Law Commons^™

Jesner V. Arab Bank, Plc: Limiting The Liability Of Foreign Corporations By Curbing The Breadth Of The Alien Tort Statute, Sudipta Das

Journal of Business & Technology Law

No abstract provided.

Perpetuating Injustice: Analyzing The Maryland Court Of Appeals’S Refusal To Change The Common Law Doctrine Of Contributory Negligence, Andrew White

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Rescuing Maryland Tort Law: A Tribute To Judge Sally Adkins, Donald G. Gifford

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Rescuing Maryland Tort Law: A Tribute To Judge Sally Adkins, Donald G. Gifford

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Data-Informed Duties In Ai Development, Frank A. Pasquale

Faculty Scholarship

Law should help direct—and not merely constrain—the development of artificial intelligence (AI). One path to influence is the development of standards of care both supplemented and informed by rigorous regulatory guidance. Such standards are particularly important given the potential for inaccurate and inappropriate data to contaminate machine learning. Firms relying on faulty data can be required to compensate those harmed by that data use—and should be subject to punitive damages when such use is repeated or willful. Regulatory standards for data collection, analysis, use, and stewardship can inform and complement generalist judges. Such regulation will not only provide guidance to …

Jackson V. Dackman Co.: The Legislative Modification Of Common Law Tort Remedies Under Article 19 Of The Maryland Declaration Of Rights, Dan Friedman

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Take-Home Toxin: Following Kesner’S Lead And Creating A Consistent Framework For Determining Duty Toward Victims Of Secondary Asbestos Exposure, Brendan Kelly

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Privacy Of The Public Schools, Emily Suski

Maryland Law Review

This Article compares the liability of the public schools with that of families for harms to children in their care. Families serve as an apt vehicle for comparative analysis because families’ and schools’ responsibilities for children overlap substantially. Despite these overlapping responsibilities, however, the law allows schools to evade liability for harms to children and penalizes families for the same or similar harms.

Drawing on feminist theory on privacy and the public/private divide, this Article argues that the limits of public school liability mean they have privacy. Feminist theorists identify privacy as freedom from regulation and intrusion into decision-making. Public …

Sexual Privacy, Danielle Keats Citron

Faculty Scholarship

Those who wish to control and expose the identities of women and people from marginalized communities routinely do so by invading their privacy. People are secretly recorded in bedrooms and public bathrooms, and “up their skirts.” They are coerced into sharing nude photographs and filming sex acts under the threat of public disclosure of their nude images. People’s nude images are posted online without permission. Machine-learning technology is used to create digitally manipulated “deep fake” sex videos that swap people’s faces into pornography.

At the heart of these abuses is an invasion of sexual privacy—the behaviors and expectations that manage …

Trial And Error: Legislating Adr For Medical Malpractice Reform, Lydia Nussbaum

Maryland Law Review

The U.S. healthcare system has a problem: hundreds of thousands of people die each year, and over a million are injured, by medical mistakes that could have been avoided. Furthermore, over ninety percent of these patients and their families never learn of the errors or receive redress. This problem persists, despite myriad reforms to the medical malpractice system, because of lawmakers’ dominant focus on reducing providers’ liability insurance costs. Reform objectives are beginning to change, however, and the vehicle for implementing these changes is alternative dispute resolution (“ADR”). Historically, legislatures deployed ADR to curb malpractice litigation and restrict patients’ access …

Technological Triggers To Tort Revolutions: Steam Locomotives, Autonomous Vehicles, And Accident Compensation, Donald G. Gifford

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Keeping Cases From Black Juries: An Empirical Analysis Of How Race, Income Inequality, And Regional History Affect Tort Law, Donald G. Gifford, Brian Jones

Faculty Scholarship

This Article presents an empirical analysis of how race, income inequality, the regional history of the South, and state politics affect the development of tort law. Beginning in the mid-1960s, most state appellate courts rejected doctrines such as contributory negligence that traditionally prevented plaintiffs’ cases from reaching the jury. We examine why some, mostly Southern states did not join this trend.

To enable cross-state comparisons, we design an innovative Jury Access Denial Index (JADI) that quantifies the extent to which each state’s tort doctrines enable judges to dismiss cases before they reach the jury. We then conduct a multivariate analysis …

Blackburn Limited Partnership V. Paul: The Birth Of Maryland’S Statute Or Ordinance Rule And Its Ill-Defined “Targeted Class” Requirement, Monica Basche

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Requiem For A Remedy: The Law And Economics Of Mutual Pharmaceutical V. Bartlett’S Over-Preemption, Robert C. Baker Iii

Maryland Law Review Online

No abstract provided.

(Still) "Unsafe At Any Speed": Why Not Jail For Auto Executives?, Rena I. Steinzor

Faculty Scholarship

Americans can be forgiven for wondering what has gone so drastically wrong with the companies that sell automobiles. In 2014, 64 million, a number equivalent to one in five of the cars on the road, was recalled. Safety defects such as the lack of torque in ignition switches installed in GM compact cars like the Cobalt put motorists in the terrifying position of coping with a stalled engine and loss of power brakes while traveling at high speeds. GM had the audacity to classify this condition was not a safety defect, but instead was merely “inconvenient” for its customers. It …

Fda Approval Of Drugs And Devices: Preemption Of State Laws For “Parallel” Tort Claims, Marcia Boumil

