Proximate Cause

Question 1

PROXIMATE CAUSE =

Answer 1

I.E., nonfortuitous cause (not caused by accident or by chance)

a. Breach must have caused the injury in a natural, rather than serendipitous manner.
b. Alignment of the breach and injury elements.

Question 2

The Relational Aspect of Breach of Duty.

Answer 2

a. Breach of duty owed to Plaintiff, not to other persons differently situated.
b. Alignment of duty and breach.

Question 3

UNION PUMP CO. v. ALLIBRITTON (TEX. 1995)

PROXIMATE CAUSE AND FORSEEABILITY

Answer 3

Main issues related to Proximate Cause:
1) Whether the breach (carelessness) is too remote from the injury to be the “natural” or “non-fortuitous” cause.

RULES:

1) Legal Cause = cause in fact and foreseeability.
2) Legal Cause is not established where defendant’s conduct does no more than create conditions for the injury to be possible.

Holding: Pump Fire only created the conditions that made Albritton’s injury possible. The circumstances of the injury were too remotely connected with Union Pump’s conduct to be the legal cause of her injuries.

Question 4

TORTIOUS ASPECT CAUSATION

Answer 4

Plaintiff must show:
1) D’s was Careless
2) D’s conduct actually caused P’s injury
AND
3) The Tortious Aspect (Breach of Duty) of D’s Conduct played a part in bringing about P’s Injury.

e.g. Child hiding under a car gets injured (Defendant negligently did not look behind her). But would not be the But-For actual cause of the Injury.

Question 5

Third Restatement Torts (Scope of the Risk Formulation)

Answer 5

Whether the injury suffered by the victim is one of the harms whose risks rendered the actor’s conduct careless.
“An actor’s liability is limited to those harms that result from the risks that made the actor’s conduct tortious.” (Restatement (third) Torts) – Liability for physical and emotional harm.

Question 6

Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad Co. (1928)

Cardozo: Forseeability goes to DUTY

Answer 6

• Negligence liability only if:
  1) Defendant owed duty to plaintiff or people similarly situated as P, and
  2) D’s Careless conduct breached that duty.

Was P within Zone of Danger? (area in which harm to P was foreseeable result of D’s Careless act?)
- Was P a foreseeable victim of D’s Careless act?

Effect: Duty can Limit liability.

Question 7

Andrews, J on:

Palsgraf - Issue of Proximate Cause

Answer 7

• Duty is owed to everyone
• Test of Proximate Cause = was injury to P the natural result of D’s careless act?
  
  • Jury gets to decide on this question.

Question 8

Petitions of the Kinsman Transit Co.

Answer 8

Rule:
Damages should not be limited to foreseeable consequences at the time the negligent conduct if the consequences are direct, and the damage, although other and greater than expected, was of the general sort that was risked.
- In Re: Polemis = Direct Rule (damage that is direct, but not foreseeable) AND
- Plaintiffs are liable for damage that occurs as a result of the same forces which required greater care than was taken.

Question 9

Wagon Mound (1) Reasonable foreseeabiliy

Answer 9

Prox Cause if:
Injury is reasonably foreseeable to the D at the time they acted.
- General consequences or type of harm must be foreseeable.

Question 10

“Per se” Rule vs. Foreseeability

Intervening Criminal Acts

Answer 10

Old Rule: Intervening criminal acts are superseding causes.

New Rule: Intervening wrongdoing is a superseding cause only if it was NOT Foreseeable.