How long do you have to file an injury claim in Georgia?

Most Georgia injury lawsuits must be filed within two years of the injury. But if a city, county, or state agency caused the harm, you also owe a written notice much sooner: six months for a city, twelve months for a county or the State. Miss the notice and the two years will not save you.

What are the Georgia injury deadlines at a glance?

Who caused the injury	Your deadline	What you must do	Georgia law
A private person or business (another driver, a store, a property owner)	2 years from the injury	File the lawsuit in court	O.C.G.A. § 9-3-33
A city or town (city bus, city police, city sidewalk or building)	6 months from the injury	Written ante litem notice to the mayor or council chair, then the lawsuit within 2 years	O.C.G.A. § 36-33-5
A county (sheriff’s deputy, county road crew, county building)	12 months from the injury	Written claim presented to the county commissioners, then the lawsuit within 2 years	O.C.G.A. § 36-11-1
The State of Georgia (DOT, State Patrol, a state agency or university)	12 months from the injury	Written notice of claim to the Department of Administrative Services and the agency, then the lawsuit within 2 years	O.C.G.A. § 50-21-26

The table is the whole answer for most people. The sections below explain each row, because the details are where claims get lost.

What is the two year deadline for most Georgia injury cases?

Georgia’s statute of limitations for injuries to the person is two years from the day the injury happened. The law is O.C.G.A. § 9-3-33. “Statute of limitations” is the legal name for a filing deadline. It covers car and truck crashes, slip and falls, dog bites, and most wrongful death cases, where the two years usually runs from the date of death.

Two things trip people up. First, the deadline is for filing a lawsuit in court, not for calling the insurance company. An open claim with an adjuster does not stop the clock. Second, two years is the outside limit, not a target. The deadlines below can cut your real window to six months.

Why is the deadline shorter if a city was involved?

Georgia requires a written notice, called an ante litem notice, before you can sue a city or town. O.C.G.A. § 36-33-5 gives you six months from the injury to deliver it. The notice must state when and where it happened, how you were hurt, what the city did wrong, and the dollar amount you are claiming, and it must reach the mayor or the chair of the council or commission.

Think about what counts as a city claim: a crash with a city bus or police cruiser, a fall on a broken city sidewalk, an injury in a city park or recreation center. Six months passes quickly when you are in treatment. If a city was involved in any way, this is the deadline to worry about first.

What is the deadline for a claim against a Georgia county?

Counties get a different rule. O.C.G.A. § 36-11-1 says all claims against a county must be presented within twelve months of when they arose, or they are barred. “Barred” means gone, with no exception for not knowing the rule. The claim goes in writing to the county’s governing authority, usually the board of commissioners.

County claims include crashes with sheriff’s vehicles, hazards left by county road crews, and injuries in county owned buildings. Counties also have strong immunity protections in Georgia, so these cases need a lawyer’s eyes early.

How do you file against the State of Georgia?

The Georgia Tort Claims Act lets you sue the State, but only after a formal notice of claim. O.C.G.A. § 50-21-26 requires written notice within twelve months of discovering the loss, delivered by certified mail or in person to the Risk Management Division of the Department of Administrative Services, with a copy to the agency involved. Then the State gets 90 days before you can file suit.

State claims involve Georgia Department of Transportation vehicles and work zones, State Patrol pursuits, state universities, and state office buildings. Courts dismiss these cases for a notice sent to the wrong office or missing one required detail, and the dismissal cannot be undone.

How do you know which deadline is yours?

Start with one question: who owned the vehicle, the property, or the employee that hurt you? A private driver or business puts you on the two year clock. A government body adds a notice deadline on top of it. It is not always obvious. A bus might belong to a city transit authority, a regional authority, or a private contractor. A road might be maintained by the city, the county, or the state. Getting that answer right in the first weeks is one of the most valuable things a lawyer does.

Can anything pause the clock? Sometimes. A pending criminal case from the same incident can suspend the two year period. A child’s clock generally does not start before age 18. Do not plan around those exceptions. Plan as if the shortest deadline applies.

The four laws in plain English

• O.C.G.A. § 9-3-33: how long you have to file an injury lawsuit in Georgia
• O.C.G.A. § 36-33-5: the six month notice for claims against a city
• O.C.G.A. § 36-11-1: the twelve month deadline for claims against a county
• O.C.G.A. § 50-21-26: how to file a claim against the State of Georgia

What should you do next?

If you are reading this, something happened to you or someone you love, and you are trying to figure out how much time you have. The real answer is less than you think, and the first few weeks matter most. Evidence disappears, witnesses scatter, and notice deadlines run quietly in the background.

Call Kenneth S. Nugent, P.C. at 770-820-0711. We will tell you which deadline applies to you, usually within a day. The call is free, the case review is free, and there is zero fee unless we win. Nine offices across Georgia, 45 years, and more than 300,000 clients who once had the same question.

And one more thing. Don’t sign anything from an insurance company before you talk to a lawyer. A release signed in week two can end a case that had two full years left.