SB 68: Protecting Big Insurance and Corporations While Leaving Injury Victims Behind

Unfortunately, Senate Bill 68 (SB 68), a proposed law in Georgia, threatens to shift the burden away from negligent parties and onto injured individuals. This legislation would make it more challenging for victims to recover fair compensation for medical bills, lost wages, and pain and suffering, while shielding big businesses, landlords, and especially insurance companies from accountability.

SB 68 is being promoted as a “lawsuit reform” measure, but in reality, it benefits large corporations and insurance companies at the expense of everyday Georgians—people like you and me who expect safe environments when we shop, drive, and live in rented homes.

Let’s explore how this proposed law could unfairly disadvantage injured people and victims while rewarding negligent businesses and their insurance companies.

How SB 68 Could Hurt Slip & Fall Victims

Imagine you’re walking down the aisle in a big box store when you suddenly slip on a clear substance near the auto parts / service center. You fall hard, tearing your shoulder and injuring your hip. Later, you discover that the store knew about the leak from a box of WD-40 cans more than 30 minutes prior to your fall but failed to put up signs or clean it up.

As a customer, you expect a safe environment in exchange for your patronage. However, under SB 68, the store’s legal team would have new avenues to minimize or entirely avoid responsibility:

• Severe Limitations on Pain and Suffering Awards: SB 68 prohibits attorneys from suggesting specific monetary values for noneconomic damages, such as pain and suffering. This restriction hampers an attorney’s ability to provide a frame of reference for the jury as to impact of the injuries on the individual. This could cause the jury to undervalue the true and full impact of the negligent or at-fault party’s actions upon the person. Many times medical bills simply fail to paint a full picture of the pain and anguish someone suffers from an accident.
• Health Insurance Benefits Will Be Used Against You: If your health insurance covers your medical treatment, the defendant (really the defendant’s insurance company) will introduce evidence of the lower, negotiated rates to reduce the amount they have to pay, regardless of how much you pay in monthly premiums to maintain your health insurance. Conversely, if you lacked insurance and were charged the full price, the defendant would have to pay more. This means that those who responsibly maintain health insurance will be penalized, while an uninsured person is likely to receive larger awards.
• Challenges in Litigation: SB 68 would restrict the timeframe for voluntary dismissal of a case to within 60 days after the defendant files an answer. This reduces a plaintiff’s flexibility in litigation, benefiting businesses that seek to delay or avoid lawsuits, especially were a witness may be difficult to locate or where conflicts in the attorney or injured person’s schedule arise.

How SB 68 Would Favor Insurance Companies in Auto Accidents

Consider you’re driving through an intersection when another driver runs a red light and collides with you. You suffer a broken leg and a concussion, rendering you unable to work for months.

SB 68 would favor insurance companies at your expense:

• Seatbelt Usage Evidence Used Against You
  • Even if the other driver was entirely at fault, their insurance company could argue that you weren’t wearing a seatbelt and use that to reduce your compensation. Previously, courts did not permit this argument because the accident would have occurred regardless of seatbelt use (in other words, the seat belt was irrelevant to the cause of the accident). Now, the insurance company can shift blame onto you (the innocent injured party) to avoid paying what you deserve.
• Reduction in Medical Damages
  • If your hospital bill was $50,000, but your insurance negotiated it down to $20,000, you could only recover $20,000—even though the at-fault driver caused your injury and even though you may have paid hundreds or thousands of dollars towards your health insurance premiums. However, if you didn’t have insurance, you could recover the full $50,000. In the past, payments by health insurance or contributions from a church or good Samaritan could not be introduced to lower an at fault party’s liability. However, SB 68 changes this and unfairly benefits insurance companies, as they would pay out less on claims, while injured victims with insurance receive reduced compensation.

• Delays in Legal Case
  • If the at-fault driver files a motion to dismiss, no matter how valid or frivolous, your case could be paused for 90 days, delaying justice and increasing legal costs. Meanwhile, your medical bills accumulate, and the insurance company hopes you settle for less just to move on. As the burden of proof is upon the injured party (plaintiff), time is on the side of the defendant. Unlike Big insurance companies who can afford to pay attorneys to drag a case along while witnesses move, pass away, or change their phone numbers, most injured plaintiffs cannot afford delay. In the vast majority of personal injury cases, the attorney for the plaintiff (injured party) must front all of the expenses of litigation and does not get paid unless or until the case results in a settlement or jury award. This is called a contingency fee and is another reason why efforts to reduce evidence of medical damages is so detrimental to plaintiffs. If an attorney can’t be compensated for the amount of time, expense, and experience put into a case, it becomes untenable. Insurance companies know this, so they delay, delay, delay.

How SB 68 Would Protect Landlords Over Assault Victims

SB 68 also makes it more difficult for victims of rape, assault, or violent crimes to hold negligent landlords accountable when inadequate security measures contribute to an attack.  Imagine you live in an apartment complex with a history of break-ins and violent crimes. The landlord is aware of these dangers but refuses to install proper lighting, cameras, or security. One night, an unknown assailant breaks into your unit and assaults you.

Under SB 68, landlords would be shielded from liability in most cases:

• High Threshold for Proving “Foreseeability
  • SB 68 stipulates that a property owner is only responsible for crimes if they had:
    • “Particularized warning” of an imminent attack, OR
    • “Prior occurrences of substantially similar wrongful conduct” in the past.

• • If previous crimes were slightly different—such as burglaries instead of assaults—the landlord could argue that the attack wasn’t foreseeable, leaving you without recourse.
• Liability Avoided by Simply CallingIf a landlord receives a warning about potential danger, they can avoid all liability by simply calling 911. This provision disincentivizes proactive safety measures, such as installing security cameras or hiring security personnel. A mere phone call is sufficient to avoid liability.

The False Promise of Lower Insurance

Proponents of SB 68 argue that limiting lawsuits will lead to lower insurance premiums. However, historical evidence suggests otherwise:

• 2005 Georgia Tort Reform: A Failed Promise
  • In 2005, Georgia implemented comprehensive tort reform, including caps on noneconomic damages in medical malpractice cases. Despite these measures, there was no significant reduction in insurance premiums for consumers.
• Insurance Company Profits Continue to Soar
  • Insurance companies such as State Farm, Allstate, and Progressive have reported record profits in recent years, yet consumer rates continue to rise.
• A Giveaway to Corporations and Insurance Companies
  • The promised savings won’t trickle down to consumers—they will only pad the profits of big insurance companies while stripping rights away from injury victims.
• Nothing in the Bill Requires Insurance Companies to Lower their Rates
  • If this bill’s primary aim is to help the consumer by bringing down the cost of insurance, then why doesn’t it freeze insurance rates or require that insurance companies lower their rates over a period of time? The truth is that big insurance companies pay lobbyists to present these idea to legislators without fully explaining the how these changes will impact the consumer.

Conclusion

SB 68 Is a Corporate Protection Bill, Not Lawsuit Reform

SB 68 will not protect Georgians—it will protect the profits of big corporations and insurance companies. If SB 68 becomes law, it will make it harder for victims to get justice and easier for businesses to avoid responsibility. If you’ve been injured, you deserve a fair chance to recover, not a system rigged against you.

Georgia’s lawmakers must reject SB 68 and stand up for the rights of injury victims, not just big corporations and insurance companies.

Sources:
¹ State Farm 2023 Financial Report
² Allstate 2023 Earnings Report
³ Progressive 2023 Financial Data