The Georgia Court of Appeals issued a written decision this summer that settles much, but not all, of a civil case tied to a 2019 Cedartown hit-and-run. At the center of the closely watched litigation is a narrow but high-stakes question: can state Rep. Trey Kelley be held civilly liable for what he did after a driver hit bicyclist Eric Keais and left the scene? The answer, at least for now, is mostly no, although the ruling has been spun in very different ways.
What the appeals court actually held
In an opinion issued June 17, 2026, an appellate panel took up two related appeals and made clear that the trial court’s dismissal of claims against Kelley in docket A25A2193 was proper. The companion appeal was decided “in part and reversed in part,” according to FindLaw. The court said that, based on the facts alleged in the complaint, Kelley could not be shown to have voluntarily assumed the driver’s statutory duties in a way that would support a wrongful-death claim, so those particular claims fail as a matter of law.
How coverage differed
Some news outlets described that same ruling as breathing new life into the case against Kelley. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution ran a story characterizing the panel as having revived claims and suggested a Polk County judge improperly tossed them, a framing that does not line up cleanly with the court’s written holding. For anyone trying to sort out the mixed headlines, the best guide is still the opinion itself.
How the crash and the suit began
According to the facts recounted in the opinion, on Sept. 11, 2019, Ralph Dover struck 38-year-old bicyclist Eric Keais on North Main Street in Cedartown, then drove on to a gas station before calling Trey Kelley. Kelley in turn called the town’s police chief. An officer later found Keais lying in a ditch, and Keais died at a hospital. That chain of events, including the timing and sequence of calls, is laid out in FindLaw.
Criminal history and the civil claim
The criminal case against the driver wrapped up in 2023, when Ralph “Ryan” Dover was convicted of leaving the scene resulting in death and reckless conduct and was sentenced to five years, according to Coosa Valley News. Kelley faced his own criminal exposure when he was indicted on a misdemeanor reckless-conduct charge in December 2020, but that charge was dismissed in December 2021, as reported by Georgia Public Broadcasting. The civil wrongful-death suit that triggered the current appeals was filed by the victim’s father, Manfred Keais.
Why the judges said the law did not bend
The panel’s analysis turned on the “voluntary undertaking” doctrine and on statutory duties to report crashes. The judges explained that liability for mere nonfeasance, meaning a failure to act, is generally not imposed on a non-driver unless there is detrimental reliance or an increased risk of harm. According to Justia, the court concluded that those elements were not pled in a way that could survive a motion to dismiss.
“The voluntary undertaking doctrine does not apply,” the opinion stated. The panel added that an injured person must show either detrimental reliance or an increased risk of harm for the doctrine to attach, and the complaint did not do so, according to Justia. In other words, the way the lawsuit was written did not clear the doctrinal hurdles the court said were required.
What is next for the case and for Kelley
With the Court of Appeals ruling now on the books, remaining claims can head back to superior court, and both sides still have procedural options depending on how aggressively they want to keep fighting. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution notes that Kelley is running for re-election in November, and the long-running litigation could surface on the campaign trail as election season heats up. The Keais family’s lawyers have not publicly laid out their next move in court filings as of this writing.
