Hit and Run Accident Lawyer in Missouri

Who pays when the driver is never found, and who pays when the driver is found?

When the driver is never found, your own insurer pays. RSMo 303.025 requires every Missouri driver to carry liability insurance, and every policy sold in the state includes uninsured motorist coverage, which is the coverage that responds to an unidentified driver. It pays medical bills, lost income and pain and suffering up to its limit. The claim goes to your own company, which evaluates it as an adversary would.

If your household has more than one policy, more than one may respond. Missouri lets a person who lives with a relative look to that relative's uninsured motorist coverage in many situations, and a passenger can look to the policy on the vehicle they were in as well as their own. Whether limits stack depends on the language of each policy, so we collect the declarations pages and the full policy forms from every carrier in the home.

Missouri has no public fund for a victim with no coverage anywhere in the household. That person's claim depends on the driver being found, so the search becomes the case, and we run it alongside the police investigation rather than behind it. Underinsured motorist coverage, which is optional in Missouri, matters once a driver is identified and turns out to carry only the state minimum.

When the driver is found, the picture changes. The driver's liability insurer becomes the primary source of recovery, your uninsured motorist claim converts into an underinsured claim if you bought that coverage and the driver's limits are too low, and the driver personally is exposed for anything above the insurance. Leaving the scene is a crime under RSMo 577.060, and a guilty plea or conviction becomes powerful evidence in the civil case. If the driver was working, the employer's policy is on the line too.

How much is a Missouri hit and run claim worth?

A hit and run claim is measured the same way as any other injury claim: by what was lost. Medical bills already paid, the treatment your doctors expect to order next, wages missed, benefits lost, the drop in earning power if you cannot return to your old job, and expenses like rides to therapy are the economic side. Pain, scarring, sleep lost, activities given up and the strain a long recovery puts on a household are the non economic side.

What is different is the ceiling. When the driver stays unidentified, the ceiling is the uninsured motorist limit on the policies that respond, added together if they stack. A person carrying the state minimum in uninsured motorist coverage has a much smaller ceiling than one who bought higher limits, no matter how serious the injury. That is why we hunt for every policy in the household before anyone talks about a number.

Severity moves the number within that ceiling. A soft tissue injury that resolves with therapy sits low. A fracture, a herniated disc with injections or a concussion with lasting symptoms sits higher. Surgery, a brain injury or a spinal cord injury fills whatever coverage exists and often exceeds it. Identifying the driver adds a second layer of insurance and, if the driver has assets, a third.

Fault is argued even when the other driver ran. Your own insurer can raise your share of fault under RSMo 537.765 and reduce the payment by that percentage. Venue matters as well, since an uninsured motorist dispute that ends up in the Circuit Court of Jackson County or the Circuit Court of the City of St. Louis is valued differently by adjusters than one headed for a small county. We do not put a figure on a case until the medical picture is clear. Past results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

What if your own insurer denies or lowballs the uninsured motorist claim?

It happens more than people expect. The company you have paid for years treats an uninsured motorist claim the way it would treat a claim from a stranger, because the money comes out of the same pocket. The common denials are that the crash was not reported the way the policy requires, that there is no proof a second vehicle was involved, that your injuries came from somewhere else, and that you share the fault.

On reporting and proof, every Missouri policy has its own conditions for a hit and run claim, and they are written in the policy, not in a statute. Some set hours for a police report, some require written notice, and some describe the proof of the other vehicle they expect. We read the actual form, compare it to what was done and, where a condition was missed for a good reason, argue the reason.

On causation and fault, the answer is the same as in any crash: treating doctors, imaging, a clean timeline of care, and the physical evidence from the scene. The paint transfer on your bumper, the mirror housing found in the gutter and the footage from a gas station on US 71 all prove that a second vehicle existed and how it hit you. The insurer's argument that you drifted or braked late is answered by the same evidence.

Many Missouri policies send uninsured motorist disputes to arbitration rather than to court, and some let either side choose. We handle either path. If the policy allows suit, we file in the circuit court for the county and use discovery to obtain the insurer's file. Missouri law gives a policyholder remedies when an insurer refuses a valid claim without a reasonable basis, and we raise them in writing when the facts support it.

How long do you have to file a hit and run claim in Missouri?

The lawsuit deadline is generous. RSMo 516.120 gives you five years from the crash to sue for injury, and RSMo 537.100 gives a family three years from the death to bring a wrongful death claim when a hit and run kills someone. Those are the outside limits for suing an identified driver. Whether the same five years governs a suit against your own insurer depends on the policy and the nature of the claim, and we calendar the earliest possible date rather than the latest.

The insurance deadlines are the ones that actually end hit and run claims. Policies require that a hit and run be reported to police promptly, often within a day or two, and that the insurer be notified promptly as well. A person who waits a month to see whether the neck pain goes away, then calls the insurer, can hear that the coverage was forfeited. Those deadlines are in your policy, and we read them the day you call.

If the vehicle that hit you turns out to be public, the timeline changes again. A RideKC bus, a Metro Transit vehicle, a city truck or a state highway crew brings Missouri's sovereign immunity rules into play, with their exceptions for the operation of motor vehicles, and some cities require a short written notice before any claim. Public vehicles rarely flee, but their contractors do.

Evidence has the shortest deadline of all. Camera systems at gas stations and storefronts overwrite in days. License plate reader data is retained for a limited period set by each agency. Paint transfer on your car disappears the moment a body shop starts work. None of that is protected by the five year statute, which is why the sooner we are involved, the more of the case there is to prove.

What should you do in the first 72 hours after a Missouri hit and run?

Call 911 from the scene and stay there. Inside Kansas City the Kansas City Police Department will respond, inside St. Louis the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department, and on the interstates and in most rural counties the Missouri State Highway Patrol. Give the officer every detail while it is fresh: color, make, body style, damage, plate fragments, direction of travel, what the driver looked like. Ask for the report number, because your insurer will ask for that report first.

Get medical care the same day. In Kansas City that means University Health Truman Medical Center or Research Medical Center, in St. Louis Barnes-Jewish Hospital or SSM Health Saint Louis University Hospital, in Springfield Mercy Hospital Springfield or CoxHealth, and in Columbia University of Missouri Health Care, while an urgent care visit is enough to document a minor injury. Tell every provider that a car hit you and left.

Preserve what the other car left behind. Photograph the paint transfer on your vehicle before it is washed or repaired, the pieces of headlight, grille or mirror on the road, and the skid or gouge marks. Those fragments carry part numbers that identify a make and model, and the paint color narrows it further. Do not let a body shop touch the car until it has been photographed and, in a serious case, inspected.

Look for cameras and witnesses while you are still there. Gas stations, storefronts, apartment entrances, traffic signals, RideKC and Metro Transit buses and the doorbells on residential streets record the road, and most of that footage is gone inside a week. Get the name and number of anyone who stopped, because a witness who saw three digits of a plate is often how a driver is found. Police license plate readers log passing vehicles, and an officer can query them if the report is filed quickly.

Notify your own insurer within a day and say the words hit and run. Ask that an uninsured motorist claim be opened and get the claim number. Do not give a recorded statement about fault before speaking with us, do not post about the crash, and keep every bill and note of missed work from that day forward. That file is what the demand is built on months later.

What Your Claim Can Cover

• Uninsured motorist claims on your own policy
• Claims through a household member's policy
• State backstop funds where they exist
• Camera, plate reader and witness investigation
• Medical benefits while the driver is unknown