Court dismisses collapsed deck lawsuit
The Georgia Supreme Court has ruled that a man who suffered serious injuries from a collapsed deck cannot recover damages from the company that built it because his lawsuit was filed too late.
In 1994, Falling Water Inc. built a deck on Richard Rosenberg's Cobb County home. In 2005, when Rosenberg walked onto the deck to inspect work being done on it, it collapsed. He sued, but in a 4-3 ruling Friday the court said the suit had to have been filed within eight years after the deck was built for Rosenberg to be able to pursue damages from Rolling Water.
"If an injury occurs outside this time period, the injury is not actionable," Justice Harold Melton wrote for the majority.
In this case, Rosenberg sustained injuries more than a decade after Rolling Water completed its work, the opinion said. This time frame, called the statute of repose, "represents an express determination by the Legislature of a time beyond which it is no longer fair to hold a defendant to be potentially liable for his actions."
Chief Justice Carol Hunstein, in dissent, wrote that the majority opinion creates an "unworkable rule" that can lead to irrational results.
About the Author
Bill Rankin has been an AJC reporter for more than 30 years. His father, Jim Rankin, worked as an editor for the newspaper for 26 years, retiring in 1986. Bill has primarily covered the state’s court system, doing all he can do to keep the scales of justice on an even keel. Since 2015, he has been the host of the newspaper’s Breakdown podcast.
