Negligence and TMI

[Paul lavely <lavelyp@UCLINK4.BERKELEY.EDU>]

Was anyone negligent for TMI? Below is a discussion of legal 

negligence. It seems that TMI folks and the government had both 

exercised reasonable care (when viewed at the time). However, you can 

decide.



NEGLIGENCE - The failure to use reasonable care. The doing of 

something which a reasonably prudent person would not do, or the 

failure to do something which a reasonably prudent person would do 

under like circumstances. A departure from what an ordinary 

reasonable member of the community would do in the same community.



Negligence is a 'legal cause' of damage if it directly and in natural 

and continuous sequence produces or contributes substantially to 

producing such damage, so it can reasonably be said that if not for 

the negligence, the loss, injury or damage would not have occurred.



Negligence may be a legal cause of damage even though it operates in 

combination with the act of another, a natural cause, or some other 

cause if the other cause occurs at the same time as the negligence 

and if the negligence contributes substantially to producing such 

damage.



In cases involving allegedly defective, unreasonably dangerous 

products, the manufacturer may be liable even though it exercised all 

reasonable care in the design, manufacture and sale of the product in 

question.



On the other hand, any failure of a manufacturer of a product to 

adopt the most modern, or even a better safeguard, does not 

necessarily make the manufacturer legally liable to a person injured 

by that product. The manufacturer is not a guarantor that nobody will 

get hurt in using its product, and a product is not defective or 

unreasonably dangerous merely because it is possible to be injured 

while using it. There is no duty upon the manufacturer to produce a 

product that is 'accident-proof.' What the manufacturer is required 

to do is to make a product which is free from defective and 

unreasonably dangerous conditions.



In general, the law of California declares that '[e]very one is 

responsible . . . for an injury occasioned to another by his want of 

ordinary care or skill in the management of his property or person . 

. . .' Cal.Civ.Code Sec. 1714(a). That, of course, means that people 

are generally liable when they negligently injure others. If the 

language is a bit quaint, it is because that has been the law of 

California since at least 1872. The California courts have 

assiduously enforced that principle and only deviate from it when 

some powerful public policy dictates a contrary result. See Lipson v. 

Superior Court, 31 Cal. 3d 362, 372-73 (1982).



When considered in relation to contracts, negligence may be divided 

into various degrees:

Ordinary negligence is the want of ordinary diligence; Slight or less 

than ordinary negligence is the want of great diligence; Gross or 

more than ordinary negligence is the want of slight diligence.



In general, a party who has caused an injury or loss to another in 

consequence of his negligence is responsible for all the 

consequences. An example of this may be found in the case of a person 

who drives a car during a dark night on the wrong side of the road 

and injures another.



When the law imposes a duty on an officer, whether by common law or 

statute, and he neglects to perform it, he may be held accountable 

for such neglect . . ..

   --b--



The above is from The 'Lectric Law Library's Lexicon

http://www.lectlaw.com/def2/n010.htm

-- 

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