Constitutional rights Category Archives - Atlanta Injury Lawyer Blog Published by Atlanta Personal Injury Lawyer

When Will the Senseless Deaths of Innocent People Due to Police Chases Stop?

April 15, 2025 | Robin Frazer Clark

When will the senseless deaths of innocent Georgians due to police chases stop? I found myself asking this question once again this morning when I heard the news of exactly that, i.e., another innocent Georgian killed last night due to a police chase of another driver. This time is was a completely innocent 19 year old young man out at 7:51 p.m., not late by anyone’s standards. It is just unbelievable.

The tragedy last night occurred at the intersection of Moreland Avenue and Euclid Avenue in Little Five Points, a neighborhood that is densely populated with bars, stores and apartments, that has a high amount of pedestrians walking on the sidewalks and that has very narrow streets that are usually bumper-to-bumper. I live very near this intersection and am very familiar with it. The last thing I could possibly imagine is for a police officer to choose to engage in a high-speed chase into this neighborhood. It was totally reckless. And the chase apparently began on I-20 and continued until the collision at this intersection, which is about 3 miles from I-20. This officer drove 3 miles into this heavily congested city neighborhood at high speeds chasing another vehicle for “speeding and erratic lane changes” and this decision by the police officer resulted in the death of a completely innocent teenager. Help it make sense!

The driver of the vehicle being chased by police is now facing several charges, including murder, first-degree vehicular homicide, reckless driving, possession of a schedule 1 narcotic, felony fleeing among other things. But what charges is the police officer facing? The person who made that horrible, deadly decision to chase her at high speeds through a densely populated City of Atlanta neighborhood ? Any?

McCracken Poston Regales Lawyers Club of Atlanta with Tales from “Zenith Man: Death, Love and Redemption in a Georgia Courtroom”

March 27, 2025 | Robin Frazer Clark

Last week we were thrilled to have Georgia Trial Lawyer McCracken King Poston, Jr. be our guest speaker at Lawyers Club of Atlanta. McCracken regaled the crowd of over 200 attorneys with stories about his trial in Ringgold, Georgia in which he represented Alvin Ridley, who was accused of holding his wife captive in their basement for almost three decades before killing her.

McCracken Poston is a former four-term legislator in the Georgia House of Representatives. He is a graduate of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and is a 1985 graduate of The University of Georgia School of Law. He has practiced law for 39 years in Georgia. He gained national attention for his handling of several notable cases that were featured on CNN Presents, Dateline NBC, A & E’s American Justice and Forensic Files.

McCracken’s new book “Zenith Man: Death, Love and Redemption in a Georgia Courtroom” tells the tale of Alvin Ridley, accused of murdering his wife, and McCracken’s courtroom battle for Justice for Alvin. Alvin was a difficult client, storing evidence in a cockroach-infested suitcase, unwilling to reveal key facts to his defender. Gradually, Poston pieced together the full story behind Virginia and Alvin’s curious marriage and her cause of death—which was completely overlooked by law enforcement. Calling on medical experts, testimony from Alvin himself, and a wealth of surprising evidence gleaned from Alvin’s junk-strewn house, Poston presented a groundbreaking defense that allowed Alvin to return to his peculiar lifestyle, a free man.

The Trickery of Forced Arbitration Clauses Leaves the Consumer Out of Luck

November 11, 2024 | Alexandria Clark

IMAGINE THIS HYPOTHETICAL SCENARIO:

It’s College Football Playoff season. Your beloved [insert college mascot here, not going to jinx it for any team in particular] are in the National Championship. Your husband is somehow able to secure tickets to the big game and purchases four tickets online for you, the kids, and your live‑in mother. He keeps all five tickets for the family in his phone’s “Wallet” to ease the entry process into the game.

While walking out of the stadium post‑game, a portion of the railing—intended to guide pedestrian traffic flow—collapses due to the stadium management’s negligent placement of the broken railing in a crowded area. Your mother falls due to the collapsed railing and suffers catastrophic injuries. Your family now faces unexpected medical bills in the thousands of dollars, your mother experiences pain and suffering no elderly person should have to ever endure, and you and your mother decide to pursue legal action against the stadium because of the growing costs that the stadium’s negligence has caused your family.

My Client’s Presidential Pardon Achieved Seven Years Before President Biden’s Sweeping Pardons

July 2, 2024 | Robin Frazer Clark

I was very happy to hear that President Biden has decided to right historical wrongs by pardoning any U.S. veterans who were convicted for being gay while serving in our U.S. Armed Forces. It is well past time for our country to acknowledge this wrong and the damage it did to so many gay veterans. As President Biden stated: “Today, I am righting an historic wrong by using my clemency authority to pardon many former service members who were convicted simply for being themselves,” Biden said in a statement. “We have a sacred obligation to all of our service members –- including our brave LGBTQI+ service members: to properly prepare and equip them when they are sent into harm’s way, and to care for them and their families when they return home. Today we are making progress in that pursuit.” About time, is all I can say.

I find this very interesting given my experience in securing a Presidential Pardon for a client who had been convicted of having a homosexual relationship while he was serving as an Officer in the U.S. Army. He served a year and a half in Ft. Leavenworth Prison for being gay. I worked for this client for 6 years pro bono, partly because my innate sense of Justice drove me to do so, partly because I have been fighting for equality for gay people for the last 40 years or so, and partly because I could not let this injustice to this client go on and be able to look my two children in the eyes. Both of my kids, who were in college at the time, could not believe that our Government, with its vasts resources, would use those resources to prosecute and convict a U.S. Veteran of simply being who he was. It was simply unfathomable to them and to me. But it really happened. So I set out on a 6 year journey and struggle to obtain a Presidential Pardon for him. Since being gay in the U.S. Army was a Federal offense, only a Presidential Pardon would do. He had been convicted on July 17, 1989, which means he endured 28 years of having the conviction and a dishonorable discharge on his record. This resulted in his being unable to obtain a home mortgage, being limited in potential jobs he would be hired for, being unable to vote, just as some examples of the impact on his life this had.

I will never forget that telephone call on January 17, 2017 from the Department of Justice Pardon Attorney, informing me that President Obama would be granting my client a pardon. What an unbelievable moment! Probably my greatest achievement as a lawyer. And then to call my client and hear his elation on the phone was an incredible moment.

Solitary Confinement in Georgia Prisons is “Draconian”: Confinement in a Prison Shower is Immoral and Unconscionable

May 1, 2024 | Robin Frazer Clark

Last week, Judge Marc Treadwell, United States District Court Judge for the Middle District of Georgia, held several officers of the Georgia Department of Corrections in contempt of court for failing to correct numerous violations of the Federal and Constitutional rights of Georgia inmates who are housed in solitary confinement in Georgia Prisons. In his 100 page Order, Judge Treadwell threatened them with fines and ordered an independent monitor to ensure compliance with a settlement agreement for the Special Management Unit of the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson, about 50 miles south of Atlanta. In its Order, the Court found that prison officials falsified documents and said they routinely placed new arrivals at the facility in “strip cells,” where one inmate said he was not given clothes or a mattress and could not use the toilet because it was broken and filled with human waste.

A psychology professor and prison expert, Craig Haney, Ph.D., J.D., told the court back in 2018 he had toured maximum security prisons in roughly two dozen states, and Georgia’s SMU unit was “one of the harshest and most draconian” he had seen. His report, submitted to the court in 2018 by lawyers for prisoners — included images of prisoners with self-inflicted cuts, blood on the floor of one cell and the window of another, and descriptions of “extraordinarily harsh” living conditions. His conclusion: “The prisoners at this facility face a substantial risk of serious harm, harm that may be long-lasting and even fatal.” Southern Center for Human Rights attorney Sarah Geraghty, who represented the prisoners, said in a news release back in 2018 when the initial agreement was reached“A civilized society doesn’t lock people in isolation cells for years on end,” she said. “It was past time to move out of the dark ages.”

