Naudia Daise says she was attacked for about 10 minutes inside a downtown Atlanta parking garage, beaten with a belt buckle until she was bruised and bloodied, and that nobody came to help her while it happened. Two years later, she says the person responsible for the harm still has not truly been held accountable — because the lawsuit she filed over what happened on state property has been thrown out of court.
Daise was attacked in 2024 inside the Georgia World Congress Center's Orange Deck parking garage, according to 11Alive. The man accused of attacking her was arrested the same day, the station reports, but Daise says that arrest did little to address the physical and financial toll of the assault. She filed a lawsuit against the Georgia World Congress Center, hoping to recover costs tied to her hospital bills, only to see a court dismiss the case in June 2026 under the legal doctrine of sovereign immunity.
That doctrine generally shields government entities from being sued unless immunity is waived or a lawsuit is otherwise allowed to proceed, per the station's report. Daise called the dismissal “bogus and wrong,” and told 11Alive she is frustrated that no one came to her aid during the attack and that no one has been held accountable since. As a military veteran, she said the lack of institutional accountability felt especially unjust to her.
Why the Lawsuit Never Had a Chance
The legal obstacle Daise ran into is baked into Georgia law. Under O.C.G.A. § 10-9-2, the Georgia World Congress Center Authority is established as a body corporate and politic and an instrumentality of the State of Georgia, according to Justia Law. That statute does not itself explicitly grant the Authority sovereign immunity. The authority also runs its own law enforcement arm: under O.C.G.A. § 10-9-15(d), the Georgia World Congress Center Authority operates a dedicated Department of Public Safety with state-certified police officers and contracted security patrolling the campus around the clock, per the authority's own board materials.
Even when sovereign immunity is waived for state negligence, Georgia law caps what victims can recover. Under the Georgia Tort Claims Act, O.C.G.A. § 50-21-29, total financial liability is capped at $1 million per single occurrence and $3 million in aggregate per occurrence, according to a breakdown from The Champion Firm. There is also a strict procedural hurdle that trips up many claimants before a case ever reaches that cap: O.C.G.A. § 50-21-26 requires an injured party to serve a formal written ante litem notice to both the state agency and the Department of Administrative Services Risk Management Division within 12 months of the injury, as explained by The Gunn Law Group.
A 2020 Georgia constitutional amendment did open one narrow door for citizens to challenge state and local entities in court, allowing suits for injunctive or declaratory relief. But that waiver explicitly prohibits monetary damage awards, according to FindLaw — meaning it offers no path to the kind of compensation Daise is seeking for her hospital bills.
The Orange Deck
The Orange Deck where the attack occurred is a six-level, 576-space parking structure at 103 Mangum Street NW, sitting adjacent to Mercedes-Benz Stadium and Building B of the convention center, according to information from Reeves + Young. It sits within the Georgia World Congress Center Authority's downtown campus.
An Alternative Path, With Its Own Limits
With civil litigation closed off, Daise's remaining options for financial relief run through administrative programs rather than the courts. Victims of violent crime in Georgia can apply for assistance through the Georgia Crime Victims Compensation Program, administered by the Criminal Justice Coordinating Council, according to program guidance published by the Georgia Crime Victims Compensation Program. Those benefits may fall short of covering a serious hospital bill.
11Alive reporter Chase Houle contacted the Georgia World Congress Center about Daise's claims and lawsuit but had not received a response as of the station's report. For now, Daise says she is left without the accountability or financial help she has been seeking since the attack.
