How Comparative Negligence Works in South Carolina

At 20% fault you keep 80% of your damages, at 50% you keep half, and at 51% you recover nothing. Frost Law Group can walk you through that math with the facts of your crash. People sometimes call this the 51% bar. The court's own words are "not greater than," which is why an exact 50% split still leaves a claim.

Nelson also ended the older rule under which a plaintiff's own contributory negligence could defeat a claim entirely. Take a jury that values a driver's losses at $100,000. That figure is a round teaching number, not an estimate for anyone's case.

Start with 20%. A driver heading down Berlin G. Myers Parkway glances at the radio just as another car pulls out without yielding. If the jury puts 20% of the fault on her, she may recover $80,000, the award less her own share.

Now take an even split. Two drivers back out of facing spaces in a Summerville parking lot and collide. If the jury finds each one 50% at fault, neither driver was more negligent than the other. Each can collect 50% of his or her losses from the other, so the $100,000 claim becomes $50,000.

Last, picture a driver who runs a red light on Main Street and meets a car moving too fast for conditions. If the jury places 51% on the red-light driver, that driver recovers nothing, because 51% is greater than 49%. The speeding driver, held 49% at fault, may still recover 51% of his or her own damages. Real juries land on their own numbers, and those numbers depend on the evidence.

A jury decides how fault is divided, or the judge does when the case is tried without a jury. Section 15-38-15(C) gives that job to the fact finder, and adjusters' estimates bind nobody. Frost Law Group handles at-fault insurance claims knowing that any settlement offer is a guess about what that fact finder would do.

A claim that settles never reaches a verdict form, so settlement talks run on predictions about what a jury would do. An adjuster's 30% or 40% is an opening position in that negotiation. It carries no legal weight unless you agree to it.

In Dorchester County, those trials happen in the Court of Common Pleas, which hears civil cases for the circuit court. The courthouse sits at 5200 East Jim Bilton Boulevard in St. George, within the First Judicial Circuit. A 2012 Supreme Court opinion, Fairchild v. South Carolina Department of Transportation, restates a long-standing rule. Whether a traffic violation actually caused an injury is ordinarily a question for the jury.

With more than one driver at fault, the jury weighs your share against their combined fault. Nelson says so directly, comparing the plaintiff's negligence with the combined negligence of every defendant. Under Section 15-38-15, a driver found under 50% at fault then owes only that share, while one at 50% or more can owe the whole award. Frost Law Group also handles rear-end crash claims, where a chain of three or four cars can split fault several ways.

Under joint and several liability, one defendant can owe the whole award and then seek repayment from the others. Section 15-38-15, first enacted in 2005, narrowed that rule. Under its original text, and under the 2026 version, a defendant held responsible for under 50% of the total fault owes just its own percentage.

Yes, an insurer can argue that you share the blame and lower its offer, but that argument decides nothing. Only a jury or judge makes a legal finding of fault. Frost Law Group also represents people in claims where the driver caused part of the crash, and there an adjuster's percentage can decide whether a claim looks worth pursuing.

Suppose an adjuster calls after a wreck on Dorchester Road and says you share the fault because you were not wearing a seat belt. The seat belt statute speaks to this directly. Under Section 56-5-6540(C), the violation is not negligence per se, meaning it does not count as carelessness by itself. It is not contributory negligence either, and a civil jury may not hear it as evidence.

Another common argument is that you knowingly accepted a risk, such as riding home with a friend you knew had been up all night. In Davenport v. Cotton Hope Plantation, a 1998 decision, the Supreme Court folded that defense into the same comparison. Assumption of risk bars recovery only when the fault arising from it is greater than the defendant's negligence. Signed waivers follow different rules.

The adjuster may also point to the officer's report. When a damages case reaches trial, Section 56-5-1290 keeps the required crash reports out as evidence of negligence. On the witness stand, the officer may glance at a report to refresh recall, and nothing more. Arguments about speed, lookout or following distance still count, and a lawyer has to answer them with photos, witnesses and the physical evidence.