Tort law is that branch of the law that deals with civil law, including law suits but excluding issues involving contracts. Tort law is considered to be a form of restorative justice since it seeks to remedy losses or injury with monetary compensation.

Tort now means a breach of some duty independent of contract giving rise to a civil cause of action and for which compensation is recoverable. In general terms, a tort may be defined as a civil wrong independent of contract for which the appropriate remedy is an action for unliquidated damages.

A tort can be intentional or unintentional (negligence), or it can be a tort of strict liability. The same act may be both a crime and a tort. In effect, criminal law provides a way of punishing people who commit crimes. It acts to protect all citizens from such wrongdoing.

However, tort law was viewed as relatively undeveloped by the mid-19th century; the first American treatise on torts was published in the 1860s but the subject became particularly established when Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr wrote on the subject in the 1880s.

There are generally three degrees of negligence: slight negligence, gross negligence, and reckless negligence. Slight negligence is found in cases where a defendant is required to exercise such a high degree of care, that even a slight breach of this care will result in liability.

Causation

The plaintiff must show that the defendant owed her a legal duty of care under the circumstances. The duty of care can arise from different factors, such as the relationship between the plaintiff and the defendant. Examples of relationships that create a duty of care are: a doctor and a patient; or.

To establish medical negligence, an injured patient, the plaintiff, must prove: The existence of a duty owed by the health care professional to the plaintiff (for example, a doctor/patient relationship); Injury to the patient.

Negligence (Lat. negligentia) is a failure to exercise appropriate and/or ethical ruled care expected to be exercised amongst specified circumstances. The area of tort law known as negligence involves harm caused by failing to act as a form of carelessness possibly with extenuating circumstances.

Breach of Duty A defendant breaches such a duty by failing to exercise reasonable care in fulfilling the duty. Unlike the question of whether a duty exists, the issue of whether a defendant breached a duty of care is decided by a jury as a question of fact.

In tort law, a duty of care is a legal obligation which is imposed on an individual, requiring adherence to a standard of reasonable care while performing any acts that could foreseeably harm others. It is the first element that must be established to proceed with an action in negligence.

A duty of care is breached when someone is injured because of the action (or in some cases, the lack of action) of another person when it was reasonably foreseeable that the action could cause injury, and a reasonable person in the same position would not have acted that way.