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I recently saw ご愁傷様です used to express condolences for a recent death. Is that
something you'd also use in situations where a death happened some
undetermined amount of time ago? Like for example if you're talking to your
coworker and you ask something about their father and they say "oh he passed
away 5 years ago."

In English it might be kinda weird to say "sorry for your loss" if you're
referring to someone that died 5 years ago. You'd probably just say "sorry to
hear that" or something similar instead. The fact that it's different in
English makes me wonder if it's also expressed differently in Japanese.
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2022-09-06T16:50:29.923
96140
2022-09-07T00:05:02.960
2022-09-06T18:42:30.457
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expressions
How to express condolences for a death that happened several years ago?
I guess it depends, but using ご愁傷さまでした (in the past tense) would be possible.

As for your example, if you know the coworker well enough, then ご愁傷様でした is not
that weird. But if you just know her/him recently, ご愁傷様でした is definitely odd.

In either case, it may be safer to use something like それは大変でしたね/だったね or to say
something to the effect that you are sorry you didn't know.

* * *

ご愁傷さまです in the present tense sounds more normal when talking about a death of
the near past, as you guess. But there is no clear limit on how near it should
be.

Also note that the phrase can be used for teasing. (See
[#2](https://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/word/%E5%BE%A1%E6%84%81%E5%82%B7%E6%A7%98/#jn-78913).)
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