Georgia

Personal injury and wrongful death claims must be filed within two years of accrual under OCGA § 9-3-33. This two-year period applies broadly to negligence-based tort claims, intentional tort claims resulting in personal injury, and most categories of bodily harm. Property damage to real property follows a four-year period under OCGA § 9-3-30, and property damage to personal property follows a four-year period under OCGA § 9-3-32.

Medical malpractice operates under a distinctive framework: two years from the date of injury under OCGA § 9-3-71(a), with a five-year outside maximum (statute of repose) from the date of the negligent act under OCGA § 9-3-71(b). The two-year-plus-five-year-cap structure parallels California's CCP § 340.5 framework but differs in the specific accrual triggers and exception provisions.

Written contract claims must be filed within six years of breach under OCGA § 9-3-24. Open accounts must be filed within four years under OCGA § 9-3-25, and oral contract claims have a four-year period under OCGA § 9-3-26. UCC sale-of-goods claims follow a four-year period from breach under OCGA § 11-2-725. Georgia's distinction between written (six years) and oral (four years) contract periods requires careful attention to whether the contractual relationship was reduced to writing.

Fraud claims must be filed within four years of accrual under OCGA § 9-3-31, with the discovery rule under OCGA § 9-3-96 providing that accrual is delayed until the fraud is discovered or should have been discovered through reasonable diligence. The discovery rule is particularly important in latent fraud cases where the fraudulent conduct was concealed and not reasonably discoverable until later.

Defamation (libel and slander, identified statutorily as injuries to the reputation) must be filed within one year under OCGA § 9-3-33. This is the same statute as the general two-year personal injury period, with the one-year period applying specifically to reputation-injury claims. The shortened period requires accelerated intake for defamation matters, parallel to similar one-year periods in New York, California, and DC.

Georgia's Ante Litem Notice requirements (covered separately) impose additional procedural deadlines that operate alongside these SOL periods when governmental defendants are involved. The six-month municipal Ante Litem deadline under OCGA § 36-33-5 and the twelve-month state Ante Litem deadline under OCGA § 50-21-26 function independently of the SOL periods. Missing either notice deadline can bar the claim even when the underlying SOL period remains open.

Georgia applies a modified comparative fault framework under OCGA § 51-12-33. A plaintiff whose fault is 50 percent or greater is barred from recovery. A plaintiff whose fault is less than 50 percent recovers damages reduced by their proportionate share of fault. The modified comparative framework was established by Georgia's 2005 tort reform legislation, replacing a prior framework that included joint and several liability and other elements common to traditional tort doctrines.

Georgia's apportionment framework under OCGA § 51-12-33(b) requires the trier of fact to allocate fault among all persons or entities who contributed to the alleged injury or damages, including parties to the action, settled defendants, and non-parties. This non-party apportionment provision is distinctive among US comparative fault frameworks and substantially affects litigation strategy in Georgia tort cases.

To trigger non-party apportionment, a defendant must give notice of intent to apportion to non-parties under OCGA § 51-12-33(d), generally at least 120 days before trial. The non-party apportionment provision allows defendants to argue that fault should be allocated to potential tortfeasors who are not named in the case, whether because they were never sued, settled out, were dismissed, were immune from suit, or for other reasons. The framework rewards thorough investigation of all potentially responsible parties early in case development and incentivizes defense identification of empty-chair tortfeasors.

Georgia eliminated joint liability for most tort claims through the 2005 amendments to OCGA § 51-12-33. Each defendant is liable only for the percentage of damages assessed against that defendant. There is no joint liability for damages allocated to other tortfeasors. This several-only liability framework applies regardless of whether the damages are economic or non-economic, and it applies to all defendants in most tort claims.

Limited exceptions to several-only liability exist for certain types of intentional conduct, concerted-action conspiracies, and specific statutory frameworks where joint liability may be preserved. These exceptions are narrowly construed and the general rule of several-only liability dominates Georgia tort practice. The combination of modified comparative fault with non-party apportionment and several-only liability makes Georgia among the more defense-favorable tort jurisdictions in the US.

Georgia's municipal Ante Litem Notice requirement under OCGA § 36-33-5 imposes a six-month written notice deadline for tort claims against any municipality. The notice must be in writing and presented to the governing body of the municipality. The six-month deadline is significantly shorter than the underlying two-year tort SOL under OCGA § 9-3-33, creating accelerated procedural deadlines for any municipal tort claim.

The notice must contain the time, place, and extent of the injury, with sufficient specificity to allow the municipality to investigate the claim. Strict construction is applied to the content requirements: substantial compliance is generally insufficient if material information is missing, vague, or so general that the municipality cannot reasonably investigate the underlying incident. Failure to provide timely written notice with adequate content bars the claim regardless of the underlying merits.

The Georgia Tort Claims Act applies to claims against the State of Georgia and state agencies. Under OCGA § 50-21-26, written ante litem notice must be presented to the Department of Administrative Services within twelve months of the date the loss was or should have been discovered. The twelve-month period is more generous than the six-month municipal period but still operates as a procedural deadline independent of the underlying SOL.

State ante litem notice must contain the name of the state government entity, the time and place of the transaction or occurrence, the nature of the loss suffered, and the amount of damages claimed. The notice must be sent by certified mail or statutory overnight delivery to satisfy the service requirement. Strict construction applies to the state framework as well, and content failures bar the claim independently of timing issues.

