Trespass to the Person Flashcards
An actionable battery requires:
1) The intentional application of unlawful force (the touching or contact;
2) Which is direct and immediate; and
3) For which the defendant has no lawful justification or excuse.
Intentional application - the mental element for the tort of battery requires:
1) An intention (that is, setting out) to apply force to another person; or
2) Recklessness at to (that is, foreseeing the likelihood of) one’s actions causing the application of force to another person.
An actionable assault requires:
1) The defendant intends that the claimant apprehends the application of unlawful force;
2) The claimant reasonably apprehends the immediate and direct application of unlawful force;
3) For which the defendant has no lawful justification or excuse.
An actionable claim for false imprisonment:
1) The defendant must intend to completely restrict the claimant’s freedom of movement:
2) Without lawful justification or excuse.
Thomas v National Union of Miners (South Wales Area) [1968]
During the 1984-5 miners’ strikes, strike-breakers sought an interlocutory injunction against the striking miners from verbally abusing and harassing them as they went to work.
Dismissing their claim, Scott J held that the action of the striking miners did not meet the requirements of immediacy or directness necessary to establish an assault.
R v Ireland [1998]
Three women had suffered psychiatric illness as a result of being subjected to a length period of harassment by the defendant, including silent telephone calls.
Liability depends on whether the claimant in the circumstances reasonably believed that the oral threat could be carried out in the sufficiently near future to qualify as an immediate threat of personal violence.
On the facts, the court was prepared to accept that silence would be capable of giving rise to such fears.
Bird v Jones [1845]
The defendant’s employer had, without permission, installer seating to view a regatta on the River Thames across the public footway from Hammersmith Bridge in London. Although this prevented the claimant using the footway, the defendants were not liable for false imprisonment as his freedom of movement was not completely restrained; he was able to turn back the way he had come: ‘imprisonment is… a total restraint of the liberty of the person… and no partial obstruction of his will, whatever inconvenience it may bring on him’.
Iqbal v Prison Officers Association [2009]
The POA called an unlawful strike which meant that very few prison officers turned up for work. In light of this, the prison governor decided that prisoners should remain in their cells for the entire day. A prisoner, who is normally allowed out of his cell for 6 hours a day for work and recreation, brought a claim against POA for false imprisonment for be period that he would normally be allowed out.
Court of Appeal rejected his claim. The omission to release did not constitute liability.
Defence - consent
No battery when the claimant consents to the direct and immediate application of force by the defendant.
Implied consent to battery as a participant in sport, Condon v Basi (1985).
A competent adult may withhold medicinal treatment, even if at risk of death.
Mental Capacity Act 2005 may change consent - if they lack the capacity of make such a decision, the doctor will do so for them.
Chatterton v Gerson [1981] (Consent)
The court ruled that a patient’s consent to an operation is valid, despite the fact that she had not been fully informed of the risks, because she broadly understood the nature of the operation.
Battery definition, case:
Collins v Wilcock, Lord Goff:
‘the actual infliction of unlawful force upon another’.
Assault definition, case:
Collins v Wilcock, Lord Goff:
‘An act which causes another to reasonably apprehend the infliction of immediate, unlawful force upon his person’.
False imprisonment definition (x2):
Collins v Wilcock, Lord Goff:
‘The unlawful imposition of constraint on another’s freedom of movement from a particular place’.
Termes de la Fey:
‘Imprisonment is no other thing than the restraint of a man’s liberty’. (Affirmed in Bird v Jones).
Scott v Shepherd
Defendant threw a squib into a marketplace, landed on a stall. A bystander grabbed it and threw it across the market to save himself and the gingerbread and it landed on another stall. That stall holder then threw it away, accidentally hitting Scott in the face just as it exploded, taking out one of Scott’s eyes.
Satisfied stage 1 of an actionable battery, intentional application. Recklessness, foreseeing the likelihood of one’s action causing the application of force to another person.
Majority held Shepherd was fully liable, because De Gray CJ said: “I do not consider [the intermediaries] as free agents in the present case, but acting under a compulsive necessity for their own safety and self-preservation.”
DPP v K
Schoolboy put sulphuric acid into the upturned nozzle of a hand dryer. Blew into claimant’s face causing permanent scarring. Liable as the space of time between the act and the accident can be concluded as ‘immediate’ - satisfies stage 2 of battery.
