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Do You Understand The Different Tort Categories?
April 17, 2021
Do You Understand The Different Tort Categories?
Civil law is a branch of the United States legal system by which non-criminal wrongdoings are judged. Lawyers in Bryan Texas who handle civil trial settings consider an action to be non-criminal if it is based on violations or offenses committed because of some problem in the interpretation of verbal disputes, contract disagreements, property ownership or damages, most family law, etc.
Criminal acts are considered either a felony or misdemeanor based on the crime committed, its severity, and its possible results. In a similar fashion, civil law dealing mostly with injury and accident is divided into three tort categories that are distinguished by cause and results: intentional, negligent, and strict liability.
- Intentional – An act to knowingly and willfully cause harm or injury to a victim is a definition of an intentional tort. College Station civil trial lawyers advise that some common examples of intentional actions include: assault to cause injury; intimidation or fear whether physically or non-physically; and battery which involves actual, physical contact with the intent to cause injury. An intention to do emotional or psychological harm is also considered an intentional tort.
- Negligence – Negligence usually involves the breach of some type of duty that causes harm or injury even though that was not the intent of the original action. A Bryan TX lawyer who typically handles such cases would advise that this category of tort could include: accidental injury such as a slip-and-fall incident, carelessness resulting in injury or damages such as medical malpractice, and the results of acts that were unexpected or misjudged.
- Strict or Absolute Liability – The third tort category is strict liability; it is an action that is considered to be inherently hazardous and should involve extraordinary measures to prevent injury or damage. Any activity with hazardous material or the involvement of wild animals such as at a zoo or circus would fall into this category. The fact that a visitor to a zoo is injured by an animal means that liability automatically rests with the owner of the property because a zoo containing wild animals must take out-of-the-ordinary measures to protect visitors and employees. Strict liability torts arise from what civil trial lawyers advise is often a no-fault situation – it doesn’t matter who was at fault, injury or damage happened.
In both intentional and negligence torts, liability is usually placed on the person who caused the accident or injury, with intentionality being the determining factor between the two. Of course, strict liability is self-explanatory by its name and liability is assumed in most cases with causation not a factor.
More About Torts
Interestingly, it may not be commonly known except by College Station lawyers that individual states create the laws – both common law through judges and statutory law through legislators – that are handled as tort law. A tort may involve a criminal act but certainly not always. This area of the law is intended to provide recovery of damages such as loss of earnings, medical expenses, and pain and suffering to name a few. Payment of damages is hoped to act as a deterrent for such crimes being committed in the future.
Lawyers in Bryan TX stress the importance of understanding basic facts about torts and tort law. By knowing more about this, it can help a person wronged by someone’s actions be able to take the proper steps to recover any damages that occurred as a result. It is impossible to plan ahead for every situation; however, understanding liability potential before something happens can help make better decisions at that time.
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