E-bikes in San Diego are causing severe injuries among children due to their high speeds and lack of regulation.
SAN DIEGO — Gone are the days when a child falls off their bicycle and suffers only a scraped knee.
Hundreds of children across San Diego have faced severe or life-threatening injuries after crashing while riding e-bikes. What makes e-bike injuries different is the speeds these devices can reach — whether by design or through illegal modifications. In 2025 alone, Rady Children’s Hospital treated 262 patients in its Intensive Care Unit.
The total number of severe injuries is much higher, but it’s difficult to track. Some children were treated in emergency rooms across the city and released.
Even a crash at the top speed of the slowest e-bike on the market — which is roughly 20 MPH — can be equivalent to a child falling from a 30-foot building.
San Diego police often see the worst injuries before children are hospitalized. Officers want to prevent these life-threatening crashes, but current laws make enforcement difficult. As of now, there is no e-bike rider age restriction in the city of San Diego. Lawmakers, such as Councilmember Raul Campillo, are working to create regulations in San Diego for the emerging technology before more lives are severely impacted.
Police say young riders and their parents may not realize that a crime committed on an e-bike at age 12 can affect future driver’s license eligibility and even college admissions.
News 8 sat down with San Diego police officers Nicholas Tamagni and Anthony Carrasco to better understand the hurdles officers face in enforcing the law — and what riders may not understand before they take a ride.
“I actually investigated the first serious injury traffic collision involving a 14-year-old child on an electric motorcycle. It was actually unreported at first, because people were unaware that the child was actually on a motorcycle. They were just starting to gain in popularity. I actually was asked to go to the hospital to work this crash backwards and figure out what happened. I remember when I walked into the hospital and I saw the child in the ICU, unconscious on a ventilator, in just horrible shape, and I was told he probably wasn’t going to survive. I remember the absolute devastation on the parents’ faces. I knew at this time that certain things were illegal, and I asked the parent, I said, ‘Was he on this type of motorcycle?’ And he said, ‘Yes.’ My heart sank, because I just knew that this was not a bicycle collision anymore. At this point, I was looking at a 14-year-old boy who was wearing a bicycle helmet when he crashed his motorcycle. I said, ‘Never again.’ I said, ‘I never want another parent to have to go through what these parents are going through, possibly lose their child or have that type of injury.’ It’s definitely a life-changing moment for me. I don’t let it bias how I do my job. But like I said, I just said ‘I never want to see another child in this situation ever again.’”
“You see the passion that comes out in officers for instances like this. I think that it’s important to realize that sometimes when you do have those contacts with law enforcement, you’re out riding on one of these e-motorcycles, and you see an officer who’s feeling very strongly about it, it’s because of the things that [Officer Tamagni] has seen out in the field enforcing these laws. I work a lot in our media relations unit and on social media, and the comments that we get a lot of the time are, ‘Why don’t you guys focus on real crime? This isn’t a good allocation of resources. Why are you guys using a police helicopter to chase down these e-motorcycles?’ My response is always that this is a crime that is seriously injuring people and seriously affecting the quality of life for our neighborhoods. So this is exactly what San Diegans ask us to do, and I think it’s time and resources well spent.”
