Animals
This doctrine imposes liability on someone who keeps or possesses an animal, even if they are not the owner, when the animal causes harm. What is it called?
What is strict liability for keeping or harboring an animal?
This doctrine applies when an activity carries a high risk of harm that cannot be eliminated with reasonable care.
What is strict liability?
What are the three types of product defects recognized in strict liability?
What are manufacturing, design, and warning defects?
A warning defect occurs when a product’s risks could have been reduced by doing what?
What is providing reasonable instructions or warnings?
This defense reduces recovery when the plaintiff failed to use reasonable care, even in strict liability cases.
What is comparative fault?
Some states impose strict liability when an animal physically intrudes onto another’s land, but others apply only a negligence standard. What type of animal conduct are these rules regulating?
What is trespassing animals?
One of the six balancing factors asks whether the activity is uncommon in the community; name this factor.
What is “extent to which the activity is not a matter of common usage”?
This defect arises when a single product departs from its intended design, even if all possible care was used
What is a manufacturing defect?
A manufacturer has no duty to warn of these types of dangers because they are already known to ordinary users.
What are obvious dangers?
This defense applies when a plaintiff knowingly and voluntarily encounters a product’s danger.
What is assumption of risk?
In jurisdictions using a four-rule framework, one rule makes an owner strictly liable if the animal breaks through another’s properly maintained barrier. What is the name of that statutory approach?
What is the Fencing Out statute?
This element must still be proven even after an activity is classified as abnormally dangerous.
What is causation (and damages)?
Under a design defect theory, what test is used to determine if the design is defective and unsafe?
What is the Risk-Utility Test, including whether a reasonable alternative design (RAD) existed?
This rule presumes that if a proper warning had been provided, the user would have read and followed it.
What is the presumption that warnings will be read and heeded?
A seller is not liable when a product causes harm due to this type of handling, which is outside normal or intended use.
What is abnormal handling?
A person who brings a non-domesticated creature onto their land may face strict liability for any injuries it causes. What category of animals is this rule referring to?
What are wild animals?
Transporting explosives, toxic chemicals, or radioactive material commonly triggers this type of liability.
What is strict liability for abnormally dangerous activities?
This rule states that a product’s inherent danger does not automatically make it unreasonably dangerous.
What is the Good Bourbon Rule?
Under this doctrine, the manufacturer satisfies its duty by warning a professional intermediary—usually a doctor—who then advises the consumer.
What is the Learned Intermediary Rule?
Even misuse of a product may not bar recovery if this factor makes the misuse one the manufacturer should have anticipated.
What is foreseeability of misuse / common practice?
Strict liability for domestic animals depends on whether the owner had prior knowledge of abnormal aggressive behavior. What legal concept describes this requirement?
What is vicious propensity?
This factor looks at whether the activity’s value to society outweighs its dangerous attributes.
What is “extent to which the activity’s value to the community outweighs its dangerous attributes”?
For a failure-to-warn claim, what must the plaintiff show about the risk the manufacturer failed to warn about?
What is that the risk was known or knowable at the time of manufacture, based on prevailing scientific and medical knowledge?
To succeed on a failure-to-warn claim, the plaintiff must show the manufacturer failed to warn about what kind of risk?
What is a risk that was known or knowable in light of prevailing scientific and medical knowledge at the time of manufacture?
This type of product generally carries no strict liability, though negligence may still apply.
What are used goods?