If you have suffered bodily harm or severe emotional stress due to the actions or carelessness of another person, you may qualify for a personal injury lawsuit. Personal injury lawsuits must meet certain criteria in order to be considered a tort. A tort is a legal term for the occurrence in which a person suffers physical or emotional harm due to the actions of another (with the exception of harm caused under contracts). There are specific criteria that must be met in order for an occurrence to be considered a tort.
First, a person must have a legal obligation to another person. This legal obligation cannot be under a contract. A good example is your legal obligation to stop at a red light in traffic. The second criterion for a tort is the “breach of duty” by one person. If you do not stop at a red light, you are breaching your legal obligation to stop. Third, your “breach of duty” must be the approximate cause of injury to another. If you ran the red light and hit a pedestrian crossing the road, you have cause injury due to your violation of the law. The final criterion is that injury must be caused to one person. If you broke the pedestrian’s leg when you hit him after running the red light, you have fulfilled all four criteria for being the defendant in a personal injury lawsuit.
Running a red light and causing physical injury to a person is a simple example of how you can use the four criteria for tort law to determine if an occurrence qualifies for a personal injury lawsuit. Unfortunately, not all cases are this simple to interpret.
When a person suffers emotional injuries, proving intentional infliction of damages is more complex and difficult. Generally the extent of emotional harm and effects are subject to interpretation by a judge or professional.
Additionally, a victim in a personal injury lawsuit involving emotional distress must prove several criteria. First, he must prove that the defendant’s actions were made with harmful intentions. If a person makes extreme threats or participates in severe verbal abuse, he is acting with harmful intentions. The victim must also prove that the defendant’s actions were extremely outrageous or uncivilized and that he experienced emotional injuries as a result of such actions. For example, if a person witnessed a murder or extreme act of violence, he could suffer emotional injuries.
Typically, personal injury cases involving emotional harm are not easy to interpret, and a judge or jury would deliberate on if the behavior of the defendant is, in fact, outrageous or uncivilized. Otherwise, the victim could be overly sensitive to behavior that is not extreme.
To learn more about personal injury lawsuits such as truck accident lawsuits, nursing home negligence lawsuits, defective product lawsuits, automobile accident lawsuits, and wrongful death lawsuits, it is important to speak with our personal injury attorneys in Scranton, Pennsylvania.