Here you will find both extended and summarised torts law notes for the entire Monash University topic (Both Torts A and Torts B).
The summary notes are an excellent exam help, with steps to work out whether a particular tort is found in a problem question, and relevant precedent and case citations for that HD answer. They are short enough for use in an exam, but detailed enough that you will never miss a point.
The extended provide comprehensive information about all areas of the subject...
The following is a more accessible plain text extract of the PDF sample above, taken from our Torts Law Notes. Due to the challenges of extracting text from PDFs, it will have odd formatting:
Intentional Torts to the Person
Writ of Trespass | Writ of Trespass on the case |
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Tort of trespass
All involve wrongful direct and intentional interference
Trespass to person
Battery
Assault
False imprisonment
Trespass to goods
Trespass to land
Common elements
Actionable per se (don’t need to prove damage, just need to prove it happened). Actions are considered so important that it is irrelevant whether damage was caused, only that the tort was committed
Defendant’s act
Voluntary (not ‘involuntary’) Must have meant to do something
Positive (rather than passive conduct or omission)
Consequence to plaintiff must be direct result of the defendant’s act
Type of interference required in trespass to the person
Battery: contact
Assault: certain apprehension
False imprisonment: restraint
BATTERY
Elements of battery
Actionable per se (doesn’t matter if it hurts someone, don’t even have to KNOW it happened)
Voluntary and positive act by defendant
Interference – is physical contract necessary
CONTACT with the plaintiff
Not necessary that the defendant physically touches the plaintiff
If one body doesn’t touch another, doesn’t matter, a TRANSMISSION OF FORCE can satisfy the requirement
Although must be:
An interference and
Interference must be direct result of defendant’s act
Hostility isn’t needed
Must be intentional act by defendant
Directness – defendant’s act must directly cause the interference. Must touch.
Actionable per se
Voluntary and positive act by defendant
Voluntary in the sense that the act is directed by the defendant’s conscious mind.
Where the defendant is forcibly carried onto the plaintiff’s land by a third party, the trespass will be that of the third party, not of the defendant.
Authorities:
Stokes v Carlson: ‘A contraction of muscles which is purely a reaction to some outside force, convulsive movements of an epileptic, movements of the body during sleep when the will is in abeyance, and movements during period of unconsciousness, are not ‘acts’ of the person, and the person will not be responsible for injuries inflicted thereby, since such movements are without volition’
Acts done in a state of automatism will not be regarded as intentional but, in general, mental illness is not to be regarded as negativing volition. Acts performed under threat or pressure from circumstances beyond the control of the actor likewise will not negative volition, but may be pleaded by way of defence, for example self-defence, necessity or duress.
Interference
There is no battery unless there is an act by the defendant.
Merely to obstruct entrance to a room by standing still, is not an act in the sense required
Battery is not committed if the incident is one over which the defendant has no control; for example, where their horse bolts and injuries the plaintiff, since the incident is not attributable to the defendant.
The contact must be with the person of the plaintiff
Been extended judicially to encompass situations where no actual touching of the plaintiff occurs but where, for example, the defendant upsets the chair in which the plaintiff is sitting or if the defendant collided with the plaintiff’s curricle causing the horses to bolt and the plaintiff, in order to preserve his life, to jump out of the curricle and fracture his collarbone, it was held that there was sufficient contract with the body of the plaintiff to maintain an action in battery
Battery may be committed if the contract is with an item of the plaintiff’s clothing rather than directly to the body
Whether contract with clothing where no force has been applied but there is an element of insult, is undecided.
However, battery protects against insult and not merely against bodily harm, so contact with anything so closely attached to a person should be treated as battery.
Authorities:
Purcell v Horn Throwing water on the clothes being worn by the plaintiff was not battery. Contact with things attached to the person may be battery only where this involves a transmission of force to the body of the plaintiff, and any protection from insult is limited to insult inflicted by touching another person. ‘the act must imply personal violence’
Morgan v Loyacomo ‘to constitute an assault and battery, it is not necessary to touch the plaintiff’s body or even his clothing; knocking or snatching anything from the plaintiff’s hand or touching anything connected with his person, when done in a rude or insolent manner, is sufficient’. This decision would suggest, provided some element of force or insult accompanies the act, this would lead to a finding of trespass even in cases where the plaintiff’s body has not actually been touched but only the plaintiff’s clothing.
Hostility isn’t needed
Both motive and malice (unlike intention) are irrelevant in determining liability for battery, although the presence of either may affect the amount of damages awarded to the successful plaintiff
It may be more sensible to approach the matter from the point of view of the plaintiff rather than that of the defendant, and to ask whether, from that point of view, the physical contract was in excess of that generally acceptable in everyday life
It was outside the usual behaviour that would be appropriate
The fact that something is done with hostility means that it can change it from something that is everyday and normal becomes something that is battery
What constitutes contact with the plaintiff
Every persons body is inviolate thus the ‘least touching of another in anger is battery’ (Holt CJ)
‘The law cannot draw the line between different degrees of violence,...
Buy the full version of these notes or essay plans and more in our Torts Law Notes.
Here you will find both extended and summarised torts law notes for the entire Monash University topic (Both Torts A and Torts B).
The summary notes are an excellent exam help, with steps to work out whether a particular tort is found in a problem question, and relevant precedent and case citations for that HD answer. They are short enough for use in an exam, but detailed enough that you will never miss a point.
The extended provide comprehensive information about all areas of the subject...
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