Georgia Supreme Court Weighs Dismissal of Lawsuits Brought under the Amended Sovereign Immunity Waiver Clause of the Georgia Constitution due to Misidentifications of Proper Defendants

This recent opinion from the Georgia Supreme Court decided on March 4, 2025, stems from the case of Warbler Investments, LLC, v. City of Social Circle; S24A1024.  Warbler Investments sued the City of Social Circle, the Mayor of Social Circle, and three City Council members in July of 2021, alleging that the Mayor and Councilmembers unlawfully rezoned a property owned by Warbler Investments that Warbler Investments desired to develop.  The subject property was rezoned from a “Planned Unit Development District”, allowing for both residential and commercial structures to be built on the property, to “R-15”, the new classification of which only allowed for medium-density single-family residential structures to be constructed on the subject property. 

In 2020, an amendment to the Georgia Constitution, Article I, Section II, Paragraph V (b) (1) was ratified that provides a waiver of sovereign immunity for actions seeking declaratory relief from certain unlawful acts of the state or local governments.  In addition, a procedural requirement was added with the amendment, requiring that an action brought pursuant to the amended paragraph must be brought solely against the name of the State or relevant local government or else said action shall be dismissed. 

In the aforementioned Warbler case, the Defendant City of Social Circle moved the trial court to dismiss the action due to Warbler naming not only the City of Social Circle as a defendant, but also the Mayor and three Councilmembers, in violation of the recent amendment.  Warbler Investments moved to amend its original complaint, dropping the individual Defendants, which the Defendants and trial court also allowed. 

While litigation was ongoing, the Georgia Supreme Court issued a decision in State v. SASS Group, LLC; S22A1243, and S22A1244, which held that when a plaintiff brings claims that require the waiver of sovereign immunity in the amended paragraph of the Georgia Constitution in an action that names other defendants besides the State or relevant local government, the entire case must be dismissed.  In light of this decision, the City of Social Circle renewed its motion to dismiss, citing the Georgia Supreme Court’s recent ruling.  The trial court dismissed the case. 

However, Warbler Investments appealed, claiming that, although the naming of other individual defendants besides the State/relevant local government was incorrect, by amending the complaint it had sufficiently remedied this issue.  The Georgia Supreme Court agreed, and overruled the trial court’s dismissal, remanding the case in its opinion issued on March 4, 2025.  For defense attorneys, this opinion, while initially promising in that it provides an easy avenue for dismissal of lawsuits that require the waiver of sovereign immunity in the amended paragraph of the Georgia Constitution if other defendants are named besides the State/relevant local government, essentially allows plaintiffs to circumvent this issue at any time by amending their complaints.  While an action in violation of the amended paragraph of the Georgia Constitution may be dismissed relatively quickly in the trial courts, a plaintiff can easily appeal and have the lawsuit remanded for further litigation.

Topic/Tags: Municipal Liability, Sovereign Immunity