Paul Dorn, individually and as administrator of the estate of his son, Brooks Cameron Dorn (the “decedent”), sued the Georgia Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities (the “Department”) for damages, contending thаt the Department’s negligence was the proximate cause of the decedent’s death. The trial court dismissed Dorn’s complaint for failure to comply with the ante litem notice provisions of the Georgia Tort Claims Act, OCGA § 50-21-20 et seq. (“GTCA”) in that Dorn did not specify the amount of the loss claimed. On appeal, Dorn contends that he complied with the ante litem notice requirements notwithstanding that the notice did not state the dollar amount of the loss claimed and thаt the trial court therefore erred in dismissing his complaint. For the reasons that follow, we affirm.
The record shows that the decedent committed suicide on April 5, 2011, while on conditional release from a psychiatric facility opеrated by the Department. On January 9, 2012, Dorn presented, via certified mail, return receipt requested, his “Ante Litem Notice of Wrongful Death Claim” to the Risk Management Division of the Georgia Department of Administrative Services, and he provided a copy of the notice to the Department. Dorn’s notice did not state the dollar amount of the loss claimed. Rather, the notice stated that “[t]he amount of the loss suffered” is the “[m]onetary value of [the decedent’s] life in an amount sufficient to appropriately penalize State’s deliberately indifferent, negligent breach of State’s duty, and also in an amount sufficient to appropriately penalize State’s deliberately indifferent, negligent violation of [the decedent’s] rights.”
On March 28, 2013, Dorn filed suit against the Department to recover damages for personal injuries and wrongful death allegedly caused by the negligent acts or omissions of the Department. Contemporaneously with its answer, the Department filed a motion to dismiss the complaint for, among other things, Dorn’s failure to comply with the ante litem notice requirements set forth in the GTCA. The trial court dismissed the complaint because Dorn’s ante
The GTCA is “a limited waiver of the State’s sovereign immunity, crafted, as is constitutionally authorized, by our Legislature, and not subject to modification or abrogation by our courts.” (Citation omitted.) Cummings v. Ga. Dept. of Juvenile Justice,
A claimant must strictly comply with the notice provisions as a prеrequisite to filing suit under the GTCA, and substantial compliance is not sufficient. Cummings v. Ga. Dept. of Juvenile Justice,
“If the ante litem notice requirements are not met, then the State does not waive sovereign immunity, and therefore, the trial court lacks subject matter jurisdiction.” Bd. of Regents of the Univ. System of Ga. v. Myers,
Pertinеnt to this dispute, the GTCA requires that a written notice of claim “shall state, to the extent of the claimant’s knowledge and belief and as may be practicable under the circumstances, . . . [t]he amount of the loss claimed])]” OCGA § 50-21-26 (a) (5) (E). Dorn cоntends that he complied with this provision because the GTCA does not require that the notice state the dollar amount of the claim, and that he stated the amount of the loss to the extent of his knowledge and belief as practiсable under the circumstances given that a claim for wrongful death is an unliquidated claim.
As the Supreme Court of Georgia has explained, “the GTCA’s ante litem notice provisions clearly contemplate the possibility that a claimant may have imperfect information regarding various facets of [his] claim at the time [his] notice is submitted.” Cummings v. Ga.
In a recent case, this Court determined thаt a claimant’s ante litem notice failed to satisfy the notice requirement of OCGA § 50-21-26 (a) (5) (E) where the claimant for the loss of the life of another “made no mention of any amount of loss claimed even though his losses were comрleted, and there was nothing about the circumstances that prevented him from assigning values to his losses to the best of his knowledge and belief within the statutory deadline.” (Footnote omitted.) Driscoll v. Bd. of Regents of the Univ. System of Ga.,
Dorn argues that, unlike the notice at issue in Driscoll, his ante litem notice did not entirely lack any statement regarding the amount of loss.
Dorn contends that quantifying the amount of his claim would have necessitated reference to mortality tables, wage records, and perhaps an expert economist, none of which is required by the GTCA.
Dorn maintains that the failure to quantify the amount of his claim should not be fatal to his complaint because the State suffered no prejudice thereby and because he was acting pro se at the time he submitted the ante litem notice. In Cummings, our Supreme Court considered whether an error in the claimant’s ante litem notice misidentifying the responsible agency prejudiced the State, but in that case the claimant, who undisputedly believed she had identified the correct agency, complied with the plain language of the ante litem notice provisions. See Cummings v. Ga. Dept. of Juvenile Justice,
Nor does the fact that Dorn composed the ante litem notice while unrepresented by counsel excuse compliance with the statutory requirements. We acknowledge that the dismissal of Dorn’s complaint is a harsh result, perhaps even more so because Dorn drafted the notice while acting pro se. Nevertheless, “[a] 1 though [Dorn] is proceeding pro se, that status does not relieve him of the obligation to comply with the substantive and procedural requirements of the law[.]” (Citation omitted.) Simon v. City of Atlanta,
For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that the trial court did not err in dismissing Dorn’s complaint.
Judgment affirmed.
Notes
Dorn also refers us to Sikes v. Candler County,
The damagеs reeoverahle in a wrongful death action include the full value of the life of the decedent. OCGA §§ 51-4-1 (1); 51-4-2 (a), (e). “The full value of the decedent’s life is the economic value and the value of other noneconomic intangible items that the decedent would have attained to the end of his life had he lived.” (Citation omitted.) Carroll Fulmer Logistics Corp. v. Hines,
In his appellate brief, Dorn relies largely on this Court’s decision in Myers v. Bd. of Regents of the Univ. System of Ga.,