Justia Georgia Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Appellants Holly and Polly Stubblefield, and appellees Loxley and William Stubblefield, are sisters and brothers. The sisters were residents of Florida; the brothers lived in Mississippi. Together, the siblings were officers, directors and shareholders of three closely held corporations, Scarlett & Associates, Inc., Parnell & Associates, Inc., and PJ & Associates, Inc. Scarlett was a Georgia corporation with its registered agent in Forsyth County. Parnell and PJ were Mississippi corporations with registered agents in Fulton County. In 2013, the brothers withdrew large sums of money from one of the corporations without board approval. The brothers notified the sisters of these withdrawals, asserting the sisters were entitled to receive equal amounts. However, the sisters took the position that the withdrawals were unlawful. The sisters notified the brothers that the three corporations would hold board meetings in Biloxi, Mississippi, and that the brothers were required to attend the meetings in person. The brothers did not appear at the meetings and the sisters voted to remove them from their positions as officers and directors of the three corporations. The brothers brought suit against the sisters and the corporations in Forsyth County. The primary question presented by this case was whether appellants were subject to personal jurisdiction in this state under the Georgia Long-Arm Statute. The Georgia Supreme Court concluded that appellants were indeed subject to the Georgia statute, and affirmed the judgment of the trial court. View "Stubblefield v. Stubblefield" on Justia Law

Peggy Dion (“Dion”), the widow of Dale Dion (“Dale”), appealed a Superior Court order that granted Y.S.G. Enterprises, Inc., d/b/a Depot Sports Bar and Grill's (“Depot”) motion to dismiss. Dale died in a single-car wreck; his blood alcohol content was .282. At 2:30 p.m. the previous day, Dale went to the Depot and drank alcoholic beverages for the next eight hours, closing his tab at 10:43 p.m. During that time, he was visibly intoxicated and a Depot employee asked for the keys to Dale’s car, but Dale refused. Dion filed a wrongful death action against Depot, contending that the conduct of its employees was the proximate cause of Dale’s death. Depot moved to dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim, arguing that Dion’s asserted cause of action fell under the Dram Shop Act. The trial court granted Depot's motion, specifically rejecting Dion's contentions that the Act was unconstitutional. Dion appealed the trial court's holding, but finding the Act constitutional, and finding no otherwise reversible error in the trial court's decision, the Supreme Court affirmed the dismissal of Dion's case. View "Dion v. Y.S.G. Enterprises, Inc. d/b/a The Depot Sports Bar & Grill" on Justia Law

In this case, Subodh Raysoni raised consumer fraud claims under the Fair Business Practices Act of 1975 against Payless Auto Deals, LLC, alleging that Payless gave false assurances that a used minivan never had been in a collision or otherwise damaged - assurances upon which he relied - when he purchased the minivan from Payless. Contending that the terms of their written contract rendered any such reliance unreasonable as a matter of law, Payless moved for judgment on the pleadings. The trial court granted that motion, and the Court of Appeals affirmed. Payless relied on several provisions of the contract disclaiming warranties, but the Supreme Court held that its reliance was misplaced because these disclaimers were not absolute and unequivocal enough to warrant judgment on the pleadings: "We cannot say as a matter of law that the contractual disclaimers of warranties - which are, at least arguably, equivocal and limited - preclude any reasonable reliance in this case on a written Carfax report furnished by Payless. We do not mean to suggest that the provisions of the contract upon which Payless relies would not have been most reasonably understood by a customer just as Payless argues. On these pleadings, we cannot say as a matter of law that Raysoni will be unable to show that his reliance on representations that the minivan was undamaged and never had been in a wreck - particularly the written Carfax report - was reasonable." Judgment on the pleadings ought not have been awarded to Payless. The case was reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "Raysoni v. Payless Auto Deals, LLC" on Justia Law

The City of Brookhaven has won the right to ban adult entertainment businesses that sell alcohol. Less than a month after Brookhaven incorporated, its new City Council passed its own "Sexually Oriented Business Code," an ordinance that bans consumption of alcohol combined with fully nude dancing. Of particular importance to Pink Pony, the ordinance, in conjunction with Brookhaven's Alcohol Code, prohibits the sale of alcohol in sexually-oriented businesses and allows only semi-nudity (g-strings and pasties), not full nudity. The Council found that sexually oriented businesses were associated with a wide variety of "adverse secondary effects," including crime, prostitution, public indecency, illegal drug use and trafficking, urban blight and sexual assault. The Council further found that alcohol consumption increased the risk of those effects. Pink Pony sued the City, its Mayor, its City Council members and its City Clerk, claiming that the sexually oriented business ordinance was unconstitutional and that Pink Pony was exempt from the ordinance based on its settlement agreement with DeKalb County. In upholding the trial court's decision, the Georgia Supreme Court held that given "the established record regarding the deleterious effects of alcohol coupled with nude dancing, the trial court did not err by finding that, as a matter of law, Brookhaven's sexually-oriented business ordinance does not unconstitutionally infringe upon Pink Pony's free speech rights." View "Trop, Inc. d/b/a Pink Pony v. City of Brookhaven" on Justia Law

The issue this case presented to the Supreme Court stemmed from litigation involving the dissolution of an anesthesiology practice. Plaintiffs Angel Cancel, M.D., Pravin Jain, M.D., Grace Duque-Dizon, M.D., and Monajna Sanjeev, M.D. were shareholders in the now-defunct Central Georgia Anesthesia Services, P.C. (CGAS), which was at one time the exclusive anesthesiology provider at a Macon hospital owned and operated by The Medical Center of Central Georgia, Inc. According to Plaintiffs' complaint, beginning in 2001, Plaintiffs Cancel and Jain discovered what they believed were billing irregularities within the practice, which they brought to the attention of their fellow shareholders and officials at The Medical Center over a period of time between 2001 and 2003. In 2003, The Medical Center announced its intention to restructure its anesthesiology department, after which CGAS shareholders voted to terminate CGAS' contract with The Medical Center. The Medical Center subsequently began recruitment of physicians for its restructured department and eventually selected several former CGAS physicians to join it. None of the four Plaintiffs were selected, and their affiliation with The Medical Center ended. The Medical Center had entered into an exclusive services contract with The Nexus Medical Group, LLC, which was comprised of the former CGAS physicians, and some non-CGAS physicians, who had been selected by The Medical Center for its restructured anesthesiology department. Alleging that the restructuring at The Medical Center and formation of Nexus were effectuated as part of a scheme to expel Plaintiffs from their practice in retaliation for bringing to light the billing issues, Plaintiffs filed suit seeking damages for breach of fiduciary duty, fraud, and other claims. Several years of discovery, and various motions for summary judgment were filed and hearings were held. In 2011, the trial court issued an order granting summary judgment to Defendants on all of Plaintiff Cancel's claims. Cancel appealed this order. Prior to the filing of Cancel's notice of appeal, the trial court issued a second order, denying Nexus' motion for summary judgment as to the remaining Plaintiffs. After the filing of the notice of appeal, the trial court issued the last of its summary judgment orders, denying the motions filed by the CGAS Defendants and The Medical Center Defendants as to the remaining Plaintiffs. Nexus and the CGAS Defendants filed a notice of cross-appeal, challenging the orders denying them summary judgment. A few days later, the Medical Center Defendants filed their own notice of cross-appeal. The Court of Appeals consolidated the appeal and cross-appeals and issued a single opinion in which it affirmed the grant of summary judgment against Cancel; reversed the denial of summary judgment against Nexus; and dismissed the cross-appeals of the CGAS Defendants and the Medical Center Defendants. Dismissal of the cross-appeals was premised on the Court of Appeals' conclusion that it had no jurisdiction to consider them because they sought to challenge orders issued after the filing of Cancel's notice of appeal. Upon review, the Supreme Court concluded that the appellate court had jurisdiction, and erred in holding otherwise. Accordingly, the case was reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "Sewell v. Cancel" on Justia Law

This appeal stemmed from a dispute over equipment owned by Tri-State Concrete Contracting, an unincorporated sole proprietorship. Abel Ramirez worked at Tri-State, and when its proprietor, DuWayne Juhnke, died. Ramirez entered an agreement with Juhnke's wife to continue operating Tri-State and to make payments to purchase Tri-State and its equipment. After making some payments, Ramirez stopped, opened Abel & Sons Concrete, LLC, and started doing Tri-State's jobs with Tri-State's equipment without paying for the use of that equipment. In response, Mrs. Juhnke and the administrator of Mr. Juhnke's estate ("Appellees") sued Ramirez and Abel & Sons ("Appellants") along with Dollar Concrete Construction Company, the company that was storing the equipment and allegedly letting Appellants use it without Appellees' permission. Appellees and Dollar filed cross-motions for summary judgment. The trial court denied both motions for summary judgment, explaining that it was undisputed that Dollar did not own the equipment and that Appellees did not have access to it, but there was a genuine factual dispute as to the ownership of the equipment and whether Dollar had refused Appellees' demand for its return. The trial court's order that although Appellees and Dollar had asked at a hearing for time to resolve how Dollar would relinquish the equipment, they had not presented a consent order, so the court sua sponte required Dollar to place the equipment outside its locked storage yard within 30 days and after giving seven days' notice to Appellants and Appellees to allow them to "arrange to retrieve and store same pending determination as to ownership." The order further directed Appellants and Appellees not to "transfer, damage, or use the property pending determination as to ownership" and to equally share the costs of moving and storage. The Supreme Court concluded that those portions of the order comprised, in substance, an interlocutory injunction, and Appellants filed this appeal to challenge the injunction against them on the ground that they were not given notice before the court imposed it. Because Appellants did not have proper notice of the interlocutory injunction, the trial court abused its discretion in imposing it against them, and the portion of the court's order issuing equitable relief binding Appellants was vacated. View "Abel & Sons Concrete, LLC v. Juhnke" on Justia Law

