Purpose of tort law
to provide relief to the injured party through the award of damages for the injuries incurred during a tortious act
General
to deter others from committing the same act
Categories of torts
intentional torts
General
negligence strict liability torts
Intentional Torts
General
Definition
An intentional tort is a tort resulting from an intentional act on the part of the tortfeasor.
★Apprehension is not the same as fear— here it means awareness that an injury or offensive contact is imminent.
Requirements
The act must be overt.
Mere words do not constitute an assault.
A person refused to inform another of the whereabouts of that other's child for several years, though the person knew where the child was the entire time.
Statutes have been passed in attempts to ‘reform’ the tort system.
General
Most of them have related to procedural matters and amounts and categories of damages.
Tort Law
General
Tort
a civil wrong which unfairly causes someone else to suffer loss or harm
★It does not include breach of contract or trust. (A civil wrong can be a tort, breach of contract or breach of trust.)
The plaintiff must have a reasonable apprehension of such contact.
Actual fear on the plaintiff’s part is not required.
Examples
Assault
swinging a baseball bat at someone holding a rock and threatening to throw
★The essence of the tort is the natural mental harm that results when one’s freedom is restricted without justification.
Elements
intent to confine a person within a certain area
Many judges utilize the Restatement of Torts (2nd) as an influential guide.
The Restatement is an influential treatise issued by the American Law Institute, which summarizes the general principles of common law United States tort law.
dignitary torts
defamation invasion of privacy
Torts Against the Person
Assault
Definition
an intentional act that causes an apprehension of immediate harmful or offensive contact
Subcategories
torts against the person
assault battery false imprisonment intentional infliction of emotional distress
General
property torts
trespass to land trespass to chattels (personal property) conversion
IIED
★This standard is quantified by the intensity, duration, and any physical manifestations (ulcers or headaches, for example) of the distress.
Examples
False Imprisonment
actual confinement awareness of the confinement by the
person so confined no reasonable means of escape
False arrest
‘False arrest’ occurs when someone arrests another individual without the legal authority to do so, which becomes false imprisonment the moment he or she is taken into custody.
Assault
There must be an accompanying act.
The defendant must have the apparent ability to carry out the contact.
Actual ability to carry out the contact is not necessary.
Severe emotional distress
This tort involves more than hurt feelings, disappointment, or worry.
There must be severe mental suffering, i.e. such that no reasonable person should be expected to endure it.
was riding, causing him to fall and be injured mixing something offensive in food that he knows another will eat—the other does in fact eat the offensive matter
‘Offensive’ contact
contact that would offend a person’s sense of personal dignity
Battery
Examples
beating someone with a tire iron spitting in someone's face knocking a hat off someone's head whipping a horse on which someone
IIED
Definition
★short for intentional infliction of emotional distress
★referred to as the tort of outrage in some jurisdictions
intentional conduct that results in extreme emotional distress
Elements
The defendant must act intentionally or recklessly.
IIED
The defendant's conduct must be extreme and outrageous.
The conduct must cause the plaintiff to suffer severe emotional distress.
Criminal law recognizes degrees of crimes involving physical contact.
There is but a single tort of battery.
False Imprisonment
Definition
the detention of a person in a bounded area without justification or consent
US tort law
Tort law in the U. S. is largely common law.
Courts have the power to shape and change the elements of claims and defenses of existing torts and the power to create new torts.