Two Trials Instead of One: Georgia’s New Bifurcation Rule in Macon Injury Cases

By Ben Sessions on October 22nd, 2026 in Personal Injury

Of everything Georgia’s 2025 tort reform did, the change least discussed outside courtrooms may be the one that matters most to a badly injured person: the trial itself can now be split in two.

What O.C.G.A. § 51-12-15 says

In any action for bodily injury or wrongful death, a party may elect a bifurcated trial by written demand filed before entry of the pretrial order. Once elected:

Phase One: the trier of fact determines the fault of each defendant and the percentages of fault of all persons or entities that contributed to the injuries.
Phase Two: if fault is found, the trier of fact determines all compensatory damages.
Phase Three: further proceedings as required, including punitive damages and liability for attorney’s fees, court costs, or expenses.

A court may deny the election only on motion and specific findings that either:

the plaintiff — or a minor plaintiff — was injured by an alleged sexual offense and would suffer serious psychological distress from testifying in multiple phases; or
the amount in controversy is less than $150,000.

That is the entire list. Absent one of those two findings, the election stands.

Unlike the negligent security and medical damages provisions, which apply only to causes of action arising on or after April 21, 2025, the bifurcation provision applies to pending cases.

Why defendants want it

In a single unified trial, the jury hears everything together: how the crash happened, and what it did to a human being. Those two things are not supposed to influence each other, but jurors are people, and the severity of an injury has always exerted some gravitational pull on the liability finding — particularly in a case where fault is genuinely close.

Bifurcation severs that. In Phase One the jury decides fault while knowing comparatively little about consequence. The person in the wheelchair is present, but the medical evidence, the life care plan, the testimony about what daily life now looks like — none of that is before them yet.

In a clear-liability case, bifurcation changes little. In a contested case with catastrophic damages, it changes a great deal.

What it means for how a case is built

Phase One has to stand entirely on its own. Liability proof — reconstruction, scene evidence, event data, witness testimony, corporate safety practices — has to carry the day without any help from the damages story. Investigation that would once have been adequate no longer is.

The apportionment fight moves up. Phase One is where the jury assigns percentages of fault among defendants and nonparties. Under Georgia’s modified comparative negligence rule, a plaintiff found 50% or more at fault recovers nothing. That question is now decided in a proceeding stripped of the human context of the injury.

The $150,000 threshold creates a strange incentive structure. A court may deny bifurcation where the amount in controversy is under $150,000 — which means that pleading a smaller case can secure a unitary trial, while a serious case is essentially guaranteed to be splittable on demand. Whether that is what the legislature intended, it is what the statute does.

Cost and duration go up. Two phases means more trial days, potentially recalled witnesses, and higher expert cost. In a contingency case, that is a real consideration in how a case is evaluated.

How it interacts with the rest of SB 68

Bifurcation does not operate alone. Read alongside the other 2025 changes, the pattern is consistent.

O.C.G.A. § 9-10-184 now bars counsel from arguing a specific monetary value for noneconomic damages before the close of evidence, and requires any such argument to be rationally related to the evidence.
O.C.G.A. § 51-12-1.1 limits medical special damages to reasonable value and lets the jury see negotiated amounts alongside billed charges.
O.C.G.A. § 9-11-12(j) stays discovery while a motion to dismiss filed before an answer is pending, with the prior 90-day outside cap removed — though the stay terminates immediately as to any defendant who answers, limited discovery remains available on jurisdictional and party-identification questions, and a party may move for good cause to modify the stay if the court has not ruled within 90 days of the close of briefing.
O.C.G.A. § 9-11-41(a) narrows voluntary dismissal to a 60-day window following service of the answer, replacing the old right to dismiss any time before the first witness was sworn.

Each of these independently compresses the plaintiff’s room to maneuver. Together they mean a Georgia injury case has to be substantially further developed, substantially earlier, than it did three years ago.

The voluntary dismissal change deserves its own note, because it is a trap. The dismiss-and-renew strategy under O.C.G.A. § 9-2-61 now has a hard 60-day runway from the answer. After that, dismissal requires a stipulation or a court order. That date should be calendared the day the answer is served.

Where it stands in the courts

SB 68 took effect April 21, 2025. Several of its provisions — bifurcation among them — apply to cases that were already pending, and retroactive application of substantive changes is subject to challenge under the Georgia Constitution’s prohibition on retroactive laws impairing vested rights.

As of this writing we are not aware of a Georgia appellate decision resolving a retroactivity challenge to SB 68. That is a live issue rather than a settled one.

Where to go from here

If you have a serious injury case in Bibb County, assume the defense will demand bifurcation and assume the court will grant it. The case has to be built so that Phase One wins on its own.

Our Macon office is at 544 Mulberry Street, Suite 319. Free consultation, no fee unless we recover for you. (470) 225-7710.

Sessions & Fleischman, LLC — Macon office: 544 Mulberry Street, Suite 319, Macon, GA 31201 | (470) 225-7710
Responsible attorney for the content of this page: Ben Sessions, Georgia Bar No. 141280.

This article is general information about Georgia law, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Every case is different and past results do not predict future outcomes.

SB 68 is recent and its application — including whether its provisions may be applied to cases that were already pending — is still developing in the courts.

Contingent attorneys’ fees refers only to those fees charged by attorneys for their legal services. Such fees are not permitted in all types of cases. Court costs and other additional expenses of legal action usually must be paid by the client.