These solitary confinement cells at the heart of this Contempt Order measure 7 feet X 13.5 feet, and contain a toilet and mattress. Inmates housed in these solitary confinement cells receive their meals through a slit in a solid door that has a small window at the top. You may think the photograph at the top of this blog post is of one of these solitary confinement cells that have been ruled to be inhumane. But you would be wrong. That’s because this photograph is of a shower stall in Smith State Prison in Glennville, Georgia, where my client was held for nearly three days and where, ultimately he hanged himself, resulting in his death. The shower stall measures only 3.75 feet X 6.75 feet, which makes the Georgia solitary confinement cells practically Ritz Carlton luxury in comparison. Also, as you can see, there was certainly no mattress in the shower stall, nor toilet where my client could relieve himself for three days. No ventilation, no heat, no cup of water. Just imagine. Housing an inmate in a shower violates Georgia Department of Corrections’ Standard Operating Procedures. So does falsifying cell counts so it looks as if an inmate is in his cell when he is actually physically being illegally detained in a shower stall.

Would Frozen Embryos Be Considered “Unborn Children” in Georgia? You Bet They Would

March 12, 2024 | Robin Frazer Clark

By now we have all heard of the Alabama Supreme Court decision holding that frozen embryos are “unborn children” under Alabama State Law. This was the holding in LePage v. Center for Reproductive Medicine, issued on February 16, 2024. Although much hay was made out of a concurring opinion that quoted the Bible extensively, the primary opinion was based squarely on Alabama State Law only, specifically the Alabama Wrongful Death of a Minor Act. You can read the full, actual opinion here.

In LePage, three couples had their frozen embryos destroyed in an incident at a fertility clinic. The plaintiffs in the Alabama case had undergone IVF treatments that led to the creation of several embryos, some of which were implanted and resulted in healthy births. The couples paid to keep other embryos frozen in a storage facility at the Mobile Infirmary Medical Center. A patient in 2020 wandered into the area and removed several embryos, dropping them on the floor and “killing them.”

The justices ruled that wrongful death lawsuits by the couples could proceed. Justices, citing anti-abortion language in the Alabama Constitution, ruled that an 1872 state law allowing parents to sue over the death of a minor child “applies to all unborn children, regardless of their location.””Nothing about the [Wrongful Death] Act narrows that definition to unborn children who are physically “in utero.”

Georgia Tech Recognizes Justice Robert Benham with the Ivan Allen Jr. Prize for Social Courage

January 16, 2024 | Robin Frazer Clark

Robert Benham and his 1984 appointment with Georgia history
On Thursday, Feb. 8, Georgia Tech’s Ivan Allen Jr. Prize for Social Courage will be presented to Retired Justice Robert Benham. There is not a more worthy recipient. I have admired Justice Benham for my entire legal career, spanning 35 years now. I highly recommend you listen to an interview of Justice Benham by University of Georgia Professor Paul Kurtz on Youtube. It is fascinating.

Back in 2013, when I was President of the State Bar of Georgia, I had the distinct honor of giving remarks at the 14^th Annual Justice Robert Benham Awards for Community Service. That’s right. The State Bar of Georgia Community Service Awards are aptly named in honor of Justice Benham. In light of Georgia Tech’s wonderful announcement that he will be receiving its Ivan Allen Jr. Prize for Social Courage, I wanted to share again my remarks from that special day in 2013.

Remarks of President Robin Frazer Clark at the 2013 Justice Robert Benham Community Service Awards

Georgia Rules of Evidence Carry the Day in the Ross Harris Hot Car Death Appeal

June 23, 2022 | Robin Frazer Clark

You have probably heard by now that the Georgia Supreme Court on Wednesday reversed the conviction of Ross Harris for murder for the death of his young child, Cooper Harris, who Ross Harris left in the back seat of a hot car for hours. I think the Court got it exactly right. Many people have some very strong opinions on both sides of this case. All you have to do is check the hashtag #RossHarris to see how polarized the public is on the case. The reversal was certainly big news not only in Georgia, but Nationwide. This was a closely watched case.

