Personal Injury Lawyers in Houma, LA

Drive through Houma and you will cross more bridges than you expect for a city its size. Bayous and shipping canals split neighborhoods down the middle here, small vessels and shrimp boats tie up within sight of front porches, and the Intracoastal Waterway runs straight past downtown. It is a working waterfront as much as it is a city street grid, and that geography shapes the kind of injury claims that come out of it, from ordinary rear-end collisions to cases involving maritime and offshore work.

The Seat of Terrebonne Parish

Houma is the county seat of Terrebonne Parish, home to roughly 33,000 residents in the city itself and more than 100,000 across the parish it anchors. Long known as the commercial and cultural center of Louisiana’s deep bayou country, Houma grew from a fishing and shrimping economy into a hub for the offshore oil and gas service industry starting in the 1970s, and that shift still defines much of the local workforce today. Terrebonne General Health System, one of the parish’s largest employers, anchors the healthcare side of the economy and generates its own share of premises liability and workplace injury claims separate from the crash cases tied to the highways in and out of town.

US-90, and the Roads That Feed the Oilfield

U.S. Highway 90 is Houma’s main connection to New Orleans to the east and Lafayette to the west, carrying a steady mix of commuter and freight traffic through the parish. Louisiana Highways 24, 182, 311, and 20 fan out from the city center to reach the surrounding communities and the service yards that support offshore operations, and heavy trucks hauling oilfield equipment share those same roads with everyday commuters. Crashes involving equipment haulers or company vehicles often bring in commercial insurance policies and federal trucking rules on top of Louisiana’s ordinary negligence standards, which tends to make them more complicated to resolve than a typical two-car wreck.

Bayou Cane and Downtown

Bayou Cane, just west of the city center, functions as Houma’s primary retail and commercial corridor, dense with the shopping centers, restaurants, and parking lots where slip-and-fall and premises liability claims tend to concentrate. Downtown Houma sits closer to the water, its historic storefronts and murals fronting the Intracoastal Waterway, with pedestrian and bicycle traffic that picks up sharply during festivals and weekend events along the bayou. Together the two districts cover most of the foot traffic and local driving that generates injury claims outside the highway corridors.

Filed in the 32nd Judicial District

Personal injury lawsuits arising in Houma are filed with the 32nd Judicial District Court at the Terrebonne Parish Courthouse, 7856 Main Street. The 32nd JDC has original civil and criminal jurisdiction throughout the parish, hearing everything from routine auto claims to larger suits against corporate or maritime defendants.

When an Injury Involves Offshore or Maritime Work

Because so much of the local economy runs through offshore service work, Houma sees injury claims that a typical inland Louisiana city rarely does. A wreck on US-90 or a fall in a Bayou Cane parking lot is governed by the same state negligence law that applies anywhere else in Louisiana. An injury that happens on a vessel, a fixed platform, or during offshore transport is a different animal entirely, potentially triggering the Jones Act or the Longshore and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act instead of — or alongside — state law. Sorting out which framework applies is usually the first question an attorney has to answer in one of these cases.

Statewide Rules That Apply in Houma

• Two years to file. Louisiana’s prescriptive period runs two years from the date of injury for accidents on or after July 1, 2024, under Civil Code Article 3493.1.
• 51% fault bar. As of January 1, 2026, a claimant found 51% or more at fault recovers nothing; below that line, damages are reduced proportionally.
• No general damage cap, punitive damages barred. Ordinary injury claims carry no ceiling on compensatory damages, and punitive damages are barred outright except in a narrow set of statutory situations.

Finding the Right Lawyer for Your Case

The Lawyer Atlas is a directory, not a law firm, and nothing here is legal advice for your specific situation. If your injury happened on a boat, a platform, or otherwise connects to offshore work, ask any attorney you contact whether maritime law changes how your claim should be handled — it often does.

Browse the New Orleans page above for personal injury coverage elsewhere in southeast Louisiana, or check the Louisiana overview for statewide law details.