The Iowa statute of limitations sets how long you have to file a civil lawsuit or how long prosecutors have to bring criminal charges, and the deadline depends entirely on the type of case. Personal injury claims get two years. Written contracts get ten. Most felonies must be charged within three years, but murder and many sex offenses against children can be prosecuted at any time. Miss the deadline and the case is almost always over before it starts.
Civil Filing Deadlines by Claim Type
Iowa Code section 614.1 controls the filing windows for most civil lawsuits. The clock generally starts the day the harm occurs, though certain claims use a discovery-based start date instead.
Personal Injury
You have two years from the date of injury to file a personal injury lawsuit in Iowa.1Justia Law. Iowa Code Title XV, Chapter 614, Section 614-1 – Period That window covers most negligence claims, car accidents, and slip-and-fall injuries. File after two years and a court will almost certainly dismiss the case no matter how strong the underlying facts are.
Medical Malpractice
Malpractice claims also run two years, but the clock starts when you knew or should have known about the injury, not necessarily when the treatment happened. Iowa layers a hard outer limit on top of that: no malpractice lawsuit can be filed more than six years after the act that caused the injury, even if the injury wasn’t discoverable within that time. The only exception is when a foreign object was unintentionally left in the body.2Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code 614.1 – Period For children under eight when the malpractice occurred, the deadline extends at least until the child’s tenth birthday.
Wrongful Death
Wrongful death claims must be filed within two years. The deadline is treated as though it accrued to the deceased’s representative at the time it would have accrued to the deceased person if they had survived.1Justia Law. Iowa Code Title XV, Chapter 614, Section 614-1 – Period The discovery rule can shift the start date when the cause of death wasn’t immediately apparent.
Contracts
Iowa draws a sharp line between written and oral agreements. Written contract claims get ten years from the breach; oral contract claims get five.1Justia Law. Iowa Code Title XV, Chapter 614, Section 614-1 – Period A handshake deal to remodel a kitchen sits under the shorter oral rule; the same deal reduced to writing sits under the longer one.
Property
Claims to recover real property, including adverse possession and boundary disputes, carry a ten-year deadline. A party claiming adverse possession must show continuous, open use for the full ten years. Claims for damage to property, as opposed to ownership, get five years from the date of the damage.1Justia Law. Iowa Code Title XV, Chapter 614, Section 614-1 – Period
Fraud and Other Civil Claims
Fraud claims fall under the same five-year window that covers oral contracts and property damage.2Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code 614.1 – Period The five-year period also acts as Iowa’s catch-all: any civil action not specifically covered elsewhere in the statute must be brought within five years.
Product Liability
Product liability follows the two-year personal injury deadline, but Iowa also imposes a fifteen-year statute of repose. No product liability lawsuit can be filed more than fifteen years after the product was first sold or leased, regardless of when the injury occurred.2Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code 614.1 – Period An injury from twenty-year-old machinery is barred even if you were hurt yesterday.
Childhood Sexual Abuse
Civil deadlines for childhood sexual abuse are unusually short. Survivors have one year after turning eighteen to file a civil lawsuit, meaning the claim must be filed before the survivor’s nineteenth birthday.3Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code Chapter 614 – Limitations of Actions A separate provision allows four years from the date the survivor discovers the connection between the abuse and the resulting injuries, if that discovery comes after age eighteen.4Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code 614.8A – Damages for Child Sexual Abuse, Time Limitation
Claims Against the State or a City
Suing the government works differently from suing a private party. For claims against the state of Iowa, you must first file a written claim with the director of the Iowa Department of Management within two years of when the claim accrued.5Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code Chapter 669 – Iowa Tort Claims Act You cannot go to court until the attorney general issues a final decision. If the attorney general doesn’t act within six months, you can withdraw the claim in writing and proceed to file suit. The Chapter 669 two-year deadline is the only statute of limitations that applies to claims against the state.
Claims against cities, counties, and other municipalities also carry a two-year deadline under a separate chapter of the code.6Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code 670.5 – Limitation of Actions Courts enforce both deadlines strictly.
Criminal Prosecution Deadlines
Iowa’s criminal deadlines determine how long prosecutors have to file charges. The most serious offenses have no limit at all; lesser crimes must be charged quickly.
No Time Limit
Murder can be prosecuted at any time. The same applies to a range of sexual offenses committed against someone under eighteen, including first-, second-, third-, and fourth-degree sexual abuse, incest, lascivious acts with a child, indecent contact with a child, sexual exploitation of a minor, and child endangerment involving sexual conduct.7Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code Chapter 802 – Limitation of Criminal Actions
Felonies and Higher Misdemeanors
Most felonies, aggravated misdemeanors, and serious misdemeanors must be prosecuted within three years of the offense.8Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code 802.3 – Felony, Aggravated or Serious Misdemeanor That default applies unless a specific provision in Chapter 802 sets a different window.
Several offenses get longer windows. First-degree robbery carries a five-year deadline.9Justia Law. Iowa Code Title XVI, Chapter 802, Section 802-2F – Robbery, First Degree Sexual abuse in the first, second, or third degree committed against an adult must be charged within ten years of the offense, or within three years of identifying the offender through DNA, whichever is later.7Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code Chapter 802 – Limitation of Criminal Actions
Simple Misdemeanors
Simple misdemeanors, Iowa’s lowest-level criminal offenses, carry a one-year prosecution deadline. These cover minor traffic violations, disorderly conduct, and similar infractions.
When the Clock Pauses
Tolling pauses or extends a statute of limitations when applying the standard deadline would be unfair. Iowa recognizes several tolling situations.
Minors
If a cause of action arises while the injured person is a minor, the statute is extended so the person has one year after reaching age eighteen to file.3Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code Chapter 614 – Limitations of Actions Medical malpractice for a child under eight uses a different rule: the child has at least until the tenth birthday to file.1Justia Law. Iowa Code Title XV, Chapter 614, Section 614-1 – Period
Mental Illness
A person with a mental illness gets one year after the disability ends to file.3Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code Chapter 614 – Limitations of Actions This tolling covers civil claims, tort claims against the state, and claims against municipalities, but not actions for penalties or forfeitures.
Nonresident or Unknown Defendants
When a defendant is not a resident of Iowa, the time the defendant is outside the state does not count toward the limitation period.3Iowa Legislature. Iowa Code Chapter 614 – Limitations of Actions For personal injury or death resulting from a felony or serious misdemeanor, the clock also pauses while the defendant’s identity remains unknown despite diligent efforts to find them.
The Discovery Rule
Iowa applies the discovery rule to several claim types, most prominently medical malpractice and childhood sexual abuse. Under this rule, the clock doesn’t start until the injured person knows or should know about both the injury and its cause. Courts won’t rescue someone who ignores obvious warning signs. If the facts would prompt a reasonable person to investigate, the clock starts running whether or not you actually investigate.
What Happens If You Miss the Deadline
Filing after the statute of limitations expires almost always ends the case. In a civil suit, the defendant raises the expiration as a defense, and the court grants a motion to dismiss unless a valid tolling provision applies. No amount of compelling evidence about the underlying claim can overcome a missed deadline.
In criminal cases, expiration means the government can no longer bring charges for that offense. The narrow exceptions, particularly for murder and child sexual abuse, reflect a legislative judgment that some crimes are serious enough to prosecute regardless of how much time has passed. For everything else, the calendar is the calendar, and the day after the deadline the case is effectively gone.