Both the municipal and state ante litem frameworks operate as conditions precedent to suit. Missing either deadline bars the claim independently of the SOL period. Georgia courts apply strict construction rigorously, and most failures to provide timely written notice with adequate content are fatal to the claim. The strict construction principle in Georgia is comparable to DC's strict construction of § 12-309 notice but with different deadlines and content requirements.

For practitioners, the dual-track framework (six months for municipal, twelve months for state) and the strict construction principle make Georgia one of the more demanding jurisdictions for tort claims against governmental defendants. Calendar discipline, written notice templates, and careful early identification of the defendant type (state vs. municipal vs. other governmental entity) are essential to preserving claims against governmental defendants in Georgia.

Georgia's State Medicaid False Claims Act under OCGA § 49-4-168 et seq. provides a qui tam framework targeting Medicaid program fraud. The statute closely parallels the federal False Claims Act in structure, with qui tam relator provisions, government intervention procedures, treble damages, civil penalties, and relator's share of recoveries. The Medicaid FCA was modeled on the federal framework and qualifies under the federal Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (DRA) for enhanced state share of Medicaid fraud recoveries, an incentive structure that has driven the adoption of state Medicaid FCAs across many jurisdictions.

Georgia's broader Taxpayer Protection False Claims Act under OCGA § 23-3-120 et seq. extends qui tam coverage beyond Medicaid to fraud against the State of Georgia in any context. Enacted in 2012, the Taxpayer Protection FCA covers fraudulent claims for payment from the State, fraudulent submissions to state programs, and other categories of fraud against the State. Like the Medicaid FCA, it parallels the federal FCA structure in most material respects including qui tam relator provisions, intervention procedures, and treble damages.

The dual GA FCA framework places Georgia among a small number of states (alongside Tennessee, New Mexico, and others) maintaining both a Medicaid-specific FCA and a broader general state FCA. This structure provides greater coverage than Medicaid-only state FCAs (Colorado, Arizona, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Utah, Washington) and broader-only state FCAs. Practitioners must determine which framework applies based on the nature of the alleged fraud and the state program affected.

Both Georgia FCA statutes provide for relator's share of recoveries similar to the federal FCA: 15 to 25 percent if the government intervenes, or 25 to 30 percent if the government declines and the relator proceeds alone, subject to framework-specific variations. The intervention decision in Georgia FCA cases is coordinated through the Georgia Attorney General's Office, which functions as the lead state agency for FCA matters.

Sealed complaint procedures parallel the federal framework. The relator's complaint is filed under seal and served on the Attorney General and the relevant state agency (the Department of Community Health for Medicaid matters, other relevant agencies for non-Medicaid matters). Seal extensions are common as the AG's office evaluates intervention. The decision to intervene shapes the case trajectory significantly, just as in federal FCA practice, with parallel federal-state coordination common in matters that implicate both state and federal claims.

The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, headquartered in Atlanta and covering federal cases from Georgia, Florida, and Alabama, has developed substantial FCA jurisprudence shaped by the healthcare industry concentration in its geographic territory. Atlanta-based major healthcare companies, Florida's substantial Medicare and Medicaid population, and Alabama's significant healthcare provider community generate a steady flow of FCA matters that produce 11th Circuit appellate decisions on key FCA doctrines including pleading standards, materiality, falsity, and scienter.

The Eleventh Circuit applies a heightened particularity requirement to FCA complaints under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 9(b). United States ex rel. Clausen v. Laboratory Corporation of America, 290 F.3d 1301 (11th Cir. 2002) established that FCA relators must plead the specific details of false claims submitted, including the identity of who submitted false claims, when and where they were submitted, and the content of the false statements. Mere allegations of fraudulent schemes without identification of specific false claims have generally been insufficient under Clausen.

Subsequent Eleventh Circuit decisions have applied and refined Clausen's particularity requirement across a range of FCA pleading challenges. The Circuit's approach to Rule 9(b) particularity has been one of the more rigorous applications among federal circuits, requiring relators to undertake substantial pre-filing investigation and identification of specific submitted false claims rather than relying on inferences from broader schemes.

Universal Health Services, Inc. v. United States ex rel. Escobar, 579 U.S. 176 (2016) established the rigorous and demanding materiality standard for FCA claims, requiring that misrepresentations be material to the government's payment decision. The Eleventh Circuit has applied Escobar's materiality standard rigorously, requiring evidence that the government would have changed its payment decision based on the alleged misrepresentation rather than treating materiality as a per se element of any fraud allegation.

The Eleventh Circuit's post-Escobar jurisprudence has emphasized that the government's actual payment behavior in similar situations is highly relevant to materiality analysis. Where the government continued to pay claims with knowledge of the alleged misrepresentation, courts have found the misrepresentation immaterial as a matter of law. This evidentiary approach to materiality has substantially affected FCA case development in the Circuit and influenced practitioner case-selection criteria.

For practitioners filing FCA matters in the Eleventh Circuit, the combined effect of Clausen particularity and Escobar materiality is to require substantial pre-filing investigation. Specific false claims must be identified with detail (claim numbers, dates, amounts, submitting entities), and evidence supporting government materiality must be developed (parallel claims that the government rejected, regulatory enforcement history, internal government communications). Relator counsel filing cases in the Eleventh Circuit (or with appeals likely to reach the Eleventh Circuit) should structure case development accordingly, with substantial investment in pleading-stage substantiation.