Written Discovery in Georgia Personal Injury Cases

Written discovery in a Georgia injury case means three main tools: interrogatories under § 9-11-33, document requests under § 9-11-34, and requests for admission under § 9-11-36. All three carry a 30-day response clock, with a longer period for a defendant just served. The last one is a trap. A request for admission that gets no timely response is treated as admitted, and it can decide a case.

The three tools side by side

Tool	What it does	Clock	Limit
Interrogatories	Written questions, answered under oath	30 days; a defendant has 45 days after service of the summons and complaint	50, including subparts, without leave
Requests for production	Documents, things, and entry for inspection	30 days; a defendant has 45 days after service	Reasonable particularity
Requests for admission	Asks a party to admit facts, law applied to fact, or a document's genuineness	30 days; a defendant isn't required to respond before 45 days after service	None stated in § 9-11-36

The 50-limit language in § 9-11-33(a)(1) counts “subparts”, and more takes leave of court “upon a showing of complex litigation or undue hardship”. So a long set with lettered parts can draw an objection. Scope comes from § 9-11-26(b)(1): any non-privileged matter “relevant to the subject matter”, and information can be discoverable even if it wouldn’t itself be admissible at trial, as long as it appears reasonably calculated to lead to admissible evidence.

Uniform Superior Court Rule 5.1 sets the outer frame. To use the court’s compulsory process, discovery has to be finished “within 6 months after the filing of the answer”, and the court may open, extend, or shorten that. State courts have their own version, so check which applies. A motion to dismiss can also stay discovery for a period under § 9-11-12(j).

Requests for admission: the trap

Under § 9-11-36(a)(2), “[t]he matter is admitted unless” a written answer or objection is served within 30 days after service. Then § 9-11-36(b) says an admitted matter is “conclusively established”, unless the court allows withdrawal or amendment.

So a missed date can establish fault, causation, or the amount of your bills against you, with no evidence offered at all. The court may permit withdrawal when “the presentation of the merits” would be served, and the other side can’t show prejudice. That’s a motion to file right away, and a court isn’t required to grant it.

Requests can help a plaintiff too. Ask the defendant to admit that a record is genuine, or that the driver was on the job. Section 9-11-37(c) can shift the expense of proving a matter that a party refused to admit, subject to the exceptions there.

What a plaintiff should ask the defense

Target	Why it matters
Insurance	§ 9-11-26(b)(2) allows discovery of policies that may satisfy a judgment
Others blamed	Non-party fault under § 51-12-33(d) can arrive 120 days before trial
Witnesses and experts	§ 9-11-26(b)(4)(A) and (e)(1)
Prior incidents	Notice and pattern, if relevant
Policies, training, inspection logs	What the company told its people to do
Video, phone, and vehicle data	What was kept, and what was overwritten
Employment and agency	Whether the driver or worker acted for the company
Each denial and defense	Facts behind it; § 9-11-33(b)(2) allows contention interrogatories

A question about who else the defendant blames is worth sending early, since the answer and defenses stage may leave little time once that notice arrives. Section 9-11-33(c) lets a business answer by pointing to records when the burden is about equal, but the records have to be identified.

Documents from people outside the case

Section 9-11-34(c)(1) reaches non-parties, with a copy of the request served on all parties. A non-party’s objection means the requesting party has to move to compel, and the motion needs a showing of good cause. A subpoena under § 9-11-45 is another route, and the person served has ten days after service to object to inspection or copying, or until the compliance date if that’s sooner.

Medical records have their own trigger. Under § 9-11-34(c)(2), a request to a healer or hospital has to be served on the person whose records are sought. And § 9-11-34(c)(3) gives the non-party immunity when no objection arrives and it produces the records, “notwithstanding that the produced documents contained confidential or privileged information”. So don’t ignore those papers. Read the deadline, and raise any objection to mental health or other sensitive records in time. See medical records.

Answering the defense’s questions

Each interrogatory is answered “separately and fully in writing under oath”, and you sign the answers. The defense will ask about prior injuries, prior claims, all treating doctors, income, and social media.

• Read the draft answers line by line, since your lawyer writes from what you say.
• Match them against the records. A forgotten doctor can look like hiding.
• Keep documents safe, including photos, posts, and phones. See spoliation.
• Report any need to correct something to your lawyer.

The duty to update is narrow. Under § 9-11-26(e), a complete response creates “no duty to supplement”, except in listed situations:

Situation	Duty
Identity and location of people with knowledge	Supplement seasonably, if directly asked
Experts, their subject, and their testimony	Supplement seasonably, if directly asked
You learn an answer was wrong when made	Amend seasonably
An answer is no longer true, and failing to amend would amount to knowing concealment	Amend seasonably
A court order, an agreement, or a new request for supplementation	As stated there

Fights over responses

A party seeking more can use § 9-11-37(a) after notice. An “evasive or incomplete answer” counts as a failure to answer under (a)(3). The losing side on a motion can face expenses, including attorney’s fees, under (a)(4). Serious failures, including not answering at all under § 9-11-37(d), can bring the (b)(2) sanctions, which reach as far as striking pleadings or dismissal. A protective order under § 9-11-26(c) is the tool for a request that goes too far, and the party that wants one has to show good cause.

Work product also limits what comes back. Under § 9-11-26(b)(3), material prepared for litigation takes a showing of substantial need and undue hardship, and the court protects an attorney’s mental impressions and legal theories.

Connecting it to the rest of the case

Written answers set up depositions. Questions drawn from a document request are sharper with the document in hand. And an unanswered admission or a set of sworn answers can feed a summary judgment motion, since § 9-11-56(c) counts “answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file”. In federal court, the discovery rules differ, including initial disclosures, so the Georgia timing described above doesn’t carry over.

Sources

• Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26
• Official Code of Georgia Annotated, November 2022 public release: §§ 9-11-26, 9-11-33, 9-11-34, 9-11-36, 9-11-37, 9-11-45, 9-11-56, 51-12-33
• Georgia Senate Bill 68 (2025): § 9-11-12
• Uniform Rules for the Superior Courts of Georgia, Rule 5.1

This page was last reviewed in November 2026 for general information. Laws and court decisions can change after that date. It is not legal advice and does not create an attorney-client relationship.