Georgia supreme court

Published on: July 15, 2011

Georgia Supreme Court Hands Down Pivotal Ruling in Drunk Driving Car Accident

On July 5, by a vote of 6-1, Georgia’s Supreme Court found a convenience store could be held liable for selling alcohol to a man who was responsible for a fatal car accident. Initially, the trial court granted the store’s motion for summary judgment on the grounds that the beverage was not sold to be consumed on the premises, reports the Associated Press. This seems to be an assumption the consumer was unaware of – at the time of the auto accident, and only four hours after buying a twelve-pack of beer from Exprezit!, his blood alcohol content was a whopping 0.181, more than twice the legal limit.

As a car accident attorney in Atlanta, Georgia, I come into contact with similar claims involving drunk drivers. When I heard about this particular ruling, I immediately honed in on the fact that the man was said to be visibly intoxicated at the time the alcohol was purchased. Another article by The Florida Times-Union notes the Court’s application of the “dram shop act” to its reasoning. The law states that anyone who knowingly sells or provides alcohol to someone who is noticeably intoxicated while knowing that the person will soon be driving may be liable if the alcohol is the direct cause of an injury.

In his opinion for the majority, Justice Hugh Thompson reasoned that the act was all-inclusive, meaning that it was intended to encompass the sale of alcohol at places other than the “proverbial dram shop” or bar. On the other hand, Justice Robert Benham, dissenting, concluded this was an unfair interpretation of the act because clerks at grocery stores and convenience stores often experience a lesser degree of interaction with patrons. Ostensibly, he claims, this affords them little opportunity to really judge the sobriety customers.

Published on: October 8, 2009

Georgia Tort Reform Challenged in State Supreme Court

by Robert N. Katz, Esq.

Georgia’s Medical Malpractice Law Challenged in Supreme Court

The Georgia Supreme Court is hearing arguments relating to a key provision of the state’s tort reform laws, which requires plaintiffs in a medical malpractice action to establish that an emergency room doctor was guilty of gross negligence.

The hearings revolve around the case of Carol Gliemmo, who suffered a sudden headache on April 22^nd 2007, and visited the San Francisco Hospital in Columbus. According to Gliemmo’s lawyers, the ER doctor, Mark Cousineau diagnosed her condition as resulting from stress, prescribed valium, and sent her home. This was even as the 56-year-old Gliemmo continued to scream in agony. Gliemmo suffered a stroke, and has since been left paralyzed and with significant neurological damage.

Published on: January 27, 2009

Georgia Supreme Court Hearings in Medical Malpractice Case Soon to Begin

by Robert N. Katz, Esq.

Medical malpractice lawyers in Georgia will be looking with interest at the outcome of a civil case that’s due to begin hearings this week.The judgment in the case that involves four doctors who were cleared of negligence by a jury, has lasting repercussions for medical malpractice lawsuits in the state.

In 2003, 13-year-old Justin Smith was sickened with a rare tick-borne condition called Rocky Mountain spotted fever.The disease is spread by tick bites, and as symptoms worsen, can quickly lead to flat, pink rashes, severe abdominal pain, diarrhea and joint pain. It can be a potentially life threatening illness. Justin was first taken to pediatric doctors, and then transferred to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta at Egleston, where he finally recovered from his illness. By then however, he had already suffered some amount of brain damage.His parents, in their medical malpractice lawsuit against the four doctors, alleged that the doctors had been negligent in falling to diagnose the illness.The doctors claimed that the condition itself is so rare that it’s difficult to diagnose. In 2006, the four doctors were cleared of any wrongdoing by the jury.

Now, the Georgia Supreme Court will consider whether instructions given by the judge to the jurors regarding hindsight could have been inaccurate or confusing.Plaintiff’s attorneys claim that the hindsight instruction should only be given in case of a claim of negligence where the defendants had no knowledge of certain information.Here, the doctors were aware of the tick bite.The defendant’s attorney argue that Justin’s rashes, which are a symptom of the fever, only became evident when the child was taken to the Egleston facility, and therefore, the doctors were not aware of the symptomatic rashes.