Indiana's Two Fault Systems: What to Know Before You File an Injury Claim

Most states pick one fault rule and apply it to everyone. Indiana runs two — and which one governs your claim depends entirely on who hurt you. Injured by a private driver or business, and you are in a fairly forgiving comparative fault system. Injured by a city vehicle, a county road crew, or a public school, and you drop into one of the harshest rules in American law, with a notice deadline measured in months, not years.

The rule most people hear about: comparative fault

For claims against private defendants, Indiana follows modified comparative fault. Under Ind. Code 34-51-2-5, any fault assigned to you reduces your compensation proportionately, and under Ind. Code 34-51-2-6, you are barred from recovering only if your share of the fault climbs above 50%. Found 20% responsible? You can generally still recover, minus that 20%. Found 50% responsible? Still eligible, at half. Found 51% responsible? Nothing.

That last percentage point is why fault fights in Indiana are so intense. The number an insurance adjuster floats in an early phone call is a negotiating position, not a verdict — juries decide fault if a case goes the distance, and most percentage disputes are far more contestable than injured people assume.

The trap: when the government is on the other side

Here is the part of Indiana law that genuinely surprises people. The Comparative Fault Act expressly does not apply to tort claims against governmental entities or public employees — Ind. Code 34-51-2-2 carves them out entirely. Those claims instead fall under the old common-law rule of contributory negligence, where being found even slightly at fault can bar recovery completely.

So the same crash can play out two completely different ways. Sideswiped by a private delivery van while going a little over the limit? Your speed likely just trims your recovery. Sideswiped by a city-owned truck in the same circumstances? The government’s lawyers can argue that your own sliver of fault ends the claim outright. Fault that would be a footnote in an ordinary case becomes the whole battle when a public entity is the defendant.

Government claims come with two more tripwires under the Indiana Tort Claims Act:

• A short notice clock. Before you can sue, you generally must serve a formal tort claim notice — within 180 days of the loss for claims against a city, county, town, or school corporation (Ind. Code 34-13-3-8), and within 270 days for claims against the State of Indiana or a state agency (Ind. Code 34-13-3-6). Miss the notice window and the claim is usually gone, no matter how strong it was.
• Damage limits. Recovery against a governmental entity is generally capped at $700,000 per person and $5 million per occurrence under Ind. Code 34-13-3-4, and punitive damages are not available.

If there is any chance a government entity is involved — a pothole the county knew about, a crash with a municipal vehicle, an injury on public property — the safe assumption is that your real deadline is months away, not years.

The clocks: two years for most everything else

For ordinary personal injury claims, Indiana generally allows two years from the date of injury to file suit, under Ind. Code 34-11-2-4. That two-year rule covers most car crashes, slip and falls, and other negligence claims.

Limited exceptions exist. If the injured person was under a legal disability when the injury occurred — a minor, for example, or someone mentally incapacitated — the clock generally does not start until the disability is removed. Courts apply these exceptions narrowly, so no one should plan around them without advice from a licensed Indiana attorney. To see how Indiana’s window compares with its neighbors, our state-by-state statute of limitations guide lays the deadlines side by side, and our Indiana quick-reference page collects the state’s key rules in one place.

Auto claims: at-fault, at the Crossroads of America

Indiana is not a no-fault state. It runs a traditional at-fault (tort) system: the driver who caused the crash, through their liability insurance, is generally responsible for the harm. There is no PIP requirement and no injury threshold to clear before you can bring a liability claim — fault, not a statutory threshold, is the whole ballgame.

Indiana drivers are generally required to carry minimum liability coverage of $25,000 per person and $50,000 per crash for bodily injury. Serious injuries exhaust those minimums quickly, which is why uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage on your own policy often ends up mattering more than the other driver’s.

One structural fact shapes a lot of Indiana crash claims: the state’s motto is the Crossroads of America, and it is earned. Major freight corridors — I-65, I-70, I-69, I-74, and the I-80/94 corridor across the north — funnel enormous volumes of commercial truck traffic through and around Indianapolis. Crashes involving semis and delivery fleets bring different insurance policies, federal regulations, and evidence (driver logs, telematics) than an ordinary two-car collision, and that evidence can disappear fast if no one asks for it.

Damage caps: mostly none, with two big exceptions

For ordinary injury claims against private defendants, Indiana generally does not cap compensatory damages — economic or non-economic. The exceptions:

• Medical malpractice. Indiana’s Medical Malpractice Act caps total recovery at $1.8 million for acts of malpractice occurring after June 30, 2019, with the provider responsible for up to $500,000 and the state’s Patient’s Compensation Fund covering the excess. Med-mal claims also generally route through a medical review panel before trial, a distinctive Indiana procedure that adds time and its own filing rules.
• Government claims. The Tort Claims Act caps described above.

Punitive damages, where available at all, are generally capped at three times compensatory damages or $50,000, whichever is greater — and in a quirk few plaintiffs see coming, Indiana law directs 75% of any punitive award to a state fund for violent crime victims, not to the injured person. What any individual claim is worth turns on facts, coverage, and fault, and we walk through those variables in what goes into an injury claim’s value.

What changed recently

Effective January 1, 2026, the Indiana Supreme Court amended the state’s Rules of Trial Procedure — among other things, permitting service of lawsuits by social media in limited circumstances and eliminating boilerplate “general objections” in discovery. These are procedural changes rather than shifts in your underlying rights, but they are a reminder that Indiana practice is actively evolving, and that pages written even a year ago may describe rules that no longer apply. Everything here reflects the general state of the law as of 2026; confirm the specifics with a licensed Indiana attorney before relying on them.

The practical takeaway

Two questions drive almost everything about an Indiana injury claim: who is the defendant, and when did the injury happen. A claim against a private party generally gives you two years and a forgiving fault rule. A claim touching any government entity gives you months to act and a fault rule where any misstep can be fatal to the case. If you are not sure which side of that line your situation falls on, that is precisely the question to get answered early — not at month five.

If you were hurt in Indiana and want to know whether you may have a claim, answer a few questions about what happened and we will connect you with a participating law firm that can evaluate it. Free, confidential, and no obligation.