Atlanta Injury Attorney Blog

I see unusual and tragic facts patterns quite often and recently we analyzed an unusual potential case for a client. The mother of a Georgia woman contacted us to see whether we could bring a claim on behalf of her deceased daughter against the daughter’s deceased husband. The husband negligently crashed the car the unlucky couple was riding in and killed them both. The short answer is “yes”, although there are some practical limitations on what can be done with such a case.

Normally in Georgia, a spouse may not sue a spouse for personal injury because there is spousal immunity. This rule exists to protect the sanctity of marriage. However, when one spouse dies, the public interest in preserving the marriage no longer has the same power. In the case of Jones v. Jones 259 Ga. 49, 376 S.E.2d 674 (1989), the daughter brought a wrongful death suit against the wife who had killed the father. The father’s insurance lawyers argued that spousal immunity barred the suit but the Court ruled that when the spouse is dead, the spousal immunity prohibition has no real purpose and violates the equal protection clause of the Constitution.

Although no one wants to see a family fracture in a hailstorm of litigation, where there is negligence and separate family interests in the two estates, a wrongful death attorney can bring the claim.

One of our readers asked “can I appeal my Fulton County property taxes even when the don’t send an assessment?” Given that I practice law primarily as a wrongful death attorney, I went to Hal Roach, a property tax assessor who handles appeals for Georgia Property Tax assessments and has twenty years of government experience.

As we discussed in the previous article on how to appeal your Fulton County and City of Atlanta taxes, you used to need to have a Change of Assessment notice sent to you to trigger your right to file an appeal. So if they are not raising your assessment, you normally won’t get the Change of Assessment notice. Good news though, they changed the rule.

Here is the new link to the revised directions for Fulton County.

I just completed posting a detailed timeline on the website answering the question “how long will it take for a lawyer to settle my Georgia case?” As I detailed in the article, not every case should be settled and more and more often, I am encouraging my client’s to allow me to litigate their cases because Georgia insurance companies are low-balling significant injury cases. Remember that the timeline describes what you should expect for a straightforward Georgia car accident case. As any car accident lawyer will tell you, each case is different, as is each Judge.

If you are in a car accident in Georgia and the person that hit you is not a resident, you have the right to hale them into Court in the County in Georgia where the crash happened or in your home county. We frequently deal with issues regarding venue (the proper court in which the lawsuit must be filed). Normally, under the Georgia Constitution you have to sue a Georgia citizen or corporation in the County where they reside so that there is a jury of their peers. GA. CONST. Art. VI, II, Para. VI. However, the Non-Resident Motorist statute makes an exception for drivers who lived outside of Georgia at the time of the crash. O.C.G.A. 40-12-3.

Under Georgia law, the complaint (the document that starts a law suit) must include facts that establish venue. O.C.G.A. 9-11-8(a)(2). A skilled lawyer knows which counties are more favorable and can walk you through the options. If you decide to file the suit on your own though, be sure to read the statutes first.

The hospital wants to bill the emergency room bill to the driver of the car that crashed into me; that sounds fair, right? WRONG. All injury lawyers know that If you have health insurance and do not have Georgia Medical Payments insurance coverage, then the medical care should be billed to your health insurance after a crash, every single time. “Why” you may ask. “After all it is only fair that the other driver’s insurance company should pay the emergency room bill if they caused the crash.”1. Your health insurer has a contract fee schedule for services so that a $1400.00 MRI will only be billed to your health insurer at around $500.00. So when time comes to reimburse the health insurer out of your settlement you are repaying less than $500.00 instead of $1400 to the hospital.

2. You may not want to hire a lawyer and bother with trying to make a financial recovery from the other driver. If the hospital fails to bill the driver, they may try to take out a Georgia Medical Lien against you and you end up on the hook.

What should I do with the hospital bill after a car accident in Georgia?

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Last month, the City of Atlanta raised taxes 42% and with property values falling, many of my neighbors are asking “how do I appeal the Fulton County property tax assessment?” I am an l injury lawyer so do not pick up the phone and ask me to handle your appeal because i won’t . However, as a resident in the City and an officer of the Court, I do want to give you the tools to file your own appeal if the County is taking advantage of you. So how do you sink their battleship?

First off, you should not panic. For a home worth about $240,000.00, this should not be more than a $250 increase for the year which breaks down to just over $20.00 a month. However, it is certainly a punch in the eye when you consider the amount of waste the Mayor has allowed to occur. To add insult to injury, with property values in Georgia sinking to 1996 levels in some counties, this is going to anger a lot of good citizens. So, let’s get to it. How do you appeal the Fulton County property tax assessment now that values are going down?

1) When you get Change of Assessment Notice, file your written appeal on uniformity or value within 45 days.

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I get a lot of questions from clients that have been in serious crashes and they worry that using their medical payments insurance or their Georgia Uninsured Motorist insurance will cause them to have their own car policy canceled. This is untrue unless you exceed the number of claims listed in the statute below. Under O.C.G.A. § 33-24-45(c), the insurance company cannot drop you for claims unless:

You have three or more of the following within the preceding 36 month period:

(1) Accidents involving two or more motor vehicles in which you were not at fault;

I recently finished a new video explaining how to logically approach getting the full fair market value for your car when the insurance company totals it out after a car accident. I am asked these questions time and again, so I thought I would share this information with the web community so that folks can feel more comfortable when they deal with the insurance companies.

I am handling a wrongful death case for a Georgia family where the death occurred in California and it is stunning how much less favorable California law is for the family of the deceased. I represent the children of a deceased 35 year old who was run down by a tractor trailer as he walked down a lonely stretch of highway late at night. From the police investigation and photographs, we determined that the trucker hit the young man from behind and that the truck had swerved several feet over the fog line when it struck him.

As a Georgia wrongful death lawyer handling an out-of-state wrongful death case, we always associate excellent local counsel. On this particular case, the firm of Howarth and Smith has been handling the California wrongful death legal issues while our firm develops the value of the life components and the engineering aspects.

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Any sexual harassment lawyer will tell you that there can be a fine line between an uncomfortable office environment that can be cured by human resources and one that requires EEOC involvement. As sad as it may seem, we spend more waking hours with the people we work with than we do with our own families. Because we all want to earn money, take care of ourselves and our families, we put in as many hours as it takes to keep our jobs, and possibly even get promoted. Jobs have changed even in the last 10 years from simple 9-5 professional relationships to people working together day in and day out – – trying to earn some money, working hard to maybe advance within the company, and trying to form friendships and bonds in the process.

The other day, I heard from a friend that, within her company, there were many deeper-than-professional relationships amongst the employees, and even between employees and their supervisors. And her particular supervisor was a touchy-feely guy. A guy who gave hugs- and kisses on the cheek – gave lots of compliments on how she looked. He made comments on what she was wearing and asked questions about whom she was dating. She asked me, “what if my boss touches me, is the that sexual harassment?”

In Georgia, what is sexual harassment? The answer is that, in Georgia, as well as most other states, it depends. There is no clear cut answer. Some examples: