When a Car Crashes Into a Building and Someone Gets Hurt
These are not freak accidents. They are predictable, preventable tragedies — caused by property owners who knew the risk existed, knew the solution existed, and chose to do nothing. If you or someone you love was injured when a vehicle entered a building, an emergency room lobby, a storefront, a restaurant, a parking structure, or any other premises, you may have a significant legal claim against the property owner. Not just the driver.
The scale of this problem: • Vehicles crash into buildings in the United States approximately 60 times per day • More than 4,000 people are injured in vehicle-into-building crashes every year • As many as 500 people are killed annually in these incidents • In Texas alone, there have been at least 85 vehicle crashes involving medical facilities in the past decade
Most victims don’t realize they may have a legal claim against the property owner. They assume it was just the driver’s fault. But property owners — hospitals, retailers, restaurants, landlords — have a duty to protect the people they invite onto their premises from known, foreseeable dangers. When they know a risk exists, know how to prevent it, and choose not to act, they can be held legally responsible for the consequences.
Vehicle intrusion crashes happen at every type of property. Howry Breen & Herman, LLP represents people injured in all of them:
Hospital and Emergency Room Lobbies
Emergency rooms are especially dangerous. Drive-up access lanes point vehicles directly at lobby entrances. The people waiting inside are often distracted, scared, or stationary — and they have no warning before impact. The drivers coming toward them are frequently impaired, confused, anxious, or experiencing a medical emergency themselves. Responsible hospitals have known for decades that safety bollards can stop these crashes. Many still haven’t installed them.
Retail Stores and Shopping Centers
Parking lots built to deliver cars right to the front door create a direct vehicle pathway to glass storefronts filled with shoppers. Pedal errors, distracted driving, and sudden medical events cause vehicles to jump curbs and crash through storefronts regularly. When a property owner has failed to install wheel stops, raised curbs, bollards, or other vehicle barriers where the risk is obvious, they may be liable.
Fast-Food Restaurants and Drive-Throughs
Drive-through lanes are a uniquely engineered vehicle intrusion hazard. The business model deliberately directs cars to travel slowly alongside pedestrian sidewalks and entrances — that’s by design, not accident. When a restaurant then fails to install any barrier between that vehicle lane and the people on foot, it has created a foreseeable kill zone and done nothing to protect the people in it.
This risk is amplified at locations near college campuses and entertainment districts, where restaurants that stay open until 3 a.m. know their late-night customer mix will include intoxicated drivers. That’s not a hypothetical risk — it’s a calculated business decision. Bars close at 2 a.m. The restaurants close at 3:30 a.m. The overlap is intentional. The failure to protect pedestrians from the customers those hours attract is indefensible.
Howry Breen & Herman filed suit in November 2025 against Raising Cane’s Chicken Fingers — the third-largest fast-food chicken chain in the country — after a 21-year-old University of Texas student, Srivaishnavi “Vaishu” Vijay, was struck by a vehicle in Raising Cane’s drive-through lane at 2:30 a.m. on Halloween 2025. She suffered a massive traumatic brain injury requiring emergency removal of part of her skull to relieve pressure and save her life. Raising Cane’s had bollards at that same location — to protect its own equipment. It had none protecting the people on its sidewalk. That distinction is at the heart of the case.
Farmers Markets, Outdoor Events, and Fairs
Crowded pedestrian events in open spaces with vehicle access — where a single driver’s mistake can kill or injure dozens of people — require meaningful vehicle separation. When organizers and venue owners fail to provide it, they may bear responsibility for resulting injuries.
Parking Garages and Structures
Structural failures, inadequate barrier ratings, unprotected pedestrian lanes, and ramp designs that put vehicles in close proximity to foot traffic have all produced serious injury cases. The engineering standards governing these structures exist for a reason.
Government Buildings, Office Parks, and Institutions
Any public-facing facility with vehicle access creates a potential intrusion risk. Where that risk is foreseeable and the owner has done nothing to address it, premises liability law may provide a path to recovery.
