Guide to Ohio’s 2024 Car Accident Laws – Forbes Advisor

Ohio is a failure state. This means that a driver who caused an accident may be held liable to pay compensation to the accident victim.

This is in contrast to clean states like Florida. Under Florida car accident laws and laws in other no-fault states, victims cannot hold irresponsible drivers responsible for minor accidents. Instead, they must make a claim under their own personal injury protection.

This is not the case in Ohio and many other places. For example, Georgia’s car accident laws are among many with rules similar to those in Ohio. In Ohio and other at-fault states, a driver is at fault if his or her negligence was the direct cause of a collision that resulted in damages.

Victims can prove negligence by showing that the motorist who injured them was unreasonably negligent compared to a hypothetically reasonable driver, or by proving that the driver who injured them violated a safety regulation.

For example, in distracted or speeding car accidents, a victim could prove that a driver violated the speed limit or laws prohibiting cell phone use while driving. This would give rise to the presumption of negligence.

Ohio also follows modified comparative error rules. This means that if the other driver was at least 51% responsible for the accident, victims may hold them responsible for some losses. For example, if the other driver was 65% at fault, the accident victim could make a claim to recover 65% of his or her damages from the at-fault driver.