Georgia CommonsCourt opinions
Georgia Supreme Court decisions with plain-language summaries. Browse by year and case type, or search by case name.
MCBRAYER v. SCARBROUGH
The Supreme Court of Georgia ruled that placing and restraining a man in a patrol car's back seat counts as 'use' of the vehicle, so a wrongful death suit against a sheriff can proceed despite sovereign immunity.
Maynor v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia upheld a Fulton County man's murder conviction, ruling the evidence was enough to reject his self-defense claim and that his trial lawyer's decisions were not constitutionally deficient.
Pauldo v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia upheld Raekwon Pauldo's murder conviction for shooting Jacquel Smith, ruling that his trial lawyer's handling of the accident defense, gun registration evidence, and plea offer did not amount to constitutionally ineffective assistance.
Priester v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia upheld a Paulding County man's murder conviction for a shooting outside a house after a football-game rivalry, rejecting claims about the evidence, missing jury instructions, and his lawyer's performance.
Prodigies Child Care Management, LLC v. Cotton
The Supreme Court of Georgia ruled that the 'special circumstances exception' used by the Court of Appeals for lunch-break and commuting car accidents is not a real separate legal rule, but just a way of applying the ordinary test for when an employer can be sued for an employee's actions.
Rivera v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia upheld a Ben Hill County man's felony murder conviction in a 1996 cold case solved decades later by DNA testing, but threw out his rape conviction because prosecutors never told the grand jury why the rape charge wasn't too old to bring.
Sosebee v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia upheld a man's felony murder conviction and life-without-parole sentence for a car chase death, rejecting his arguments that a lenity rule required a lighter sentence and that his punishment was unconstitutionally cruel.
State v. COOK (Six Cases)
The Supreme Court of Georgia ruled that Fulton County jailers charged in an inmate's death are not 'peace officers' entitled to special pre-indictment notice, because guarding inmates inside a jail is not the same as maintaining public peace in the community.
Steele v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia upheld Donald Steele's felony murder conviction in the stabbing death of Kevin McGruder, but ruled his separate aggravated assault conviction must be erased because it was based on the same act.
WISE BUSINESS FORMS INCORPORATED v. FORSYTH COUNTY
The Supreme Court of Georgia revived a Forsyth County business's lawsuit over a sinkhole caused by a road-widening drainage system, ruling the lower courts wrongly assumed all the harm was obvious back in 2000.
Adams v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia upheld Leon Adams's murder conviction in a Fulton County drive-by shooting, rejecting his claims that the evidence was too thin and that shared defense counsel with his brother created a disabling conflict of interest.
Carter v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia affirmed the dismissal of a man's motion to withdraw his guilty plea to murder, ruling the trial court had lost jurisdiction to allow withdrawal and that his sentence was not void.
Ford Motor Company v. Cosper
The Supreme Court of Georgia ruled that reckless conduct alone, separate from willful or wanton conduct, can excuse a product-liability negligence claim from Georgia's ten-year statute of repose, and defined what counts as reckless.
Funvestment Group, LLC v. Crittenden
The Supreme Court of Georgia ruled that money a business earns by leasing coin-operated amusement machines like arcade games is exempt from Georgia sales and use tax, just like money played directly into those machines.
Hamilton v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia upheld Nuwrulhaqq Hamilton's felony murder conviction, ruling that surveillance footage and testimony showed he was more than a bystander and that missing a good-character jury instruction did not affect the trial's outcome.
In THE MATTER OF ROBERT MALLORY CRAWFORD (Two Cases)
The Supreme Court of Georgia suspended a former superior court judge from practicing law for three years after finding he took money from a court registry he was not entitled to and lied about it, rejecting the harsher sanction of disbarment recommended by the disciplinary special master.
Kennebrew v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia upheld Phillip Kennebrew's murder conviction from his second trial, ruling that a dead witness's testimony from his first trial was properly admitted and that any errors in other hearsay rulings were harmless.
Roberts v. Cuthpert
The Supreme Court of Georgia ruled that a man who successfully sued for a weapons carry license can pursue recovery of his attorney fees from the probate judge who denied him, because Georgia law waives sovereign immunity for such claims.
Salvesen v. State
The Supreme Court of Georgia upheld a Richmond County man's murder conviction, ruling that gruesome crime scene and autopsy photos were properly admitted and that the trial judge was not required to repeat manslaughter instructions the jury never asked about.
WISE BUSINESS FORMS INCORPORATED v. FORSYTH COUNTY
The Supreme Court of Georgia revived a Forsyth County printing company's lawsuit over a sinkhole caused by decades-old road drainage work, ruling that the Court of Appeals wrongly assumed all the harm was obvious back in 2000.