Lovett v. Garvin
| Decision Date | 17 September 1974 |
| Docket Number | No. 28886,28886 |
| Parties | , 69 A.L.R.3d 1043 Joseph Cecil LOVETT v. Kenneth Michael GARVIN et al. |
| Court | Georgia Supreme Court |
Syllabus by the Court
The right of action of a husband for the tortious homicide of his wife under the Georgia wrongful death statute accrues at the time of the death of the wife from the injuries inflicted by the defendant.
Powell, Goldstein, Frazer & Murphy, Eugene G. Partain, Robert M. Travis, Atlanta, for appellant.
Richard A. Rice, Atlanta, for appellees.
The sole question presented in this appeal is whether the right of action of a husband for the tortious homicide of the wife under the wrongful death statute of this state (Ga.L.1887, pp. 43, 45; 1939, p. 233; 1960, pp. 968, 969; 1971, p. 359; Code Ann. § 105-1306) accrues at the time of the death of the wife from the injuries inflicted by the defendant, or at the time the injuries were inflicted. Certiorari was granted because this court considered the issue to be one of gravity and importance.
The suit was brought in the Superior Court of Fulton County by Kenneth Michael Garvin, as the widower of Joan Platt Garvin, against Joseph Cecil Lovett, seeking damages for the death of his wife from injuries received in an automobile collision caused by the defendant's negligence in driving through a stop sign into their vehicle. The parties agreed that at the time the deceased received the injuries she was not the wife of the plaintiff; that some months after suffering the injuries she and the plaintiff were married; and that three weeks after the marriage she died of the injuries sustained in the automobile collision.
The trial court granted the defendant's motion for summary judgment upon the ground that there were no genuine issues of material fact that entitled the plaintiff to a judgment as a matter of law. The Court of Appeals reversed. Garvin v. Lovett, 131 Ga.App. 46, 205 S.E.2d 124.
We affirm the Court of Appeals.
The particular question here is one of first impression in this state. However, in a previous construction of the Georgia wrongful death statute this court stated that 'the gist of the action is not the injury suffered by the deceased, but the injury suffered by the beneficiaries, resulting from the death of the deceased . . . The cause of action, while dependent upon the fact of an actionable tort against the deceased, accrues only by reason of the death.' Thompson v. Watson, 186 Ga. 396,...
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