The Law of tort – Tort Law
Tort Lawyers
Tort Lawyers deal within the law of tort (Tort Law) which covers a wide variety of situations where legal action results from the breach of a general duty fixed by the civil law. Whether you are a pedestrian knocked to the ground by a speeding motorist (negligence) or a pop star gratuitously abused in a national newspaper, it is to the law of tort that you would turn to for a remedy.
The person who commits a tort is known as the tort feasor. The other party is referred to as the wronged or innocent party. In some circumstances, it is possible to establish a tort without showing that you have suffered damage and the wrong is said to be actionable per se (ie by itself). On other occasions it is necessary to prove that you have suffered a loss. In both cases you will be awarded monetary compensation, in the form of damages, if the court decides that you have been the victim of a tort.
Tort Feasor
The Tort Lawyer addition to proving that an individual (the tort feasor) carried out a particular act, it is often necessary to show that he or she did so with a particular state of mind.
This can be intention, where the tort feasor deliberately and knowingly performed an act fully cognisant of the consequences it would have; negligence, where the tort feasor is careless about whether or not the act will result in certain consequences; or malice, where the tort feasor performs an act out of spite or with an evil motive.
If the action is lawfully permitted, malice will not usually convert it into a tort though there are circumstances where an evil motive can effect such a transformation.
Purported justifications
The Tort Lawyer must deal with the are many purported justifications for the requirement of fault. Most obviously, the notion appeals to social conceptions of what is ‘just’. According to this argument, you should only have to pay for (and by implication, be punished for) acts or omissions which are in some sense blameworthy and for consequences which were intended. A more sophisticated spin-off from this line of argument focuses upon the consequential deterrence effect of a fault system.
Responsible conduct will only be encouraged if accountability is reserved for irresponsible conduct. In this way, individuals will be made accountable for their actions.
There are, however, a limited number of torts that are committed once the relevant act or omission is completed without any necessity to prove a particular state of mind. These are known as ‘strict liability’ torts.
It is important to remember that liability is not absolute because defences are available. The main importance of strict liability is that it robs the defendant of the ability to extinguish his liability merely by virtue of showing that he has taken reasonable care.