Tennessee Injury Law Center
It has been a long time since this there has been a post on this blog. Some might actually say we have been negligent. So, we thought we would use our return to discuss the law of negligence, especially since negligence is at the heart of injury and wrongful death law. Negligence is comprised of three things: breach of duty, causation and damages. It sounds easy enough, but these concepts are the stuff of nightmares for first year law students in a tort class. Let’s get to it.
Duty is a legal obligation requiring a person to do OR not do something. In the context of a car accident, drivers have an obligation to stop at red lights. Another duty would be that drivers have an obligation to drive the speed limit. If a driver fails to stop at a red light as they are required by law to do, the driver has breached his legal duty. Likewise, if a driver races down the street exceeding the speed limit despite the law forbidding them to do so, it is a breach of legal duty.
Next is causation. There are two types of causation: cause-in-fact and proximate (or legal) cause. For purposes of this blog post, we are going to keep it simple and discuss the concept of causation broadly. Again, using the example of a car accident, people run red lights and speed in their vehicles every single day. Fortunately, most of the time, these breaches of duty do not “cause” an accident. For example, a car accident does not occur because there was not another driver entering the intersection at the red light. But of course, sometimes the breach of duty does cause harm – the red-light runner hits another vehicle, or the speeding vehicle strikes a pedestrian or a bicyclist. This is the causation part of the equation; the breach of duty caused an accident.
One final thought on causation before moving to damages: if you run a red light or exceed the speed limit, it is a legal violation for which you can be issued a criminal ticket. But if you run a red light and do not cause any harm, you have not been “negligent” as defined by the civil justice system.
Finally, to be negligent, there must be damages. If someone runs a red light and causes an accident with another vehicle, they are responsible for the damages they cause. Of course, there will almost certainly be property damage. If the collision also injures the other driver, the red-light runner is responsible for the injury and the damages related to the injury. For example, if the other driver sustains a broken leg in the accident and can’t work in his job as a waiter, the red-light runner is legally responsible for the waiter’s lost wages as well as the broken leg.
There you have it – a thumbnail sketch of the law of negligence. Returning to the original question, have we been negligent in posting to this blog? Since we do not have a legal obligation to write and publish blog posts, we have not been “negligent”, but we have certainly been derelict and will try to do better. John is the President of the American College of Trial Lawyers this year, so the Days have had a lot of busy days. But as always, we are here if you need us. Just give us a call at 615-742-4880