KADIATOU SANOH v. METROPOLITAN ATLANTA RAPID TRANSIT AUTHORITY (2026)

The Supreme Court today denied the petition for certiorari in this case.

SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF GEORGIA Clerk's Office, Atlanta

Georgia law requires a “carrier of passengers” like MARTA to exercise “extraordinary diligence to protect the lives and persons” of their passengers. OCGA § 46-9-132; Metro. Atlanta Rapid Transit Auth. v. Rouse, 279 Ga. 311, 311 (2005). Just as it sounds, extraordinary diligence means more than ordinary care; it is “that extreme care and caution which very prudent and thoughtful persons exercise under the same or similar circumstances.” OCGA § 51–1–3. See also Rouse, 279 Ga. at 311. And as with other questions in tort law that ask what a hypothetical person (here, a “very prudent and thoughtful” one) would do under the circumstances, outside of “plain and undisputable cases,” the question whether a carrier breached its statutory duty of extraordinary diligence is a question for the factfinder, even in the absence of factual disputes. Bussey v. Dawson, 224 Ga. 191, 193–94 (1968) (applying as “controlling” the “well established rule that questions of negligence, diligence, contributory negligence and proximate cause are peculiarly matters for the jury, and a court should not take the place of the jury in solving them, except in plain and undisputable cases). See also, e.g., Givens v. Coral Hosp.-GA, LLC, 317 Ga. 282, 284 (2023) (Pinson, J., concurring); Am. Multi-Cinema, Inc. v. Brown, 285 Ga. 442, 445 (2009); Ellington v. Tolar Constr. Co., 237 Ga. 235, 237 (1976).

In this case involving an abrupt stop of a MARTA bus, however, the Court of Appeals took the extraordinary diligence question from the factfinder. Citing its recent decision in MARTA v. Brown, 366 Ga. App. 275, 281 (2022), the court held that MARTA “has no duty to give passengers a reasonable time to find a seat before departing the station.” Sanoh v. Metro. Atlanta Rapid Transit Auth., A25A1341, slip op. at 4 (Ga. App. Oct. 15, 2025) (unreported). As an initial matter, that holding appears to have mixed up the elements of duty and breach. There can be no real dispute that MARTA owes a duty of extraordinary diligence to protect its passengers, see Rouse, 279 Ga. at 311, and indeed, the Court of Appeals began its analysis by noting that the parties agreed on that much. Sanoh, A25A1341, slip op. at 4. The real question was whether MARTA had breached that duty under the circumstances of this case. And the court's holding, in effect, was that, as a matter of law, MARTA does not breach its duty of extraordinary diligence by not giving a passenger enough time to sit down or otherwise secure herself on a MARTA bus.

I am not so sure about that. What if a bus driver mashes the accelerator immediately after closing the bus doors, when most of the new riders are still looking for seats? What if he does so even after someone asks him to wait? Or what if the driver notices an elderly or disabled person has not yet found a seat, and still hits the gas? Would a “very prudent and thoughtful” bus driver exercising “extreme care and caution” do any of those things? At the least, is that “plain[ly] and undisputabl[y]” so? Under the Court of Appeals's rule, the answer would seem to be yes: case dismissed. But see, e.g., Eason v. Crews, 88 Ga. App. 602, 612–13 (1953) (agreeing that it was up to the jury whether the carrier exercised extraordinary diligence to protect the passenger when a limb on the side of the roadway protruded through an open window and injured the passenger's eye, and ultimately affirmed the jury's verdict resolving the question against the defendant); Metts v. Louisville & Nashville R.R. Co., 52 Ga. App. 115, 116–18 (1935) (reversing grant of general demurrer to railroad company in case where passenger was injured when disembarking the train because while there is ordinarily “no duty upon a carrier to assist a passenger in boarding or alighting from its train,” “whether extraordinary diligence requires that a passenger be assisted in entering a train, may be dependent upon the circumstances and conditions” and, “[i]f, in the exercise of extraordinary care” it is necessary for the safety of a passenger to be assisted or aided in entering the train “then it would become the duty of the carrier to assist the passenger.”); Piller v. Hanger Cab Co., 115 Ga. App. 260, 264 (1967) (holding that the trial court erred in sustaining a general demurrer to the complaint alleging that a taxicab was speeding on wet roads in the dark when “[t]he petition raise[d] too many issues of fact ․ to hold as a matter of law that the defendant was exercising extraordinary diligence to protect the plaintiff passenger” or that another driver involved in the accident was the sole proximate cause of the collision); Cuthbert v. Metro. Atlanta Rapid Transit Auth., 190 Ga. App. 550, 550–51 (1989) (stating that “[w]hether the passenger was owed a duty of extraordinary care or ordinary care is also a jury question” when the driver stopped the bus about four feet from the curb and a passenger who was walking along the side of the bus fell under its rear wheel and was killed).

Or how about this case? Headed home from work on the evening of January 22, 2022, Kadiatou Sanoh boarded a MARTA bus. She swiped her Breeze card at the terminal, but the card was a few cents short of the fare. Believing that she could not sit down without paying her fare, Sanoh stepped to the side and searched her purse for the necessary change. In the meantime, without signaling, the bus driver accelerated away from the stop but then hit the brakes as a car pulled in front of the bus. At that point, Sanoh was still looking through her purse, and although she had braced herself with one hand, she flew forward and hit her head on a railing at the front of the bus, causing significant injuries. Would a “very prudent and thoughtful” bus driver exercising “extreme care and caution” have acted in the same fashion? Under the decision below and Brown, the answer is apparently a clear and indisputable “yes.” That strikes me as a difficult rule to defend given (1) the high standard set by a duty of extraordinary diligence and (2) our law generally reserves questions of breach for decision by the factfinder.

This is not to say that the right answer is clear. Not every “the bus started/stopped fast and I fell” claim against a common carrier like MARTA must reach a jury. No doubt it will be “plain and undisputable” under the circumstances of some cases that MARTA's conduct in starting or stopping or otherwise driving a bus or train met even that high standard of extraordinary diligence, or that the passenger's own negligence was the proximate cause of her injury and thus barred relief. See Bussey, 224 Ga. at 193–94. The question is whether there is a particular set of circumstances in these cases that demand a rule that the carrier has not breached its duty (or is not liable for some other reason, like contributory negligence) as a matter of law. I don't have a ready answer.

But in my view, the fact that it may be hard to figure out whether some bright-line rule can be fashioned in these cases (and if so, where to draw it) does not mean we should not try. Not taking up this question leaves in place a rule (from Brown) that cuts off liability as a matter of law in too many cases given the common carrier's duty of extraordinary diligence and the general rule that questions of breach are for the factfinder. And because this question is both important and recurring, I would grant review in this case to address it as best we can.

All the Justices concur, except Peterson, C.J., and Ellington, Pinson, and Land, JJ., who dissent. Colvin, J., disqualified.