LAW 122 Lecture Notes - Lecture 6: Contributory Negligence, Product Liability, Situation Two
25 Oct 2014
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
The tort of negligence determines whether the defendant can be held liable for carelessly causing injury to the plaintiff. The plaintiff must prove that the defendant: owed a duty of care, in that they were required to act carefully toward the plaintiff, breached the standard of care by acting carelessly, cause harm to the plaintiff. A duty of care existing the defendant is required to use reasonable care to avoid injuring the plaintiff (be specific: donoghue v. stevenson [1932] ac 562 (hl) p. 137 of textbook. The courts have develop an unique test to determine a duty of care: Is there a precedent for this particular situation. If not, then the following 3 questions are asked: was it reasonably foreseeable that the plaintiff could be injured by the carelessness of the defendant, did the parties share a relationship of sufficient proximity. Is there a policy reason to deny a duty of care.
