Chapter 3.2 Negligence and Liability

1. Chapter 3.2Negligence and Liability

2. Negligence Can you be sued if you hurt someone by accident? Negligence is a tort that results when one person carelessly injures another • An accidental tort but occurs often. • Examples: Can occur in car accidents, meltdown of a nuclear power plant, or when someone slips on ice. Elements of Negligence: • Plaintiff must prove all of the following to succeed in a tort suit for negligence: • The defendant owed the plaintiff a duty of care. • The defendant breached that duty by being careless. • The defendant’s carelessness was the proximate cause of harm. • The plaintiff was really hurt by the defendants carelessness. *Remember, you have to prove ALL elements.

3. Elements of Negligence continued… Duty of care: • The law of torts is based on the concept of rights. Every person has rights and we all have a duty to not violate them. • If the plaintiffs cannot prove the defendants owed a duty of care, the judge will throw the case.

4. Breach of Duty: • In order to determine if the certain conduct is negligent, the law created the reasonable person test. • Reasonable Person Test: • You have to be as careful as a reasonable person would be in the situation • A reasonable person considers how likely the act is to cause harm, how serious the harm would be, and the burden involved in avoiding the harm.

5. Proximate Cause: When the link between negligent conduct and injury is strong enough to be recognized by the law. • Also called “legal cause. • The court uses the foreseeability test to determine if proximate cause exists. • Foreseeable test: • Asks if the injury to the victim was foreseeable at the time. • If it was foreseeable, then proximate cause exists and defendant is liable for negligence Actual Harm: Victim must have the following to result in negligence- • Suffer an injury • Have property destroyed • Lose a lot of money

6. Defenses to Negligence You can defend yourself in a negligence suit by eliminating one of the four elements: • Could argue that you owed no duty to the plaintiff • Could claim that you were as careful as a reasonable person would have been • Could state that your actions did not cause the victim’s injury • Could try to prove that the victim was not really injured in the way that he/she claims

7. Contributory Negligence- a defense against negligence whenever the defendant can show that the victim did something that helped cause his or her own injuries Comparative Negligence- a defense against negligence which is raised when the carelessness of each party is compared to the carelessness of the other party Assumption of risk- a defense against negligence that is raised when the plaintiff knew of the risk involved and still took the chance of being injured

8. Strict Liability- a legal doctrine that says that some activities are so dangerous that liability will always follow any injury results from those activities Product Liability- when people are injured by defective products, both the firm that manufactured the products and the seller of the products are liable for injuries. Fault doesn’t matter. • Product Liability has limits • Does not apply if the seller of defective product does not usually sell such items. Example: a corporation that auctions off some machinery after one of its plants closes would not be liable for an injury caused by a defect in one of the machines.

9. Tort Reform • Survival Statues • Under common law, when an injured person died, the right to sue also died. This means that the defendant was better off if the plaintiff died from injuries cause by the defendant. • Most states now have survival statues that say a lawsuit can continue even if both the plaintiff and the defendant die. • Wrongful Death Statues • When an injured person died, the person’s family forfeited the right to sue the party whose negligence caused the injury