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2017

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Institution
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Articles 151 - 159 of 159

Full-Text Articles in Torts

Ab 2748: Like Lead And Methane Gas, Causation Issues Continue To Lurk, Wiemond Wu Jan 2017

Ab 2748: Like Lead And Methane Gas, Causation Issues Continue To Lurk, Wiemond Wu

University of the Pacific Law Review

No abstract provided.

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Chapter 32, Sections 69–70: California Seismic Safety Capital Access Loan Program, Bryce Fick Jan 2017

Chapter 32, Sections 69–70: California Seismic Safety Capital Access Loan Program, Bryce Fick

University of the Pacific Law Review

No abstract provided.

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Time Is Money: An Empirical Assessment Of Non-Economic Damages Arguments, Christopher Robertson Jan 2017

Time Is Money: An Empirical Assessment Of Non-Economic Damages Arguments, Christopher Robertson

Faculty Scholarship

Non-economic damages (pain and suffering) are the most significant and variable components of liability. Our survey of 51 U.S. jurisdictions shows wide heterogeneity in whether attorneys may quantify damages as time-units of suffering (“per diem”) or demand a specific amount (“lump sum”). Either sort of large number could exploit an irrational anchoring effect.

We performed a realistic online, video-based experiment with 732 human subjects. We replicate prior work showing that large lump sum demands drive larger jury verdicts, but surprisingly find no effect of similarly-sized per diem anchors. We do find per diem effects on binary liability outcomes, and thus …

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Class Actions In The Era Of Trump: Trends And Developments In Class Certification And Related Issues, John C. Coffee Jr., Alexandra D. Lahav Jan 2017

Class Actions In The Era Of Trump: Trends And Developments In Class Certification And Related Issues, John C. Coffee Jr., Alexandra D. Lahav

Faculty Scholarship

In this memorandum prepared for the Annual ABA National Institute on Class Actions, Professors Coffee and Lahav review and assess developments in class certification over recent years, and track trends in approaches to certification. Special attention is given to securities litigation, the use of confidential witnesses, ascertainability, attorney's fees, standing, mootness, statutes of repose, and the impact of recent Supreme Court decisions, including Halliburton II and Spokeo.

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Gun Control Through Tort Law, Richard C. Ausness Jan 2017

Gun Control Through Tort Law, Richard C. Ausness

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

I have been asked to respond to an article by Professor Andrew Jay McClurg that recently appeared in the Florida Law Review. In this article, the author, a longtime advocate of firearms regulation, argues that owners and commercial sellers of firearms who negligently fail to secure them against theft should be held liable when persons are killed or injured by firearms used in the commission of a crime.

In the past, believing that existing federal and state laws were inadequate to halt the spread of gun-related deaths and injuries, proponents of stricter gun control measures proposed a number of tort …

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It's About Time: The Long Overdue Demise Of Statutes Of Repose In Latent Toxic Tort Litigation, Jean M. Eggen Dec 2016

It's About Time: The Long Overdue Demise Of Statutes Of Repose In Latent Toxic Tort Litigation, Jean M. Eggen

Jean M. Eggen

Latent toxic illness typically does not become manifest until months, years, or decades after a person’s exposure to a toxic substance. The timing, extent, and characteristics of its physical manifestation are unpredictable and vary among individuals. Similarly, property damages associated with environmental contamination may not be detected for years, and the diseases caused by the contamination could take even longer to manifest. Accordingly, toxic harms present unique challenges for plaintiffs confronted with time limitations on their actions. Statutes of repose operate in conjunction with statutes of limitations to provide defendants with maximum protection from stale claims. Unlike statutes of limitations, …

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The Jewel In The Crown: Can India’S Strict Liability Doctrine Deepen Our Understanding Of Tort Law Theory?, Deepa Badrinarayana Dec 2016

The Jewel In The Crown: Can India’S Strict Liability Doctrine Deepen Our Understanding Of Tort Law Theory?, Deepa Badrinarayana

Deepa Badrinarayana

The evolution of tort law in former British colonies is not only fascinating; it also holds clues into the age old question of whether law or any discrete area of law can be universal. The exploration into doctrinal divergences and convergences is part of a larger quest: to capture the theoretical underpinnings of tort law and, in that process, discover the universal core of tort law, if there is one. For example, is the central purpose of tort law efficient resource allocation, corrective justice, or simply a compensatory system for wrongs? To answer these questions, theorists have generally considered tort …

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Understanding Insurance Policies As Noncontracts: An Alternative Approach To Drafting And Construing These Unique Financial Instruments, Christopher French Dec 2016

Understanding Insurance Policies As Noncontracts: An Alternative Approach To Drafting And Construing These Unique Financial Instruments, Christopher French

Christopher C. French

Insurance policies commonly are understood to be a species of standardized contracts. This Article challenges that conventional wisdom and argues that insurance policies do not actually qualify as contracts under the doctrinal and theoretical bases of contract formation. It examines the process by which insurance policies are created and sold, and measures that process against the requirements for contract formation. This Article also distinguishes insurance policies from other types of standardized contracts, such as wrap agreements, which currently are the subject of much litigation and scholarly commentary. It then explores the doctrinal and theoretical bases underlying the specialized rules that …

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Insurance Policies: The Grandparents Of Contractual Black Holes, Christopher French Dec 2016

Insurance Policies: The Grandparents Of Contractual Black Holes, Christopher French

Christopher C. French

In their recent article, The Black Hole Problem in Commercial Boilerplate, Professors Stephen Choi, Mitu Gulati, and Robert Scott identify a phenomenon found in standardized contracts they describe as “contractual black holes.” The concept of black holes comes from theoretical physics. Under the original hypothesis, the gravitational pull of a black hole is so strong that once light or information is pulled past an event horizon into a black hole, it cannot escape. In recent years, the theory has been reformulated and now the hypothesis is that some information can escape, but it is so degraded that it is virtually …

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