Injury lawyers have scooters in sights
Some have carved out dedicated spots on their websites.
Bird Rides and other scooter startups have drawn fire from pedestrian advocates, politicians and annoyed citizens. Now they have a new nemesis: Personal-injury lawyers.
In recent months, people hurt riding (or hit by) scooters in San Francisco and Los Angeles have been calling legal firms to file claims. Smelling opportunity, firms have even carved out dedicated spots on their websites urging people to file scooter-related claims.
“Our thought when we first saw them ‘flying’ around Santa Monica and haphazardly abandoned on city sidewalks: This is an accident waiting to happen,” blared McGee Lerer & Associates.
Los Angeles abounds with personal-injury lawyers on the hunt for cases.
“Lawyers will be lawyers when there’s the potential for some money to be made,” says John Perlstein, a 25-year veteran who litigates accident claims referred to him by other attorneys. “Most of them are trying to keep the doors open and hope for a million-dollar case to come their way.”
There are no records so far of lawsuits being filed against Bird or its rival, Lime, but lawyers say it’s just a matter of time.
The scooters began appearing in many parts of the U.S. last year. They can be unlocked with a smartphone for a buck, cost 15 cents an hour to rent and reach 15 miles an hour. The machines have proved popular — and polarizing. The companies see them as a logical next step to the transportation revolution started by Uber and Lyft. Foes consider the scooters an annoying fad among tourists and tech workers, who zip around imperiling themselves and others.
Investors expect scooters to become a lasting feature of the urban landscape. Both Bird and Lime are in the process of raising large investment rounds to fuel their expansion. Though the scooter revolution is on hold in San Francisco while operators apply for permits, the machines are expected to reappear within weeks as the city conducts a pilot program. They continue to weave through the traffic in Santa Monica and other cities. Accidents happen.
Catherine Lerer, one half of McGee Lerer’s husbandand-wife legal team, says she got the first scooter-related call about five months ago. A 16-year-old boy had been injured falling from a Bird scooter, and the family wanted to make a claim.
The phone has been ringing ever since.
Many of the mishaps involve young riders who broke a collarbone or an arm in a single-rider accident, when the brakes locked or they lost control of the scooter, Lerer says.
Los Angeles lawyers expect there to be more scooter incidents in L.A., where the automobile famously rules, than in San Francisco, where cyclists, runners and cars compete for lane space.
Lawyers say winning damages won’t be simple. Pedestrians who claim they were injured dodging a scooter on the sidewalk typically have no one to sue because the riders are long gone. Riders hit by cars probably have the strongest cases.
“I have been turning away a lot of callers because I need to have an insurance company to go after,” Lerer says.
She expects the number of accidents to increase, particularly on college campuses and heavily touristed precincts.
“It’s like the plague,” Lerer says. “It’s spreading so fast.”