Deborah Song practices under her own name, doing business as Empire Law, a personal injury and car accident firm she founded in May 2021 to serve Riverside and San Bernardino counties from its office in Norco, California. She was born and raised in Moreno Valley, two cities away, and headquartering the firm in the Inland Empire rather than Orange County or Los Angeles was deliberate. Her full biography is published on her attorney site, including the recognitions summarized below.
Song earned her J.D. from Western State University College of Law and her undergraduate degree from the University of California, Riverside. She was admitted to the State Bar of California on May 28, 2021, and has practiced as a licensed attorney since that date. She entered the legal field earlier, in 2017, working as a case manager, legal advocate, and litigation associate, a period the firm counts separately from her years as a licensed attorney because the roles carry different professional responsibilities.
Song's trial-first posture is the credential this book leans on most directly. She earned the nickname "Queen of Sanctions" at a Santa Ana trial firm early in her career for holding defense attorneys accountable in court, and she carried it into her own practice: cases at the firm are prepared as though they are going to trial, on the theory that thorough preparation is what creates the leverage to settle. Her willingness to file motions for sanctions rather than let opposing counsel run out the clock, and her practice's stated policy of never handing a client off to a case manager, are the habits behind this book's chapters on insurance-company tactics and evidence preservation. She was named a Rising Star by Super Lawyers in 2025 and 2026, and has helped recover over $50 million for clients across her career.
Roughly 95 percent of the firm's caseload is car, motorcycle, and pedestrian collision claims, the category this book is written for, alongside dog bites, premises liability, and identity theft. Empire Law also staffs a property damage department, a service Song has described as one the firm does not profit from directly but includes because clients need it while they are still recovering physically: vehicle inspections, rental cars, total-loss valuations, and the diminution-in-value claims discussed in Chapter 7. Through the Inland Empire's Hispanic Bar Association and Mexican-American Bar Association chapters she addresses a concern she hears often in the region, the fear that pursuing a crash claim could expose a family's immigration status. Her practice does not ask clients for a Social Security number, and immigration status has no bearing on a person's right to compensation for an injury someone else caused.
Song hosts the Inland Empire Injury Law podcast, where the conversation behind this book's chapters was originally recorded as Episode 4: How to File a Car Accident Claim in Inland Empire, available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. She is verified through her listing on the State Bar of California's official attorney directory, bar number 337172.
Song built Empire Law around a simple bet: that a claimant who understands the process protects it better than one who is guessing. That is the same bet this book makes. If a car accident anywhere in the Inland Empire, in Riverside County, San Bernardino County, Norco, Eastvale, Corona, or anywhere along the corridor the 91 and the 215 cut through the region, has left you or someone you love figuring out what happens next, Empire Law offers a free consultation to talk through the specifics of your case.