Justia Georgia Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Amy Smith, individually and as next friend of her daughter Tyasia Brown, sued her landlord, Bobby Chupp for injuries Brown allegedly sustained as the result of ingesting lead from deteriorating lead-based paint at the house Smith rented from Chupp. The house was insured by Chupp under a commercial general liability (CGL) policy issued by Georgia Farm Bureau Mutual Insurance Company (GFB). After Chupp tendered Smith’s claims to GFB under the provisions of the policy, GFB filed a declaratory judgment action against Smith and Chupp seeking a determination that Brown’s injuries were not covered under the policy and that it had no duty to defend Chupp against Smith’s claims. The Georgia Supreme Court granted a petition for certiorari to the Court of Appeals to determine whether the Court of Appeals erred in holding, as a matter of first impression, that personal injury claims arising from lead poisoning due to lead-based paint ingestion were not excluded from coverage pursuant to an absolute pollution exclusion in CGL insurance policy covering residential rental property. Because the Supreme Court disagreed with the Court of Appeals’ conclusion that lead-based paint was not clearly a “pollutant” as defined by the policy, it reversed the Court of Appeals' decision in this case. View "Georgia Farm Bureau Mut. Ins. Co. v. Smith" on Justia Law

Before the Georgia Supreme Court issued its decision in "Zaldivar v. Prickett," (774 SE2d 688 (2015)), the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia certified a question of Georgia law that was effectively answered later by that case. "Zaldivar" directed the trier of fact in certain cases to “consider the fault of all persons or entities who contributed to the alleged injury or damages." The federal district court posed this question: "[d]oes OCGA 51-12-33 (c) allow the jury to assess a percentage of fault to the non-party employer of a plaintiff who sues a product manufacturer and seller for negligence in failing to warn about a product danger, even though the non-party employer has immunity under OCGA 34-9-11?" The Georgia Supreme Court replied that unless there was a compelling reason to treat nonparty employers with immunity under the Workers’ Compensation Act differently than nonparties with other defenses or immunities against liability,"Zaldivar" required an affirmative answer to the certified question. "We see no such compelling reason, and so, we adhere to Zaldivar and respond to the District Court in the affirmative." View "Walker v. Tensor Machinery Ltd." on Justia Law

This case involves the application of Georgia’s "ER statute" (OCGA 51-1-29.5), which required that plaintiffs who bring malpractice claims based on "emergency medical care" provided in a hospital emergency department must meet a higher standard and burden of proof to prevail. In this case, the plaintiffs took their infant daughter, who had fallen off a bed, to the emergency room with what the child’s mother described as a huge discolored bump on her head. Plaintiffs’ alleged the emergency room personnel committed malpractice in failing to properly evaluate the child and releasing her from the ER without diagnosing and treating her subdural hematoma and skull fracture, which led a few days later to severe brain damage. The trial court granted partial summary judgment to the plaintiffs, holding that section 51-1-29.5 did not apply to their claim, but on appeal the Court of Appeals reversed. After its review, the Supreme Court concluded that the Court of Appeals reached the right result, because the trial court misapplied 51-1-29.5 as well as the summary judgment standard of review. View "Nguyen v. Southwestern Emergency Physicians, P.C." on Justia Law

Dana Foster sued the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority under the provisions of the Georgia Tort Claims Act, alleging that the Authority was liable in tort for injuries that she sustained while riding as a passenger on its bus. The Authority moved for judgment on the pleadings, noting that the period of limitation for a claim under the Tort Claims Act is two years, and Foster filed her lawsuit more than two years after she sustained the injuries in question.1 Foster, however, had given ante litem notice of her claim to the Authority and the Department of Administrative Services as required by the Act, and she argued that the period of limitation was tolled for so long as her notice of claim was pending. The trial court denied the motion for judgment on the pleadings, and the Authority took an interlocutory appeal. Concluding that the tolling provision of OCGA 36-33-5(d) had no application to a claim asserted under the Tort Claims Act, the Court of Appeals reversed. The Supreme Court issued a writ of certiorari to review the decision of the Court of Appeals, and although its analysis differs from that of the Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court concluded that the Court of Appeals reached the right result. Accordingly, the Court affirmed the appellate court's judgment. View "Foster v. Georgia Regional Transp. Auth." on Justia Law

