1.
Absolute privilege: a witness testifying in a court or legislature may never be sued for defamation.
2.
Actual Malice: publishing a statement with the knowledge that it was false or publishing a statement in "reckless disregard" of whether it was false or not.
3.
Assault: When a defendant does some act that makes a plaintiff fear an imminent battery.
4.
Battery: An intentional touching of another person in a way that is unwanted or offensive. An assault in which the assailant makes physical contact
5.
Boeken v. Philip Morris Incorporated: Boeken diagnosed
6.
Business Torts: intentional torts that occur almost exclusively in a business setting
7.
Carvel v. Noonan: Carvel sold ice cream only through franchised stores. Declining revenues caused the company to begin selling its products in supermarkets. Many franchise stores went out of business. Franchisees filed suite, claiming tortious interference with a prospective advantage. Plaintiffs argued that Carvel undersold them in supermarkets, and issued coupons only redeemable there. Court ruled for defendant (Carvel). The coupon program was not economic pressure rising to the level of wrongful or culpable conduct.
8.
Commercial Exploitation: This right prohibits the use of someones likeness or voice for commercial purposes
9.
Compensatory Damages: money intended to restore a plaintiff to the position he was in before the injury
10.
Conversion: Taking or using someone's personal property without consent.
Personal property is any possession - other than land .
11.
Defamation: False statements that harm someone's reputation. Can be written written (libel) or oral (slander).
12.
Element: A fact that a plaintiff must prove to win a lawsuit.
13.
Emotional Distress: The intentional infliction of emotional distress involves extreme and outrageous conduct that causes serious emotional harm.
14.
False imprisonment: the intentional confinement or restraint of another person without reasonable cause and without consent.
15.
Four elements of a Defamation Case:: 1. Defamatory Statement - statement likely to harm another person's reputation.
2. Falseness - statement must be false.
3. Communicated - statement must be communicated to at least one person other than the plaintiff.
4. Injury - in slander case, plaintiff generally must show some injury (lower reputation, embarrassment, etc.). In a libel case, the law is willing to assume injury since libel is written and more permanent.
16.
Fraud: intentional deception resulting in injury to another person
17.
How are damages figured?: 1. Plaintiff received money for medical expenses.
2. Defendants are liable for lost wages.
3. Plaintiff is paid for pain and suffering.
18.
Intentional infliction of emotional distress: extreme and outrageous conduct that causes serious emotional harm
19.
Intentional Torts: Harm caused by a deliberate action.
20.
Intrusion: Tort if a reasonable person would find the invasion of her private life offensive. Examples: peeping in windows, wiretapping.
21.
Jane Doe and Nancy Roe v. Lynn Mills: Facts: antiabortion protester publicizes documents indicating women scheduled to have abortions and then post signs with their names and protest, women sued claiming intentional infliction of emotional distress. Trial court dismissed the lawsuit since it was not deemed outrageous, appeal followed Issue: did plaintiff's make valid claim of intentional infliction of emotional distress? Yes they did since the defendants had no right to publicize private matters
22.
Justification: A claim that special circumstances made its conduct fair.
23.
Malice: Public personalities can win a defamation suit only by proving actual malice.
24.
Name the two categories of Tort Law: Intentional Torts
Negligence and Strict Liability
25.
Negligence and Strict Liability: Injuries caused by neglect and oversight rather that by deliberate conduct.
26.
Opinion: A valid defense in a defamation suit because it cannot be proven true or false.
27.
Privacy & Publicity: The related torts of privacy and publicity involve unreasonable intrusion into someone's private life and unfair commercial exploitation by using someone's name, likeness, or voice without permission.
28.
Public Personalities: Someone in the limelight has a higher standard for proving defamation, and must show actual malice. Public official (senator, police chief). Public figure (movie star)
29.
Punitive Damages: Intended to punish the defendant for conduct that is extreme and outrageous. (i.e. certain behavior that is so unacceptable that society must make an example of it)
30.
Qualified privilege: Exists between two people who have a legitimate need to exchange information
31.
Single Recovery Principle: Requires a court to settle the matter once and for all, by awarding a lump sum for past and future expenses.
32.
The court when awarding punitive damages, must consider these "guideposts": 1. Reprehensibility of the defendant's conduct.
2. Ratio between the harm suffered and the award.
3. Difference between the punitive award and any civil penalties used in similar cases.
4. Verdict must be reasonable.
33.
The Lanham Act: A federal statute that provides broad protection against false statements in commercial advertising or promotion.
34.
To establish justification, a defendant (business) must show that ...: 1. It was acting to protect an existing economic interest, such as its own contract with the third party.
2. It was acting in the public interest, for example, by reporting to a government agency that a corporation was over billing for government services.
3. The existing contract could be terminated at will by either party, meaning that although the plaintiff had a contract, the plaintiff had no long-term assurances because the other side could end it at any time.
35.
Tort: A wrong; a violation of a duty imposed by the civil law; a civil wrong committed against a person or a person's property.
36.
Tort Examples: most common examples of intentional torts involve instances of:
Assault and / or Battery
False imprisonment
Trespassing
Fraud
Invasion of privacy
37.
Tort Reform: the revision of state laws to limit the ability of plaintiffs in personal injury lawsuits to recover damages in court
38.
Tortious Interference with a Contract: The defendant improperly induced a third party to breach a contract with the plaintiff. Exists only if the plaintiff can establish:
1. There was a contract between the plaintiff and a third party.
2. The defendant knew of the contract
3. The defendant improperly induced the third party to breach the contract or made performance of the contract impossible.
4. There was injury to the plaintiff.
39.
Tortious Interference with a prospective advantage: Malicous interference with a developing economic relationship.
40.
Tortious Interference with Business Relations: When healthy competition in business becomes illegal interference. Examples:interference with a contract or interference with a prospective advantage.
41.
Trespass: Intentionally entering land that belongs to someone else or remaining on the land after being asked to leave.
42.
Yeagle v. Collegiate Times: Facts: vice president of student affairs in virginia college defamed in school newspaper. Trial court dismissed the case, ruling no reasonable person would take the words literally and the phrase conveyed no factual information. Appeal to Virginia Supreme Court