Why the Property Owner — Not Just the Driver — May Be Liable
Texas law imposes a duty on property owners to protect the people they invite onto their premises from unreasonable risks. When a known hazard exists — one the owner was aware of or should have been aware of — and the owner failed to take reasonable steps to address it, that failure can be the basis for a negligence or premises liability claim.
In vehicle intrusion cases, the legal theory typically rests on several interlocking facts:
Foreseeability
The risk of vehicles crashing into buildings is extensively documented. Cars crash into buildings 60 times per day in the United States. Emergency rooms, restaurants, and retail locations have all been the subject of national news coverage, industry guidelines, and internal safety assessments for well over a decade. A property owner who claims they had no idea this could happen is almost certainly not telling the truth — and discovery will often prove it.
In the fast-food context, foreseeability is even harder to deny. A restaurant that stays open until 3:30 a.m. — specifically to capture the post-bar crowd — has made an affirmative business decision to attract impaired drivers. Prior incidents at the same chain or at comparable locations are almost always in the record. When those incidents exist and the company did nothing to protect pedestrians, foreseeability is not a close question.
Knowledge of the Solution
Safety bollards are widely available, well understood, and relatively inexpensive. Industry guidelines from the International Association for Healthcare Security and Safety (IAHSS) have called for physical barrier protection at emergency room entrances since at least 2012. CPTED (Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design) policies adopted by major health systems specifically identify vehicle penetration protection as required at main entrances and emergency department areas. When a property owner has installed bollards at other locations — or at the same facility to protect equipment — they cannot claim they didn’t know the solution existed.
Failure to Act Despite Resources and Opportunity
The most damning evidence in these cases is often what the defendant chose not to do. Internal inspection checklists that flagged the absence of bollards. Corporate communications that acknowledged the risk. Safety programs that were applied to some facilities but not others. Evidence that management was told about the problem and decided it wasn’t a priority. These documents exist — and they tell a very different story than the defendant’s public-facing position.
Gross Negligence and Exemplary Damages
When a property owner had actual, subjective knowledge of an extreme risk and chose to proceed with conscious indifference to the safety of the people on their premises, their conduct may constitute gross negligence under Texas law. Gross negligence opens the door to exemplary damages — damages designed not just to compensate the plaintiff, but to punish the defendant and deter future conduct of the same kind. In cases involving major institutions with vast resources, exemplary damages can be substantial.
“The entire purpose of bollards is to stop drunk and impaired and out-of-control drivers. If only sober, careful drivers crashed into buildings, bollards wouldn’t exist. St. David’s knew that. Their own corporate representative admitted it.” — From our petition in Bernard v. St. David’s Healthcare Partnership, Travis County District Court (2025)
Our Experience
Howry Breen & Herman represents clients in two of the most significant active vehicle intrusion / bollard liability cases in Texas.
Bernard v. St. David’s Healthcare Partnership (Travis County, 2024)
On February 13, 2024, Levi and Nadia Bernard and their one-year-old and three-year-old sons were struck by a vehicle that crashed through the unprotected emergency room entrance at St. David’s North Austin Medical Center. Both parents sustained traumatic brain injuries, damage to their pituitary glands, and serious orthopedic injuries. One-year-old S.B. was found in the footwell of the car, lying in jagged aquarium glass and debris, covered in blood. Three-year-old R.B. underwent multiple surgeries for glass lacerations. The entire family is still in treatment.
St. David’s had bollards at that same facility — to protect its own electrical equipment. It had bollards at other ER entrances in its system. It had a national inspection program that was supposed to cover NAMC and never did. Its own safety inspector — who would have recommended bollards at that exact entrance — lived less than one mile away. After the crash, St. David’s installed cosmetic posts that its own standards identify as inadequate. This case was filed in Travis County District Court (Cause No. D-1-GN-24-003215) and settled for a confidential amount of money.
Vijay v. Raising Cane’s Restaurants, LLC (Travis County, 2025)
On Halloween 2025 at 2:30 a.m., Srivaishnavi “Vaishu” Vijay — a 21-year-old University of Texas student on scholarship, a participant in UT’s prestigious Take the World by the Horns study-abroad program, with a bright future in informatics — was standing on the sidewalk alongside the drive-through lane at Raising Cane’s #140 on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in Austin. An intoxicated driver lost control of her truck in the drive-through line and drove over the curb and onto the unprotected sidewalk, striking Vaishu and her friends.
