Torts Flashcards
What is the risk-utility test?
To prevail on a claim for strict product liability, a jury must determine that the risks posed by the product outweigh its benefits. The alternative design must have been economically feasible.
What is required to show defamation of a group?
If a defamatory statement is made about a group, the group must be so small that it can reasonably be understood to refer to the plaintiff as a member of the group.
What is self defense?
Defense to intentional tort.
Third-parties are justified in using reasonable force in defense of others upon reasonable belief that the defended part would be entitled to use self-defense him/herself.
Cardozo’s view of duty
Defendant is liable only to a plaintiff who is within the zone of foreseeable harm. This looks like a causation inquiry, but Cardozo analyzed it under duty.
Trespass to chattels
Intentional interference with the plaintiff’s right of possession by either (1) dispossessing the plaintiff of the chattel OR (2) using or intermeddling with the plaintiff’s chattel.
Must prove actual damages caused by interference or loss.
Manufacturing defect elements
(1) product was defective (differed from design specification)
(2) the defect existed at the time the product left the defendant’s control
(3) the defect caused the plaintiff’s injury when used in an intended or reasonably foreseeable way (including foreseeable misuse).
What is the professional negligence standard?
Whether the professional exercised the same skill, knowledge, and care as another electrician in the community.
Note: Community standard is NOT conclusive. Judge can determine that community standard itself is negligent.
Common carrier and innkeeper liability
Common law = Highest duty of care.
Third Restatement = Reasonable care
What is a guest statute?
Automobile drivers owe a duty of ordinary reasonable care to all passengers, including guests (riders who do not pay for the ride).
A minority of states have passed guest statutes, imposing only a duty to refrain from gross or wanton and willful misconduct regarding guests. (Lowers the standard of care.)
What is an intervening cause?
Does NOT break the causal chain. Defendant is liable for harm caused by foreseeable intervening forces that occur at the time of the defendant’s act and the plaintiff’s injury.
What is a superseding cause?
Breaks the causal chain.
Attractive nuisance doctrine elements
(1) artificial condition exists
(2) owner knows or has reason to know children are likely to trespass
(3) owner knows or has reason to know that the condition poses an unreasonable risk of death or serious injury to children.
(4) the children, because of youth, do not discover or cannot appreciate the danger
(5) utility of maintaining the condition and the burden of eliminating the danger are slight compared to the risk of harm to children
(6) landowner fails to exercise reasonable care to protect the children from harm.
Elements of Intentional Tort
(1) Voluntary act
(2) Intent = purposeful and knowing the consequence is substantially certain
Battery elements
(1) harmful or offensive conduct (objective standard)
(2) To another’s person
(3) Causation
(4) Intent (transferred intent applies)
Assault Elements
(1) Conduct or other circumstances (mere words insufficient)
(2) π has reasonable apprehension and awareness of ∆’s act
(3) Imminent threat of harm
(4) intent (transferred intent applies)
Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress (IIED) Elements
(1) intent (not transferred) or recklessness
(2) Extreme and outrageous conduct by ∆
(3) 3rd Party Liability (members of immediate family even if no bodily injury) (bystander with bodily injury)
False Imprisonment elements
(1) Intent to confine or restrain within boundaries
(2) victim is conscious of confinement OR harmed by it
Shopkeeper’s privilege = can reasonably detain someone suspected of shoplifting
What are the 6 defenses to intentional torts?
(1) Consent (express or implied)
(2) Self defense
(3) Defense of others
(4) Defense of property
(5) parental discipline
(6) Privilege of arrest (see felony + reasonable to suspect the person arrested committed it. Different standards for mistake of whether crime committed for private vs police)
Trespass to Chattels elements
(1) interference with πs right of possession (dispossessing or intermeddling)
(2) Intent to do the act
mistake not a defense
Conversion
(1) intentional act
(2) interferes with π’s possession
(3) serious enough to deprive π of the use of the chattel
(4) damages (full value of property or replevin)
Trespass
(1) intent to be on the land (knowledge of trespass immaterial)
(2) physical invasion
Necessity as defense: Private and public necessity
Private Nuisance
substantial and unreasonable interference with another’s use or enjoyment of his land
Defenses: (1) regulatory compliance = admissible but not complete defense (2) coming to the nuisance = not complete defense
Abatement = reasonable force permitted to abate, but ∆ must receive notice of the nuisance and refuse to act first.
Public Nuisance
Unreasonable interference with a right common to the general public
Negligence elements
(1) Duty
(2) Breach
(3) Causation (but-for and proximate)
(4) Harm
When do ∆’s have an affirmative duties to act?
(1) assumption of duty
(2) placing another in peril
(3) contract
(4) by authority
(5) by relationship (employer-employee / parent-child / common carrier-passenger)
What is negligence per se? What are its elements?
(1) Criminal or regulatory statute imposes a specific duty for protection of others
(2) ∆ neglects duty
(3) ∆’s violation proximately caused the harm
∆ is liable for anyone in the class of people intended to receive protection for the harms of the type the statute intended to protect against
Defenses: (1) compliance impossible, (2) violation reasonable under the circumstances
What are the three specific standards of care assigned to three types of tortfeasers?
Common carriers = highest duty of care consistent with operation of the business (majority view)
Innkeepers = ordinary negligence standard (majority)
Automobile drivers = ordinary care to guests and passengers (majority), unless guest statute imposes lower duty. (minority = refrain from wanton & willful misconduct)
What duty is owed to trespassers under the traditional and modern/restatement approaches?
Traditional approach = no willful, wanton, reckless or intentional misconduct
Modern and Third Restatement = reasonable standard of care under all circumstances. No duty to a flagrant trespasser.
What duty is owed to off-premises victims?
Duty to prevent unreasonable risk of harm by artificial conditions.
No duty to protect against harm by natural conditions (except trees in urban areas)
Res ipsa loquitur elements
(1) π’s injury under ∆’s exclusive control
(2) injury would not occur unless negligent
(3) π is not responsible for injury
Eggshell π rule
Extent of damages need not be foreseeable
What are “actual damages”?
Actual injuries (personal or property damages), not just economic loss