Slip and Fall Like a Man: A Gentleman’s Guide to Tort Law

tort law

If you’ve been around the legal world at all, you’ve probably heard the term “torts” before. But unlike other areas of law (family law, environmental law, etc.), the name “tort law” isn’t exactly self-explanatory. So what are torts anyway, and why do they always make us think of delicious desserts?

Knowing a little about the realm of tort law is a good idea because it’s actually the area in which you’re most likely to have a case. Read on to learn a little more about tort law and why you should know about it.

What Are Torts?

The legal world is notorious for having its own jargon; the fact that the word “legalese” exists is enough to prove that. But sometimes, the confusing terminology can start before you ever even get into the details of the law. Tort law may be a term you’ve heard multiple times before without ever knowing what it means.

In short, tort law refers to the area of the legal system that deals with personal injuries and grievances. They handle one individual suing another person or company in order to get compensation for an injury or some harm done to them. There are a few ways that lawsuits can fall into the torts category, and we’ll discuss those in a moment

Can Torts Lead to Jail Time?

Torts are civil suits, which means there is not a specific law broken as part of the suit. It isn’t illegal to mop your business’s floor without putting out a “wet floor” warning sign, so you haven’t broken the law, but you may still be on the hook for your customer having a broken arm. This puts them outside the category of criminal suits, where convictions do mean jail time.

Because torts are civil suits, they usually result in settlements. This means that the defendant, if they are convicted, has to pay the plaintiff a certain amount of money to make up for their injury and to help cover medical bills and expenses. If you heard about the woman who burned herself with the McDonald’s coffee and became a millionaire, that’s a great example of a tort case and settlement.

Intentional Torts

There are three different categories tort cases can fall into: intentional torts, negligence, and strict liability. The first of these, intentional torts, are exactly what they sound like; if you injure someone on purpose, that’s an intentional tort. If your sister’s boyfriend breaks up with her, and you go find him and punch him in the face, that’s a case of battery and will qualify as an intentional tort.

But wait, you say, I thought assault and battery were criminal charges. While intentional torts can toe the line between civil and criminal cases, there is a slight difference. If what you did qualifies as a wrongful act that injures or interferes with the interests of society, that’s criminal; otherwise, it’s civil.

Negligence

The second category of torts cases is negligence. This covers cases when you didn’t do anything intentionally to harm someone, but neither did you try to prevent them from coming to harm. Negligence cases are the most common form of tort law.

The example we gave earlier of a customer slipping on a wet floor and breaking their arm would fall under the category of negligence. While the shop owner didn’t push the person or otherwise intentionally make them fall, they didn’t do their due diligence to make sure their customer stayed safe. Slip and fall accidents make up most of negligence tort cases; you can read more about those cases here.

Strict Liability

Strict liability is the last category of tort law. It’s also one of the most nebulous since it involves cases where the defendant didn’t intentionally injure the plaintiff, nor did they allow them to come to harm through negligence. In strict liability cases, even though the victim may have caused the injury, the defendant is still responsible for the thing that caused the injury.

A good example of strict liability tort cases would be people who sued the Hoverboard company after their hoverboard caught fire or exploded. The Hoverboard company didn’t neglect to do their due diligence when they sold the product, and they didn’t design the hoverboards to explode. But their product was defective and caused harm, which makes them liable for the damage.

Determining If You Have a Case

If you’ve been injured recently, there’s a chance that you have a tort case. And if you do have a case, you should pursue it. The law is on your side and the party that, by hook or by crook, caused your injury is responsible for making the situation right.

The best way to determine if you have a case is to talk to your lawyer. They’ll be able to decide if there’s a case to be made that the company who made your razors is on the line for the shaving accident you had. If you think there’s a good chance that someone other than yourself is liable for your injury, it’s worth having the conversation.

How Long Do Tort Law Cases Take?

While the actual legal process of settling a tort case doesn’t take very long most of the time, the proceedings can drag on a while. This all depends on how severe your injury was because your lawyer will want to give you time to heal completely before pursuing the case. If your brakes failed and you were in a car crash that resulted in permanent loss of function, your lawyer will want to push to have that included in the case instead of just suing to cover your hospital bills.

However, if you’re dealing with a simple slip and fall accident, your case probably won’t take too long. You’ll heal quickly enough from that, and unless there are complications or permanent effects of the accident, the case should be a relatively simple one. With a smaller case, you could be done in as little as two weeks.

Find More Gentlemen’s Guides

While tort law may sound confusing from the outside, it’s just a fancy term that refers to cases that deal with personal injury. Knowing about torts and when you might be entitled to a settlement, though, is a good idea for any gentleman making his way in the world.

If you’d like to read more gentlemen’s guides like this one, visit the rest of our site at Izzy Web. We have articles for men on all topics, from grooming tips to fatherhood advice. Check out our popular articles today.

Author: IzzyWeb