Wrongful Death Statute of Limitations in California

Most California wrongful death lawsuits must be filed within two years of the date of death. But the two-year rule is only the starting point.

If a government entity may be responsible, a written claim can be required within six months. A survival action based on the deceased person’s own injuries follows a different clock. Minor children can receive additional time against private defendants. Medical malpractice and criminal convictions can trigger still other rules.

That is why the statute of limitations in a wrongful death case should be determined at the beginning of the investigation, not when the two-year anniversary approaches.

A statute of limitations is a legal deadline for filing a lawsuit. Missing it can permanently bar an otherwise valid claim.

This guide explains the major deadlines that can apply after a wrongful death in California. For information about our firm’s work in these cases, visit our San Diego wrongful death attorney page.

Wrongful Death Deadlines at a Glance

Several different deadlines can apply after a fatal accident:

• Most wrongful death claims against private defendants: two years from the date of death.
• Wrongful death involving a government entity: a written government claim generally must be presented within six months after the claim accrues, ordinarily the date of death for the wrongful death claim.
• Lawsuit after a government claim is rejected: generally six months after a proper written rejection notice is personally delivered or deposited in the mail.
• Survival action: generally the later of six months after death or the limitations period the deceased person would have had if they had lived, provided the claim had not already expired before death.
• Minor heir against a private defendant: the limitations period generally is tolled while the child is under 18.
• Minor heir against a government entity: the ordinary minority tolling rule does not apply, although special late-claim procedures can provide limited relief.
• Claim against a convicted felon: a separate limitations period may provide additional time depending on the conviction.
• Death caused by medical malpractice: special medical-malpractice deadlines apply.

The shortest deadline controls the immediate strategy, which is why every potential defendant should be identified early.

Two Years From the Date of Death for Most Claims

For most California wrongful death claims, Code of Civil Procedure section 335.1 provides a two-year limitations period for an action involving the death of a person caused by the wrongful act or neglect of another.

The wrongful death cause of action is authorized by Code of Civil Procedure section 377.60, which identifies the family members and other persons who may bring the claim.

Eligible claimants commonly include a surviving spouse or registered domestic partner, children, and certain other heirs or dependents depending on the family circumstances. Our guide to who can file a wrongful death claim in San Diego explains those rules in detail.

The wrongful death claim belongs to the eligible survivors. It compensates them for losses caused by the death, such as lost financial support and the loss of love, companionship, comfort, care, assistance, protection, affection, society, and moral support.

That makes it different from the deceased person’s own injury claim, which can sometimes continue after death through a survival action.

Date of Death vs. Date of Injury

A wrongful death claim ordinarily accrues when the person dies.

That distinction matters when death does not occur immediately.

Someone seriously injured in a vehicle crash, construction accident, or other event may survive for weeks or months before dying from the injuries. The family’s wrongful death claim generally does not exist until the death occurs, and the ordinary two-year wrongful death period therefore runs from the date of death.

Our guide to fatal car accidents discusses some of the issues that arise after a fatal collision.

But the date of injury can still matter.

The deceased person’s separate survival claim may have begun running before the death. A government claim based on the deceased person’s own injury may also have an earlier deadline. Medical malpractice cases operate under their own limitations rules.

A fatal injury case can therefore involve several clocks running at the same time.

Survival Actions Have a Different Deadline

A wrongful death claim and a survival action are not the same thing.

A wrongful death claim belongs to the eligible family members and compensates them for their own losses resulting from the death.

A survival action continues a claim that belonged to the deceased person before death. Under Code of Civil Procedure section 377.30, the decedent’s personal representative or successor in interest may pursue a surviving cause of action.

The deadline is governed in part by Code of Civil Procedure section 366.1.

If a person dies before the applicable limitations period expires and the cause of action survives, the action generally may be filed by the later of:

• six months after the person’s death; or
• the limitations period that would have applied if the person had lived.

For example, suppose someone suffers an injury subject to California’s ordinary two-year personal injury statute of limitations and dies from the injuries 22 months later. Only two months would remain on the original limitations period. Section 366.1 generally extends the survival-action filing period to six months after death.

But section 366.1 does not revive a cause of action that had already expired before the person died.

Survival Damages Changed for Cases Filed in 2026

The damages available in a survival action also require special attention.

Under the current version of Code of Civil Procedure section 377.34, a survival action generally can recover losses or damages the decedent sustained before death, along with qualifying penalties and punitive damages the decedent could have recovered.

