Negligence: Kimberly & Charlesc V. Elle

Introduction

Negligence is defined by, a failure to take reasonable care to avoid causing injury or loss to another person. There are typically four steps in proving negligence: is there a duty of care, a breach of duty, damages or loss that was able to be foreseen and damage caused by a breach of duty.

Plaintiff v Defendant (Kimberly & Charlesc v Elle)

The issue is that Elle, who runs a ‘Bed & Breakfast’ house, had installed pine shutters to the exterior of her building in which a handyman had installed. The instructions for the pine shutters disclosed that the shutters were merely for aesthetics than for practical use and should not be installed within areas of harsh weather. After several months Elle had noticed that the pine wood started

The damages inflicted upon Charles is a head injury, severe enough to place him in recovery for 6 months. These damages would not have occurred if Elle had fixed the shutters when she had realised the fault. Charles would have avoided the injuries if he had not been trespassing at the time the shutter blew off. Either scenario, Elle should have initially demonstrated the well needed duty of care.

Defense

In this case, Elle lacked a duty of care for Charles and Kimberly as well as any other guests. Charles on the other hand showed negligence in his actions by trespassing thru Elles’ property, i.e. in the even that signage and fences were surrounding the property. If these fences/signs were in use around the property, Charles would and should have avoided the injuries he had incurred. Therefore, Charles may lose to the defense in the relation of him trespassing on Elles’ property.

Decision of The Court.

In conclusion, the damages incurred would be compensable and Elle would be at fault to the extent of a lack of duty or care to Kimberly and Charles. However, in terms of Charles trespassing, his situation could have ultimately been prevented if he had avoided entering an unknown

Donoghue vs Stevenson. Due to the fact that the accounting firm made the initial mistake of an error in the books, Jacob suffered the next financial year making a $12000 when it was expected to be roughly around $120000. The accounting firm and previous owner/s own a duty of care in providing legitimate information, hence was responsible in providing liable risks resulting in the probability that the harm would occur (The Civil Liability Act). The damage incurred to Jacob would be financial loss due to