Maryland Motorcycle Accident Lawyer Blog
Three Maryland riders did not come home in April 2026.
On April 4, a man was thrown from his motorcycle on I-370 in Gaithersburg and pronounced dead at the scene despite aggressive life-saving efforts by Montgomery County Fire and Rescue.
On April 7, a motorcyclist died at the intersection of Manor Road and Connecticut Avenue in Chevy Chase after a crash with a car around 6:14 a.m. The driver of the car was hospitalized with minor injuries.
On April 18, 24-year-old Donald Charles Ebaugh of Hampstead was killed on Marriottsville Road in Howard County. According to police, he was traveling northbound on a 2014 Yamaha FZ09 when a 2023 Nissan Rogue heading southbound attempted to make a left turn into his path. The motorcycle struck the SUV. Police said the preliminary investigation suggested the motorcycle was traveling at a high rate of speed. The Nissan driver was not injured.
Three different jurisdictions. Three different intersections. Three families who suddenly had to plan a funeral instead of a Saturday.
For Maryland riders and the people who love them, what happened in Howard County is worth a careful second look — not because the facts are unique, but because of the language. “High rate of speed.” That single phrase, especially when it appears in a preliminary press release, often becomes the centerpiece of how an insurance company tries to defeat a left-turn claim.
Why Left-Turn Crashes Are Among the Most Dangerous for Riders
Left-turn crashes are a recurring pattern in motorcycle fatalities, in Maryland and nationally. The dynamics are familiar. A driver waiting to turn left has to estimate the speed and distance of an oncoming vehicle, often through limited windshield framing, and frequently while juggling other inputs: radio, phone, passengers, the car turning out of a side street, or a glare that flattens depth perception.
Drivers misjudge motorcycles even more often than they misjudge cars. The smaller frontal profile of a bike makes it look farther away than it is, and a single headlight is harder to read for speed than two.
That is why Maryland law assigns a high duty of care to a driver attempting a left turn across oncoming traffic. The driver turning across must yield. When that duty is breached, and a rider is hurt or killed, the turning driver is generally the one whose conduct put both vehicles in the same physical space.
How Insurers Use “High Rate of Speed” to Shift the Story
Insurance companies have one job in a serious motorcycle case: control the cost. The cleanest way to do that, in a state with contributory negligence, is to argue that the rider contributed to the crash.
A line in a preliminary police report — “the motorcycle was traveling at a high rate of speed” — is the kind of phrase insurers can build an entire defense around. They will treat it as proof of recklessness. They will use it to justify a low offer, or no offer at all. They will repeat it to a jury if they think it will work.
What they often do not say out loud is that “high rate of speed” in a press release is not a measurement. It is an early observation, sometimes based on witness perception, sometimes based on damage patterns at the scene, and sometimes based on assumptions that do not survive scrutiny. It is also not the same thing as legal causation.
Even where a rider was traveling above the speed limit, the question in a Maryland injury case is not whether the rider was speeding. It is whether speeding by the rider was a proximate cause of the collision, and whether the turning driver could have avoided it by exercising reasonable care.
A driver does not get to turn into the path of an oncoming motorcycle and then point at the speedometer. That is a real legal argument that insurers have to deal with — but only if the rider’s case is built carefully.
Maryland’s Contributory Negligence Rule Makes Investigation Critical
Under Maryland’s contributory negligence rule, an injured person who is found to be even slightly at fault for a crash can be barred from recovering anything. That rule makes the early investigation in a motorcycle case enormously important.
Things that matter in left-turn motorcycle cases:
- The exact geometry of the intersection, including sightlines from the turning driver’s seated position.
- Signal timing and any traffic-camera footage.
- Speed reconstruction from skid marks, final rest positions, vehicle damage, and any onboard data.
- Helmet camera footage if the rider used one.
- Cell phone records for both drivers.
- Witness accounts captured before memories fade and stories shift.
A press release written hours after a fatal crash is not the last word on what happened. It is the first word, and it is often incomplete.
What Maryland Riders’ Families Should Know Right Now
If your family is in the position so many Maryland families have been in this April — trying to understand a crash report, trying to talk to insurance companies, trying to figure out what is true and what is being assumed — there are a few things worth holding onto.
You do not have to accept the first version of the story. You do not have to give a recorded statement to the other driver’s insurance company. You do not have to wait for the police investigation to wrap up to start preserving evidence. And contributory negligence, as harsh as it is, does not automatically defeat a left-turn case where the turning driver violated the right of way.
The motorcycle cases that come into Lebowitz & Mzhen Personal Injury Lawyers very often share the same insurance playbook: blame the rider, point at the bike, repeat the words “high rate of speed” enough times to make them feel like a verdict. The firm pushes back on that playbook with the kind of investigation a fatal or catastrophic crash actually deserves — accident reconstruction, intersection analysis, helmet-camera and traffic-camera footage, and a careful look at what the turning driver did or failed to do. Riders and their families deserve someone who treats their loss as more than a file number, and who refuses to let a preliminary phrase rewrite a careful person’s record.
Reach a Maryland Motorcycle Crash Lawyer for a Free, Confidential Consultation
If you lost a loved one or were seriously hurt in a Maryland motorcycle crash, the team at Lebowitz & Mzhen Personal Injury Lawyers is ready to listen. The firm offers a free consultation by phone at (800) 654-1949, and you can also reach the firm through the online contact form. There is no fee unless we recover compensation, and there is no pressure to make a decision before you are ready.