Area we serve · Hillsborough County
Car accident lawyer in West Tampa
The office’s own neighborhood, with an interstate cut through the middle of it
A crash in West Tampa is a Hillsborough County claim under the same Florida law as anywhere else: fourteen days to get initial care, the injury threshold, two years to sue. Two things are local. This is inside the City of Tampa, so Tampa Police write the report rather than the Sheriff — the opposite of the unincorporated communities a few blocks north and west. And Interstate 275 runs straight through the middle of the neighborhood, which puts interstate speeds and a dense old street grid in the same square mile. The statutes are on the Florida car accident page. What follows is about this ground, which is also where this office sits.
01 What a crash here actually looks like
An old grid, a pair of one-ways, and an interstate through the center
Interstate 275 runs through the approximate center of West Tampa. The on and off ramps dump highway-speed traffic onto surface streets that were laid out long before the interstate existed, and the blocks either side of it absorb that transition.
Howard and Armenia Avenues are the north-south pair, and they move a great deal of traffic quickly through a neighborhood of short blocks, driveways and parked cars. One-way pairs produce a particular kind of collision: the driver who looks the wrong way.
Columbus Drive and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard are the east-west arterials, carrying the traffic between the interstate, the hospital and the airport corridor.
The grid itself is historic and tight. The National Register historic district, listed in 1984, runs roughly south to Cypress Street, west to Armenia and Habana Avenues, north to Columbus Drive and east to Albany and Fremont. Short blocks, narrow lanes, cars at the curb and limited sight distance at almost every corner.
An interstate through the middle of a street grid built before interstates existed.
02 The part nobody tells you
Inside the city here, outside it a few blocks away
West Tampa is inside the City of Tampa, so the Tampa Police Department writes the crash report. Its historical boundaries run from the Hillsborough River and Rome Avenue on the east to Dale Mabry Highway on the west, with Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard to the north and Kennedy Boulevard to the south.
That is the opposite of what happens just outside it. Hillsborough County has only three incorporated cities — Tampa, Temple Terrace and Plant City — so a short distance north or west and the report belongs to the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office instead. On Interstate 275 it is the Florida Highway Patrol. Three agencies, one neighborhood, and the right one depends on the block.
Because this is a city, there is a city to claim against. Where a city vehicle or a dangerous condition on a city street is involved, the claim runs under Fla. Stat. § 768.28: written notice to the city within three years, six months for it to respond before suit, caps of $200,000 per person and $300,000 per incident, and four years to file rather than two.
St. Joseph’s Hospital is on the northern edge, at 3001 West Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. It is a Level II adult trauma center and a state-designated pediatric trauma center, which means most serious injuries from here are treated in the neighborhood. The county’s only Level I adult center is Tampa General on Davis Islands.
A West Tampa case is filed in the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit, at 800 East Twiggs Street downtown. Most injury claims resolve with the insurer before a suit is filed.
03 The roads
Where the claims actually come from
Interstate 275, through the center, with ramps feeding highway traffic onto the old grid.
Howard and Armenia Avenues, the north-south one-way pair, fast through short residential blocks.
Columbus Drive, the main east-west arterial across the neighborhood.
Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, the northern edge, past the hospital and toward the airport corridor.
Habana and Albany Avenues, the quieter north-south streets that take the overflow, and where this office sits.
04 What to do now
The things that can only be done in the first two weeks
A checklist rather than advice about your own case, and nothing in it requires hiring anyone.
Get seen within fourteen days
Personal Injury Protection pays nothing at all if the first treatment falls outside fourteen days — not a reduced amount, nothing. It is the deadline that expires before most people have decided what to do.
Confirm it was Tampa Police
Inside the city it is the Tampa Police Department. A short distance north or west it is the Sheriff, and on Interstate 275 it is the Florida Highway Patrol. Note which agency and the report number.
Say so if anything public was involved
A city vehicle, a signal that was dark, a defect in a city street. That puts the claim under § 768.28, which starts with a written notice rather than a demand and runs on different deadlines.
Photograph the corner, not just the cars
On short blocks with cars parked at the curb, what each driver could see approaching the intersection is the argument. A photograph from the driver’s eye level answers it; a diagram does not.
Note the ramp if there was one
A crash at an Interstate 275 ramp involves a speed change that surface-street witnesses consistently misjudge. Where exactly it happened matters to how it gets reconstructed.
Pull your own declarations page
Uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage, and whether it stacks. Florida does not require any driver to carry bodily injury liability, so your own policy is often the ceiling.
Do not give the other insurer a recorded statement
You are not required to. The answer given in the first week gets quoted back for the next two years.
05 The kinds of crash this covers
The same streets, four different claims
Hillsborough County recorded 26,269 traffic crashes in 2024, with 17,359 people injured and 180 killed, according to the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles. That is a county figure; no published count exists for West Tampa alone. Which of them a historic grid with an interstate through it produces is the local part.
