Underlying Facts
Milton McBride was injured when two employees of an ambulance company dropped him from a stretcher. He died more than a year later. The administrator of his estate, Mildred Toomer, sued the company and the two employees to recover for his injuries, just inside the statutory limitation period for personal-injury actions. But later, during discovery, Toomer learned that McBride’s injuries from the stretcher incident caused his death, so she amended her complaint to add a wrongful-death claim. The trial court dismissed the wrongful-death claim as untimely.
Relation-Back Doctrine
The Georgia Appellate Court held: “The new claim was timely because it related back to the original complaint under OCGA § 9-11-15 (c). The new claim arose out of the same core of operative facts that gave rise to Toomer’s initial negligence claims: McBride being dropped from the stretcher and sustaining serious injuries. The relation-back inquiry here is not affected by the rule that we must “strictly construe” the wrongful-death statute. That rule is not a true “strict construction” rule, but in any event, we are not interpreting that statute.”
“First, we reject the premise that Toomer was acting in a different capacity. She had the statutory right to bring both the initial personal-injury action under OCGA § 9-2-41 and the wrongful-death claim under OCGA § 51-4-5 (a) in her capacity as the administrator of McBride’s estate. And neither the trial court nor Metro offer any basis for concluding that having different statutory authority for the two claims somehow precluded application of the relation-back provision.”
“Second, even if Toomer were acting in different capacities in filing her initial and amended complaints, that would not end the inquiry. Complaints “may be amended to change the capacity of the plaintiff,” and the amended complaint will relate back to the original one if the three-part test in Morris, 201 Ga. App. at 659, is met. This test requires a plaintiff to show that (1) the claim “asserted in the amended complaint arises out of the conduct, transaction, or occurrence set forth” in the original complaint, (2) there is an “identity of interest between the old and new parties,” and (3) relation back will not prejudice the defendant. Morris, 201 Ga. App. at 659. Toomer would pass that test here.”
Source Toomer v. Metro Ambulance Services, Inc., A22A0160.
If you or a loved one may have been injured (or worse) as a result of ambulance malpractice in Georgia or in another U.S. state, you should promptly find a Georgia medical malpractice lawyer, or a medical malpractice lawyer in your state, who may investigate your medical malpractice claim against an ambulance company for you and represent you or your loved one in an ambulance medical malpractice case, if appropriate.
Click here to visit our website or call us toll-free in the United States at 800-295-3959 to find medical malpractice attorneys in your state who may assist you.
Turn to us when you don’t know where to turn.