Torts - Restatements

Battery: Restatement (Second) of Torts

The defendant acted to cause a harmful or offensive contact with the person of the other...and...a harmful contact or offensive contact with the person of the other directly or indirectly resulted.

Battery: Restatement (Third) of Torts

Contact is offensive if "the contact offends a reasonable sense of personal dignity" or if the actor knows that such "contact is highly offensive to the other's unusually sensitive sense of personal dignity"

Intent: Restatement (Second) of Torts

sets out a dual intent requirement: "the word 'intent' is used throughout the Restatement of the subject to denote that the actor desires to cause consequences of his act, or that he believes that the consequences are substantially certain to result from it. (1) if an act is done with the intention of inflicting upon another an offensive but not a harmful bodily contact, or putting another in apprehension of either a harmful of offensive bodily contact, and such act causes a bodily contact to the other, the actor is liable to the other for a battery although the act was not done with the intention of bringing about the resulting bodily harm. (2) if an act is done with the intention of affecting a third person in the manner stated in Subsection (1), but causes a harmful bodily contact to another, the actor is liable to such other as fully as though he intended so to affect him.

Intent: Restatement (Third) of Torts

a person who acts with the "intent to produce a consequence" is defined as either (1) the person acts with the "purpose of producing that consequence" or (2) the person acts "knowing that the consequence is substantially certain to result"

Reckless, willful, and wanton conduct: Restatement (Third) of Torts

a person acts recklessly in engaging in conduct if: (a) the person knows of the risk of harm created by the conduct or knows facts that make the risk obvious to another in the person's situation, and (b) the precaution that would eliminate or reduce the risk involves burdens that are so slight relative to the magnitude of the risk as to render the person's failure to adopt the precaution a demonstration of the person's indifference to the risk

The New Tort of Purposeful Infliction: Restatement (Third) of Torts

an actor is subject to liability to another for purposeful infliction of bodily harm if: (a) the actor purposely causes bodily harm to the other, either by actor's affirmative conduct or by the actor's failure to prevent bodily harm when the actor has a duty to prevent such harm; and (b) the other does not effectively consent to the otherwise tortious conduct of the actor

Transferred intent: Restatement (Second) of Torts

it is enough that the element of intent was satisfied because actor intends to produce such an effect upon some other person and that his act so intended is the legal cause of harmful contact to another

False Imprisonment: Restatement (Second) of Torts

(1) an actor is subject to liability to another for false imprisonment if (a) he acts intending to confine the other or a third person within boundaries fixed by the actor, and (b) his act directly or indirectly results in such a confinement of the other, and (c) the other is conscious of the confinement or is harmed by it. (2) An act which is not done with the intention state in Subsection (1,a) does not make the actor liable to the other for a merely transitory or otherwise harmless confinement, although the act involves unreasonable risk of imposing it and therefore would be negligent or reckless if the risk threatened bodily harm

Conversion of chattel: Restatement (Second) of Torts

an "intentional exercise of dominion or control over a chattel (tangible personal property, stocks, bonds, commercial paper) which so seriously interferes with the right of another to control it that the actor may justly by required to pay the other the full value of the chattel"

Dominion: Restatement (Second) of Torts

in determining the seriousness of a defendant's exercise of dominion, the following factors are relevant: (a) extent and duration of control; (b) defendant's assertion of a right to the property; (c) defendant's good faith; (d) the harm done; and (e) the expense or inconvenience caused.

Trespass to Chattels: Restatement (Second) of Torts

a trespass to chattel may be committed by intentionally "(a) dispossessing another of the chattel, or (b) using or intermeddling with a chattel in the possession of another."

IIED: Restatement of Torts

"One who, without a privilege to do so, intentionally causes severe emotional stress to another is liable (a) for such emotional distress, and (b) for bodily harm resulting from it"

IIED: Restatement (Second) of Torts

(1) One who, by extreme and outrageous conduct intentionally or recklessly causes severe emotional distress to another is subject to liability for such emotional distress, and if bodily harm results from it, for such bodily harm. (2) Where such conduct is directed at a third person, the actor is subject to liability if he intentionally or recklessly causes severe emotional distress (a) to a member of the person's immediate family who is present at the time, whether or not such distress results in bodily harm, or (b) to any other person who is present at the time, if such distress results in bodily harm

IIED: Restatement (Third) of Torts

"Emotional harm means impairment or injury to a person's emotional tranquility."
"An actor who by extreme and outrageous conduct intentionally or recklessly causes severe emotional harm to another is subject to liability for that emotional harm and, if the emotional harm causes bodily injury, also for the bodily harm”

self-defense & defense of others - mistake [defense]: Restatement (Second) of Torts

"the actor is not privileged to use any means of self-defense which is intended or likely to cause a bodily harm or confinement in excess of that which the actor correctly or reasonably believes to be necessary for his protection"

repossession of property [defense]: Restatement of Torts

"the value of human life and limb, not only to the individual concerned but also for society, so outweighs the interest of a possessor of land in excluding from it those whom he is not willing to admit thereto that a possessor of land has...no privilege to use force intended or likely to cause death or serious harm against another whom the possessor sees about to enter his premises or meddle with his chattel, unless the intrusion threatens death or serious bodily harm to the occupiers or users of the premises...a possessor of land cannot do indirectly and by a mechanical device that which, were he present, he could not do immediately in person"

arrest and detention [defenses]: Restatement (Second) of Torts

"One who reasonably believes that another has tortiously taken a chattel upon his premise...is privileged, without arresting the other, to detain him on the premises for the time necessary for a reasonable investigation of the facts. Reasonable force may be used to detain the person; but...the use of force intended or likely to cause serious harm is never privileged for the sole purpose of detention to investigate."

consent [defense]: Restatement (Second) of Torts

(1) One who effectively consents to conduct of another intended to invade his interests cannot recover in an action of tort for the conduct or for harm resulting from it. (2) to be effective, consent must be (a) by one who has the capacity to consent or by a person empowered to consent for him, and (b) to the particular conduct, or to substantially the same conduct. (3) conditional consent or consent restricted as to time, area, or in the other respects is effective only within the limits of the condition or restriction. (4) if the actor exceeds the consent, it is not effective for the excess. (5) upon termination of consent its effectiveness is terminated, except as it may have become irrevocable by contrast or otherwise, or except as its terms may include, expressly by implication, a privilege to continue to act

consent [defense]: Restatement (Third) of Torts

consent "extends to conduct that is not substantially different in nature from the conduct that the person is willing to permit." Presumed consent "exists where if (1) under prevailing social norms, the actor is justified in engaging in the conduct in the absence of the other person's actual or apparent consent, and (2) the actor has no reason to believe that the person would not have actually consented if the actor had requested it”

public and private necessity [defense]: Restatement (Second) of Torts

the defense protects against actual harms done where public interests are involved, the defendant had a reasonable belief that the action was needed, and the action was a reasonable response to the need