Vaishu suffered a massive traumatic brain injury. She was transported by EMS to Dell Seton Medical Center, where surgeons performed an emergency decompressive hemicraniectomy — removing part of her skull to relieve intracranial pressure and save her life. Raising Cane’s is the third-largest fast-food chicken chain in the United States, with $5.1 billion in annual revenue. It had bollards at that same location to protect its own property. It had none protecting its customers on the sidewalk next to the drive-through lane it built and advertised. This case is pending in Travis County District Court (Cause No. D-1-GN-25-010177).
“Cane’s knew exactly what flies in their parking lot at that time of the evening. Like a light bulb attracts moths, Cane’s stayed open until 3:30 a.m. precisely because bars close at 2 a.m. — and they brought those drivers right alongside their unprotected pedestrian sidewalk with no protection whatsoever.” — From our petition in Vijay v. Raising Cane’s Restaurants, LLC, Travis County District Court (2025)
Through these cases and others, we have developed deep experience in how large corporate defendants — whether hospital systems or restaurant chains — evaluate, document, delay, and sometimes actively conceal vehicle intrusion risk. We know:
What internal documents to request: safety worksheets, bollard inspection checklists, CPTED assessments, incident logs, near-miss reports, corporate communications about safety program scope
What admissions to pursue: prior incidents at the same facility or chain, knowledge of industry standards, selective installation at other locations, post-incident remediation that reveals the pre-incident feasibility defense was false
What experts to retain: crash-rated bollard engineers, premises safety consultants, security design specialists, and accident reconstructionists who can speak directly to the gap between what was done and what should have been done
What the post-incident conduct reveals: bollards installed quickly after a “unforeseeable” incident prove both foreseeability and feasibility — and installations that fall below the defendant’s own stated standard are evidence of continued conscious indifference
This is one of the most underlitigated areas of serious premises liability in the country. Victims often assume the driver bears all responsibility. Corporations count on that assumption. We know better.
What Your Case May Be Worth
Vehicle intrusion cases can involve catastrophic, life-altering injuries: traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord damage, severe orthopedic injuries, permanent disfigurement, prolonged surgeries, and the profound psychological trauma of witnessing a loved one struck. These cases also frequently involve injured children. When the evidence supports gross negligence, exemplary damages can multiply the recovery substantially.
In evaluating any vehicle intrusion case, we look at:
The nature and permanence of the injuries and the long-term medical and rehabilitation costs
The plaintiff’s lost earning capacity, both past and future
The severity of pain, suffering, and mental anguish, including bystander trauma for family members who witnessed the crash
The defendant’s financial resources, prior notice of the risk, and post-incident conduct
Whether the evidence supports an exemplary damages claim, and if so, the defendant’s net worth as a benchmark
We handle these cases on a contingency fee basis. You pay nothing unless we recover for you.
1. The driver was drunk. Can I still sue the property owner?
Yes — and in many cases, the drunk or impaired driver is exactly why the property owner is liable. The entire purpose of safety bollards is to stop vehicles driven by people who are drunk, impaired, distracted, or out of control. Property owners who operate facilities where impaired drivers foreseeably appear — hospitals and emergency rooms are the clearest example — know that their entrances will be approached by people who may not be in full control of their vehicles. St. David’s, for example, admitted in discovery that it knew drunk and impaired drivers would be in its parking lots and at its entrances. That knowledge is one of the reasons they knew bollards were necessary — and one of the reasons their failure to install them may constitute gross negligence.
A drunk driver’s negligence doesn’t absolve the property owner. Texas law allows multiple parties to be found negligent, and the jury will apportion fault. In a strong vehicle intrusion case, the property owner’s failure to install readily available protective barriers may be found to be the greater cause of the plaintiff’s injuries — even if the driver was intoxicated.
