Hit-and-Run Laws and What to Do in the District of Columbia

In DC, a hit-and-run is charged as leaving after colliding. Here is what the law requires, what fleeing costs, and how victims of an unidentified driver still get paid.

ThatCarHitMe.com Editorial
May 28, 2026
7 min read

Hit-and-run laws and what to do in the District of Columbia

Someone hits your car and drives off. Maybe you caught a plate, maybe just a color and a sick feeling. In the District, that driver committed a crime the D.C. Code calls "leaving after colliding," and the same crash starts a set of civil deadlines and coverage rights that decide whether you actually get paid.

The national hub covers hit-and-run in general. This page sticks to what is true inside D.C.: the statute numbers, the dollar figures, and the deadlines that apply here and nowhere else.

What the law requires after any collision

D.C. Code § 50-2201.05c is blunt about the duty. Any driver who knows, or has reason to believe, that their vehicle was in a collision must immediately stop.1 What comes next depends on what got hit.

If a person is injured, you have to call 911 (or have someone call it in), stay at the scene until law enforcement arrives, and give your identifying information.1 That means your name, address, and the vehicle's registration, the basics the other side needs to make a claim. If the damage is only to property or a domestic animal, you still have to give that information to the owner or report the collision to the police.1

The phrase that trips people up is "reason to believe." You don't have to be sure you hit something. If a reasonable driver would have known a collision happened, driving off is enough to support a charge, even if you say you never felt the impact.

What leaving the scene costs

The penalties in § 50-2201.05c scale with the harm done. Leave the scene of a crash that hurt someone, and a first offense carries up to 180 days in jail, a fine, or both.1 The fine ceiling comes from the District's fine schedule at § 22-3571.01, which caps a 180-day offense at $1,000.2 A second or later offense pushes the exposure to a year in jail and a $2,500 fine.12

Leave the scene of a property-damage-only crash and the numbers fall: up to 30 days and a $250 fine for a first offense, rising to 90 days and $500 for a repeat.12 The gap between staying and fleeing a minor scrape is the gap between swapping insurance details and a criminal record.

The statute has no separate tier for a death. A fatal crash is charged under the District's negligent homicide law, § 50-2203.01, which makes causing a death by careless, reckless, or negligent driving a felony punishable by up to five years in prison.3 Fleeing does not erase that; it stacks the leaving-after-colliding charge on top.

The hit to your driving record

The criminal case is only half of it. The DMV runs its own point system, and hit-and-run sits near the top of the scale. Leaving the scene of a collision that caused personal injury is 12 points, which triggers automatic revocation of your D.C. license.4 Leaving a property-only crash is 8 points.4 For comparison, the DMV suspends a license for 90 days at 9 points and revokes it, for at least six months, at 12.4 A single injury hit-and-run conviction clears that revocation line by itself.

If the driver took off, you can still recover

Here is the part that matters most when you were the one hit. In the District, a driver who flees and is never identified counts, for insurance purposes, as an uninsured driver. D.C. Code § 31-2406 defines an "uninsured motor vehicle" to include one that "causes bodily injury or property damage and whose owner or operator cannot be identified."5 That one sentence is why a hit-and-run does not have to end your claim.

Every D.C. auto policy has to carry uninsured motorist (UM) coverage at the same floor as liability: $25,000 per person and $50,000 per accident for bodily injury, plus $5,000 in UM property damage subject to a $200 deductible.56 So even when the other car is never found, you can file a UM claim on your own policy for your injuries and, above that deductible, your vehicle damage.

To make that claim hold up, you need a paper trail. Report the crash to the Metropolitan Police Department and get the accident report, which MPD files on its PD Form 10. You or your attorney can request a copy directly from the department; the steps live on our D.C. crash report page.7 If your car is worth less on resale even after a clean repair, that is a separate diminished value claim worth making.

If you added personal injury protection (PIP) to your policy, that is another route to getting medical bills paid without waiting for the other driver to surface. PIP is optional in the District (insurers must offer it, and you can turn it down in writing), and the minimum benefits run to $50,000 for medical and rehabilitation costs, $12,000 for lost wages, and $4,000 for funeral expenses.8 The catch is a deadline: you have to elect PIP benefits in writing within 60 days of the crash, and choosing them limits your right to sue unless your injuries clear a serious-injury or cost threshold.8

Watch the clock on the lawsuit too. The District's statute of limitations gives you three years to file a personal injury claim and three years for vehicle damage.9 If the car that hit you turns out to belong to the District government, a much shorter rule kicks in: you have to give the Mayor written notice of the claim within six months.10 Miss either deadline and an otherwise strong case can be gone.

One more D.C. trap worth knowing: the District follows a strict contributory negligence rule. In an ordinary driver-versus-driver claim, being found even one percent at fault can bar you from recovering anything.11 The Council carved out an exception for pedestrians, cyclists, and other vulnerable users, who keep a comparative-fault standard and recover unless their own share of the fault is greater than everyone else's combined.12 If you were walking or biking when a driver hit you and sped off, that carve-out can be the difference between a full recovery and zero.

This is also why your own coverage carries so much weight here. The District's minimum liability limits are just $25,000/$50,000/$10,000, and they have not moved since 1986, so even a driver who does get caught may carry too little to cover a serious injury.6 The Council passed a bill in June 2026 (B26-0057) to raise the bodily-injury minimums to $50,000/$100,000, but it had not taken effect as of mid-2026, so the old floors still apply.13 Your UM coverage, and a lawyer who knows how to push it, often does more for you than the at-fault driver's policy ever will. If you want that help, start with our legal directory.

This article is general information, not legal advice.

Sources

  1. D.C. Code § 50-2201.05c, Leaving after colliding. https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/50-2201.05c

  2. D.C. Code § 22-3571.01, Fines for criminal offenses. https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/22-3571.01

  3. D.C. Code § 50-2203.01, Negligent homicide. https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/50-2203.01

  4. District of Columbia DMV, Driver Point System Chart. https://dmv.dc.gov/page/point-system-chart

  5. D.C. Code § 31-2406, Uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage. https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2406

  6. District of Columbia DMV, Vehicle Insurance requirements. https://dmv.dc.gov/service/vehicle-insurance

  7. Metropolitan Police Department, Request an Accident Report (PD-10). https://mpdc.dc.gov/service/request-accident-report-pd-10-or-incidentoffense-report-pd-251

  8. D.C. Code § 31-2404, Personal injury protection benefits; § 31-2405, election and threshold. https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2404

  9. D.C. Code § 12-301, Limitation of time for bringing actions. https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/12-301

  10. D.C. Code § 12-309, Notice to District of injury or damage. https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/12-309

  11. Wingfield v. Peoples Drug Store, Inc., 379 A.2d 685 (D.C. 1977). https://law.justia.com/cases/district-of-columbia/court-of-appeals/1977/11243-3.html

  12. D.C. Code § 50-2204.52, Contributory negligence limitation for vulnerable users. https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/50-2204.52

  13. District of Columbia B26-0057, Motor Vehicle Insurance Modernization Act of 2025. https://legiscan.com/DC/bill/B26-0057/2025

About This Guide

Written by: ThatCarHitMe.com Editorial

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