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TORT V CRI
ME
Tort and crime are different things – assault and battery are crimes as well as torts. There is a
clear difference between the aims of the two branches of law. The criminal law has moved in
recent years in the direction of emphasising individual responsibility. The function of the civil
law is distinct as it provides a framework of compensation for wrongs which holds the
balance fairly between the conflicting rights. (Ashley v Chief Constable of Sussex)
Criminal law is public in nature and is brought by the state. They are guilty and will go
through the criminal tort system. Tort is a private law area with actions brought against one
person to another. There is a tortfeasor who will be liable rather than guilty.
It is possible to commit more than one tort when you analyse a set of facts.
English law has no objection to concurrent liability between one and another – concurrent
liability. The claimant can only recover once for their damage.
TRESPASSTO THE PERSON
- Battery
- Assault
- False imprisonment.
Collins v Wilcock
An assault is an act which causes another person to apprehend the infliction of immediate
unlawful force on his person; a battery is the actual infliction of unlawful force on another
person… false imprisonment is the unlawful imposition of constraint on another’s freedom of
movement from a particular place.
For an assault there does not need to be harm of injury – for the battery it ACTUALLY has to
happen.
Intentional Torts:
You have to have intention to commit them. This requires a deliberate conduct. You do not
have to intend to commit a tort you just do what you did deliberately.
Wilson v Pringle
It is the act and not the injury which must be intentional – an intention to injure is not
essential to an action for trespass to the person. It is the mere trespass itself which is the
offence.
, Recklessness- going ahead with the action even though you knew of a risk
Carelessness – measure against the reasonable person … not to measure up to the reasonable
person you have behaved in a careless way
ASSAULT AND BATTERY
What is the point of these torts?
Both assault and battery protect aspects of our personal integrity:
- Battery protects our bodily integrity.
- Assault protects the right not the be put in fear of unlawful invasion of our integrity.
These are fundamental aims and rights that we hold
Collins v Wilcock
There was a police officer who approach two ladies who were engaging in acts of
prostitution. She walked away and he followed her and she swears at him. He persists in
talking to her and she held on to her arm and tried to restrain her but had NOT arrested the
woman. She said the police officer had committed battery and the question for the court was
whether the holding of the woman’s arm could amount to the battery.
The law applies equally to the police.
‘The fundamental principle, plain and incontestable is that every person’s body is inviolate…
every man’s person being sacred and no other having a right to meddle with it, in any the
slightest manner’
Ashley v Chief Constable of Sussex Police
The police had planned to raid Ashley in connection to drug trafficking. They were warned he
had shot another person in the past and had armed robbery. Upon entering the bedroom of the
flat the police shot at Ashley and injured him after Ashley made advances. They brought
against the police a rang of different torts. They refused to accept the claim in battery. By the
time the claim came before the HoL there were a number of questions.
The claim could happen if no compensation was available?
They wanted the claim that the police had acted with intention and vindicate the rights of
their family member.
- Ashley had been put into the position he had been in?
- Vindication of the rights…
A claimant has no cause of action in negligence unless he has suffered injury or damage. By
contrast, battery or trespass to the person is actionable without proof that the victim has
suffered anything other than the infringement of the right to bodily integrity.
BATTERY REQUI
REMENTS
1) Application of direct and immediate force.
2) Intention on the part of the defendant.
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