Every April, the New Jersey Division of Highway Traffic Safety and the Attorney General's Office team up for “Put the Phone Away or Pay”, a statewide enforcement campaign aimed at drivers who can't put their phones down behind the wheel. The 2026 campaign put $706,860 in the hands of 126 municipal and county police departments and another $211,820 with the New Jersey State Police, all of it earmarked for extra patrols looking specifically for distracted drivers. The prior year's April crackdown alone produced 6,872 citations for cellphone use or texting and 4,337 for careless driving in a single month.
That kind of enforcement doesn't happen in a vacuum. New Jersey officials have pointed to 2024 data showing distracted driving was a factor in an estimated 42 percent of crashes statewide, contributing to 175 deaths and roughly 1,500 serious injuries. If you or someone you love has been hurt in a crash caused by a driver who was looking at a phone instead of the road, here is what the current numbers, and the law, mean for your claim.
Our famous NJ roads are some of the most congested and heavily trafficked in the world: NJ Turnpike (95), NJ Parkway, Route 3, Route 495, Route 1 and 9, Route 23, Route 46. Combine that congestion with distracted driving and this is a dangerous mix.
New Jersey's experience mirrors a national pattern. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's most recent research on distracted driving found that distraction-affected crashes killed 3,208 people nationwide in a single year, roughly 8 percent of all traffic fatalities, and injured an estimated 315,167 more. Cellphone use specifically was tied to 404 fatal crashes and 437 deaths. Drivers between the ages of 15 and 44 were consistently more likely to be distracted at the time of a fatal crash than older drivers, a pattern that lines up with how often phones, rather than alcohol, show up in police reports for crashes involving younger drivers.
Under the state's cellphone and texting laws, a first offense carries a fine of $200 to $400. A second offense within the following ten years jumps to $400 to $600 plus three motor vehicle points, and a third or subsequent offense can reach $800 in fines along with the same points and a mandatory court appearance rather than simply paying by mail. Those penalties matter to a personal injury claim for a very specific reason: a citation, or even an officer's observation of phone use at the scene, becomes powerful evidence of negligence.
Distracted driving cases often turn on details that disappear quickly if no one preserves them. Police accident reports, the responding officer's notes on cellphone use or admissions made at the scene, and any independent witness statements are the foundation of the claim. Dashcam and nearby surveillance or traffic camera footage, when it exists, can be the difference between a contested claim and a fast settlement, but it is frequently overwritten or deleted within days or weeks, which is one reason it helps to have an attorney send preservation letters early.
Because a texting-and-driving citation or admission isn't always available, injury attorneys frequently subpoena the at-fault driver's cellphone carrier records to show call, text, or data activity at the precise time of the crash. New Jersey courts have permitted this kind of discovery in appropriate personal injury cases, and a documented pattern of phone activity in the minutes surrounding a collision is often the single most persuasive piece of evidence a jury will see.
New Jersey follows a modified comparative negligence rule under N.J.S.A. 2A:15-5.1. In practical terms, if you are found partly at fault for a crash, your damages are reduced by your percentage of fault, and if a jury finds you 51 percent or more responsible, you recover nothing at all. This is exactly why proving that the other driver was distracted, rather than simply that a crash happened, matters so much: it shifts fault away from you and protects the full value of your claim.
Call 911 and get a police report on record, even for a crash that seems minor at the time. Photograph the scene, both vehicles, and, if it's safely visible, the other driver's phone if it's still in hand or mounted. Get names and phone numbers for any witnesses before they leave. Seek medical evaluation promptly, both for your own health and because a documented, contemporaneous medical record is difficult for an insurance adjuster to dispute later. And avoid giving a recorded statement to the other driver's insurance company before speaking with an attorney, since those statements are often used to minimize a claim rather than resolve it fairly.
Because a distracted driver typically fails to brake or swerve before impact, these crashes tend to involve higher speeds at the moment of collision than crashes where the driver at least attempted evasive action. That translates into a disproportionate share of whiplash and other soft-tissue neck injuries, herniated discs, concussions and other traumatic brain injuries, and fractures, particularly in rear-end and intersection collisions. Pedestrians and cyclists fare even worse: a driver who never looks up rarely brakes at all before hitting someone outside the vehicle, which is one reason distracted driving is such a persistent factor in serious pedestrian injuries.
New Jersey's distracted driving laws and NHTSA's own research define distraction more broadly than a driver typing out a message. Safety researchers generally group it into three categories: visual distraction, taking your eyes off the road; manual distraction, taking a hand off the wheel; and cognitive distraction, taking your mind off driving even with your eyes forward. A driver glancing at a GPS app, scrolling through a playlist, eating, or arguing with a passenger can be just as dangerous as one holding a phone, even though none of those behaviors shows up as neatly in a police report. Increasingly, we also see this play out with rideshare and delivery drivers, whose jobs require them to glance at a navigation or dispatch app throughout a shift, adding a layer of built-in distraction to the more familiar problem of personal cellphone use.
There is no set formula, and anyone who promises you a number before reviewing your medical records and the facts of the crash is getting ahead of the evidence. What we can say is that the value of a distracted-driving injury claim generally tracks a handful of factors: the nature and permanency of your injuries, the medical treatment and any future care you'll need, lost wages and diminished earning capacity if the injury affects your ability to work, and the strength of the liability evidence discussed above. A well-documented case, where the distraction is proven through records rather than assumed from the circumstances, consistently resolves better than one where fault is left to argument.
Our firm based in NJ continuously round tables cases with its attorneys and retired Judges to try to determine a fair value. We have a mock court room in our Passaic County, NJ office located in Wayne, NJ where we run focus groups with mock juries. We frequently ask our own Judge Brogan to preside over those mock focus groups to help us develop the best strategy in our cases.
Enforcement campaigns like “Put the Phone Away or Pay” are a reminder that distracted driving is a solved problem in theory and a daily reality on New Jersey roads in practice. If you or a family member has been injured because another driver couldn't wait to check a phone, our auto accident attorneys can help you preserve the evidence that proves it, deal with the insurance company, and pursue the full value of your claim.