Phil Friduss is a Partner in the Atlanta office with strong practice ties to the Firm’s 6 Georgia regional offices. His practice focuses on the defense of high-exposure cases in the areas of governmental liability, labor and employment, correctional health care, and education. In over 30 years, Phil has had the pleasure of representing over 225 public entities.
For the success of his team, Phil has been named a Georgia Super Lawyer by Atlanta Magazine 16 times, and he has also been an honored member of Georgia Trend Magazine’s Legal Elite in the area of labor and employment law. For over 20 years, he has been AV Preeminent Peer Review Rated by Martindale-Hubbell.
Phil has been a member of DRI’s Governmental Liability Committee for over 20 years, serving as its Chairman from 2012 to 2014. He is a national level speaker and author. His legal column, Towns and the Law, appeared monthly from 2011 to 2018 in Georgia Municipal Association’s flagship print publication, Georgia Cities.
Experience
Correctional Health Care
Having represented the largest private correctional health care provider in the world for nearly 20 years, Phil has seen every type of correctional health care case imaginable. Delays in treatment, suicides, tasering cases, excited delirium death cases, medical negligence, class actions, and claims under brought under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983 - Phil has been at the forefront of correctional health care cases since they started popping up with regularity in the 1990s.
Education
Phil has successfully represented Georgia school districts and officials in every manner of education law, including Title IX matters, IDEA cases, and FERPA matters to name a few.
Phil also serves as counsel to school districts in matters related to Georgia’s Fair Dismissal Practices Act. Phil currently serves as the Advisory Chair to the Defense Research Institute’s newly minted Education Substantive Law Group
Governmental Liability
In representing now well over 200 different public entities, Phil’s governmental liability practice covers every corner of Georgia, often in tandem with the firm’s regional offices in Georgia. He has successfully defended jury trials in every federal district in the state.
Phil works closely with public entities and officials as insurance, special, and outside counsel in all manner of 1983 litigation and state law matters. With a governmental practice ranging from police misconduct to First Amendment cases, from land use to wrongful death suits, and from high-speed pursuits to jail cases, he is a go-to lawyer in the highest exposure cases.
Phil is a widely known speaker and author on both the state and national levels. He served as Chairman of the powerful Defense Research Institute’s Governmental Liability Committee (where he presently serves on the Advisory Board), and also chaired the American Bar Association’s Sub-Committee on Civil Rights / First Amendment Liability. From 2011 to 2018 he served as the legal columnist for the Georgia Municipal Association’s flagship print publication Georgia Cities.
Labor & Employment
Over 30 years, Phil has successfully defended employment discrimination cases in every Georgia federal district. Phil has worked as insurance counsel, special counsel, outside counsel, and as an investigator within both the private and public sector communities.Georgia Trend magazine has awarded Phil the honor of being a member of Georgia’s Legal Elite in the area of labor and employment law.
Recognition
•AV Preeminent Peer Review Rated, Martindale-Hubbell
•Georgia Super Lawyers, Super Lawyers, 2003-2018
•Legal Elite, Georgia Trend Magazine
Presentations
Since 1996, Phil has regularly presented at numerous national and local engagements such as those for DRI, ABA, Georgia ICLE, ACHSA, USLAW, the Texas Bar Association, and others.
Publications
•Supreme Court Expands Fourth Amendment Protections
HBS Governmental Liability Blog; March 30, 2021
•Supreme Court Quietly Hammers Fifth Circuit in Conditions of Confinement Case, Reversing Qualified Immunity Ruling
HBS Governmental Liability Blog; November 5, 2020
•Supreme Court Takes on New Fourth Amendment Case
HBS Governmental Liability Blog; October 27, 2020
•Supreme Court Refuses To Stop Order To Move Inmates From Virus-Ravaged Prison
HBS Correctional Healthcare Blog; June 4, 2020
•COVID-19 In Jails And Prisons - US Supreme Court Asked To Stay Ohio Injunction Requiring Transfer Of Inmates
HBS Correctional Healthcare Blog; May 28, 2020
•US Supreme Court Ready To Sit Down To A Full Plate Of Qualified Immunity
HBS Governmental Liability Blog; May 6, 2020
•Yes, It’s True: You Cannot Sue A Dog- Or A Cat, For That Matter
HBS Governmental Liability Blog; April 29, 2020
•Of Dogs And Privacy: The Warrantless Seizure Of A Dog’s Blood, And All That Comes With It
HBS Governmental Liability Blog; April 15, 2020
•US Supreme Court Hands Down Pro-Law Enforcement 4th Amendment Ruling
HBS Governmental Liability Blog; April 7, 2020
•Gun Store Owner Sues Over Shelter-In-Place Ordinance
HBS Governmental Liability Blog; March 30, 2020
•Forced Labor in Privatized Prisons? Eleventh Circuit Cries Foul!
