A lot of the people hurt in Galveston County don’t live here, and a lot of the people who hurt them don’t either. The island fills up every weekend with drivers from Houston and the rest of Texas, and that matters for where a case gets filed. A Texas injury suit can go in the county where the crash happened or in the county where the at-fault driver lived (Civil Practice and Remedies Code § 15.002). So a wreck on the Seawall can end up in front of a Galveston County jury at the Justice Center on 59th Street, or in Harris County at 201 Caroline if the other driver came down from Houston. We make that choice on purpose, because the courthouse changes what an insurer is willing to pay.
Call (713) 664-4000. The consultation is free, and there’s no fee unless we recover for you. If we don’t recover, you don’t owe us for case expenses either. If an insurance company calls you, don’t give a recorded statement until you’ve talked to us.
Car wrecks on the island and the mainland
Seawall Boulevard has long been the island’s deadliest road, and from 2019 through 2023, six of the seven fatal crashes on the Seawall corridor involved someone on foot or on a bike. Broadway comes next. On the mainland, I-45 through League City and Texas City carries causeway traffic at freeway speed, and FM 646, FM 518, FM 517 and SH 146 have grown faster than they were built for. Street-legal golf carts on island streets add a vehicle with no crash protection at all. We get the crash report, then check it against the photos, the damage, the witnesses and the cars’ event data recorders, and we ask the businesses along the road for video before it’s recorded over.
Serious injuries on the island go to UTMB’s John Sealy Hospital in Galveston, the region’s Level I trauma center and a verified burn center. On the mainland, UTMB runs a Level II trauma center at Clear Lake and a Level III in League City. The records from that first visit follow your case all the way to the end, so tell the doctor everything that hurts.
Drunk drivers and the bars that served them
A holiday weekend on the Seawall means drunk drivers, and a drunk-driving crash is a different case. The driver’s intoxication can support punitive damages on top of your ordinary damages. And under the Texas dram shop law, a bar or restaurant that served someone so obviously drunk that he was a clear danger to himself and others can be liable for the crash that followed (Alcoholic Beverage Code § 2.02). Jay Blass Cohen defends DWI cases, so he knows how intoxication really gets proven: the breath and blood science, the officer’s observations, the 911 calls and the bar tab. We use all of it.
Property and cruise ship injuries
Visitors get hurt on property too, on broken stairs at a beach rental, in a hotel pool, in a parking lot or on a pier. A hotel or any other business that invites you in has to use reasonable care to fix or warn about dangerous conditions it knew about or should have known about. See our premises liability page for how those cases work.
Cruise ship injuries run on different rules. Your ticket is a contract, and federal law lets the cruise line require written notice of your claim within six months and a lawsuit within one year (46 U.S.C. § 30526). Most of the major lines’ tickets also require the suit to be filed in Florida, usually in federal court in Miami, not in Texas. Those deadlines are short. Miss the one-year filing deadline and the claim is almost always gone, and a late notice gives the cruise line a fight you don’t want. Workers hurt on the water or offshore have their own federal remedies, which we cover on our maritime injury page.
Fault rules and policy limits in Galveston
Texas cuts your recovery by your share of the fault, and at more than 50 percent you get nothing (Civil Practice and Remedies Code §§ 33.001, 33.012). The minimum Texas auto policy is $30,000 per person and $60,000 per crash (Transportation Code § 601.072), which a serious injury goes through fast, so we look for every other policy, including your own uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage (Insurance Code § 1952.101). Medical damages are limited to what was actually paid or is still owed for your care (Civil Practice and Remedies Code § 41.0105), so how your treatment gets paid for matters from the first week.
Short deadlines for cruise and city claims
You get two years from the injury, as a general rule, to file suit (Civil Practice and Remedies Code § 16.003). A claim against a city or county, including the City of Galveston, needs notice within six months, and a city charter can require it sooner (Civil Practice and Remedies Code § 101.101). A cruise claim needs notice within six months and a lawsuit within a year, filed where the ticket says.
Two of our results
We recovered a $2.95 million settlement for a client rear-ended by a commercial truck driver who was following too closely, and $100,000 for a client hit by a driver who ran a red light. See all of our settlements and verdicts. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.
Need a Galveston accident lawyer? Call Blass Law
Jay Blass Cohen was born and raised in Houston and has practiced here since 2009. We take injury cases from the island and the mainland, and we prepare every one as if it’s going to trial. For wrecks in League City, see our League City car accident page. For truck wrecks, see our 18-wheeler accident page.
Call (713) 664-4000. If it happened this week, call now, while the video and the witnesses are still easy to find.
Reviewed by Jay Blass Cohen, founder of Blass Law PLLC, ACS-CHAL Forensic Lawyer-Scientist, certified Drug Recognition Expert, and SFST instructor, serving Houston since 2009. This article is general information, not legal advice for your situation. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.