2020 Georgia Code
Title 50 - State Government
Chapter 21 - Waiver of Sovereign Immunity as to Actions Ex Contractu; State Tort Claims
Article 2 - State Tort Claims
§ 50-21-27. Retroactive Operation; Limitations of Actions; Applicability of Other Related Statutes

1. It is the specific intent of the General Assembly that this article shall operate retroactively so as to apply to tort claims or causes of action which accrued on or after January 1, 1991.A tort claim or cause of action shall be deemed to have accrued on the date the loss was or should have been discovered.This article shall not apply to tort claims or causes of action which accrued prior to January 1, 1991.
2. For tort claims and causes of action which accrued between January 1, 1991, and July 1, 1992, any tort action brought pursuant to this article is forever barred unless it is commenced within two years after July 1, 1992.
3. For tort claims and causes of action which accrue on or after July 1, 1992, any tort action brought pursuant to this article is forever barred unless it is commenced within two years after the date the loss was or should have been discovered.
4. Statutes of ultimate repose and abrogation, as provided for elsewhere in this Code, shall apply to claims and actions brought pursuant to this article.
5. All provisions relating to the tolling of limitations of actions, as provided elsewhere in this Code, shall apply to causes of action brought pursuant to this article.

(Code 1981, §50-21-27, enacted by Ga. L. 1992, p. 1883, § 1.)

- Pursuant to Code Section 28-9-5, in 1992, "July 1, 1992" was substituted for "the effective date of this article" in two places in subsection (b) and once in subsection (c).

JUDICIAL DECISIONS

Expouse for federal civil rights violations.

- Georgia Tort Claims Act, O.C.G.A. § 50-21-20 et seq., does not expand the state's exposure for federal civil rights actions beyond that provided in O.C.G.A. § 9-3-33. Doe #102 v. Department of Cors., 268 Ga. 582, 492 S.E.2d 516 (1997), cert. denied, 523 U.S. 1047, 118 S. Ct. 1363, 140 L. Ed. 2d 512 (1998).

- In a tort action brought by a passenger against a regional transportation authority, the reversal of the denial of the authority's motion for judgment on the pleadings was upheld because, by its terms, O.C.G.A. § 36-33-5(d) permitted the tolling of the period of limitation only for claims against municipal corporations and it was not a municipal corporation. Foster v. Ga. Reg'l Transp. Auth., 297 Ga. 714, 777 S.E.2d 446 (2015).

- Statute of limitations was not tolled on the plaintiff's state law claims when the plaintiff's failure to effect proper service in accordance with the Georgia Tort Claims Act for over a year after filing the plaintiff's complaint, knowing of the defendants' attack on the sufficiency of service of process, precluded the plaintiff from establishing lack of fault for the delay. Gibbons v. McBride, 124 F. Supp. 3d 1342 (S.D. Ga. 2015).

- Plaintiff's tort action against the Georgia Ports Authority complied with the statute of limitations and ante litem notice statute, O.C.G.A. §§ 50-21-26(a)(4) and50-21-27(c), and the plaintiff's second action was proper under the renewal statute, O.C.G.A. § 9-2-61, but was dismissed for failure to timely attach the ante litem notice. The plaintiff's third action was improper because dismissal of the first action occurred outside the statute of limitations, so only one renewal was authorized. Burroughs v. Georgia Ports Authority, 339 Ga. App. 294, 793 S.E.2d 538 (2016).

Trial court did not err by dismissing the plaintiff's personal injury lawsuit on statute-of-limitation grounds because the first lawsuit did not name the same defendant and the two lawsuits named entirely different instrumentalities of the state; thus, the instant lawsuit was not a valid renewal action. Aaron v. Jekyll Island-State Park Authority, 348 Ga. App. 332, 822 S.E.2d 829 (2019).

Cited in Datz v. Brinson, 208 Ga. App. 455, 430 S.E.2d 823 (1993); Sylvester v. DOT, 252 Ga. App. 31, 555 S.E.2d 740 (2001); Backensto v. Ga. DOT, 284 Ga. App. 41, 643 S.E.2d 302 (2007).