Negligent Security Claims in Georgia After Senate Bill 68

By Ben Sessions on September 4th, 2026 in Personal Injury

If you are assaulted in an apartment complex parking lot, a hotel corridor, or a shopping center, Georgia law sometimes allows a claim against the property owner. The theory is not that the owner committed the crime — it is that the owner knew the danger existed and failed to take reasonable steps.

Senate Bill 68, effective April 21, 2025, changed how these claims work. Negligent security was one of the areas the legislation targeted most directly.

What the law required before

Georgia courts historically asked whether the criminal act was reasonably foreseeable, and foreseeability was usually established through prior similar incidents on or near the property. A pattern of violent crime at a complex could support the claim that management should have anticipated the risk.

What changed

SB 68 tightened the foreseeability standard and narrowed the circumstances in which an owner or occupier can be held liable for the criminal conduct of a third party. In practical terms, the connection between what the owner knew and the specific harm that occurred must be closer than it once had to be.

The legislation also affects how a jury apportions fault among the parties, including the criminal actor who is rarely present in the courtroom and rarely has assets.

What still matters

These cases have not disappeared. What has changed is the evidentiary work required at the outset:

• Incident history. Police call data for the address, prior reports, and internal complaints to management.
• Notice. Emails, work orders, and tenant complaints showing management was told about broken gates, dead lighting, or non-functioning cameras.
• Security measures actually in place. What was promised in the lease or marketing materials versus what existed on the night in question.
• Condition of the premises. Lighting levels, gate function, camera coverage.

Much of this evidence is controlled by the defendant and some of it is overwritten quickly. Camera footage in particular is often gone within days.

If the incident happened after April 2025

The rules governing your case are not the rules that governed cases filed two years ago, and analysis based on older outcomes will not be reliable. If it happened before that date, the prior framework may still apply depending on the procedural posture.

Sessions & Fleischman handles premises liability and negligent security claims in middle Georgia and metro Atlanta. Ben Sessions defended injury claims for a national insurer before he began representing injured people.