There were 128,769 reported crashes across Massachusetts in 2025.1 Most of those drivers stopped. When one doesn't, the law has a specific name for it, leaving the scene, and it sits in the state's motor vehicle code with real jail time attached. If you were the one left standing at the curb, you also have a specific set of moves that protect your medical bills and your claim, even when the other car is already gone.
Here's what Massachusetts law actually says, and what you should do.
What the law requires you to do at the scene
Massachusetts doesn't use the phrase "hit and run" in its statute. It uses "goes away without stopping." Under M.G.L. c. 90, § 24, a driver who collides with another vehicle, with property, or with a person, and then goes away without stopping to give a name, residence, and the vehicle's register number, has committed a crime.2 That duty applies even when nobody else is around. If you clip a parked car or a mailbox and can't find the owner, leaving a note with your information is how you comply.
What gets you charged under § 24 is the leaving, whether or not the crash was your fault.
The criminal penalties, by what was damaged
The penalty ladder in § 24 climbs sharply with what the fleeing driver hit.
Property only. Leaving after hitting a vehicle or property carries a fine of $20 to $200, or imprisonment for two weeks to two years.2 The registrar can revoke the driver's license on top of that.
Personal injury. Leaving after injuring someone is punished by six months to two years in jail and a fine of $500 to $1,000 under § 24(2)(a½)(1).2 A first offense also costs the driver a one-year license loss.
Death. Leaving the scene of a crash that kills someone is a felony under § 24(2)(a½)(2). It carries two and a half to ten years in state prison and a $1,000 to $5,000 fine, or a year to two and a half years in a house of correction with the same fine.2 There is a mandatory minimum, so this is not a charge that gets fully suspended away.
One quirk worth knowing: the statute lets the registrar hold off on a license suspension when "the court or magistrate recommends otherwise,"2 so the judge in the criminal case has a say in whether the driver keeps the right to drive.
The report you owe the RMV within five days
This part catches people off guard, because it applies even if you did everything right and stayed. M.G.L. c. 90, § 26 requires the operator of any vehicle in a crash that kills or injures someone, or that causes more than $1,000 in damage to any one vehicle or piece of property, to file a written report with the Registry of Motor Vehicles within five days.3 A copy goes to the police department for the city or town where it happened.3
The form is the Motor Vehicle Crash Operator Report, and the RMV publishes it on Mass.gov.4 Miss the deadline and the registrar can suspend your license for the failure alone.3 File it even in a hit-and-run. Your report is often the official record that a phantom driver existed.
How you get paid when the other driver is gone
This is where Massachusetts is genuinely different from most states, and it's good news for hit-and-run victims.
Massachusetts is a no-fault state. Every auto policy includes Personal Injury Protection, and it pays your medical bills and lost wages up to $8,000 per person regardless of who caused the crash, under M.G.L. c. 90, § 34M.5 Because PIP doesn't turn on fault, it pays even when the other driver never stopped. Once your doctor sends the bills, the insurer has to start paying within ten days or send you a written denial.5
For anything past that $8,000, your uninsured motorist coverage does the heavy lifting. Massachusetts requires every policy to carry UM coverage, and the statute, M.G.L. c. 175, § 113L, states that it covers injuries caused by "hit-and-run motor vehicles."6 As of July 1, 2025, the mandatory minimum is $25,000 per person and $50,000 per crash.6
Now the part that trips up a lot of drivers: you do not need to have been touched by the other car. In Surrey v. Lumbermens Mutual Casualty Co., 384 Mass. 171 (1981), a driver was forced off the road by an oncoming car that never made contact and was never identified. The Supreme Judicial Court held that an insurer can't use a "physical contact" clause to deny a hit-and-run UM claim, because that limit conflicts with § 113L.7 A car that runs you into a guardrail and speeds off is still a hit-and-run under your policy, contact or not.
To document the claim, you'll want the police crash report, which the RMV's Crash Records unit provides through Mass.gov.8 You can read how to get your Massachusetts crash report here.
Deadlines and fault if the driver turns up
Hit-and-run drivers get identified more often than you'd think, through plate fragments or camera footage. If the driver is found, ordinary injury rules apply.
You have three years from the date of the crash to file a personal injury or property damage lawsuit, under M.G.L. c. 260, § 2A.9 That clock is the same for your car as it is for your body.
Massachusetts follows modified comparative negligence. Under M.G.L. c. 231, § 85, you can recover only if you were no more than 50% at fault, and your award drops by your share of the blame.10 A driver who flees is rarely the sympathetic party, but the rule still governs the math.
There's also a tort threshold. To sue a fleeing driver for pain and suffering, your reasonable medical bills generally have to exceed $2,000, unless the crash caused death, a fracture, permanent disfigurement, or loss of sight or hearing, under M.G.L. c. 231, § 6D.11 Below that threshold, PIP and property coverage are usually the whole recovery.
If your car lost market value even after a clean repair, that's a separate claim. Here's how diminished value works in Massachusetts.
For a sense of the risk, Boston alone recorded 451 crashes in April 2026.12 Not all become hit-and-runs, but the volume is why UM coverage matters. New minimum liability limits of $25,000/$50,000/$30,000 also took effect July 1, 2025 under Acts of 2024, c. 275,13 so it's worth checking that your own policy carries more than the floor. A hit-and-run claim is one of the harder ones to handle alone, and you can find a Massachusetts attorney here.
This is general information, not legal advice.
Sources
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thatcarhitme.com, Massachusetts Year-over-Year Crash Report, 2025. https://thatcarhitme.com/crash-data/massachusetts/statewide/2025-annual-report
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 90, § 24. https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXIV/Chapter90/Section24
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 90, § 26. https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXIV/Chapter90/Section26
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Massachusetts RMV, Report a Motor Vehicle Crash (Motor Vehicle Crash Operator Report). https://www.mass.gov/how-to/report-a-motor-vehicle-crash
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 90, § 34M. https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXIV/Chapter90/Section34M
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 175, § 113L. https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXXII/Chapter175/Section113L
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Surrey v. Lumbermens Mutual Casualty Co., 384 Mass. 171 (1981), via CourtListener. https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2074998/surrey-v-lumbermens-mutual-casualty-co/
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Massachusetts RMV, Request a Copy of a Police Crash Report. https://www.mass.gov/how-to/request-a-copy-of-a-police-crash-report
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 260, § 2A. https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartIII/TitleV/Chapter260/Section2A
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 231, § 85. https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartIII/TitleII/Chapter231/Section85
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Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 231, § 6D. https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartIII/TitleII/Chapter231/Section6D
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thatcarhitme.com, Boston Crash Report, April 2026. https://thatcarhitme.com/crash-data/massachusetts/boston/april-2026-report
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Acts of 2024, c. 275 (amending Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 90, § 34A). https://malegislature.gov/Laws/SessionLaws/Acts/2024/Chapter275