LAW 122 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Seat Belt, Contributory Negligence, Reasonable Person
2 Mar 2017
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Negligence determines whether the defendant can be held liable for carelessly causing injury to the plaintiff. Duty of care why should the defendant care? (relational analysis) Standard of care how should the defendant care? (analyze the act or omission) All three elements must be met to impose liability for the tort of negligence. Duty of care exists if the defendant is required to use reasonable care to avoid injuring the plaintiff. Not subjective; opinion of either plaintiff or defendant does not matter. Physical; contractor and tools, careless driver hits bridge. Standard of care tells the defendant how they should act. Focuses on the defendant"s actions or omissions. Defines how much are a person with a duty of care must exercise. Breached when the standard of care breached when the defendant acts less carefully. Reasonable person test requires the defendant to act in the same ay that a reasonable person would act in similar circumstances.
