Torts

Question 1

Battery

Answer 1

Voluntary Act
Intent to cause harmful or offensive contact
Harmful of offensive contact
With another person

Question 2

Assault

Answer 2

Voluntary act
Intent to cause a person to apprehend harmful or offensive contact
Act causes apprehension of harmful or offensive contact

Question 3

Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress

Answer 3

VOLUNTARY ACT
EITHER:
INTENT TO CAUSE SEVERE EMOTIONAL DISTRESS
(Specific or general); OR
RECKLESS DISREGARD OF THE PROBABILITY OF CAUSING
EXTREME AND OUTRAGEOUS CONDUCT
Shocking and indecent; intolerable in civilized society
Objective unless D knowingly exploits P (vulnerability of victim)
Consider: repetition; escalation; imbalance in power/authority
NOT insulting language, rudeness
SEVERE EMOTIONAL DISTRESS
Significant change in wellbeing
CAUSATION – harm must be proven

Question 3

False Imprisonment

Answer 3

Voluntary Act
Intent to confine or restrain someone to a defined or bounded place (SPECIFIC OR GENERAL)
Act causes actual and unlawful confinement or restraint
Actual or apparent physical barriers; physical force or threat to apply physical force; duress; retaining something of value
NOT moral or social pressure
Not aware of any reasonable or safe escape
Any amount of time
Excluding P from a place is not FI
EITHER
Awareness of the confinement or restraint; OR
if not aware, harm

Question 4

Transferred Intent

Answer 4

Reminder—Doctrine applies to 5 torts:
Assault
Battery
False Imprisonment
Trespass to Land
Trespass to Chattels
When Def intends any 1 of the 5, and accomplishes any 1 of the 5, Def is liable.

Doctrine also applies to transfer from person to person.

Question 4

Trespass to Land

Answer 4

VOLUNTARY ACT
INTENT TO ENTER LAND
Only intent req’d: do the act/enter the land
Mistake does not negate intent
Motive is irrelevant
ENTRY ONTO LAND
Enter land or cause a thing or third person to do so
Remain on the land
Failure to remove from the land a thing which Def has a duty to remove
Usually must be physical (person; fence; building; equipment)
*Notes
Property does not need to be enclosed, fenced, or posted
Extends above and below (some jurisdictions consider whether P can actually use space above and below ground)
Damages include all harm directly resulting from trespass
Nominal damages ok

Question 5

Trespass to Chattels

Answer 5

VOLUNTARY ACT
INTENT TO INTERFERE WITH PROPERTY
Mistake does not negate intent
Motive is irrelevant
Simply using interfering w/chattel, even without knowledge that D is interfering with another’s possessory interest
INTERFERENCE WITH PROPERTY
ACTUAL DAMAGES
Harm to the chattel
P dispossessed of chattel for sufficient period of time
Bodily harm is caused to P
Damage to P’s interest in the chattel
May be intermeddling with chattel in a way that interferes with P’s business

Question 6

Negligence

Answer 6

Duty
Duty, obligation of one person to another, flows from millennia of social customs, philosophy, and religion. Serving as the
glue of society, duty is the thread that binds humans to one another in community. Duty *1675 constrains and channels
behavior in a socially responsible way before the fact, and it provides a basis for judging the propriety of behavior
thereafter
Breach
The second element of the tort of negligence is the misconduct itself, the defendant’s improper act or omission. Normally
referred to as the defendant’s breach of duty, this element implies the preexistence of a standard of proper behavior to avoid
imposing undue risks of harm to other persons and their property, which circles back to duty.