Torts Flashcards
Elements of Battery
Voluntary Touch (contact) Harm or Offense Intent to Touch Intent to Harm or Substantial Knowledge Harm Could Result
Restatement of Torts Definition of Assault
(a) An act intending to cause harmful or offensive contact or an imminent apprehension of such contact
(b) and harmful or offensive contact results
Restatement 8A
Intent: the actor desires to cause the consequences of his act or he believes that consequences are substantially certain to result from it.
Extended Liability Principle
Also called the “thin skull doctrine”
A person is responsible for all of the consequences of their intentional act, regardless of whether they were foreseeable.
Transferred Intent
A person intends to commit one tort and accidentally commits another.
A person intends to commit a tort on one person but commits it on another person.
False Imprisonment
Intentional Confinement within a limited area
For a period of time, however short
Without lawful privilege
Without consent
Person who is confined is aware of their confinement or harmed by it
Elements of Substantial Dominion (Restatement of Torts 222A)
Time Intent to Assert Right to Property Harm to Chattel Good Faith Expense or Inconvenience
Trespass to Chattels
Intentionally and without consent or justification, physically interfered with the use or enjoyment of the personal property of another and that the other was harmed thereby.
Liability only if “the owners materially valuable interest in the physical condition, quality, or value of the chattel or if the owner is deprived of the use of the chattel for a substantial time.”
42 USC Sec. 1983
Every person who under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, or any state or territory or the District of Columbia, subjects, or causes to subjected, any citizen of the United States or other persons within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress.
14th Amendment
Due process and equal protection under the law
Violations will “shock the conscience”
4th Amendment
Search and Seizure
Violations will be “unreasonable”
8th Amendment
Cruel and Unusual Punishment
Self Defense
Reasonable force
Under the treat of imminent battery, assault, or confinement
Relies on objective evidence (not the intent of the person committing the assault)
Reasonable person would have perceived the threat
Response was reasonable and not excessive
Restatement 120A
“Shopkeeper’s Privilege”: One who believes a person has stolen or shoplifted is privileged, without arresting the person, to detain them on the premises for the time necessary to perform a reasonable investigation of the facts.
