The Filing Deadline Depends on the Claim Route and Triggering Facts
There is no safe single deadline for every Denver injury matter. Colorado generally uses a two-year period for tort actions and a three-year period for actions arising from motor-vehicle operation, but the correct statute depends on claim classification, defendant, accrual, discovery, tolling, repose, and special procedures. Government, workplace, wrongful-death, professional, product, minor, and policy-based routes may use different or additional clocks.
Classify the Route Before Writing a Date
Create a matrix with one row per possible route: ordinary tort, motor-vehicle action, government claim, workers’ compensation or occupational system, wrongful death or estate route, medical or product claim, first-party insurance benefit, and any contractual dispute. For each, record the responsible actor, event date, discovery facts, notice requirement, filing period, repose issue, and current authority.
An accident settlement lawyer can test which row actually fits, but should not select the most generous date without support. The same event may create parallel clocks for notice, preservation, policy proof, administrative filing, and court action. Calendar the earliest plausible date until classification is confirmed.
Add the Exceptions That Can Shorten or Change the Path
Colorado governmental matters generally include a 182-day written-notice rule with content and recipient requirements. Workers’ compensation uses its own reporting and filing structure. Wrongful-death claimant timing has statutory first- and second-year features. Accrual, minority or disability, fraudulent concealment, repose, contribution, and recent amendments require route-specific review.
A personal injury claim lawyer should obtain the actual policy for contractual notice, cooperation, consent, proof, arbitration, and suit provisions. Do not assume opening an insurer file, negotiating, receiving treatment, or being underage pauses every legal and contractual clock. Any tolling agreement must be read for parties, claims, scope, and expiration.
Verify the Calendar With Documents, Not Memory
Collect reports, medical records showing discovery, contracts, policies, denial letters, government identities, employer notices, death and estate documents, court filings, and proof of delivery. Record the source for each date and who confirmed it. Maintain a separate evidence-retention calendar because material may disappear long before filing expires.
Three priorities are to identify every possible route, calendar the earliest unverified deadline, and obtain the documents that determine accrual and notice. That approach protects review without presenting the ordinary Colorado period as a universal answer or promising that an exception applies. At S&S Law, we help Denver clients with filing deadlines.