South Carolina's Hands-Free and Distracted Driving Act reached full enforcement on February 28, 2026, and the first month of data placed Charleston County at the top of the state. Drivers here received 470 citations in the first 30 days, more than any other county in South Carolina, according to figures reported by the South Carolina Department of Public Safety and local coverage of the rollout. As the summer travel season fills the roads across the peninsula and Mount Pleasant, that enforcement is colliding with peak holiday traffic.
The law took effect on September 1, 2025, followed by 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 the 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."
According to the Charleston personal injury lawyers at Woron and Dhillon, LLC, those citations are changing how fault gets proven after a crash across the Lowcountry. The firm, located at 90 Queen Street in Charleston, handles car accidents, catastrophic injuries, and wrongful death claims throughout South Carolina.