California temporarily expanded survival damages to include pre-death pain, suffering, and disfigurement for qualifying actions filed on or after January 1, 2022 and before January 1, 2026.

For actions first filed on or after January 1, 2026, that temporary exception generally no longer applies, and section 377.34 again excludes damages for the decedent’s pain, suffering, and disfigurement.

The family’s separate wrongful death damages remain governed by different rules. Our guide to the types of damages in wrongful death cases explains the distinction.

Government Claims Can Have a Six-Month Deadline

A potential claim against a California public entity requires immediate attention.

Under Government Code section 911.2, a claim relating to death or personal injury generally must be presented to the appropriate public entity no later than six months after the cause of action accrues.

For a wrongful death claim, accrual is ordinarily the date of death.

Government responsibility may arise when a fatal accident involves:

• A public vehicle, such as a city or county vehicle or an MTS bus.
• A dangerous public roadway, including a state highway maintained by Caltrans or a city or county roadway with a legally actionable dangerous condition.
• Public property, such as a government building, park, sidewalk, transit facility, or other property when the requirements for public-entity liability are satisfied.
• A public employee, when the employee’s conduct creates liability under California law.

The six-month claim is not the lawsuit. It is a required administrative claim that ordinarily must come first.

The Survival Claim May Have an Earlier Government Deadline

This distinction is particularly important when the injured person survives for a period before dying.

The family’s wrongful death claim generally accrues at death. But the deceased person’s own claim may have accrued on the date of the underlying injury.

If a public entity was involved, the six-month government-claim deadline for the decedent’s own injury claim may therefore begin before the wrongful death claim even exists.

For example, if someone is seriously injured because of an alleged dangerous public roadway condition and dies eight months later, waiting until the death to investigate the government claim can create a serious problem for the survival action.

The wrongful death and survival claims should therefore be calendared separately.

The Deadline After a Government Claim Is Rejected

Presenting the government claim is only the first deadline.

If the public entity gives proper written notice rejecting the claim in accordance with the Government Claims Act, Government Code section 945.6 generally requires the lawsuit to be filed no later than six months after the rejection notice is personally delivered or deposited in the mail.

If the entity does not provide the written notice required by the statute, section 945.6 generally provides a two-year period from accrual.

No one should plan a case around receiving the longer period. The claim and lawsuit deadlines should be calendared from the actual notices and circumstances of the case.

What Happens If the Six-Month Government Claim Deadline Was Missed?

California provides a limited procedure for seeking permission to present a late government claim.

Under Government Code section 911.4, a claimant who missed the six-month presentation deadline may apply in writing to the public entity for leave to present a late claim.

The application generally must be made within a reasonable time not exceeding one year after accrual, subject to specific statutory rules governing how that period is calculated.

Government Code section 911.6 identifies circumstances in which the entity must grant the application. They can include qualifying mistake, inadvertence, surprise, or excusable neglect when the entity was not prejudiced, as well as specified situations involving minority, incapacity, or death.

A Denied Late-Claim Application Creates Another Deadline

If the public entity denies the application for permission to file a late claim, or the application is deemed denied because the entity fails to act within the statutory period, the claimant may seek relief from the superior court under Government Code section 946.6.

That creates yet another short deadline.

The court petition generally must be filed within six months after the late-claim application is denied or deemed denied.

The late-claim procedure should therefore be viewed as a limited rescue mechanism, not a substitute for presenting the original claim within six months.

Minor Children and Wrongful Death Deadlines

California generally gives minor claimants additional time against private defendants.

Under Code of Civil Procedure section 352, when a person entitled to bring an action is under the age of majority when the claim accrues, the period of minority generally is not counted against the limitations period.

The California Supreme Court has applied this principle to minor heirs in wrongful death cases.

As a result, a child’s wrongful death claim against a private defendant generally is not lost simply because a parent or another adult failed to file within the ordinary two-year period. The limitations clock generally begins running when the child reaches 18.

But waiting is rarely advantageous.

Wrongful death cases depend on physical evidence, video, witnesses, electronic records, photographs, vehicle evidence, and other information that can disappear long before a child turns 18. A guardian ad litem can allow a minor’s claim to be pursued while the evidence is still available.

Government Claims Are Different for Minors

Section 352 expressly states that its normal minority tolling rule does not apply to claims subject to the Government Claims Act.

California instead provides specific late-claim protections for minors.

Under Government Code section 911.6, a public entity must grant a qualifying late-claim application in specified circumstances when the person who sustained the loss was a minor during the claim period.

