What is an intervening cause and how can it affect my Georgia injury claim?

· 3 min read

An intervening cause is an event that occurs after a defendant’s negligent act and contributes to the injury. In a Georgia injury claim, the key issue is whether that later event was foreseeable. A foreseeable intervening cause usually leaves the original defendant on the hook, while an unforeseeable, independent one can break the chain of causation and shift or eliminate the defendant’s responsibility.

How an intervening cause changes the analysis

Negligence requires proving that the defendant’s conduct proximately caused the harm. An intervening cause attacks that link by introducing a second force between the original negligence and the final injury. The law then asks whether the original defendant should still answer for an outcome that another event helped produce. Georgia resolves this through foreseeability:

  • If the intervening event was a foreseeable consequence of the original negligence, it does not relieve the defendant, because the harm still falls within the risk created.
  • If the intervening event was unforeseeable and independent, it may be treated as a superseding cause that breaks the chain and cuts off the original defendant’s liability.

The label matters: a mere intervening cause that is foreseeable preserves liability, while a superseding cause severs it.

Examples of the distinction

Consider a driver who negligently leaves a disabled car partly blocking a travel lane. If another driver, traveling at a normal speed, fails to see the obstruction in time and collides, that second driver’s ordinary inattentiveness may be a foreseeable response to the hazard, so the first driver can remain partly responsible. By contrast, if a third party intentionally and unexpectedly does something extraordinary and independent that no one could anticipate, a court may find that act superseding, breaking the connection to the original negligence. The line turns on whether a reasonable person would have foreseen the general kind of event that intervened.

Why it matters for a recovery

Intervening-cause questions can reshape who pays and how much:

  • A defendant may argue a later event superseded its negligence, aiming to escape liability entirely.
  • Multiple contributing causes can lead to fault being apportioned among several parties, with each bearing its share.
  • Georgia’s comparative-fault rules then reduce or bar recovery based on the injured person’s own percentage of fault.

Because these arguments can decide both liability and allocation, the foreseeability of any intervening event is often a central battleground.

The bottom line

An intervening cause is a later event that contributes to an injury, and in Georgia its effect depends on foreseeability. A foreseeable intervening cause keeps the original defendant responsible, while an unforeseeable superseding cause can break the causal chain, making the foreseeability question pivotal to whether and how a claim succeeds.

This article is for general educational and informational purposes only and is not legal advice. It does not create an attorney-client relationship, and Georgia law may change. For advice about a specific situation, consult a licensed Georgia personal injury attorney.

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