Daniel Prickett sued Imelda Zaldivar to recover money damages for injuries that he allegedly sustained in October 2009 after a vehicular collision. Prickett and Zaldivar blamed the other for the collision; Zaldivar alleged that Prickett's employer, Overhead Door Company (not a party to the lawsuit) was vicariously liable. Prickett was driving an Overhead Door vehicle at the time of the collision. According to Zaldivar, Overhead Door was negligent to have entrusted Prickett with a company truck, and for that reason, it too should bear some of the responsibility for any injuries that he sustained. Zaldivar gave notice under the "apportionment statute," OCGA 51-12-33, that she intended to ask the trier of fact in this case to assign some responsibility to Overhead Door for some of Prickett's injuries. Prickett filed a motion for partial summary judgment, asserting that OCGA 51-12-33 did not require any assignment of responsibility to Overhead Door. The trial court granted the motion for partial summary judgment, agreeing with Prickett about the meaning of the apportionment statute, and following the controlling case law to conclude that negligent entrustment on the part of Overhead Door could not possibly have been a proximate cause of any injuries that Prickett sustained. Zaldivar appealed, and in a split decision, the Court of Appeals affirmed. The Georgia Supreme Court granted certiorari review of the decision of the Court of Appeals, and concluded that the majority of the Court of Appeals correctly understood OCGA 51-12-33 to require the trier of fact to consider the “fault” of a nonparty only when the nonparty is shown to have committed a tort against the plaintiff that was a proximate cause of his injury. Furthermore, the Court concluded that negligent entrustment of an instrumentality could be a proximate cause of an injury to the person to whom the instrumentality was entrusted, and the majority of the Court of Appeals erred when it relied on statements in the case law to the contrary. The Court therefore reversed the judgment of the Court of Appeals. View "Zaldivar v. Prickett" on Justia Law

Lee V. Phillips IV, by and through his mother Santhonia Hector, and Hector individually (collectively “Plaintiffs”), brought a medical malpractice action against certified nurse midwife (“CNM”) Marcia Harmon, Deborah Haynes, M.D., Eagles Landing OB-GYN Associates, P.C., Eagles Landing OB-GYN Associates II, LLC, and Henry Medical Center, Inc. (collectively “Defendants”). Plaintiffs alleged that Defendants’ negligence caused Phillips to suffer oxygen deprivation shortly before birth, resulting in severe, permanent neurological injuries, including spastic quadriplegia, blindness, and an inability to speak. A jury returned a verdict for the Defendants. Plaintiffs filed a motion for a new trial, alleging that the trial court erred by engaging in a communication with the jury when neither the parties nor their attorneys were present, and by refusing to give their requested jury charge on the spoliation of evidence. The trial court denied the motion, and Plaintiffs appealed to the Court of Appeals. The Court of Appeals concluded that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to give Plaintiffs' requested charge on spoliation of evidence; however, it reversed the trial court’s denial of Plaintiffs’ motion for new trial after determining that Plaintiffs were entitled to a new trial because the trial court responded to a note from the jury during the course of their deliberations without ever advising the parties or their counsel that the communication had taken place. After review, the Supreme Court found that the trial court's exercise of discretion in ruling that Defendants had no duty to preserve certain paper fetal monitor strips, and the appellate court's upholding of that ruling, appeared to rest on a legally incorrect premise that a defendant's duty to preserve evidence required actual notice of a claim or litigation. "Consequently, the judgment of the Court of Appeals in regard to the spoliation issue cannot be upheld, and to the extent that the Court of Appeals cases dealing with the issue of spoliation may be read as endorsing the erroneous analysis used in this case." The Court affirmed in all other respects. View "Phillips v. Harmon" on Justia Law

Lynn Eshleman was employed with the DeKalb County Police Department as a law enforcement officer and dog handler, and in connection with her employment, she took care of Andor, a police dog trained to assist in the apprehension of persons suspected of criminal activity. When Eshleman was off-duty, Andor lived with her at her Walton County home, down the street from Benjamin Key. One day in 2011, Eshleman put Andor into a portable kennel outside her home, but she evidently failed to secure the kennel door. As a result, Andor escaped into the neighborhood, where the dog encountered Key’s eleven-year-old son. According to Key, the dog attacked his son, causing the child to sustain serious injuries to his arm. Key sued Eshleman, alleging that she failed to restrain Andor, and Eshleman moved for summary judgment on the ground of official immunity. The trial court denied her motion, Eshleman appealed, and the Court of Appeals affirmed the denial of summary judgment. The Supreme Court reversed and remanded. In this case, there was no evidence that DeKalb County gave specific direction to Eshleman about the extent to which she was to keep Andor restrained when she was not working. Key argued that the law imposed an absolute and sufficiently specific duty upon Eshleman to keep the dog under restraint, and in support of this contention, pointed to OCGA 51-2-7 and a Walton County ordinance. The statute recognized that "the keeper of an animal known to have vicious or dangerous propensities owed a duty of care with respect to the management and restraint of the animal for the protection of those who may come into contact with it." But the question, in the context of official immunity, was not merely whether an officer owed a duty of care, but rather, whether the official owed a duty that was particularized and certain enough to render her duty a ministerial one. "The duties that Eshleman was alleged to have violated were not ministerial ones because, although the duties reflected in OCGA 51-2-7 and the county ordinance may be definite, they do not require merely the carrying out of a specified task. [. . .] They require, instead, an exercise of personal deliberation and judgment about what is reasonable in the particular circumstances presented." The Supreme Court concluded that the trial court erred when it denied the motion for summary judgment on the ground of official immunity, and the decision of the Court of Appeals affirming that denial was also reversed. View "Eshelman v. Key" on Justia Law

