Tresspass to the Person Questions

1.Battery (unlawful)
2.Assault (threat of violence)
3.False Imprisonment (deprivation of liberty)

(1) They must be committed intentionally (2) They must cause direct and immediate interference to the claimant’s rights (3) They are actionable per se, i.e. without the need to prove damage

In July 1957 the plaintiff, while sunbathing, was injured when a car driven by the defendant went over her legs.
if negligent then sue in negligence

The behaviour that may constitute liability in tort for trespass to the person may also amount to a criminal offence. If a criminal prosecution is brought, in practice this may mean that the victim will not make a civil claim.

· Criminal court may award compensation order · Victim may claim under Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme · Victim may be barred from making civil claim: Offences Against the Person Act 1861, s 45

“a battery is the actual infliction of unlawful force on another person” per Goff LJ in :
Collins v Wilcock

i) Intention to act ii) Application of direct & immediate force iii) Contact is unlawful

Horse frightened and struck down man animal should be treated as the passive instrument of any third party.
“In the same manner, if A. takes the hand of B. and with it strikes C., A. is the trespasser, and not B.”

Summary: Remoteness; pushing man into swimming pool; trespass to the person; Fatal Accidents Abstract: D, a youth of nearly sixteen, accompanied his friend and the friend's parents to a swimming pool. Everybody was having a great deal of fun when D pushed the friend's father, W, a middle-aged man, into the shallow end of the pool, intending merely to cause a big splash. W's left foot struck the edge of the pool and he sustained severe injuries to his foot and ankle. He had undergone five operations and was now crippled.

Held, W had not taken such part in the pool activities that he could be said to have willingly accepted the risk of personal injury and D was guilty of both negligence and trespass to the person (Donoghue v Stevenson [1932] A.C. 562 applied and Hughes v Lord Advocate [1963] A.C. 837 applied).

Only the act needs to be intended, not the consequences

Summary: Soldiers taking part in United Nations peacekeeping operations in Kosovo owed a duty to prevent personal injury to the public and had breached that duty by deliberately firing on a vehicle full of people when they had no justification in law for doing so

An unintended victim can claim on the basis of ‘transferred intent’

-‘force’ can commence before the ‘intent’ to apply it

NB recklessness may also suffice to satisfy mental element

Contact suffices, which may entail contact with: · the flesh of the claimant · the clothing or boots of the claimant

-“the least touching of another in anger is a battery”:

R v Cotesworth (1704) 6 Mod Rep 172; 87 ER 928

Pursell v Horn (1838) 8 Ad & E 602; 112 ER 966