When Can You Sue a City or Municipality for Your Injury?
May 6, 2025
Personal injury claims are never pleasant. You can file such a claim only if you’ve been seriously injured due to the negligence of another party. This means that if you’re taking legal action, you’re likely already afflicted with issues like pain, limited mobility, and lost earnings. Searching the internet for “how to sue city for injury” is probably the last thing you want to deal with.
Frustratingly, Pennsylvania expects you to act quickly to file a claim, possibly while you’re still recovering from your injuries. This, combined with the fact that both the insurance and legal processes are highly complicated, means suing another party can seem like more trouble than it’s worth, even if you stand to receive a financial windfall. The process is even more complicated if the negligent party is a local government entity.
Fortunately, an experienced personal injury lawyer in Pennsylvania can help you understand the specifics of a municipality injury lawsuit and walk you through the procedure for filing one.
The Standard Process for Filing a Personal Injury Lawsuit
Imagine that you’re injured in a car accident caused by another driver. Filing a lawsuit against them is relatively straightforward. You’d hire a legal team to represent you in court. Your lawyers would help you collect compelling evidence and file a legal claim against the responsible party within the applicable statute of limitations.
The laws that govern this process are quite complicated. Thankfully, your attorney will handle them on your behalf. Pennsylvania laws allow you to seek compensation for every loss and expense you suffer due to the actions of a negligent party. They also allow you to pursue additional compensation for your pain and suffering.
Complications of Pursuing a Municipality Injury Lawsuit
Filing a lawsuit against the government is much more difficult. Several complications can turn an already complex undertaking into a procedural nightmare. The threshold for errors is quite low when a city or municipality is the defendant. If you make a mistake, you’re likely to lose your case — and your right to recover fair compensation.
Here are some of the special regulations that make filing a lawsuit against a government entity particularly complicated:
Six-Month Notification Deadline
While the statute of limitations for standard personal injury claims in Pennsylvania is two years from the date you were injured, the government has a separate deadline for lawsuits involving the city.
If you intend to file a claim against the city, you must provide a Notice of Claim no more than six months after the date of the initial incident. If you miss that deadline, you’ll be barred from seeking compensation at any future date.
That’s why it’s important to contact a personal injury lawyer as soon as possible after suffering an injury. Six months is a short time to take the necessary steps to file a successful lawsuit. Your lawyer will need to devote as much of that time as possible to collecting evidence and handling various legal tasks. If you delay contacting a personal injury attorney for too long, you may run out of time.
Have you been injured due to negligence on the part of a Pennsylvania city or municipality? You can file a lawsuit to recover compensation, but only if you act swiftly. Contact Wapner Newman at (215) 569-0900 right away to schedule a free case evaluation and consultation.
Caps on Damages
Under normal circumstances, Pennsylvania doesn’t place caps on damages from lawsuits — injury victims can receive as much compensation as is needed to cover their medical bills, lost wages, and other expenses. Additionally, if non-economic damages for pain and suffering, diminished quality of life, and other impacts are warranted, claimants can obtain as much compensation as they can negotiate with an insurance provider or be awarded by a jury.
The same isn’t true if you’re suing a city or municipality. When you file a claim against a government entity, the damages you stand to receive are limited by law. The total of all types of damages you can obtain when you successfully sue the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is $250,000, with a $500,000 cap on damages recovered from local governments. If multiple parties were injured in a single incident, the combined total that all parties can receive is $500,000.
Regardless of how seriously you’re injured, you can never get more than $500,000 in damages from a lawsuit against a Pennsylvania city or municipality.
Do You Have to Sue a City to Get Compensation?
While the six-month time limit to notify the city of your intent to sue is frustrating, it can also be advantageous in some situations.
When you notify the city of your intent to sue, its agents will immediately start investigating your claim. If the municipality’s attorneys determine that you have a legitimate claim, you may receive a settlement offer from the city so it can avoid the cost of a court trial.
This is never a sure bet, which is why it’s best to give your personal injury attorney as much time as possible to gather evidence before filing a Notice of Claim. The more evidence you have when you provide that notification, the more likely the city will be to attempt to negotiate a settlement and avoid a lawsuit.
Negligence and the Right to Sue
The special rules for suing the government apply only to the time limits and damage caps associated with personal injury lawsuits. These rules don’t change the negligence standards used when determining whether you have the right to sue.
As in all other personal injury cases, you need to prove the following four elements of negligence to successfully pursue a lawsuit against a government entity:
- The defendant (the city) had a duty to protect you from harm.
- The defendant breached their duty.
- That breach resulted in your suffering an injury.
- The injury you suffered caused compensable harm.
There’s one more invisible requirement when suing a government entity: You must show that the negligent entity or agent was working on behalf of the government when you were harmed. Just because you get into an accident with a government employee, this doesn’t necessarily mean the government is responsible. For example, the local government wouldn’t be liable if a city-employed bus driver crashed into you while off-duty and driving their personal vehicle.
Get Reliable Legal Help After Your Accident
If you’re dealing with injuries you sustained due to the negligence of a local government or city or municipal worker, you need the assistance of a trustworthy attorney. Even a short delay could harm your case and keep you from getting the financial support you need.
Act quickly to protect your right to sue a city or municipality after an accident. Contact Wapner Newman at (215) 569-0900 today to schedule a free case evaluation.