Bus Law test 2

Real Property

Generally IMMOVABLE

• Land

• Buildings

• Air rights

• Water rights

• Subsurface/mineral rights

Personal Property

property other than land or permanent attachments

Personal Property: Tangible property

Physical Property you can touch

• book, furniture, car, computer

Personal Property: Intangible Property

Property representing legal or financial rights

• bank accounts, stocks, bonds, insurance policies

Real Property: Estate

How much right and control a person holds over that land and for how long.

Fee Simple Absolute

The most complete ownership interest a person can have ( maximum ownership)

• possession, use, transfer rights, inheritance rights

Conditional Estate

Ownership is subject to condition. If condition is violated the ownership interest may be affected.

• ex: a grandma gives her granddaughter a bed and breakfast as long as alcohol is never sold on the property.

Life Estate

The person has the right to possess property for the duration of his or her life. When the person dies, possession passes to another designated party

Leasehold Estate

The tenant has the right to possess property for the term of the lease but does not own the property.

Real Property: Nonpossessory Interests

These rights allow someone to use property without owning or possessing it.

Nonpossessory Interests: Easement

An irrevocable right to use another person’s land for a specific purpose. (Can use it but cannot take anything)

• Ex: A neighbor has a recorded right to walk across another person’s yard to reach a lake.

Nonpossessory Interests: Profit

A right to enter another person’s land and remove something from it. (Enter + Take something)

• Timber, minerals, oil, fish, gravel

License

Permission to use another person’s property that is generally:

• temporary, revocable (take away able)

  • Ticket to a concert, permission to park on someone’s property, permission to enter property for an event

Rights Included with Land Ownership

• Surface rights, air rights, water rights, subsurface rights

  • mineral rights: Mineral rights are the legal ownership rights to explore, extract, and profit from the natural resources located beneath the surface of a piece of land

Transfer of Real Property

A valid transfer of real property generally involves legal requirements involving a deed.

Elements of A Deed Transfer: Execution

Prep and signing of a deed

Elements of A Deed Transfer: Delivery

Of a deed to grantee (receiver) with intent of transferring ownership to grantee.

Elements of A Deed Transfer: Acceptance

Grantee’s expression of intent to possess and own property

Elements of A Deed Transfer: Recording

Filing deed with appropriate county office to protect interests of grantee

Eminent Domain

the legal power of a govt to take private property and convert it into public use, prop owner must be compensated for it.

• Must provide: Just compensation, fifth amendment, condemnation

Eminent Domain: Which Amendment

Under the 5th amendment, Taking’s Clause

Condemnation

is the formal legal process the government uses to exercise its power of eminent domain. While eminent domain is the right to take private property for public use, condemnation is the actual lawsuit or enforcement action used to seize it when a voluntary sale cannot be reached.

Public uses might include:

Highways, schools, public transportation, government facilities.

Lost Property

Owner accidentally parts with possession. Finder has rights against everyone except the owner.

• ex: A person drops a wallet while walking through a parking lot.

Mislaid Property

Owner intentionally places property somewhere but forgets where it was placed.

• ex: Someone puts a phone on a restaurant counter and forgets it

Abandoned Property

Owner intentionally gives up ownership

• ex: A person puts an unwanted chair at the curb with the intention of giving it away.

Intellectual Property

protects creations of the mind.

• patents, trademarks, copyrights

Trademark

distinctive used to identify a producer’s goods or services (brand identity)

• word, name, symbol, design, picture, mark

  • ex: Nike, Swoosh —- McDonald’s Golden Arches

Patent

protects a new, the inventor may authorize another person to manufacture or sell the patented product through a LICENSE

• invention, process, machine, product design or useful innovation

  • ex: someone develops a new scuba mask that does not fog.

Copyright

generally protects original creative expression,

• books, music, movies, photographs, artwork, written materials

Copyright: Fair Use

Teachers do not have unlimited permission to use copyrighted materials simply because the use is educational.

• Educational purpose: is one factor considered under fair use, but it does not create automatic unlimited protection.

What is a Tort?

A tort is a civil wrong for which the injured part y may seek a legal remedy. Primary purpose is generally to compensate injured parties, not simply punish wrongdoers. Can occur through punitive damages in appropriate.

Intentional Torts

when a person acts with the deliberate intent to cause harm or is substantially certain that harm will result from their action.

• Torts against persons

• torts against property

• torts against economic interests

Torts Against persons

Actions that intentionally cause physical, mental, or emotional harm (e.g., assault, battery, false imprisonment).

