Breaking the Chain

Contributory Negligence: A court may find a plaintiff contributory negligent or partially responsible for their injuries.

The defendant was involved in a fight in which he inflicted a deep cut on the victim's finger. The victim failed to take care of the wound or get medical assistance and the wound became infected. Eventually gangrene set in and the victim was advised to have his arm amputated. The victim refused and died. The defendant was liable for his death despite the victim's actions in contributing to his own death.

For a plaintiff to triumph a claim of medical malpractice for negligence, four elements must be established. The first element is proving the defendant owed a duty of care to the plaintiff. The second is to show that the defendant breached the duty to the plaintiff. The third is to show that the plaintiff was harmed and experienced damages. Finally, the fourth is to show that the plaintiff was harmed by the actions of the defendant (Greenberg, 2009).

Causation: in result of factual and legal causation must be established. In other words there will be no liability if the D did not cause the result White. The decision on whether the D is at fault may depend on which test for legal causation is used by the courts; a D may escape liability if the ‘daftness’ test in Roberts/Williams is applied, whereas the harsher thins skull rule in Blaue may result in liability as it involves taking your victim as you find him however daft or unpredictable they are.

As a starting note, any mention of concurrent liability should be assumed to mean concurrently liability in tort and contract. Traditionally the distinction between contract and tort was that contract concerns the improvement of the claimant 's position, whereas tort is concerned with dealing with their position worsening. There has been dispute around concurrent liability and its ambiguity has led to varying decision in cases and statute making as Taylor puts it “the basis of concurrent liability uncertain”. This essay will argue Tort has and is extending itself beyond its traditional role due to judges presumption of morality leading to the unclear concurrent liability we see today. Whilst this concurrent liability shows some

Cal was a victim to several negligible acts that resulted in the loss of his legs. On the day in question Cal was a passenger in Abe’s car when it was in a collision with Deb’s vehicle. Although he only sustained minor injuries due to the initial impact, another negligible driver, Ann struck both cars causing Cal more traumatic injuries. Once Cal was at the hospital he was informed that he required a surgery to possibly save his legs, but was never explained the requirements or risks involved if the surgery was successful. He unknowingly consented to the surgery which was an unsuccessful, resulting in the loss of use of both of his legs. After the surgery Cal experienced indescribable amounts of pain and suffering, upon returning to the doctor it was discovered one of the surgeons had left a metal clamp inside Cal’s leg and sewed him up, which required additional surgery for its removal. Based on these facts, Cal has many legal rights to recover damages by those liable for his injuries.

One approach to minimize large amounts of tort claims for medical malpractice is to put a cap on non-economical awards. Tort reform is the response; a tort is a civil lawsuit for damages over private wrongs other than breach of contract. According to Lau and Johnson (2014), a tort can be categorized into three categories: intentional tort, when tortfeasor acted with intent, negligence, if the tortfeasor did not act intentionally, but failed to act as a reasonable person, and lastly, strict liability, if the tortfeasor is engaged in certain activities, which caused injury or death due to it. The massive medical malpractice cases across the nation have made defending frivolous lawsuits is a national problem; ultimately, the general public

In the United States justice system, a tort is best defined as an injury or loss that was committed deliberately or negligently by a single person or an entity (Crane). The history of tort law can be traced back to the initial trespass of property or person, but it was not until the 18th century that the distinction between intentional and unintentional acts was made (Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia). In recent years, tort law has become the center of scrutiny through the increase in tort costs, insurance liability costs, and the number of frivolous lawsuits made. This scrutiny has lead to the creation of tort reform. Tort reform is a movement to reshape the way consumers can access the courts by restricting their right to sue and

(1) The feasibility of apportioning fault on a comparative basis does not render an indivisible injury "divisible" for purposes of the joint and several liability rule. A concurrent tortfeasor is liable for the whole of an indivisible injury when his negligence is a proximate cause of that damage. In many instances, the negligence of a concurrent tortfeasor may be sufficient by itself to cause the entire loss. The mere fact that it may be possible to assign some percentage figure to the relative culpability of one negligent defendant as compared to another does not in any way suggest that each defendant 's negligence is not a proximate cause of the entire indivisible injury.

In the first case, Brenda and Carl are playing in a basketball game on opposing teams. During the game, Carl gets into a heated argument with one of the other teammates. Carl attempts to punch the teammate in the face, however the teammate ducks and he accidently punches Brenda with full force. The impact is so big that it breaks Brenda’s nose and she is rushed to the hospital. Brenda sues Carl for $30,000 in medical expenses related to the injury and the tuition lost when she was not able to attend school. The ruling is that even though Carl did not intend to break Brenda’s nose, he did intend on hitting the other teammate and causing harm onto him. However, I also blame the other teammate for ducking his head and being part of the physical altercation that lead Brenda to be injured. Therefore, I rule both Carl and his teammate liable for Brenda’s injury. Waldron believes that in the case between Fate and Hurt, it is unfair that Fate has full liability for his moment of carelessness when Fortune did the same act and did not have to pay any reparations.

Note that a duty of care may not be owed to a particular claimant, if the claimant was unforeseeable. See:

Torts of negligence are breaches of duty that results to injury to another person to whom the duty breached is owed. Like all other torts, the requirements for this are duty, breach of duty by the defendant, causation and injury(Stuhmcke and Corporation.E 2001). However, this form of tort differs from intentional tort as regards the manner the duty is breached. In torts of negligence, duties are breached by negligence and not by intent. Negligence is conduct that falls below the standard of care established by law for the protection of others against unreasonable risk of harm(Stuhmcke and Corporation.E 2001). The standard measure of negligence is the universal reasonable person standard. The assumption in this case is that a reasonable

The scenario is a horrendous string of coincidences that resulted in a tragedy. However, every party carries some responsibility for the eventual double amputation. This paper examines each of the parties, their possible liability and how that is covered by negligence law.

“The essential purpose and most basic principle of tort law is that the plaintiff must be placed in the position he or she would have been in absent the defendant’s fault or negligence.” It is impossible to fully restore the plaintiff, as he will never be fully restored. However, compensation is the best way to put the plaintiff back into his original position. Even though most resources of the tort system are spent on dealing with claims, it is a very slow process as it is so complex because it involves many parties. It is often time consuming and expensive to file a claim, making it very cost-ineffective. The increased involvement of insurance companies has made it even more time consuming, with the introduction of their own

The case of Donoghue versus Stevenson was a landmark case in Scottish and English tort law, establishing from that point forward a precedent for identification of negligence as a determination of liability. My colleague's posting provides some interesting insight into how this precedent was arrived at. The posting also leaves room for yet more extensive discussion on the legal implications of the 1932 decision.