Where a Tampa truck case is filed

Tampa is in Hillsborough County (opens in a new tab), and the county is, by itself, Florida’s Thirteenth Judicial Circuit (opens in a new tab).

Claims above $50,000 go to the circuit court. County courts hear cases up to that amount (opens in a new tab), and circuit courts hear the actions at law the county courts cannot (opens in a new tab).

The circuit lists the Edgecomb Courthouse, 800 E. Twiggs Street (opens in a new tab) among its court locations in Tampa. Circuit civil cases are filed with the Hillsborough County Clerk of Court and Comptroller, which gives auto negligence and personal injury as examples of circuit civil cases (opens in a new tab) and has a customer service center in Room 101 of that courthouse (opens in a new tab).

The court serves the whole county. The Census Bureau’s estimates for July 1, 2025 put 413,554 people in Tampa and 1,574,115 in Hillsborough County (opens in a new tab), so most of the county’s residents live outside the city. A crash in Seffner, Dover or Plant City is in the same county and the same circuit as one in downtown Tampa.

Sometimes. A corporation formed outside Florida that does business in the state may be sued in a county where it has an agent or other representative, or where the cause of action accrued (opens in a new tab), which for a crash usually means the county where it happened. So the county of the crash is one of the places a case can be filed, and it may not be the only one.

“Tampa Bay” is a region, and its other counties belong to other circuits. St. Petersburg and Clearwater are in Pinellas County, which with Pasco County makes up the Sixth Judicial Circuit (opens in a new tab). Polk County, to the east on I-4, is in the Tenth Circuit, and Manatee County, to the south on I-75, is in the Twelfth (opens in a new tab).

A case may not stay in state court. When every defendant is from another state and more than $75,000 is in dispute (opens in a new tab), the defendants can ask to move the case to federal court (opens in a new tab).

Hillsborough County is in the Middle District of Florida, and federal law lists Tampa among the places where that court is held (opens in a new tab).

Some vehicles on the road belong to public bodies. Mass transit in the county is run by the Hillsborough Transit Authority, known as HART, which was created in October 1979 to operate and maintain mass transit facilities in Hillsborough County (opens in a new tab). Its charter calls it a body politic and corporate (opens in a new tab).

Florida has one statute for claims against government. It waives the government’s immunity from injury claims only to the extent the statute says (opens in a new tab), and it covers state agencies, counties and cities alike. It also reaches corporations primarily acting as instrumentalities or agencies of the state, counties or municipalities (opens in a new tab). This page does not say whether a particular authority is one of them.

Before a lawsuit can be filed, the claim must be presented in writing to the agency and, unless it is against a city or a county, to the Department of Financial Services as well, within 3 years after it accrues (opens in a new tab). In a wrongful death case the period is 2 years.

The government then has 6 months to respond, or 90 days in a wrongful death case (opens in a new tab). If it does not, the claim is treated as denied and the suit can go ahead.

The amounts are limited. The State and its agencies and subdivisions cannot be made to pay more than $200,000 to one person or $300,000 for one incident (opens in a new tab) without a further act of the Legislature. The person who was driving is usually not the defendant. A public employee acting within the scope of the job generally cannot be held personally liable or named in the suit (opens in a new tab). The claim is against the agency.

The deadline is the same wherever the case is heard. Florida gives a claim founded on negligence two years (opens in a new tab). The period runs from the time the cause of action accrues (opens in a new tab), a date an attorney works out from the facts.

That is shorter than it used to be. The legislature cut the period from four years to two in 2023, and the change applies to causes of action accruing after March 24, 2023 (opens in a new tab).

A wrongful death action must also be brought within two years (opens in a new tab). A child does not get extra time simply for being a child. Florida stops the clock for a minor only while no parent or guardian is able to bring the claim (opens in a new tab), and never beyond seven years from the event.

Claims against the State, a county or a city follow a schedule of their own, set out above.