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Articles 1 - 11 of 11
Full-Text Articles in Law
Crime Spectators And The Tort Of Objectification, Amelia J. Uelmen
Crime Spectators And The Tort Of Objectification, Amelia J. Uelmen
University of Massachusetts Law Review
Reports of how some bystanders interact with victims on the scene of an emergency are shocking. Instead of assisting or calling for help, these individuals take pictures or recordings of the victims on their cell phones. This Article concentrates on the question of whether such an interaction with a victim might in certain circumstances constitute a distinct and legally actionable harm. This Article proposes a new tort: exploitative objectification of a person in need of emergency assistance. It works to articulate the moral and legal foundations for an argument that treating a person in need of emergency assistance as an …
Extracting Medical Injury Information From The Legal System To Improve Patient Safety In The Health System: A Social Utility Approach, Mary Chaffee
University of Massachusetts Law Review
As many as 400,000 people die each year, and a million are injured, by preventable medical injuries sustained in the U.S. health system. Collection of data to enhance understanding of how unintended medical injuries happen is an essential part of harm-reduction strategies. While health system data collection and reporting processes have improved in recent years, the scope and intractability of the medical injuries problem demands new efforts. The legal system could contribute valuable medical injury data to patient safety efforts but current practices largely prevent it. In medical malpractice claims where parties settle, case information is routinely protected from disclosure …
Negative Portrayal Of Vaccines By Commercial Websites: Tortious Misrepresentation, Donald C. Arthur
Negative Portrayal Of Vaccines By Commercial Websites: Tortious Misrepresentation, Donald C. Arthur
University of Massachusetts Law Review
Commercial website publishers use false and misleading information to create distrust of vaccines by claiming vaccines are ineffective and contain contaminants that cause autism and other disorders. The misinformation has resulted in decreased childhood vaccination rates and imperiled the public by allowing resurgence of vaccine-preventable illnesses. This Article argues that tort liability attaches to publishers of commercial websites for foreseeable harm that results when websites dissuade parents from vaccinating their children in favor of purchasing alternative products offered for sale on the websites.
American Punitive Damages Vs. Compensatory Damages In Promoting Enforcement In Democratic Nations Of Civil Judgements To Deter State-Sponsors Of Terrorism, Jeffrey F. Addicott
American Punitive Damages Vs. Compensatory Damages In Promoting Enforcement In Democratic Nations Of Civil Judgements To Deter State-Sponsors Of Terrorism, Jeffrey F. Addicott
University of Massachusetts Law Review
Unfortunately, while the United States has established several legal avenues for civil litigation by private citizens of terror attacks against States that sponsor terrorism, a major stumbling block in terms of effectiveness rests in the reality that fellow democratic nations in the international community refuse to honor or domesticate the monetary judgments of American courts. Acknowledging that there are a plethora of political and legal obstacles associated with establishing a workable mechanism for fellow democracies to enforce the “terror” judgments of American courts, one reason that is often raised by critics is the strong objection to the matter of American …
A Jurisprudential Divide In U.S. V. Wong & U.S. V. June, Richard J. Peltz-Steele
A Jurisprudential Divide In U.S. V. Wong & U.S. V. June, Richard J. Peltz-Steele
Faculty Publications
In spring 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court decided two consolidated cases construing the Federal Tort Claims Act, U.S. v. Kwai Fun Wong and U.S. v June, Conservator. The Court majority, 5-4, per Justice Kagan, ruled in favor of the claimants and against the Government in both cases. On the face of the majority opinions, Wong and June come off as straightforward matters of statutory construction. But under the surface, the cases gave the Court a chance to wrestle with fundamental questions of statutory interpretation. The divide in Wong and June concerns the role of the courts vis-à-vis Congress — one …
Benevolent Maleficence:How A Well-Intentioned Legislature And A Deferential Court Combined To Stunt The Development Of Massachusetts Product Liability Law, Philip E. Cleary
Benevolent Maleficence:How A Well-Intentioned Legislature And A Deferential Court Combined To Stunt The Development Of Massachusetts Product Liability Law, Philip E. Cleary
University of Massachusetts Law Review
Massachusetts product liability law is unusual. Unlike most states, Massachusetts does not recognize strict tort liability in the product area. Rather, "strict product liability" is limited to breaches of warranty under Article 2 of the Uniform Commercial Code. the Massachusetts Legislature amended Article 2 in several ways to provide a "strict liability" remedy that is, in the words of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, "congruent in nearly all respects with the principles" of strict tort liability. The court has construed the amendments to the UCC as precluding the adoption of strict tort liability in Massachusetts. In most ways, Massachusetts product …
On Business Torts And The First Amendment, Richard J. Peltz-Steele
On Business Torts And The First Amendment, Richard J. Peltz-Steele
Faculty Publications
A gaping question in free speech law surrounds the application of the First Amendment defense in business torts. The pervasiveness of communication technologies, the flourishing of privacy law, and the mere passage of time have precipitated an escalation in tort cases in which communication, and what the defendant may allege is free speech, lies at the heart of the matter.
