Personal injury lawyer help in Billings, MT

If you live in or near Billings (population about 110,263) and you were hurt in an accident that was not your fault, this page is the starting point. It explains Montana's personal injury rules as they apply to Yellowstone County residents: the three years filing deadline, the modified comparative negligence (51% bar) rule, how auto insurance works here, where cases are filed and what injured people can recover. It also explains how to request a free claim review.

Our role is simple: you describe what happened in Billings using the free claim review form, and your request may be shared with participating attorneys or legal services partners who handle that type of matter in Montana. Submitting a request does not hire an attorney, and everything below is general legal information to help you make a decision, not legal advice about your specific situation.

Federal crash records list 46 fatal crashes inside Billings from 2019 through 2023, in which 50 people died. The yearly count was 6 in 2019, 6 in 2020, 12 in 2021, 11 in 2022 and 11 in 2023; 54% of them happened after dark.

Of the 11 fatal crashes in Billings in 2023, 2 involved a pedestrian and 5 happened at or near an intersection. Roads with more than one fatal crash in Billings in 2023: Grand Ave had 3 and 4th Ave N had 2.

Across Yellowstone County, the same records show 97 fatal crashes and 109 people killed over those five years.

Most fatal crashes in Billings happen after dark. In night crashes, evidence about street lighting, headlights, speed and visibility tends to decide fault, and much of it disappears within days.

Source: NHTSA Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS), final data for 2019 to 2023. FARS counts every crash on a public road in which someone died within 30 days; a crash counts for Billings when the reporting agency coded it there. Counts for one place are small and swing from year to year, so read them as a picture of local risk, not a forecast.

Different attorneys handle different claims, so identify the type of accident early. Billings shares its court and its Montana rules with the rest of Yellowstone County; the detailed guides below, apply equally to accidents in Billings.

• Car Accident claimsCar Accidents
• Truck Accident claimsTruck Accidents
• Motorcycle Accident claimsMotorcycle Accidents
• Pedestrian Accident claimsPedestrian Accidents
• Slip and Fall claimsSlip & Fall
• Workplace Injury claimsWork Injuries & Workers' Comp
• Medical Malpractice claimsMedical Malpractice
• Wrongful Death claimsWrongful Death

Montana generally gives an injured person three years from the date of injury to file a personal injury lawsuit (Mont. Code Ann. § 27-2-204(1)); medical malpractice is different (two years). Wrongful death claims follow their own deadline, which can differ from the one above. Claims against a city, county, school district or state agency follow separate and often much shorter deadlines. Once the deadline passes, the Yellowstone County District Court will dismiss the case regardless of how clear the fault was, so the practical rule in Billings is to get legal advice early.

Montana follows modified comparative negligence (51% bar). In plain terms, you can recover as long as you were not more than 50% at fault, and your award is reduced by your share of fault. Insurance adjusters apply this rule from the first phone call, which is why the way an accident is described and documented in the days after it happens in Yellowstone County has a direct effect on what a claim is worth.

After a crash in Billings, the at-fault driver's liability insurance is the primary source of compensation. Montana requires drivers to carry only 25/50/20 in coverage (thousands of dollars for bodily injury per person, per accident, and property damage), which serious injuries quickly exhaust. Underinsured motorist coverage on your own policy and claims against additional responsible parties often make the difference in Yellowstone County cases.

Lawsuits arising from accidents in Billings are typically filed in the Yellowstone County District Court, the trial court of general jurisdiction for Yellowstone County, although cases can sometimes be filed where the defendant resides or does business, and claims against out-of-state trucking companies or manufacturers may end up in federal court. Most claims settle before trial, but the credible ability to try a case in Yellowstone County is what moves insurers to pay fair value.

Employees injured on the job in Billings are generally covered by Montana workers' compensation, administered through the Montana Department of Labor & Industry. Report the injury to your employer within 30 days of the accident (Mont. Code Ann. § 39-71-603) — that notice deadline is short and missing it can end the claim before it starts — then file the formal claim within one year. Workers' compensation does not pay for pain and suffering, so when a third party such as a subcontractor, driver or equipment manufacturer caused the injury, a separate personal injury claim is often worth pursuing alongside it.

• Laurel, MT: injury claims and local court
• Columbus, MT: injury claims and local court
• Hardin, MT: injury claims and local court
• Roundup, MT: injury claims and local court
• Yellowstone County injury guide and every community in the county
• Montana personal injury laws and local guides
• Browse all U.S. city injury guides