This post tracks notable 2026 Georgia premises liability decisions. I will update it throughout the year as new Georgia appellate and federal premises liability decisions are released.

Last updated June 8, 2026.

Webster v. Family Dollar: No Evidence of a Dangerous Condition
Mejia v. SK Battery America: Summary Judgment on Assumption of the Risk
Georgia Power & Ansley Walk v. Ries: Building Code Violations, Lighting, Prior Traverse, and Superior Knowledge
Hampton v. Publix: Actual Knowledge From Recurring Spills Near a Drink Machine
Loveless v. GSH Investments: Constructive Knowledge From Deferred Maintenance and No Inspection Routine

Webster v. Family Dollar: No Evidence of a Dangerous Condition

Webster v. Family Dollar, 2026 WL 50642 (2026)

This was a trip and fall case over an entrance mat filed in federal court. The plaintiff went into the Family Dollar store, shopped for ten to twenty minutes, then left. According to the Court’s opinion, “[s]he testified that the floor mat outside the entrance caught her foot and threw her to the cement ground.” (quotation and punctuation omitted). She also testified that the floor mat “had to be laying flat on the ground for [her] to walk across it.” Her lawyer introduced no evidence that the mat was curled, bunched or wrinkled. The court granted summary judgment to Family Dollar, ruling there was no evidence of a hazardous or dangerous condition.

Practice Pointer:

In cases involving mats, the plaintiff needs evidence that the mat was defective, curled, bunched, wrinkled, unsecured, or otherwise hazardous. A fall involving a mat is not enough. Testimony, photographs, surveillance video, incident reports, or prior complaints may be necessary to create a jury issue.

Mejia v. SK Battery America: Summary Judgment on Assumption of the Risk

Mejia v. SK Battery America, Inc., 925 S.E.2d 772 (Georgia Court of Appeals, 2026)

This was a wrongful death case from a fall at the SK Battery plant in Commerce, Georgia. The deceased was a foreman for one of the construction companies building the plant. In the ceiling of the plant, there were holes where HVAC vents would eventually be installed. The holes were covered with non-weight-bearing grilles that would fall to the ground if someone stepped on them. The grilles were marked with large red-taped Xs with “Danger” written on the red tape. The plant had a safety plan that required workers to be “tied off” when working more than six feet off the ground. The deceased had seen a co-worker fall and be saved because he was tied off. The morning of his fall the deceased had filled out a form acknowledging falls were a safety risk and required “100% tie off.” The deceased went up to work on the ceiling but did not tie off. Co-workers warned him to tie off but he did not. He stepped through one of the red-taped grilles and fell 50 feet to the ground. He died two weeks later of his injuries.

The defense argued the deceased assumed the risk of his injuries. The trial court granted summary judgment and the Court of Appeals affirmed. The Court ruled the evidence “conclusively established as a matter of law that Bell possessed actual knowledge of the specific, particular risk of harm. He witnessed another worker fall through a non-weight bearing [grill] a mere twelve days before his own fall. And he witnessed what saved the worker — that the worker was tied-off when he fell.”

Practice Pointer:

Assumption of the risk is usually a jury issue. However, the evidence that the deceased knew the risks of working while not tied-off was extremely strong and shows the defense can win summary judgment on assumption of risk when there is actual knowledge of the specific hazard, appreciation of the risk, and voluntary exposure to that risk.

Georgia Power & Ansley Walk v. Ries: Building Code Violations, Lighting, Prior Traverse, and Superior Knowledge

Georgia Power & Ansley Walk v. Ries, 928 S.E.2d 447 (Georgia Court of Appeals, 2026)

This was a trip and fall case on stairs at a condo complex. Several years before the fall, the condo association had hired a contractor to fix the stairs leading to the plaintiff’s condo because they were not up to code. The stairs were rebuilt without handrails, which violated building code. Two weeks before the plaintiff’s fall, another resident noticed that the outdoor pole light near the plaintiff’s building was out and notified the condo association. The plaintiff had not been living in her condo for several months. The day of her fall, she returned to her condo. She took her dog out for a walk and began walking down the stairs. She testified “that when she started walking down the stairs, it was absolutely normal and then all of a sudden there was no light. [She] thought that she was at the bottom of the stairs and that the safest thing was to just step off of the landing. But she was not at the bottom of the stairs. Instead, she fell down the last two steps.” (quotation and punctuation omitted)

The case went to trial and the jury returned a $8,500,000 verdict against the condo complex and Georgia Power and the Court of Appeals affirmed.

On appeal, the condo complex argued that the plaintiff had equal or superior knowledge of the dangerous condition of the stairs because of her “prior traverse” of the stairs, i.e., she had walked up and down them before. The Court of Appeals ruled that the plaintiff had not been at the property for months, that the condo complex knew the light was out but had not warned the plaintiff, that the plaintiff had walked up the stairs instead of down, that violations of building codes and regulations may be negligence per se, and evidence of nonconformity with code standards may be proof of a landowner’s superior knowledge of a defect.

Practice pointers:
- Consider retaining an expert to inspect for building code violations. A building code violation may be evidence of negligence per se and proof that a property owner has superior knowledge of a defect.
- In cases involving stairs and ramps, the prior traverse defense does not apply unless the plaintiff had walked the same direction before her fall. Walking up a ramp or set of stairs does not give equal knowledge of the hazards of walking down.
- Though not discussed in this opinion, the “necessity doctrine” applies in cases like this. If the stairs were the only way to and from the plaintiff’s condo, the necessity doctrine is an exception to the prior traverse / equal knowledge rule.

Hampton v. Publix: Actual Knowledge From Recurring Spills Near a Drink Machine

Hampton v. Publix Super Markets, 2026 Westlaw 801632 (N.D. Ga. 2026)

This was a federal slip-and-fall case involving water on the floor near a drink machine. There was no evidence showing how the water got there. The plaintiff argued the water likely came from the nearby drink machine. Publix had placed a spill mat near the machine because of concerns that customers would spill drinks and ice there. Surveillance video showed the water was on the floor for less than three minutes before the plaintiff fell.

Publix moved for summary judgment, arguing it did not have actual or constructive knowledge of the water. The district court granted summary judgment to Publix on lack of constructive knowledge but denied summary judgment on actual knowledge.

The court cited Georgia case law holding there are two ways to prove constructive knowledge:

show that the employee of the defendant was in the immediate area of the hazard and could have easily seen it or
show that the foreign substance remained long enough that ordinary diligence by the defendant should have discovered it.

The court found Publix did not have constructive knowledge under the first prong. While video surveillance showed Publix employees in the area of the fall, they were helping customers and doing other tasks and their view of the spill was obstructed. The court further ruled that the plaintiff testified she only noticed the liquid after she had fallen and that a “plaintiff’s own admission that the substance was difficult to detect is often fatal to her claim of constructive knowledge[.]”

The court then found Publix did not have constructive knowledge under the second prong. Publix had proved that the area where plaintiff fell was inspected approximately eight minutes before her fall and that no water was present. The court cited long-standing Georgia case law holding that a hazard being present fifteen minutes or less does not establish constructive knowledge

The court then analyzed whether Publix had actual knowledge of the water. The plaintiff argued Publix had actual knowledge the area near the drink machine was dangerous because water tended to puddle there and that Publix’s placement of a spill mat near the drink machine was evidence of that. The court cited case law holding that

[i]t is possible that, based on a prior history of such a number of similar hazardous occurrences or other facts that would put a proprietor on notice of the likelihood of the subject incident occurring, such fact would create a correspondingly higher duty on the proprietor to take appropriate prophylactic measures, i.e., having an attendant on duty to immediately clean up spills or post signs warning customers of the potential danger. Any such evidence would, of course, present a jury question as to the reasonableness of the proprietor’s actions.

Given this, the court found an issue of fact as to whether Publix had actual knowledge and whether it exercised ordinary care and denied summary judgment.

Practice Pointers:

If the plaintiff testifies the liquid was difficult to see, proving constructive knowledge may be difficult
Georgia courts have consistently ruled that a spill present 15 minutes or less does not give the business constructive knowledge of it
Evidence of repeated spills/liquid on the floor due to a drink machine, leak, cooler, freezer or similar source may help prove actual knowledge
Evidence that a business placed mats or other precautions may help show knowledge of a recurring hazard

Loveless v. GSH Investments: Constructive Knowledge From Deferred Maintenance and No Inspection Routine

Loveless v. GSH Investments, LLC, 928 S.E.2d 600 (Ga. Court of Appeals 2026)

The plaintiff was injured when a set of wooden stairs leading to an apartment collapsed. The plaintiff’s expert inspected the stairs and found visible evidence of wood rot. The expert concluded the stairs collapsed due to wood rot from water damage which was caused by failing to maintain the gutters.

Discovery showed that the property owner bought the apartment complex several years before plaintiff’s fall and, as part of its due diligence, received reports that the property had significant deferred maintenance issues. After receiving the reports, the owner did not inspect the property or establish any sort of inspection routine.

The property owner moved for summary judgment, arguing there was no evidence it had actual or constructive notice of the condition of the stairs. The trial court granted the motion but the Court of Appeals reversed. The Court of Appeals ruled that:

The duty of an owner or occupier of property to exercise ordinary care in keeping the premises safe includes inspecting the premises to discover possible dangerous conditions of which the owner/occupier does not have actual knowledge. So an owner/occupier is generally on constructive notice of what a reasonable inspection in the exercise of ordinary care would reveal. A property owner’s constructive knowledge of a hazard may be inferred when there is evidence that the owner lacked a reasonable inspection procedure.

The court ruled that there was an issue of fact as to whether the property owner had constructive knowledge of the condition of the stairs. The court found that there was visible evidence of wood rot, the property owner had received reports showing deferred maintenance issues, the property owner did not have an inspection procedure in place and never inspected the stairs.