No person riding in or occupying a vehicle owned by him and driven by another person with his permission has any right of action for civil damages against the driver of the vehicle or against any other person legally liable for the conduct of the driver on account of personal injury to or the death of the owner during the ride, unless the plaintiff in any such action establishes that the injury or death proximately resulted from the intoxication or willful misconduct of the driver.
Cal. Veh. Code § 17158
Private Owners
Applied in 21 court decisions — leading case 8 Cal. 3d 855 - Brown v. Merlo (1973)
Most recently applied in 19 Cal. 4th 714 - Calvillo-Silva v. Home Grocery (December 1998)
Amended by Stats. 1973, Ch. 803.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: California Legislative Information. Reproduced from public-domain California statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.