---
title: O.C.G.A. § 5-6-16. Time for appeal by personal representative where party dies after trial; effect of entry of appeal and of failure to enter appeal; when appeal heard.
collection: code
id: 5-6-16
cite_as: O.C.G.A. § 5-6-16 (2025)
canonical_url: https://georgiacommons.org/code/5-6-16
md_url: https://georgiacommons.org/code/5-6-16.md
text_url: https://georgiacommons.org/code/5-6-16/text
source_url: https://www.legis.ga.gov/api/document/docs/default-source/joint-features-document-library/t4-6-(v4)-pdf.pdf?sfvrsn=e24c7bd9_0#page=112
date: 2025
status: active
corpus_version: 2025-supplement-89aa39ab3c68
license: CC0-1.0
publisher: Georgia Commons, an independent project of Georgia Civic Data. Not the State of Georgia. Not legal advice.
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version: the only printed version
in_force: true
current_through: Including Acts of the 2025 Regular Session of the General Assembly
heading_path: APPEAL AND ERROR / CERTIORARI AND APPEALS TO APPELLATE COURTS GENERALLY / GENERAL PROVISIONS
---

# O.C.G.A. § 5-6-16. Time for appeal by personal representative where party dies after trial; effect of entry of appeal and of failure to enter appeal; when appeal heard.

(a)(1) When either the plaintiff or the defendant dies after a case has been tried and before the expiration of the time within which the party, if living, might have entered an appeal, and no appeal has been entered, the personal representative of the estate of the deceased party may enter an appeal within 30 days from the time such personal representative qualifies.

(2) If an appeal is not entered within the time prescribed in this Code section, judgment may be entered and execution issued as though the deceased party were alive, without making the personal representative a party.

(3) For purposes of this subsection, the term “personal representative” includes temporary administrators, subject to the provisions of Code Sections 53-6-31 and 53-7-4.

(b)(1) When an appeal is entered as provided in paragraph (1) of subsection (a) of this Code section, it shall not be necessary to revive the action, but it shall be revived by the appealing party giving notice to the adverse party within 30 days from the time of entering the appeal.

(2) When a defendant appeals as provided in paragraph (1) of subsection (a) of this Code section, the case shall stand for trial on the appeal docket at the first term of the court after the expiration of six months from the qualification of the personal representative.

(c) Nothing in paragraph (2) of subsection (a) or paragraph (2) of subsection (b) of this Code section shall impair the operation or limit the applicability of Article 4 of Chapter 7 of Title 53.

## History

Laws 1843, Cobb’s 1851 Digest, pp. 474, 502; Code 1863, §§ 3358, 3359, 3361; Code 1868, §§ 3377, 3378, 3380; Code 1873, §§ 3425, 3426, 3428; Code 1882, §§ 3425, 3426, 3428; Civil Code 1895, §§ 5023, 5024, 5026; Civil Code 1910, §§ 5605, 5606, 5608; Code 1933, §§ 3-408, 3-409, 3-411; Ga. L. 2020, p. 377, § 2-1/HB 865.

## Amendments

The 2020 amendment, effective January 1, 2021, in subsection (a), designated the first sentence as paragraph (a)(1) and the second sentence as paragraph (a)(2), in paragraph (a)(1), substituted “personal” for “legal”, inserted “estate of the”, and substituted “such personal representative” for “he”, inserted “personal” in paragraph (a)(2), and added paragraph (a)(3); in subsection (b), designated the first sentence as paragraph (b)(1) and the second sentence as paragraph (b)(2), inserted “paragraph (1) of” in paragraph (b)(1), and in paragraph (b)(2), inserted “as provided in paragraph (1) of subsection (a) of this Code section” and substituted “personal representative” for “executor or administrator”; and rewrote subsection (c), which read: “In case of the death or removal from office of any executor or administrator pending such proceedings as are prescribed in subsections (a) and (b) of this Code section, an administrator de bonis non may be made a party in like manner.”