This may be Justice Nahmias’s final opinion on the Georgia Supreme Court, and he is going out with a bang. I never thought Mr. Harris should have been prosecuted for murder in the first place. We know through neuroscience that it takes very little time or effort to distract our brains. Just the slightest deviation in our typical routine can make you forget where you intended to go or that a baby is in the car with you. Season 2 of AJC’s podcast Breakdown makes this clear with even an example of an Arkansas judge, Judge Wade Naramore, who left his 19-month-old child in his car while he was in court, resulting in the child’s death. The judge’s 911 call is one of the most horrific calls you will ever hear. You’ll also hear about an elementary school principal who left her home early one morning with her baby in her car seat in the back seat. It was too early for her to drop the baby off at day care, so the school principal deviated from her typical, normal route to go pick up doughnuts. Then she drove to school. Hours later a teacher saw the baby in the back seat. They rushed to get her out but she was dead. That simple deviation to the doughnut shop made the elementary school principal forget her child was in the back in her carseat. I urge you to listen to the AJC’s podcast. Season Two is called “Death in a Hot Car.”

Today, there are many tools a parent can use to help you remember your child is in the back seat, e.g., Baby in Car Seat Alarms, that sound an alarm and flash lights in your car if you forget your child in his car seat. There are phone apps, e.g., Kars 4 Kids Safety, or Backseat App, that alert you to check for you child in the backseat. Even the GPS app WAZE has added a Child Alert to remind you to check on your child before getting out of your car. This shows that anyone can make this mistake and now there are tools to help you not make it. The National Safety Council has tracked children left in hot cars for over 20 years. It reported that in 2018, 52 children died being left in hot cars. Since 1998 over 800 kids were lost from vehicular heatstroke. Of these deaths, 24% occurred in employee parking lots, just like Cooper Harris. This is telling. For those who are adamant that “this would never happen to me,” we know through neuroscience that that belief is simply one created through a heuristic called “defense attribution.” “Defense Attribution” is defined as “bias or error in attributing cause for some event such that a perceived threat to oneself is minimized. For example, people might blame an automobile accident on the other driver’s mistake because this attribution lessens their perception that they themselves are responsible for the accident.” Our minds do this to us when there is something so horrific you can not imagine it ever happening to you. We also know that the worse the event, the stronger the human mind insists it would never happen to me. This is something personal injury attorneys often face with jurors in cases in which the injuries to the plaintiff are horrible.

Georgia Supreme Courts Celebrates 175 Years

December 3, 2021 | Robin Frazer Clark

Oyez, Oyez! Oyez! All persons having business before the Honorable, the Supreme Court of Georgia, are admonished to draw near and give their attention, for the Court is now sitting. God Bless the State of Georgia and this Honorable Court. May it please the Court.

Yesterday, I was honored to speak in the Georgia Supreme Court as part of the Court’s 175th Anniversary Celebration. The Celebration began Wednesday evening with a lovely dinner at The Commerce Club. Thursday was a full day of seminar on the history of the Supreme Court and biographies of various former Justices. I spoke about the creation of the State Bar of Georgia in 1964, which was approved by the Georgia Supreme Court and five years later held to be Constitutional in two separate cases. It was one of the highest honors of my career. I am sharing with you below my presentation.

We are very fortunate to have the Georgia Supreme Court and the State Bar of Georgia, which, together, protect your rights to live in a Just society, grounded in the Rule of Law, so that all may reap the benefits and rewards that our system of Justice provides.

Have You Had An Arbitration Clause Forced On You Lately? Probably

May 21, 2021 | Robin Frazer Clark

Have you received something like this lately from any corporation? It is a “forced arbitration” clause in which a corporation unilaterally revokes your right to a jury trial should it cause you harm or damages in any way. This forced arbitration clause is AT & T’s version. Rather than telling you “Hey, Customer, we have taken away your right to trial without your consent,” they say “We have updated your contract terms.” Further, rather than simply telling you that AT & T is taking away your right to a jury trial regarding any dispute you may have with it, AT & T ridiculously states “We have simplified and updated the contract terms….” Then the unilateral notice says: