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Negligence and TMI
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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