REID v. MORRIS

Alonzo Reid was badly hurt when Lakenin Morris, driving drunk in a car owned by his cousin Keith Stroud, crashed into him. Stroud had handed Morris the keys knowing Morris was drunk, lacked a valid license, and had a history of recklessness. Reid sued Morris for negligence and Stroud for negligent entrustment (letting an unfit person use his car), and both were found liable. A Spalding County trial court awarded Reid compensatory damages split between the two men and ordered Morris to pay $50,000 in punitive damages, but refused to make Stroud pay any, reasoning that under Georgia's punitive damages statute only the actual drunk driver could ever count as an 'active tort-feasor' subject to uncapped punitive damages. The Supreme Court of Georgia disagreed with that reading. It held the law does not limit 'active tort-feasor' status to drunk drivers, and sent the case back so the trial court can decide whether Stroud himself, through his own intoxicated and reckless conduct in lending the car, qualifies as an active tort-feasor who could owe punitive damages.

The court held that OCGA § 51-12-5.1 (f)'s uncapped punitive damages provision is not limited to the drunk driver alone; any defendant, including someone who negligently entrusted a vehicle, can be an 'active tort-feasor' if intoxicated to the point his judgment was substantially impaired and his conduct involved a positive act rather than merely a failure to act.

The ruling affects anyone injured by a drunk driver who borrowed a car or was otherwise enabled by someone else's carelessness. It clarifies that people who negligently entrust vehicles or property to intoxicated or reckless individuals may face uncapped punitive damages, not just the driver behind the wheel, expanding accountability in Georgia injury lawsuits.

Vacated in part and remanded with direction

1. The court traced the history of Georgia's punitive damages statute (OCGA § 51-12-5.1), explaining that subsection (f) removes the usual $250,000 cap on punitive damages when a defendant acted with specific intent to harm or was intoxicated to the point his judgment was substantially impaired, but only against an 'active tort-feasor.'
2. The court noted that unlike Georgia's DUI statute, which is limited to driving a vehicle, subsection (f) uses broader language about defendants who 'acted or failed to act,' showing the legislature did not intend to restrict uncapped punitive damages only to drivers.
3. Because the statute distinguishes tort-feasors who 'acted' from those who 'failed to act,' the court reasoned that an 'active tort-feasor' is someone whose conduct involved an affirmative act of wrongdoing, not merely a failure to meet a legal duty, drawing on a long-standing Georgia distinction between active and passive negligence used in contribution and indemnity cases.
4. Applying that framework, the court concluded that whether Stroud qualifies as an active tort-feasor depends on whether his own intoxication impaired his judgment and whether his act of knowingly handing his keys to an unfit driver was itself a positive act of negligence, not on whether he personally was the drunk driver.
5. Because the trial court had wrongly assumed only the DUI driver could be an active tort-feasor, and disapproved the Court of Appeals decisions that supported that view, the Supreme Court of Georgia sent the case back for the trial court to make that factual determination and decide whether punitive damages against Stroud are warranted.

• punitive damages
• negligent entrustment
• drunk driving
• car accident lawsuit
• active tort-feasor