Liability resulting from negligent conduct

Court cases arising from negligence are by far the most common form of tort suit today. This is perhaps because most automobile suits involve questions of negligence. In order to sustain an action a person’s conduct must be negligent. This can be defined as conduct, which falls below a reasonable standard.

It is important to remember that not every negligent act results in liability. The act must proximately cause the injury. For example, “A” negligently drives his car into “B”’s truck, setting off explosives carried inside the truck. The explosion frightens “C”, who is six blocks away, causing him to fall down and break his arm. “A” obviously would be liable to “B” for his damages and injuries, but a court or jury may find that “A’s” negligent act was too remote from “C’s” injury to make him liable to “C’’ for damages. Whether or not the defendant’s conduct was negligent is an important issue in most negligence suits.

Harm directly caused by a negligent act. The individual fails to exercise reasonable care and caution while performing a certain act. For example, a department store delivery man comes to your home to deliver a large package. While carrying it through the front door, he misjudges the distance and breaks the glass in the door. Since his act lacks the reasonable care that can be expected under the circumstances, he is liable for the broken pane.

Another circumstance, which can result in liability for negligence, is the “misplaced sponge” situation.

Mrs. Jones is to have an operation for an appendectomy. After the operation is completed, the hospital staff discovers that one of the surgical sponges is missing. Subsequent investigation establishes that the sponge was left in Mrs. Jones’s body during the operation. This conduct is negligent. The ground for recovery in this case stem from society’s belief that it is negligent conduct to surgically operate and leave a sponge in the patient.

TRACKING HUMANS: THE ELECTRONIC BRACELET IN THE

MODERN WORLD

Alternatives to incarceration such as the use of fines, community service, and restitution are products of the social movements of the 1960s. The rationalizations of these alternatives have been cost effectiveness, efficiency and humaneness. The same arguments have been associated with the newest community-based sanction, “electronic monitoring”. It is clear that such an alternative may yield these benefits.

The electronic monitoring system generally requires the offender to wear an electronic bracelet around his or her ankle or wrist. The monitoring is usually of two types: passive or active. The passive system provides for random telephoning monitoring by authorities in order to confirm that it is the specific offender who is present and responding. In contrast, an active system provides continuous information as to whether an individual is within the range, generally 150 to 200 feet, of a transmitter located within their residence. This is commonly referred to as continuous monitoring.

The effects of imprisonment on an individual may e great. It is common knowledge that imprisonment returns a man to society with a scarred psyche, unpaid debts and financial losses, a highly disruptive if not irreparably broken family, children who lose respect for their parent, no job, and a gap in his life history that is hard to explain when he seeks a new job. In this respect, electronic monitoring allows the offender to remain at home where he or she can continue to hold employment and maintain any dependent children.

Violent crimes committed by electronically monitored offenders are rare. About one out of twenty-five electronically monitored offenders commit crimes, and the vast majority of these new offences are non-violent.