HBS Governmental Liability Blog; March 10, 2020
•The Modern Suicide Case In The Correctional Healthcare Setting
HBS Correctional Healthcare Blog; February 24, 2020
•2(B), or Not 2(B) - Show Me Your Papers Survives to See Another Day
DRI Today, 2016
•Today’s Correctional Healthcare World
White Paper, 2017
•Municipal Courts’ Practices Involving Incarceration of Indigent Defendants Under Fire
ACCG Annual Meeting, 2016
•Georgia’s Wistleblower Act as Applied to Local Governments
62nd Annual Institute for City and County Attorneys, 2015
•Georgia Municipal Association’s Georgia Cities
Legal Columnist, 2011-Present
•A Legal Fight, for Freedom: The Dred Scott Decision
For the Defense, 2011
•Defending the Indefensible: Racial Profiling Hits the Courts
For the Defense, 2000
•The Telecommunications Act of 1996
For the Defense, DRI, December 2008
•Public Entities and Public Officials’ Liability Under 42 U.S.C.
1981 and 1985
•Justices Give the War on Drugs a Significant Boost: The Year in the Fourth Amendment
The Urban Lawyer: The National Quarterly on State and Local Government Law 787-93, 1997
•Update on Fourth Amendment Search Cases: The New and Confused Framework
The Urban Lawyer: The National Quarterly on State and Local Government Law 679-700, 1996
In the Press
Supreme Court Expands Fourth Amendment Protections
March 30, 2021
Written by: Phillip E. Friduss, Esq. Getting hit by a bullet but still escaping in the getaway car implicates the Fourth Amendment after all sayeth Chief Justice Roberts in a heated 5-3 Opinion along ideological lines. Justice Amy Coney Barrett took no part in the case, which was argued in October before she took her
Supreme Court Quietly Hammers Fifth Circuit in Conditions of Confinement Case, Reversing Qualified Immunity Ruling
November 5, 2020
Written by: Phillip E. Friduss, Esq. This past Monday, in a per curiam decision (Justice Barrett not participating; Justice Alito concurring to suggest cert should not have been granted, but otherwise concurring with the judgment; and, Justice Thomas, dissenting without written opinion) the Supreme Court reversed and remanded a Fifth Circuit conditions of confinement qualified
Supreme Court Takes on New Fourth Amendment Case
October 27, 2020
Written by: Phillip E. Friduss, Esq. Last week, the Supreme Court agreed to hear Lange v. California, Docket No. 20-18, where the issue has been coined in two different, but similar ways: Whether the pursuit of a person whom a police officer has probable cause to believe has committed a misdemeanor categorically qualifies as an
Supreme Court Refuses to Stop Order to Move Inmates From Virus-Ravaged Prison
June 4, 2020
Written by: Phillip E. Friduss, Esq. Thus is the title of Adam Liptak’s New York Times coverage of the Ohio inmate transfer case, Williams v Wilson case we reported on last week. The piece begins: “The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused a request from the Trump administration to block a trial judge’s ruling that had ordered
Services
Correctional Health Care
Education
Governmental Liability
Labor & Employment
Distinguished: An excellent rating for a lawyer with some experience. This rating indicates the attorney is widely
respected by their peers for high professional achievement and ethical standards.
Notable: This rating indicates that the lawyer has been recognized by a large number of their peers for strong ethical standards.
