings a car door open without a glance. You get maybe half a second. Not enough time to swerve. Not enough time to brake.
Left-turners underestimate bicycle speed. They pull across your lane thinking they've got time. They miscalculate. You absorb the impact.
And the roads themselves? Potholes nobody's patched. Construction gravel scattered across shoulders. Crumbling pavement that forces you into the travel lane. When it's the road's fault, the city or county might be on the hook.
Most of these crashes boil down to one thing. A driver who wasn't looking or didn't care. Under Arizona law, that's negligence — the same recklessness our pedestrian crash lawyers in Phoenix see every day.
Downtown Phoenix and the Central Avenue corridor are hotspots for a dooring accident, where a driver opens their car door directly into the path of an oncoming cyclist.
"I wasn't wearing a helmet though. Does that kill my case?" We hear this weekly. No. Arizona has no adult helmet law. Tucson, Flagstaff, and a couple other cities require them for kids under 18. Adults? Your choice. And going without one won't destroy your claim.
What if you were partly responsible? Still not a dealbreaker.
Pure comparative negligence. That's the legal term. Say the jury decides you carry 20% of the fault. Maybe your taillight was out. Your total damages come to $100,000. You collect $80,000. Reduced, not wiped out.
Cops look at evidence. Camera footage, skid marks, witness accounts. Your lawyer goes further: subpoenas for the driver's phone records, dashcam pulls from nearby cars, sometimes a full accident reconstruction.
Adjusters always try flipping blame onto you. You should've been in a different lane. You were going too fast. You appeared from nowhere. Same script, every single time.
Except Arizona law says drivers owe you 3 feet of clearance when passing [3]. They must yield at intersections. You can legally ride in the full travel lane. When a car strikes a bicycle, the burden almost always falls on whoever was behind the wheel. Our car accident attorneys in Phoenix use the same evidence tools to hold drivers accountable.
So no, don't let some adjuster gaslight you into thinking this was your fault. Talk to a lawyer first.
Zero crumple zones. Zero airbags. A bike gives your body nothing.
TBI is the big one. No helmet mandate means head trauma shows up constantly in Phoenix bike crashes. Not just concussions. Skull fractures. Brain bleeds affecting memory, speech, balance — injuries that require experienced brain injury representation in Phoenix. Some injuries take weeks to surface. A client might feel fine on day one, then develop severe headaches and confusion by week three.
Spine injuries change everything. Herniated discs. Cracked vertebrae. Cord damage that leads to partial paralysis. We recovered $1.25 million for a client dealing with neck and back damage that demanded extensive treatment. That kind of injury doesn't just heal on its own.
Fractures land mostly in the legs since that's where the car connects. Arms and wrists shatter when you brace for impact. Collarbones snap constantly in bike crashes.
Road rash gets underestimated, badly. On Phoenix pavement in July, surface temps push past 140 degrees. When skin meets that asphalt, it's not scraping. It's burning. Deep tissue damage, infection risk, potential skin grafts. Way worse than road rash anywhere with normal summer temps.
Internal organ damage. Ruptured spleen. Internal bleeding. Chest injuries from blunt force.
Then the psychological damage. PTSD that kicks in every time a car drifts toward the shoulder. Panic attacks. Sleep trouble. Some clients stop riding, stop driving, withdraw from their normal routines. All of it is real. All of it is compensable.
The ER bill is just chapter one. A good attorney documents what comes next: future surgeries, ongoing therapy, career limitations, how your life actually changes.
Phoenix is one of the worst cities in America for bike safety. The data backs that up.
State-wide, Arizona DOT counted 1,027 bicycle crashes in a recent reporting year [2]. Maricopa County: 702 of them. That's 70% of the state's total in a single county. Phoenix proper: 291 crashes. Seventeen cyclists died. Two hundred seventy-four were injured. Forty-two of those injuries earned the classification "serious or catastrophic."
The city has about 600 miles of bike lanes, plus 100 miles of shared paths. Sounds solid until you ride them. Lanes vanish at busy intersections. Markings fade to nothing. Gaps in the network force you into traffic with no warning.
Where it's worst: Camelback Road. Central Avenue. Indian School Road. Corridors along the I-17/I-10 interchange. The Tempe Town Lake area sees tons of cycling traffic and plenty of car-bike conflicts.
Rush hour, 6 to 9 PM, is when most crashes occur. Drivers hurrying home, daylight dropping. Night crashes are rarer but more often fatal.
Phoenix has dumped money into fixing a few dangerous intersections. 75th and Indian School. 16th and Camelback. 19th and Southern. It helps, but there are hundreds of other intersections just as bad. You can't afford to wait.
A bike crash hits more than your body. It wrecks your finances.
ER visit, surgery, physical therapy appointments, prescriptions, imaging. That's month one. Then it's follow-up visits, ongoing rehab, maybe a second surgery. Lost paychecks piling up because you can't work. Your wrecked bike and destroyed gear. Gas money driving to appointments you never planned on having.
Beyond the bills? The stuff nobody puts on a spreadsheet. Pain that won't quit. Fear of getting back on a bike. Activities your body just won't do anymore. Strain on your partner, your family, your independence.
When a cyclist dies, the family can pursue a wrongful death claim. Funeral costs, lost income, the companionship that's gone forever.