2. No law required bollards at this location. Does that mean the property owner is off the hook
No. The absence of a specific code or statute requiring bollards does not end the legal analysis. Property owners have a common-law duty to protect invitees from unreasonable risks of harm. Whether a specific risk was unreasonable depends on the foreseeability of harm, the severity of potential injury, and the burden of taking precautions — not whether the legislature got around to codifying the precaution.
In practice, the absence of a legal mandate is often irrelevant by the time discovery is complete. Most major property owners in industries with known vehicle intrusion risk have internal policies, adopted industry guidelines, or had inspectors recommending bollards. When that evidence exists, the defendant can’t credibly claim they were just waiting for a law. They knew the standard of care. They chose not to meet it.
St. David’s own corporate representative acknowledged in deposition that the absence of a legal requirement didn’t mean bollards weren’t required. That kind of admission is dispositive.
3. The property owner says bollards weren’t feasible at that location. Is that a real defense?
It is a common defense. It is rarely a good one. When a property owner claims bollards were not feasible — due to wheelchair access, aesthetic concerns, construction constraints, or cost — and then installs bollards within weeks of a serious incident, the claim was false. The installation itself proves feasibility. It also proves foreseeability: if the incident was truly unforeseeable, there would be no urgency to install barriers after it happened.
We have seen this exact dynamic play out. St. David’s claimed bollards were not feasible and would interfere with wheelchair access to the emergency room. Within weeks of the crash that injured the Bernard family, bollards were installed at the same entrance. Patients in wheelchairs navigate them without difficulty. The feasibility defense was simply not true.
The quality of the post-incident installation also matters. If the property owner installs cosmetic, non-crash-rated posts knowing they don’t meet the minimum standard for effective vehicle protection, that post-incident conduct may be relevant to both liability and the gross negligence / exemplary damages analysis.
4. The driver’s insurance should cover this. Why do I need to sue the property owner?
Auto liability coverage is almost never sufficient to compensate for catastrophic injuries resulting from vehicle intrusion crashes. A driver who loses control and crashes through a hospital lobby may carry $30,000 or $100,000 in liability coverage. A family with four seriously injured members, multiple surgeries, traumatic brain injuries, permanent impairments, and years of lost income may have damages in the millions or tens of millions of dollars. The driver’s coverage won’t come close.
A property owner like a major hospital system or national retailer, on the other hand, carries substantial liability insurance and has deep pockets. When that property owner’s negligence contributed to or caused the injuries, they can be held responsible for the full scope of resulting harm. The combination of actual damages and exemplary damages in a strong gross negligence case can produce recoveries that genuinely compensate victims for what they have lost.
5. The crash happened at a hospital. Does the medical malpractice cap apply to my case?
No — and this is a critical distinction. A vehicle intrusion / bollard liability case against a hospital is a premises liability and negligence claim, not a healthcare liability claim under Texas Chapter 74. The damage caps, expert report requirements, and shortened statutes of limitations that apply to medical malpractice cases do not apply to these cases. The claim is about the hospital’s failure as a property owner to protect people on its premises from a foreseeable danger — not about the quality of medical care anyone received. This distinction has been expressly addressed in the Bernard litigation.
6. My accident wasn’t at a hospital. Does this still apply to my situation?
Absolutely. The legal theory applies wherever a property owner owed a duty to invitees, knew of a foreseeable vehicle intrusion risk, knew of available protective measures, and failed to act. That can be a grocery store, a restaurant, a gas station, a government building, a school, a shopping center, or any other commercial property. The facts that make a case strong — prior incidents, industry standards, internal communications, post-accident installation of the barriers that were “not feasible” — are present to varying degrees in cases across many property types.
7. My injury happened at or near a drive-through lane. Is the restaurant liable?
Potentially yes — and the theory is particularly strong when the restaurant has made deliberate operational choices that maximize the exposure of pedestrians to vehicle traffic without any protective separation between them.
Drive-through lanes are not passive features of a property — they are actively designed, advertised, and used to generate revenue. When a restaurant engineer places a drive-through lane alongside a pedestrian sidewalk and entrance, and when the restaurant then declines to install even a simple curb-height bollard to separate vehicles from people on foot, the restaurant has made an affirmative decision about how much its customers’ safety is worth.
