Intro to Torts - YouTube

The purpose of this video is to introduce you to the legal concept of

torts. Many of you have probably never even heard of the word tort, so what does

it mean? A tort is defined as a civil wrong that causes harm to another person.

We're careful to say it's a civil wrong as opposed to a criminal wrong.

We can break up torts into three main categories: One is intentional torts, two

is negligent, or otherwise known as unintentional torts, and the third is

strict liability torts. Let's start with intentional torts. Here are some

examples. A lot of these you probably are already familiar with. Assault is causing

somebody to fear that I might unlawfully touch them in some way. Battery is the

actual touching of somebody in an unlawful manner. False imprisonment is

unlawfully restricting somebody's movement. Defamation and disparagement

are related. Defamation is causing harm to somebody's reputation by saying

something that's untrue about them. Disparagement is the same idea but I'm

usually talking about somebody's business as opposed to their person.

Invasion of privacy is unlawfully invading somebody's privacy. Fraudulent

misrepresentation is often just called fraud.

It's when I mislead somebody about the nature of some product or service I'm

offering. Intentional infliction of emotional distress is when I cause

somebody so much emotional distress that I can actually prove some money damages.

Misuse of legal procedure is unlawful use of the legal system, and then

conversion is using somebody else's property as though it's mine. It's the

Civil form of the crime of theft.

Now, let's switch to unintentional torts. Unintentional torts are also

called negligent torts. Negligence is the legal concept that means a person

is liable for harm that is the foreseeable consequence of his or her

actions. Negligence can be triggered through either an act, doing something

that I shouldn't have done , or omission, which is not doing something that I

really should have.

How do we determine when somebody's been negligent? Here you can see a breakdown

of the elements of negligence.

The first is that the defendant owed a legal duty of care to the plaintiff.

The legal duty of care is this obligation we all have in society to act in such a way

to not cause harm to other people.

Second, the defendant breached that duty of care. Third, the plaintiff suffered

some type of injury. That can be physical, triggering medical bills. It can be

financial because of lost business or lost money under a contract. And then

finally, the defendant's negligence was the actual and proximate cause of the

injury. Throughout many years of statutes and court decisions, a huge body of law

has developed and established special negligence doctrines that are worth mentioning.

First of all, we have professional malpractice. You hear about this a lot

with doctors who have been accused of mishandling somebody and causing them a

lot of personal and/or money damages. Negligent infliction of emotional

distress is the negligence version of intentional infliction of emotional

distress. I might not have intended to cause them a bunch of emotional distress,

but my actions caused that anyway. Negligence per se is triggered

usually when there's a specific statute saying that if some act or omission happens,

negligence is presumed. Res Ipsa Loquitur means "the things speaks for itself".

It's the idea that given a set of circumstances, we have no choice but just

to assume that somebody was negligent in some way. Gross negligence is important

to mention because, if we can prove gross negligence, then that heightens the

amount of liability that a defendant would be liable for, so we might actually

be able to get punitive damages in addition to those compensatory damages.

The attractive nuisance doctrine is the reason why if you have a swimming pool

you have to make sure that's fenced in.

It's this idea that kids could come by, see that pool there, get in, get harmed,

and then you would be on the hook

unless you took some positive steps to try to keep that from happening. And then

finally, Good Samaritan laws are these laws that try to limit liability in

the event of some Good Samaritan stopping to try to render medical aid.

So, what if somebody accuses me of negligence? What defenses do I have

available?

Well, depending on which state I live in, I might be able to use contributory or

comparative negligence as an argument that the plaintiff was at least

partially responsible for their own harm. The one we use here in North Carolina is

contributory negligence, which is a pretty strict standard. If I can prove that the

plaintiff contributed in some way to their own harm, then I might be released

from all liability. A lot of states have switched over to comparative negligence,

meaning we could assign percentages that each party would be responsible for.

If it was a million-dollar lawsuit, and we divided it up into 50/50 liability, then I'd

be responsible for half of that, and then the plaintiff would be responsible for

the other half. Assumption of the risk is a very common defense that means a

plaintiff is aware of the risks of some particularly dangerous activity and

decides to do that activity anyway. It's why I have to sign a waiver if I go snow

skiing or skydiving or bungee jumping or something like that.

Finally, we have the superseding or intervening event defense. This is when

some crazy event happens that destroys the foreseeability of harm.

For example, let's say I did forget to put out my wet floor sign and let's say

a customer slipped and fell. While we're trying to render medical aid, an

earthquake strikes, a hole opens up in the floor, and swallows up the victim.

I couldn't have foreseen that would happen, so I'm probably not going to be held liable.

The last category of torts is strict liability.

This is a special category because I don't have to prove that any harm was

intended or that anybody was negligent. If harm happens and injuries are suffered,

liability attaches. This is reserved for particularly dangerous activities like

defective products, if a customer gets hurt,

storing and using explosives, using and transporting certain dangerous chemicals,

keeping dangerous animals, and performing controlled burns, like if I'm burning off

a field and my neighbors field catches fire. Even though I did everything right,

I would still be liable for that. So, that was a very basic introduction to torts.

We obviously didn't have time to go into every little detail. However, it should

give you a fairly broad overview of what torts are. I hope you enjoy the video