South Carolina's Hands-Free and Distracted Driving Act reached full enforcement on February 28, 2026, and Charleston County topped the state with 470 citations in the first 30 days, according to figures from the South Carolina Department of Public Safety and local coverage. As summer travel fills the roads across the peninsula and Mount Pleasant, this enforcement is colliding with peak holiday traffic, and the Charleston personal injury lawyers at Woron and Dhillon, LLC say these citations are changing how fault is proven after a crash.
The law took effect on September 1, 2025, with a six-month warning period. Since late February, officers can issue tickets instead of warnings. A first offense carries a $100 fine, and a second offense within three years brings a $200 fine and two points on the driver's record. Under Section 56-5-3890, drivers may no longer hold or support a phone with any part of the body while the vehicle is moving, a standard far broader than the state's earlier texting-only rule.
When a driver violates the hands-free law and causes a wreck, that violation can serve as evidence of negligence. In South Carolina, which follows a modified comparative negligence standard under S.C. Code Section 15-38-15, fault is everything. A distracted driving violation can cut through the ambiguity an insurer relies on when it tries to shift blame onto the injured party.
A citation is just one of many pieces of evidence that matters in a distracted driving accident claim. Others include phone records that align with the moment of impact, a police report noting handheld device use at the scene, and witnesses who saw the driver looking down or holding a phone.
"A ticket makes the conversation with the insurance company very different," said Brett Woron, a partner at Woron and Dhillon, LLC. "When there is documentation that a driver was on a phone, it becomes much harder to argue the crash was unavoidable. Injured people should know that evidence exists and how quickly it can disappear."