The issue this case presented for the Supreme Court's review centered on recovery under an uninsured motorist (UM) insurance policy. Specifically, the issue was whether the burden of proof on summary judgment between the insured and the UM carrier was misallocated. The UM carrier denied coverage based on a claim that the at-fault driver was not "uninsured" as defined in the UM policy at issue here because the drive's liability carrier had not "legally denied" coverage. After review, the Supreme Court concluded the Court of Appeals erred in placing the burden of proof on the UM carrier in this instance, and therefore reversed. View "Travelers Home & Marine Ins. Co. v. Castellanos" on Justia Law

McHugh Fuller Law Group, PLLC, a Mississippi-based law firm, ran a full-page advertisement in a Northeast Georgia local newspaper, noting that Heritage Healthcare of Toccoa, a Stephens County nursing home owned by PruittHealth, had been cited by the government for deficiencies in the care of its residents and inviting those suspecting abuse or neglect of a loved one at the facility to call the law firm. On the following day, PruittHealth filed a verified complaint for temporary and permanent injunctive relief under the Georgia Uniform Deceptive Trade Practices Act (UDTPA), and petitioned ex parte for a temporary restraining order. That same day, the Stephens County Superior Court entered a temporary restraining order enjoining McHugh Fuller from publishing, in any newspaper or other media, advertisements regarding PruittHealth utilizing the language of the ad. At the hearing, PruittHealth presented testimony that the government citation referenced in the ad arose from an old report, that the cited deficiencies had been resolved immediately, and the ad had caused severe damage to the facility's reputation. McHugh Fuller presented testimony to substantiate and justify the specific language used in the ad. The trial court found the ad to be deceptive and thus in violation of the UDTPA. Thereafter, the trial court signed an order enjoining McHugh Fuller “from publishing or causing the offending advertisement to be published in the future” and requiring McHugh Fuller remove postings of the ad. McHugh Fuller filed a verified answer and a motion to amend and/or for reconsideration of the court's order. The Supreme Court consolidated both parties' appeals of the trial court's rulings.. In case S15A0362, the Supreme Court concluded the trial court erred by granting permanent injunctive relief at the conclusion of the interlocutory hearing without giving McHugh Fuller clear notice at the time that it was doing so. In case S15A0641, the Court found the trial court erred in its conclusion that that the appellate record in McHugh Fuller's initial appeal should not have included any filings in the trial court submitted after the entry of the permanent injunction on June 2, 2014. View "McHugh Fuller Law Group, PLLC v. PruittHealth-Toccoa, LLC" on Justia Law

In "Oliver v. McDade," (762 SE2d 96 (2014)), the Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court's denial of a motion for partial summary judgment brought by Crider Transportation and Jerome Oliver, finding that a question of fact remained whether John McDade could pursue a claim for emotional distress pursuant to the pecuniary loss rule. McDade was riding as a passenger in his own truck, which was being driven by his close friend Matthew Wood. McDade, Wood, and others were returning home late at night from a dirt car race in which Wood had competed, and Wood was towing his race car on a trailer behind McDade's truck. Just after driving the truck down the on-ramp onto the interstate, Wood noticed that something on the trailer was not secured, and he pulled over to the shoulder. A tractor-trailer owned by Crider Transportation and operated by Jerome Oliver swerved onto the shoulder and struck Wood's trailer and McDade's truck. Wood was crushed between the trailer and the truck and killed instantly. The impact threw McDade against the interior of his truck, shattered the glass in the rear of the truck's cab, and propelled blood and tissue from Wood's body onto McDade. McDade then got out of his truck, discovered Wood's mangled body lying partially in the road, and protected it from further damage by passing vehicles until emergency personnel arrived. Due to the collision, McDade suffered neck, back and knee injuries, as well as headaches, insomnia, flashbacks, anxiety, depression and suicidal thoughts. He sought psychiatric help, was diagnosed as suffering from major depression as a result of the collision, and was prescribed various medications. Based on the collision, McDade brought a negligence claim against Oliver, Crider, and Crider's liability insurance carrier. The trial court initially granted the defendants' motion for partial summary judgment, ruling that Georgia's impact rule barred bystanders from recovering damages for emotional distress resulting from witnessing another person's injuries, but later the trial court granted a motion for reconsideration, finding that McDade could pursue a claim for emotional distress under the pecuniary loss rule. After its review, the Supreme Court affirmed the Court of Appeals, in Division 1, which found that a question of fact remained regarding the allocation of McDade's damages, and affirmed the trial court's denial of Oliver's motion for summary judgment. The Supreme Court found that the Court of Appeals, Division 2 went further to assume facts not fully developed and opined as to how the law would apply to assumed facts. These issues were not ripe for consideration. Therefore, the Supreme Court affirmed the Court of Appeals' holding, but vacated Division 2's opinion. View "Oliver v. McDade" on Justia Law