Geoffrey Anderson v. City of Atlanta, Georgia: Date Argued: January 27th, 2026; Docket Number: 24-13509

Case Summary:In the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, plaintiffs Multimedia Technologies, Inc., Geoffrey Anderson, and Peach Hospitality of Georgia, LLC sued the City of Atlanta, Georgia, alleging that the City’s efforts to force removal of two long‑existing billboard signs and to enforce related arrest citations violated their rights under the First, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments, including free speech and due process protections. The suit arose after Atlanta, having previously permitted the signs under its 1982 sign code and later amended its code in 2015, demanded removal of Multimedia’s nonconforming signs, and when Multimedia refused, the City issued arrest citations to Multimedia’s president and Peach Hospitality’s registered agent, prompting the plaintiffs to seek declaratory and injunctive relief in federal court to prevent enforcement of the sign code and the citations. The district court (Judge Victoria M. Calvert) granted summary judgment to the City of Atlanta on Rooker‑Feldman grounds as to Multimedia, holding that the federal claims were an impermissible attempt to relitigate issues already lost in prior Georgia state‑court proceedings concerning the same signs, while staying proceedings as to Anderson and Peach and certifying a partial final judgment under Rule 54(b), thus setting the stage for an appeal to the Eleventh Circuit.In the present court, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, the case is docketed as Geoffrey Anderson, et al. v. City of Atlanta, Georgia, No. 24‑13509, and Anderson and his co‑plaintiffs now appeal from the district court’s adverse judgment and certification order; the Eleventh Circuit placed the case on its oral‑argument calendar for January 27, 2026, at the Elbert P. Tuttle United States Court of Appeals Building in Atlanta, Georgia, and heard argument that day.