That calculus is even more troubling when the restaurant has made business decisions that predictably increase the number of impaired drivers in its drive-through. Restaurants and bars that stay open well past bar-closing time, that are located in entertainment districts or near college campuses, and that market specifically to the late-night crowd are not passive bystanders when an intoxicated driver in their drive-through line runs over a pedestrian on their sidewalk. They built that environment. They profited from it. Their failure to protect the people in it may make them liable.
Key facts to investigate: Did the restaurant have bollards at the same location protecting equipment but not people? Did the chain have prior vehicle intrusion incidents at this or other locations? Was the drive-through lane designed in a way that brought vehicles alongside an unprotected pedestrian area? Did the restaurant’s hours and marketing specifically target the post-bar crowd? All of these are lines of inquiry that can establish both foreseeability and the company’s deliberate decision not to act.
8. How long do I have to file a claim in Texas?
In Texas, the general statute of limitations for personal injury claims is two years from the date of the incident. However, there are exceptions, tolling provisions for minors, and different rules that may apply depending on the defendant (for example, if a government entity is involved). You should not rely on this general statement as legal advice for your specific situation. Contact an attorney as soon as possible. Critical evidence — surveillance video, incident reports, internal communications — is often lost or destroyed early, and early investigation dramatically improves case outcomes.
9. My child was injured. Is the case handled differently?
Minor children’s claims are handled differently in several important respects. In Texas, the statute of limitations for a minor’s personal injury claim is generally tolled until the child turns 18, meaning the child has until age 20 to file their own claim. However, the parents’ claims for bystander damages, medical expenses paid on behalf of the child, and loss of the child’s services are subject to the standard two-year limitation period. Cases involving seriously injured children also tend to involve some of the highest damages in this category of litigation — the permanent consequences of childhood trauma, disfigurement, and injury carry a lifetime multiplier that juries in Texas take seriously.
10. What does “gross negligence” mean, and why does it matter?
Under Texas law, gross negligence requires proof that (1) the defendant’s act or omission, when viewed objectively, involved an extreme degree of risk, considering the probability and magnitude of potential harm to others; and (2) the defendant had actual, subjective awareness of the risk involved but nevertheless proceeded with conscious indifference to the rights, safety, or welfare of others.
In strong vehicle intrusion cases, both elements can be met. The risk of catastrophic injury from vehicle intrusion at an unprotected entrance is objectively extreme — the statistics, the industry guidelines, and the prior incidents establish that. The defendant’s actual awareness is established through its own documents: the inspection checklists, the internal communications, the bollards installed at other locations, the safety programs that were supposed to cover the facility in question.
Gross negligence matters because it opens the door to exemplary damages under Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code § 41.003. Exemplary damages are not compensatory — they are punitive and deterrent. The jury sets them with reference to the defendant’s net worth, the nature of the conduct, and what amount would actually deter repetition of the same conduct. For a national restaurant chain doing $5 billion a year or a hospital system with over $100 billion in market capitalization, that number can be very large.
11. I’m a lawyer outside Texas with a vehicle intrusion case. Can your firm help?
Yes. We welcome co-counsel arrangements with plaintiffs’ attorneys in other states who have vehicle intrusion or bollard liability cases. Through the Bernard and Vijay litigation, we have developed what we believe is the most comprehensive evidentiary and expert foundation in this area in any active litigation in the country — covering both hospital emergency room cases and fast-food drive-through cases. We know what the key documents look like, which admissions to pursue in corporate representative depositions, and which experts can address the technical bollard standards and the industry standard of care in both contexts.
Contact Us
If you or a family member was injured when a vehicle entered a building, store, hospital, or other premises, contact us for a free consultation. These cases have strict legal deadlines. Don’t wait to get answers.
Co-counsel arrangements are handled on a case-by-case basis depending on jurisdiction, facts, and timing. Contact Sean Breen directly at sbreen@howrybreen.com or (512) 474-7300 to discuss.
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Sean Breen has been recognized for obtaining the Number 1 Verdict in Texas for electrical injury and utility negligence. This win underscores his relentless commitment to achieving justice for his clients and showcases the firms dedication to exceptional advocacy.
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