South Florida Personal Injury Lawyers Blog
After a fatal car accident in Miami, only one person can file a wrongful death claim: the personal representative of the deceased person’s estate. Individual family members, even a spouse or a parent, cannot bring their own separate lawsuit under Florida law. When a high-speed crash like the recent overnight collision in Little Havana takes a life, the family’s first questions are usually about who has the right to act and how much time they have.
How Florida’s Wrongful Death Act Decides Who Can File
Florida law puts the wrongful death claim in the hands of the estate’s personal representative, not the grieving relatives directly. The Florida Wrongful Death Act, found at sections 768.16 through 768.26 of the Florida Statutes, controls these cases. Under Florida Statute § 768.20, the personal representative files a single lawsuit on behalf of everyone who lost something because of the death.
A wrongful death claim is a civil lawsuit brought by the estate of a person killed by another party’s negligent or wrongful act. The personal representative is often a surviving spouse or an adult child. That person is usually named in the will, or appointed by the probate court if there was no will.
The people who can actually recover money are called survivors. Under Florida Statute § 768.18, survivors include the spouse, the children, and the parents, along with certain blood relatives who depended on the deceased for support. What each survivor can recover depends on their relationship to the person who died. Friedman Rodman Frank & Estrada has handled fatal crash and other wrongful death cases across Miami-Dade and Broward Counties since 1976, and the firm opens the estate and files the claim so the family is not sorting through probate paperwork while they grieve.
The Two-Year Deadline and What It Means for Your Family
You have two years from the date of death to file a wrongful death lawsuit in Florida. This deadline comes from Florida Statute § 95.11(5)(e). The clock starts on the day your loved one died, which is not always the day of the crash. If someone is hurt in a collision and passes away in the hospital weeks later, the two years run from the date of death, not the date of the accident.
Missing that deadline usually ends the case for good. Courts rarely make exceptions, and the at-fault driver’s insurance company knows the date as well as you do. In a case like the Little Havana crash, where police said an SUV may have been traveling at a high rate of speed, the proof of speed and fault can disappear fast. Skid marks get washed away, vehicles get repaired or scrapped, and witnesses move or forget what they saw. Locking down that evidence early is a large part of what makes a fatal Miami car accident case hold up later.
What a family can recover depends on who the survivors are. Common damages in a Florida wrongful death case include:
- Lost financial support and services the deceased would have provided
- Loss of companionship, guidance, and protection for a spouse and children
- Mental pain and suffering of the surviving family members
- Medical and funeral expenses charged to the estate
For a fatal crash, the at-fault driver’s auto insurance is usually the first source of payment. Serious cases often reach past a single policy, into a second driver’s coverage or a company policy if a work vehicle was involved.
If your family lost someone in a fatal car accident in Miami, call Friedman Rodman Frank & Estrada at (305) 448-8585 or contact us online. The consultation is free, and you pay nothing unless the firm recovers compensation for you.