In Tort Pursuit Of Mass Media: Big Tobacco, Big Banks, And Their Big Secrets, Richard J. Peltz-Steele, Eric J. Booth
In Tort Pursuit Of Mass Media: Big Tobacco, Big Banks, And Their Big Secrets, Richard J. Peltz-Steele, Eric J. Booth
Faculty Publications
This article examines potential civil liability under the multistate norms of tort and closely related areas in the common law of the United States for the mass media re-publisher of leaked corporate secrets. The examination employs two fact patterns derived from real cases: one, contemporary, an international bank's grievance, never resolved on the merits in court, against the online publisher WikiLeaks; and second, conventional, a tobacco manufacturer's grievance, feared but never filed, against the television newsmagazine 60 Minutes. The study assumes jurisdiction arguendo and examines liability theories in tortious interference; unfair-competition law; and conversion, trade-secret appropriation, and related theories of …
U.S. Business: Tort Liability For The Transnational Republisher Of Leaked Corporate Secrets, Richard J. Peltz-Steele
U.S. Business: Tort Liability For The Transnational Republisher Of Leaked Corporate Secrets, Richard J. Peltz-Steele
Faculty Publications
Wikileaks, the web enterprise responsible for the unprecedented publication of hundreds of thousands of classified government records, is reshaping fundamental notions of the freedom of information. Meanwhile more than half of records held by Wikileaks are from the private sector, and the organization has promised blockbuster revelations about major commercial players such as big banks and oil companies. This paper examines the potential liability under U.S. business-tort law for Wikileaks as a transnational republisher of leaked corporate secrets. The paper examines the paradigm for criminal liability under the Espionage Act to imagine a construct of civil liability for tortious interference …
Fifteen Minutes Of Infamy: Privileged Reporting And The Problem Of Perpetual Reputational Harm, Richard J. Peltz-Steele
Fifteen Minutes Of Infamy: Privileged Reporting And The Problem Of Perpetual Reputational Harm, Richard J. Peltz-Steele
Faculty Publications
This Article provides an overview of the labyrinth of media tort defenses, specifically the four privileges – fair comment, fair report, neutral reportage, and wire service – that come into play when the media republish defamatory content about criminal suspects and defendants without specific intent to injure. The Article then discusses these privileges in light of a hypothetical case involving a highly publicized crime and an indicted suspect, against whom charges are later dropped, but who suffers perpetual reputational harm from the out-of-context republication online of news related to his indictment. The Article demonstrates how the four privileges would operate …
Do Ask And Do Tell: Rethinking The Lawyer’S Duty To Warn In Domestic Violence Cases, Margaret B. Drew, Sarah Buel
Do Ask And Do Tell: Rethinking The Lawyer’S Duty To Warn In Domestic Violence Cases, Margaret B. Drew, Sarah Buel
Faculty Publications
Empirical data document that while domestic violence victims face high risk of recurring abuse, batterers’ lawyers may be privy to information that could avert further harm. Attorneys owe a duty of confidentiality to their clients that can be breached only in extraordinary circumstances, such as when counsel learns her client plans to commit a crime. To resolve the tension between client confidentiality and victim safety, this Article argues that, in the context of domestic violence cases, lawyers have an affirmative duty to (1) screen battering clients who have indicated a likelihood of harming others, (2) attempt to dissuade them from …