Car accidents
The bulk of it, and here the pattern is intersections and the one-way pair rather than open-road speed — short blocks, parked cars, and a driver who looked the wrong way.
Pedestrian accidents
This is a walking neighborhood crossed by arterials, which is the combination that produces these. They turn on how fault is divided, and more than half the fault means recovering nothing at all.
Bicycle accidents
A bicycle carries no Personal Injury Protection of its own, so the first question is whether a household auto policy reaches the rider — it often does, and most riders have never been told.
Hit and run
A dense grid with many exits is where a driver leaves, and uninsured motorist coverage is what usually answers when nobody is identified.
06 Also for West Tampa
The other matters this office takes from here
Injury work is most of this practice. The rest run from this same office, each with its own page and its own fee terms.
Immigration
Removal defense, bond, asylum, family petitions and citizenship — in a neighborhood whose Cuban and Italian history goes back to the cigar industry that built it.
Family law
Divorce, time-sharing, support, property and protective orders in the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit, filed downtown at 800 East Twiggs Street.
Criminal defense
Bond and release conditions, DUI, drug charges, theft and domestic violence, after an arrest by Tampa Police rather than by the Sheriff.
Property insurance claims
A denied or underpaid claim on one of the older houses here, where age and prior repairs become the insurer’s whole argument about causation.
07 How this works
The consultation, the documents, and what it costs
The first conversation is with Jose A. Dapena, not with an intake department. On an injury matter it is free and commits you to nothing, and it can happen by phone.
The office is at 4231 N Habana Avenue, which is in this neighborhood rather than across town. Of all the areas this firm serves, this is the one where walking in is realistic.
Fees differ by practice and are stated before anything is signed. Injury work is contingent, normally payable only if there is a recovery, with costs governed by the written agreement. Family and immigration are hourly, with payment plans and separate government filing fees. Criminal is a flat fee set by the charges and the scope, with no payment plans. The free consultation is an injury term and does not travel to the others.
08 Who you deal with
Jose A. Dapena
Admitted to The Florida Bar in 1998, number 152358, and admitted to the United States District Courts for the Southern, Middle and Northern Districts of Florida — the Middle District covers Hillsborough.
Before representing injured people he was in-house counsel for a Personal Injury Protection carrier, reviewing claims on the insurer’s behalf: the same analysis a claim meets now, learned from the other side of the file.
09 The law behind this
- Fla. Stat. § 627.736 Personal Injury Protection
80% of medical expenses and 60% of lost wages up to $10,000, and the fourteen-day deadline for initial care.
- Fla. Stat. § 768.28 Claims against the city
Written notice to the city within three years, six months for it to respond, and caps of $200,000 per person and $300,000 per incident.
- Fla. Stat. § 768.81 Comparative fault
More than 50% at fault and the claim recovers nothing, which is the whole argument in a pedestrian case.
- Fla. Stat. § 95.11 Deadlines
Two years to sue on most negligence claims accruing on or after March 24, 2023 — four years where the defendant is a government.
10 Official resources
Questions
Who writes the crash report in West Tampa?
The Tampa Police Department, because this is inside the city limits. A short distance north or west it becomes unincorporated county and the report belongs to the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office instead, and on Interstate 275 it is the Florida Highway Patrol.
Is the office actually in West Tampa?
Yes. It is at 4231 N Habana Avenue. This is the one area the firm serves where coming to the office in person is a short trip rather than a drive across the county.
Which hospital would I be taken to?
St. Joseph’s Hospital at 3001 West Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, on the northern edge of the neighborhood — a Level II adult trauma center and a state-designated pediatric trauma center. Tampa General, the county’s only Level I adult center, is across the river on Davis Islands.
A city vehicle was involved. Is that different?
Very. A claim against the City of Tampa runs under Fla. Stat. § 768.28: written notice within three years, six months for the city to respond before suit, and caps of $200,000 for one person and $300,000 for the incident. The period to file is four years rather than two.
My crash was on an I-275 ramp.
Then the report is probably the Florida Highway Patrol’s, and the speed change at a ramp is something surface-street witnesses regularly misjudge. It is still a Hillsborough claim under the same law.
My matter is not a car accident. Do you take those too?
Yes — immigration, family law, criminal defense and property insurance claims are all handled from this office, each with its own page and its own fee terms. The free consultation is an injury term and does not apply to those.
How long do I have?
Fourteen days to get initial care for Personal Injury Protection to pay anything, and two years to sue on most negligence claims. If the city is the defendant, four years to sue but written notice within three.
Talk to Jose A. Dapena about a West Tampa crash
The office is on North Habana Avenue, in this neighborhood, and the first conversation about an injury costs nothing. If the matter is not an injury, the fee terms are set out in writing before anything begins.