Chapter 7

Special Duties

Jobs that require special professional care such as lawyers, doctors, innkeepers, Need to exercise care beyond reasonable person but of the standard of the profession. Stricter Liability

Foreseeability

Legal doctrine which dictates that if an defendant could see the potential for harm and still carried out the act, they are liable. Example - not doing morning warm-up or not reporting malfunctioning equipment.

Negligence

The defendant owed a duty of care to plaintiff, the defendant failed to do so, and the breach cause an actual or proximate injury to the plaintiff as a result

Res Ipsa Loquitor (It Speaks for Itself)

the defendant has exclusive control of the instrumentality of harm (and therefore probable knowledge of, and responsibility for, the cause of the harm, the harm that occurred would not ordinarily occur in the absence of negligence; and the plaintiff was in no way responsible for his own injury.

Assumption of Risk

the plaintiff's voluntary consent to a known danger. Voluntariness means that the plaintiff accepted the risk of her own free will; knowledge means that the plaintiff was aware of the nature and extent of the risk.

Intervening Case

If a later act cause injury to the plaintiff, that the defendant is only liabile if it is foreseeable

Defenses for Negligence

Contributory Negligence Assumption of Risk Comparative Fault

Contributory Negligence

Plaintiff fails to exercise reasonable care for their own safety

Causation of Injury

Plaintiff must also prove that the defendants actions cause injury

Actual Cause

The determination that the defendant's breach of duty resulted directly in the plaintiff's injury. (But-for test)

Negligence Per Se

Using statutes, ordinances, or regulations to determine how a reasonable person would behave. Defendant may be liable if person is under protection of that statute or other law, and suffered injury from something that the statute or other law protects against.

Proximate Cause

concerns the required degree of proximity or closeness between the defendant's breach and the injury it actually caused.

Was the Duty Owed

plaintiff was among those who would foreseeably be at risk of harm stemming from the defendant's activities or conduct, or if a special relationship logically calling for such a duty existed between the parties.

Duty of Reasonable Care

premise that members of society normally should behave in ways that avoid the creation of unreasonable risks of harm to others.