Journal of Health Care Law and Policy

The U.S. Supreme Court’s important ruling in Mutual Pharmaceutical Co., Inc. v. Bartlett concerns whether the Food and Drug Administration’s (“FDA”) approval of a generic drug insulates the drug manufacturer from liability under state tort laws from claims of injury due to an alleged “design defect.” The Court previously ruled that FDA approval does not preempt state law claims based upon failure-to-warn, at least with respect to brand name products. In contrast, the Court previously ruled that the federal regulatory process leading to FDA approval of generic equivalents of brand drugs—and designation of the drug label—does preempt state law as …

Finding Fault?: Exploring Legal Duties To Return Incidental Findings In Genomic Research, Elizabeth R. Pike, Karen H. Rothenberg, Benjamin E. Berkman

Faculty Scholarship

The use of whole genome sequencing in biomedical research is expected to produce dramatic advances in human health. The increasing use of this powerful, data-rich new technology in research, however, will inevitably give rise to incidental findings (IFs), findings with individual health or reproductive significance that are beyond the aims of the particular research, and the related questions of whether and to what extent researchers have an ethical obligation to return IFs. Many have concluded that researchers have an ethical obligation to return some findings in some circumstances, but have provided vague or context-dependent approaches to determining which IFs must …

Apportioning Liability In Maryland Tort Cases: Time To End Contributory Negligence And Joint And Several Liability, Donald G. Gifford, Christopher J. Robinette

Faculty Scholarship

The Article presents a comprehensive proposal for assigning liability in tort cases according to the parties’ respective degrees of fault. The authors criticize the Court of Appeals of Maryland’s recent decision in Coleman v. Soccer Association of Columbia declining to abrogate contributory negligence, particularly the court’s notion that it should not act because of the legislature’s repeated failure to do so. The Article provides a comprehensive analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of comparative fault, including its effect on administrative costs, claims frequency, claims severity, insurance premiums, and economic performance. The authors propose the legislative enactment of comparative fault and …

Warr V. Jmgm Group: Maryland Dram Shops Escape Duty To Foreseeable Victims Of Drunk Driving, Katherine O'Konski

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Death Of The Common Law: Judicial Abdication And Contributory Negligence In Maryland, Donald G. Gifford

Maryland Law Review Online

The issue of how to handle a victim’s own contributory negligence that combines with the negligence of a tortfeasor in causing harm is one of the most important, if not the most important, issue in all of tort law. Forty-six states now apply some version of comparative fault that holds the defendant liable for its negligence even when the plaintiff is also careless, but reduces the award in proportion to the plaintiff’s degree of fault when compared with that of the defendant. In contrast, the Maryland Court of Appeals in Coleman v. Soccer Association of Columbia recently refused again to …

Kiobel And Extraterritoriality: A Rule Without A Rationale, David L. Sloss

Maryland Journal of International Law

No abstract provided.

Connick V. Thompson: Unclear Motives Behind A Misguided Result, Claude Nicolas

Maryland Law Review Online

No abstract provided.

Hostile Educational Environments, Ari Ezra Waldman

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Sexual Harassment 2.0, Mary Anne Franks

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Altered Standards Of Care: Needed Reform For When The Next Disaster Strikes, Rebecca Mansbach

Journal of Health Care Law and Policy

No abstract provided.

Reforming Public Interest Tort Law To Redress Public Health Epidemics, Michael L. Rustad, Thomas H. Koenig

Journal of Health Care Law and Policy

No abstract provided.

Independent Newspapers, Inc. V. Brodie: Maryland's Precarious Balance Between Internet Defamation And The Right To Eanonymity, Bryce Donohue

Journal of Business & Technology Law

No abstract provided.

Bonding Limited Liability, Robert J. Rhee

Faculty Scholarship

Limited liability is considered a “birthright” of corporations. The concept is entrenched in legal theory, and it is a fixed reality of the political economy. But it remains controversial. Scholarly debate has been engaged in absolute terms of defending the rule or advocating its abrogation. Though compelling, these polar positions, often expressed in abstract arguments, are associated with disquieting effects. Without limited liability, efficiency may be severely compromised. With it, involuntary tort creditors bear some of the cost of an enterprise. Most other proposals for reforming limited liability have been incremental, such as modifying veil piercing. However, neither absolutism nor …

Mainstreaming Privacy Torts, Danielle Keats Citron

Faculty Scholarship

In 1890, Samuel Warren and Louis Brandeis proposed a privacy tort and seventy years later, William Prosser conceived it as four wrongs. In both eras, privacy invasions primarily caused psychic and reputational wounds of a particular sort. Courts insisted upon significant proof due to those injuries’ alleged ethereal nature. Digital networks alter this calculus by exacerbating the injuries inflicted. Because humiliating personal information posted online has no expiration date, neither does individual suffering. Leaking databases of personal information and postings that encourage assaults invade privacy in ways that exact significant financial and physical harm. This dispels concerns that plaintiffs might …

Privacy As Product Safety, James Grimmelmann

Faculty Scholarship

Online social media confound many of our familiar expectaitons about privacy. Contrary to popular myth, users of social software like Facebook do care about privacy, deserve it, and have trouble securing it for themselves. Moreover, traditional database-focused privacy regulations on the Fair Information Practices model, while often worthwhile, fail to engage with the distinctively social aspects of these online services.

Instead, online privacy law should take inspiration from a perhaps surprising quarter: product-safety law. A web site that directs users' personal information in ways they don't expect is a defectively designed product, and many concepts from products liability law could …