But the late-claim application remains subject to the separate timing requirements of Government Code section 911.4. Minority ordinarily counts toward that statute’s one-year outer period.

When a government entity may be responsible for a parent’s death, the safest approach is to present the claim within the original six-month period rather than rely on late-claim relief.

Do Not Rely on the Discovery Rule

The ordinary rule in California is that a wrongful death cause of action accrues on the date of death.

Families sometimes ask whether the deadline can be extended because they did not learn until later that negligence, a defective product, or some other wrongdoing contributed to the death.

California’s delayed-discovery doctrine can postpone accrual in some types of cases until a plaintiff knew or reasonably should have suspected both an injury and a wrongful cause.

But its application to wrongful death should not be treated as automatic.

In Norgart v. Upjohn Co., the California Supreme Court explained that a wrongful death claim ordinarily accrues at death. The court assumed for purposes of its analysis, without definitively deciding the broader question, that delayed discovery might apply where a plaintiff was blamelessly ignorant of the cause of action.

Even under that assumption, the court emphasized that suspicion of wrongdoing can be enough to start the limitations period. A family does not need to know the defendant’s identity, possess all the evidence, or understand the precise legal theory before the clock may begin running.

If the cause of a loved one’s death is uncertain, investigate it promptly rather than assuming delayed discovery will preserve the claim.

Our guide to the causes of wrongful death in San Diego discusses the circumstances that can give rise to these cases.

A Felony Conviction Can Change the Deadline

A criminal prosecution and a wrongful death lawsuit follow separate paths.

But a felony conviction can affect the civil limitations period.

Under Code of Civil Procedure section 340.3, an action for damages based on a defendant’s commission of a felony for which the defendant has been convicted generally may be commenced within one year after judgment is pronounced, unless a longer limitations period applies.

The statute also provides a separate 10-year period measured from discharge from parole for certain specifically listed serious felony convictions.

This can matter when a fatal collision or other death leads to a felony prosecution.

The rule does not mean every criminal case automatically extends every civil claim, and it does not necessarily affect claims against other defendants who were not convicted.

Families should not delay a wrongful death case while waiting to see how the criminal case ends. The safer approach is to protect the ordinary civil deadline while evaluating whether section 340.3 provides additional time.

Medical Malpractice Deaths Follow Different Rules

Wrongful death based on professional negligence by a health care provider is governed by a different statute.

Under Code of Civil Procedure section 340.5, an action for injury or death against a health care provider based on professional negligence generally must be commenced by the earlier of:

• three years after the date of injury; or
• one year after the plaintiff discovers, or through reasonable diligence should have discovered, the injury.

The statute contains specific tolling provisions for fraud, intentional concealment, and certain foreign-body cases, along with separate rules for minors.

Hulburt Law Firm does not handle medical malpractice cases. If medical negligence may have caused or contributed to a death, a family should consult a qualified medical malpractice attorney promptly because these deadlines differ from ordinary wrongful death claims.

Why Families Should Act Before the Deadline

A statute of limitations tells you the last date a lawsuit may be filed. It does not tell you when a case should be investigated.

In a serious wrongful death case, important evidence can disappear in days or weeks.

• Vehicles can be repaired, sold, or destroyed.
• Surveillance and dashcam footage can be overwritten.
• Electronic vehicle and phone data can be lost.
• Road conditions can change.
• Defective products can be altered or discarded.
• Witness memories become less precise over time.
• Government-claim deadlines can arrive long before the ordinary two-year period.

Our guide to proving negligence in a wrongful death case explains the evidence used to establish responsibility.

The legal process for wrongful death claims in San Diego explains what happens after the investigation begins.

Fatal workplace accidents can add workers’ compensation and third-party liability issues to the analysis. Our guide to fatal workplace accidents discusses those claims separately.

The important point is simple: identify the shortest possible deadline first, then investigate while the evidence still exists.

Talk to Hulburt Law Firm About a Wrongful Death Case

Families should not have to untangle competing statutes of limitations while grieving the loss of someone they love.

Hulburt Law Firm handles serious wrongful death cases throughout San Diego County and California. We identify the responsible parties, determine which deadlines apply, preserve the evidence, and build the case from the beginning.

If your family lost someone because of another person’s or company’s negligence, our San Diego wrongful death attorneys, Conor and Leslie Hulburt, can review what happened and explain your options.

Call (619) 821-0500 or send us a message through our contact form for a free, confidential case review.

There is no attorney fee unless we recover compensation for your family.