Insurance companies lowball. That's their business model. The first offer they send? It's based on what they think you'll take when you're scared and overwhelmed. Not what your case deserves. That gap between their number and your real damages is exactly where a good attorney makes the difference.
Bikes are vehicles in Arizona. Same rights as a Honda Civic. Same rules of the road. But cyclists also get a few specific legal protections worth knowing.
Three-foot rule. Cars passing a bicycle must keep 3 feet of space between them [3]. Squeeze closer than that and you've committed a traffic violation.
Take the lane. When there's no bike lane, when the lane's too narrow to share, when you're turning left, you're allowed to ride in the full travel lane. Most drivers have no idea. Doesn't matter. It's the law.
Helmet choice. No state law requiring adults to wear one. A couple cities mandate them for kids under 18. Your call as a grown-up. Going bare-headed doesn't bar you from filing anything.
Yield requirements. Drivers must yield to cyclists in bike lanes, crosswalks, and at intersections. Check for bikes before opening your car door.
No bike lane on your street? Doesn't change a thing. Drivers owe you the same caution with or without painted lines.
Phoenix keeps expanding its cycling network along 15th Avenue and Roosevelt Street. Good. But new paint on the road doesn't make the driver behind you pay attention.
Anyone tells you that you "shouldn't have been riding there"? Arizona law says they're wrong.
We fight hard for people hurt by careless drivers. Here's a sampling.
Head-on collision left our client with a traumatic brain injury. Years of cognitive therapy ahead, career derailed, daily life restructured. We recovered $700,000 for that family.
Another client walked away from a crash thinking they were fine. Turned out they needed spinal decompression surgery months later. Spine damage is one of the most common results when a vehicle strikes a cyclist. We secured $925,000.
A pedestrian got struck by an uninsured driver and broke their leg. Like cyclists, pedestrians have no protection on the road. The claim ran through uninsured motorist coverage, same process many bike crash victims face with hit-and-runs. We obtained $500,000.
Every case is different. Past results do not guarantee a similar outcome.
Call our Phoenix personal injury attorneys before you talk to the insurance company. That's the single most important thing we can tell you.
You've got two years from the crash date to file a lawsuit in Arizona [3]. But evidence doesn't wait around. Traffic camera footage overwrites itself. Witnesses move or forget what they saw. Skid marks wash away in the next monsoon. Government entity claims? Sometimes you only have 180 days to file notice. So that two-year window isn't as generous as it sounds.
The adjuster reaching out to you this week works for the other side. Their entire job is closing your file cheaply. Having your own attorney flips that dynamic.
Hit-and-runs plague Phoenix cyclists. Maryvale, South Phoenix, some of the west side corridors. Driver takes off, you're left on the pavement. But even then, your own uninsured motorist policy might cover you. Those claims have specific rules and deadlines though. You need someone who handles them regularly.
With serious injuries, your lawyer coordinates with treating doctors to calculate not just today's costs but what recovery actually looks like. Future operations. Long-term PT. Income you'll never earn if the injury sticks.
The Simon Law Group carries over 250 years of combined experience and has recovered more than $500 million for clients. Call (602) 905-7766. Free case review. Available around the clock. Nothing out of your pocket unless we win.
Our attorneys have handled personal injury cases across Arizona and California. We know how Phoenix insurance companies operate, and we know how to push back.
That number reflects real results for real families — medical bills paid, lost wages recovered, and futures protected.
You pay nothing upfront. Our fee comes out of your settlement or verdict. If we do not win your case, you owe us nothing.
Accidents do not follow business hours. Neither do we. Call (602) 905-7766 any time — nights, weekends, and holidays.
Our Phoenix team works out of 2700 N Central Ave, Suite 320. We know the roads, the courts, and the insurance adjusters you are up against.
“After a crash, you need a team that answers the phone, explains your options, and fights for every dollar you are owed. That is what we do at The Simon Law Group.”
Over 250 years of combined attorney experience
Phoenix office at 2700 N Central Ave, Suite 320 |
Licensed in Arizona and California
When drivers or passengers open car doors into the path of cyclists, the impact can cause broken bones, road rash, head injuries, and worse. Arizona law (ARS 28-905) holds door-openers liable. Our attorneys handle insurance claims and lawsuits for dooring victims across Phoenix. Learn more about dooring accidents claims.
Get medical care right away, even if you think you're fine. Document the scene with photos, collect the driver's information and witness names, and file a report with Phoenix Police. Then contact a bicycle accident lawyer before speaking with the insurance company.
Usually the driver. Arizona law requires motorists to yield to cyclists and maintain at least 3 feet of clearance when passing. Fault is determined through police investigation, witness statements, traffic camera footage, and physical evidence from the scene.
Yes. Arizona uses pure comparative negligence. You can recover damages even if you share some fault. Your compensation gets reduced by your percentage of responsibility. If you were 15% at fault, you'd recover 85% of your total damages.
Two years from the date of the accident under Arizona's statute of limitations. Claims against government entities may have shorter deadlines, sometimes just 180 days. Don't wait to get legal advice.
You may still recover compensation through your own uninsured motorist coverage. Your attorney can also work with Phoenix Police to locate the driver using traffic cameras, witness descriptions, and other evidence.
Medical bills, lost wages, bike replacement costs, pain and suffering, emotional distress, and future care expenses. In wrongful death cases, family members can also seek compensation for funeral costs, lost financial support, and loss of companionship.
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