Hello, I am Michael Padway, a California motorcycle lawyer. Thank you for letting me post to this forum. I am an avid motorcycle rider. I often can asked what constitutes negligence in an accident.

Motorcycle accidents are usually caused by someone's carelessness or failure to act. Often times it is a combination of negligent acts or a failure to act by one or more persons or entities that cause an accident to occur. The law requires that each person owes every other person a duty to act as a reasonably prudent person would act under the same or similar circumstances.

When a person does not act reasonably, then they have violated that duty and will be held responsible for any injury or damage that results. This duty is created from statutory laws and rules in prior cases that have evolved over time. Specifically, the process of negligence uses the following information:

• the qualities of the motorcycle
• reconstruction experts with specific expertise in motorcycle accidents
• photographs of the vehicles
• other physical evidence
• testimony of the parties and eyewitnesses

Generally, each side points to those pieces of evidence, and those statements of witnesses that are favorable. The jury or the insurance company for the defendant will evaluate all of the evidence developed by each side, and determine who is at fault, and in what percentage.