Torts Fall 2025 Outline

These flashcards cover essential concepts from tort law, including intentional torts like battery and assault, the elements of false imprisonment, negligence standards, and defenses such as self-defense and consent.

What are the goals of tort law?

To right wrongs by holding faulty parties liable, remedy harm, compensate victims, and deter wrongful conduct.

What are the elements of battery in tort law?

A person is liable for battery when they act with intent to cause harmful or offensive contact, and such contact does result.

What does 'transferred intent' mean in the context of battery?

Transferred intent refers to an intent that gets transferred to an unintended victim, holding the actor liable even if they did not mean to harm that specific person.

Define 'intent' in tort law.

Intent can be defined as the purpose of causing harmful or offensive contact, or knowledge that such contact is substantially certain to result.

What constitutes offensive contact in tort law?

Offensive contact is defined as injurious or invasive to a reasonable person's sense of personal dignity.

What is 'apprehension' in the context of tort law?

Apprehension is the expectation that something is about to happen, specifically harmful or offensive contact.

What is the standard for 'imminent' in tort law?

Imminent means that an event is going to happen without delay.

What type of contact exemplifies battery?

Contact can be direct, such as hitting someone with your car, or indirect, like serving pork meatballs to someone who has a religious prohibition against eating them.

What is an example of indirect contact that can be considered battery?

Pulling a chair out from under someone, causing them to fall.

What did the case McElhaney v. Thomas establish regarding battery?

The case established that driving a truck onto someone’s feet as a practical joke can constitute battery.

Define 'assault' in tort law.

Assault is committing an act intending to cause harmful or offensive contact or causing reasonable apprehension of imminent harmful or offensive contact.

What distinguishes assault from battery?

Assault occurs when there is an apprehension of imminent harmful or offensive contact, whereas battery requires actual contact.

What does 'false imprisonment' require according to tort law?

False imprisonment occurs when someone intentionally confines another without lawful privilege, within a limited area, for any appreciable time.

What is 'shopkeeper's privilege'?

Shopkeeper's privilege allows merchants to detain a suspected shoplifter for a reasonable time to conduct an investigation.

What are the elements of self-defense in tort law?

Self-defense requires perceiving an actual or reasonably apparent threat and using proportional force to defend oneself.

What does 'consent' entail in tort law contexts?

Consent can be express or implied, is dual in nature, and can be withdrawn at any time.

What is 'negligence per se'?

Negligence per se involves negligence that is defined by violation of a statute designed to protect a particular class of individuals.

What is the 'but-for' test in establishing factual cause?

The but-for test determines that but for the defendant's negligent act, the injury would not have occurred.

What is 'res ipsa loquitur'?

Res ipsa loquitur is a legal doctrine that allows an inference of negligence from the very nature of an accident or injury.

What does the 'eggshell skull' rule state?

The eggshell skull rule means that a defendant is liable for the full extent of a plaintiff’s injuries, even if the injuries are more severe due to the plaintiff’s pre-existing conditions.

What is the significance of the 'scope of liability'?

The scope of liability refers to the types of harms that result from risks created by the defendant's negligence that they can be held liable for.