After a Crash
ORC 4549.02 — the duty that is absolute
Stopping after a crash is one of the few duties in this whole file with no balancing test attached. Whatever else is true about the situation, and however frightened anyone is, the obligation to stop and exchange information does not bend.
Who handles this in Ohio: Ohio State Bar Association lawyer referral; and legal aid programs and the state offices, listed in the Ohio directory.
- The driver stops at or as near to the scene as possible, and stays there.
- The driver gives name, address, and vehicle registration number to the other driver and to any officer at the scene.
- Where the other vehicle is unattended, the same information has to be left for its owner.
- The driver remains until an officer arrives, unless taken from the scene by an ambulance or emergency vehicle.
- A crash somewhere other than a public road, a parking lot for instance, is governed by its own section with the same shape.
- 1Property damage only
First degree misdemeanor
- The officer needs
- Nothing beyond the failure to stop and exchange.
- You owe
- Up to 180 days and a license suspension the judge cannot suspend the first six months of.
- 2Serious physical harm
Fifth degree felony
- The officer needs
- Serious physical harm to a person from the crash.
- You owe
- Six to twelve months, and the suspension still applies.
- 3Death
Third degree felony
- The officer needs
- A death resulting from the crash.
- You owe
- Nine months to five years depending on the range that applies.
Being afraid of the other driver is not a defense to leaving. It is an understandable reason and it is not a legal one. The route the law leaves open is to call 911 and stay on the line rather than to drive away, because driving away converts a civil insurance matter into a criminal charge in your name.
What you owe the other driver and what you owe an investigation are different things. The information the statute lists is required. An account of how it happened, given at the roadside, is not.
The scene has a second offense in it. Misconduct at an emergency reaches hampering the lawful operations of an official at the scene of a fire, accident, disaster, riot or emergency, and failing to obey a lawful order of such an official. It is separate from obstructing official business, and it attaches to a scene rather than to an investigation. Standing somewhere at a crash can be inside it where standing in the same place an hour later would not be.
Where proof of financial responsibility is not produced, a court may order restitution for economic loss from the crash up to a statutory cap.
Sources for this section (7)
- ORC 4549.02 — Stopping after an accident on a public road, and exchanging information
- ORC 4549.021 — Stopping after an accident somewhere other than a public road
- ORC 2929.24 — Definite jail terms for misdemeanors
- ORC 2929.14 — Definite prison terms for felonies
- U.S. Const. amend. V — Rights in criminal cases, self incrimination
- ORC 2917.13 — Misconduct at an emergency
- ORC 4509.101 — Proof of financial responsibility required to operate a motor vehicle
Legal information, not legal advice. Verified as of September 2026. Applying it to a particular situation is the work of a licensed Ohio attorney.