In 2007, Larry Thompson executed a continuing guaranty in favor of Lafarge Building Materials, Inc., as part of an application for credit submitted by his company, Elite Dwellings, LLC. During 2008, Elite Dwellings ordered building materials under the account established based on the application but then failed to pay Lafarge for the materials. In May 2009, Lafarge sued Elite Dwellings and Thompson, alleging that they were jointly and severally liable for the debt. Lafarge and Thompson eventually filed cross-motions for summary judgment, and in October 2012, the trial court ruled that the guaranty satisfied the Statute of Frauds and entered summary judgment against Elite Dwellings and Thompson jointly and severally. Elite Dwellings did not appeal the judgment, but Thompson did. A divided Court of Appeals reversed, holding that the guaranty was unenforceable because it did not sufficiently identify the name of the principal debtor and thus failed to satisfy the Statute of Frauds. The question presented for the Supreme Court's review was whether the Court of Appeals erred in holding that the guaranty agreement at issue here did not identify the principal debtor with sufficient specificity to satisfy the Statute of Frauds. The Supreme Court concluded the appellate court did err, and reversed. View "Lafarge Building Materials, Inc. v. Thompson" on Justia Law

Robert Haege died in 2006. Three months earlier, Haege made a will, in which he left his “personal assets” to his brother and sister, and in which he left his “business interests, both tangible and intangible, real or personal, connected to the business known as Traditional Fine Art, Ltd.” to his brother, sister, and two longtime employees. After Haege died, questions arose about the disposition of property associated with Traditional Fine Art, Ltd., insofar as Traditional Fine Art was a sole proprietorship and, therefore, had no legal existence separate and apart from Haege himself. The will was admitted to probate, and Sharon Haege England (sister) was appointed executrix of his estate. England failed to distribute any property to James Simmons and Elery Stinson, the two employees. The employees filed suit against England, seeking a declaratory judgment as to the meaning of the will with respect to the property associated with Traditional Fine Art. The trial court ruled in favor of England, concluding that, because Traditional Fine Art was only a sole proprietorship, the property associated with the business was merely the personal property of Haege. Simmons and Stinson appealed, and in a split decision, the Court of Appeals reversed. To the Supreme Court, England did not dispute the fundamental premise of the decision of the Court of Appeals, that a sole proprietor could separately dispose in his will of personal property connected with his sole proprietorship and his other personal property. Instead, England argued that Haege did not actually intend to separately dispose of any property associated with his sole proprietorship. Taking the will as a whole, the Supreme Court concluded that the most natural and reasonable understanding of the provisions of the will was that Haege left his personal property that amounted to "business interests . . . connected to the business known as Traditional Fine Art, Ltd." specifically including, but not limited to, membership certificates that he owned, to Simmons, Stinson, and his brother and sister, and he left all of his other personal property to his brother and sister alone. Accordingly, the Court affirmed the judgment of the Court of Appeals. View "England v. Simmons" on Justia Law

Premier Petroleum, Inc. appealed the confirmation of the sale of a gas station held in receivership, entered after the superior court determined that a restrictive covenant Premier signed with a third party to encumber the property was unenforceable. Finding no reversible error, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "CML-GA Smyrna, LLC v. Atlanta Real Estate Investments, LLC" on Justia Law

Kia Motors Manufacturing Georgia, Inc. instituted a "Quick Start Program" run in conjunction with the Technical College System of Georgia. Krystal Coleman, Sabrina Robinson Bolston, Tim Durden, and Darrell Strawbridge each submitted a request to the Technical College System pursuant to the Open Records Act, seeking to inspect certain records concerning Kia's hiring practices. The College System refused on several grounds to make the requested records available for inspection, and Coleman, Bolston, Durden, and Strawbridge filed suit to compel their production. In 2012, while the lawsuit was pending, the General Assembly amended the Open Records Act, and among other revisions, it added an exemption for certain records concerning the Quick Start program from public inspection. The Technical College System and Kia then moved to dismiss the lawsuit, asserting that exemption from the revised Act. Without deciding the extent to which paragraph of the revised Act applied to the requested records, the trial court denied the motions to dismiss, concluding that it would be unconstitutional in any event to apply the revision in a pending lawsuit. The Technical College System and Kia appealed, and after review of the trial court record, the Supreme Court concluded in this case the applicable revised parts of the Act applied and that its application was constitutional. The trial court's decision was reversed, and on remand, the trial court was mandated to determine which of the pertinent records were subject to the revised Act. View "Deal v. Coleman" on Justia Law