Torts against property

Actions that interfere with someone's lawful possession or rights to property (e.g., trespass to land, conversion)

Torts against economic interests

Actions that result in financial or business harm (e.g., fraud, unfair competition, interference with a contract).

Intentional Tort: Assault

intentionally placing another person in reasonable apprehension (fear or anxiety of the future) of immediate harmful or offensive contact

• ex: someone raises a fist and appears ready to hit another person

  • no physical contact is necessary

    • Telephone threat to harm someone far away at some later point is not assault because it is not immediate

Intentional Tort: Battery

involves intentional harmful or offensive physical contact, actual serious injury is not required

• a person intentionally shoves someone from behind

  • can constitute battery even if the victim is not physically injured

Intentional Tort: Defense to Battery — consent

consent, consent can defeat a battery claim when the contact falls within the scope of the consent

• boxing match, contact sports, medical procedure with valid consent

Intentional Tort: Defense to Battery —- Self Defense

A person may use reasonable force to protect himself or herself from unlawful force.

• ex: if someone strikes another person with a heavy purse and the victim grabs the attacker’s hand and pushes her away, the victim may rely on self-defense rather than being liable for assault or battery.

Intentional Tort: Trespass to Real Property

can occur when someone intentionally enter or causes something to enter another person’s land without authorization. INDIVIDUAL DOES NOT ALWAYS HAVE TO PERSONALLY STPE ONTO THE PROPERTY

• intentionally throwing an object onto a neighbor’s property may create trespass.

Intentional Tort: Conversion

involves serious or permanent interference with another person’s personal property, treating someone else’s property as your own.

• ex: selling someone’s laptop without permission

Intentional Tort: Intentional Interference with Contract

Intentionally causing another party to breach an existing contractual relationship. Plaintiff must show that the interference causes injury or damage

• MUST BE PROVEN

Negligence

failure to exercise reasonable care. Plaintiff must establish all 4

• not intentional or willful conduct

  • D- Duty

  • B- Breach

  • C- Causation

  • D- Damages

Negligence: Unexpected Emergencies and Reasonable Care

Negligence asks whether someone failed to act reasonable under the circumstances, if the medical emergency was truly sudden and unforeseeable, the accident may not have been preventable through reasonable care.

• if a heart attack patient who is driving, strikes a pedestrian.

Negligence: Malpractice

professional negligence

• doctor, attorney, accountant

  • Attorney who allows the client’s statute of limitations to expire.

Negligence Doctrines: Res Ipsa Loquitur

“thing speaks for itself”

it permits negligence to be inferred from circumstances where the accident normally would not occur without negligence: normally would not occur w/o some type of negligence, court would allow you to sure for comp

• a surgical sponge is discovered inside a patient after surgery

(probably would not happen unless somebody was negligent)

Negligence Doctrines: Assumption of the Risk

defense applies when the plaintiff:
- knows of a risk

-voluntarily encounters it.

Strict Liability

legally responsible for damages or injuries they caused without requiring the injured person to prove negligence, carelessness, or wrongful intent.

Common areas include:

• abnormally dangerous activities

• certain wild animals

• certain product liability situations

Strict Liability: Abnormally dangerous activities

• blasting dynamite

• storing nuclear fuel

• certain dangerous chemical activities

  • ex: ordinary activity such as working at a retail outlet mall is not abnormally dangerous

Strict Liability: Dangerous Animals

A person who knows an animal has dangerous tendencies may face increased liability if the animal injures someone.

If an owner who knows his dog has previously bitten people and fails to warn a visitor

This is both negligence and strict liability principles

• negligence: breached a duty of reasonable care

• strict liability principles: automatic accountability for keeping a dangerous animal

Tort Damages: Compensatory Damages

to compensate the injured person

• medical bills

• lost wages

• property damage

• pain and suffering

Tort Damages: Nominal Damages

are a small, symbolic monetary award—often just one dollar—granted by a court to formally recognize that a legal right was violated, even though the plaintiff suffered no actual financial loss or measurable harm

• breach of contract

Punitive Damages

are extra financial penalties awarded to a plaintiff in a civil lawsuit to punish a defendant for extreme wrongdoing and deter similar behavior.

designed to:

• punish especially wrongful conduct

• deter similar conduct in the future

Leases: sublease

when the original tenant leases some or all of the leased premises to another party.

• original tenant generally remails responsible to the landlord under the original lease unless the landlord agrees otherwise.