Exam 8: Negligence and Strict Liability

All intervening causes of harm are also superseding causes.

A "reasonable person standard" does not apply to children since they do not have the judgment, intelligence, knowledge, or experience of adults.

A duty to act is imposed on those whose innocent conduct has injured another and left him helpless and in danger of further harm.

Under the Restatement  Second   Torts: Liability for Physical and Emotional Harm , a possessor of land has a legal duty to warn business invitees of obvious dangers that invitees should be able to discover themselves.

In some instances, people may be held liable for injuries they have caused even though they have not acted intentionally or negligently.

If a raccoon gets loose from a cage and harms someone, the owner can escape liability by showing that he took great care to keep the animal confined.

All states have enacted workers' compensation statutes that make employers liable to employees for injuries arising out of the course of employment. Because the law imposes this liability without regard to the employer's negligence, it is a form of strict liability.

A widely applied test for causation in fact is the "but for" rule.

Robert, a salesperson for Brightway Home Products, made a sales call at the Todds' house. The Todds have no duty of care toward Robert regarding the condition of their property since Robert was not an invitee or a licensee.

As a general rule:

Under the Restatement  Second   Torts: Liability for Physical and Emotional Harm , the owner of land is liable to adult trespassers for failure to maintain the land in a reasonably safe condition.

In determining a defendant's liability for negligence, his or her superior skill or knowledge will be attributed in applying the reasonable person standard, thus increasing the chance that the defendant may be held liable.

By law, all apartment buildings in the state where Morgan lives must have smoke alarms in the ceilings. Morgan suffers smoke inhalation during a fire when she could not get out quickly enough because the smoke alarm in her apartment building was not yet installed. To win a negligence action against the building owner, Morgan would have to prove:

In Soldano v. O'Daniels , the court re-examined the common-law rule of nonliability for not taking affirmative action to save someone from peril. The court considered which of the following factors with respect to imposing duties for affirmative action by third parties?

The  Restatement Third, Torts: Liability for Economic Harm  does not address :

If a defendant acts under emergency conditions, these conditions will be taken into account in applying the reasonable person standard.

Cal sprayed pesticide on his crops in a very careful manner on a windless day. Nevertheless, some of the pesticide spray fell on his neighbor's side of the fence and contaminated the cracked corn for the chickens. The chickens died and the neighbor sues. What is the likely result?

In applying the reasonable person standard, the court takes into account a person's physical and mental handicaps.

A number of states have abolished or modified the defense of implied assumption of risk.

Even though contributory negligence is proven by a defendant in a state in which it acts as a complete bar to recovery, the plaintiff may still recover if the defendant had the last clear chance to avoid the injury.