THE UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH PACIFIC

UNIVERSITY EXTENSION
 

EXAMINATION PAPER

SEMESTER 1 2002
 

 

 

 

 

COURSE CODE/TITLE:  LA 203     Law of Torts I

 

DURATION OF EXAM:

 

    

 

TOTAL NUMBER OF PAGES:

 

      Four (4) including this one

 

MARK VALUE & ALLOCATION:

 

      Fifty percent (50%) of course grade:

      Questions 1, 2, 6 –   5 % each

      Questions 4, 5     -- 10 % each

      Question 3           -- 15 %

 

NUMBER OF QUESTIONS:

 

      Six (6)

 

NUMBER OF QUESTIONS TO BE

ANSWERED:

 

       Six (6) – although NB Questions 1 and 6

       each involve a choice

 

MATERIALS ALLOWED:

 

       Watch; pens.

       CLOSED-BOOK EXAM

 

NOTES TO CANDIDATES

·        Be very aware of precisely what the question asks for.

·        Make sure every conclusion you come to, including those which are steps in your   reasoning within your answer, is explicitly justified.

·        If you cite a case, use it: explain how it affects the answer you are giving.

·        Watch the time, so that you do not devote too little time to the last question you do.

 

 

1.         Answer either A  or  B.                                                                         (value 5 marks)

 

 

            A.        John Hopoate, known as Hoppa, played rugby league for the professional team West Sydney Tigers of the NRL. During a match he poked several opposing players in the rear end – his finger, through the shorts fabric, actually inserted into them. The extract below from newspaper coverage supplies the context.

Do you think one of those players could succeed in a suit in battery against Hopoate, if the incident occurred in a NRL exhibition match in your jurisdiction?

 

Wests Tigers coach Terry Lamb admitted he and his players laughed at video tape of John Hopoate jamming his fingers up the backside of Dragons player Craig Smith a month ago.

"Everyone had a big laugh," one player said. Lamb added, "We thought it was OK because Hoppa is good mates with Craig. We thought it was just a gee-up [rough teasing]."

This week, angry North Queensland players revealed Hopoate's tactics, and he has been banned for 12 games.

Hopoate also did this behaviour at training sessions, but all the while it was tolerated. Hopoate has been stunned by the consequences of his actions, asking his closest mates: "Why is this happening? I thought it was just a joke."

"We're 100 per cent behind Hoppa," one Tigers player said. "He has been victimised and has all our support."

 

OR

 

            B.        In March of this year, the High Court of Fiji declared (obiter) that corporal punishment of children (that is, physically striking them) violated the children’s constitutional right against “inhumane or disproportionately severe treatement”. Suppose a complaint against the striking of their child was brought against a school in your jurisdiction, as a suit in battery.

The 11-year-old plaintiff had been struck on the rear by his teacher, painfully but not hard enough to bruise, with a wooden ruler, for ‘talking back’.

Should the defendant school succeed in arguing that such punishment is “socially acceptable” or “reasonable discipline”?

 

 

 

 

2.                                                                                                                         (value: 5 marks)

 

            Pamai, a 23-year-old woman, was sitting in the tray, or back, of her cousin's utility truck, being given a lift to the market. A speeding car struck the truck, an accident caused by the negligence of the speeding car's driver. Pamai was injured.

            There was no special seating in the truck’s tray. If Pamai had been riding in the cab, beside the driver, she would not have been as badly injured.

            Suppose this occurred in your home jurisdiction. If Pamai sues the car’s driver in negligence, do you think the court should reduce her compensation on the ground of ‘contributory negligence’?

3.                                                                                                                         (value 15 marks)

 

            Will is a law lecturer at the University, teaching the second-year course LA 203. One day, discussing the relationship of law and business, he mentions that the limitation period for contractual claims is three years – if a person who thinks he or she is a victim of a contract violation does not sue within three years, the claim is no longer valid

One of the students in the class is Anna. On a visit home at Christmas, an uncle tells her of his disappointing refrigerator. Since a little while after he bought it, it used an enormous amount of electricity and never got very cold.

“When exactly did you get it?” asked Anna. “I bought it, let’s see, yes, almost exactly four years ago. Present for your aunt, really,” he replied. “Ah then, it’s too late, uncle,” Anna said. She explained to him what Will had said about limitation periods.

As a result of that discussion, the uncle, who could not afford the electricity, got rid of the refrigerator by giving it to a distant cousin.

Now, in reality, the uncle’s purchase was a “consumer purchase”, and in his jurisdiction there is legislation extending the limitation period for consumer purchase contracts to four years. If he had returned the refrigerator to the store where he bought it within a week of his conversation with Anna, which he was able to do easily, he would have received the full price back. That price was $500.

Anna eventually realised this, and complained to her lecturer Will. He said he was sorry for her uncle. “In fact,” he continued, “I’ll even help you make up the $480 to him – if you give me a good argument why, in tort law, I owe it to him.”

What should she say?

 

 

 

 

 

 

4.                                                                                                                        (value 10 marks)

 

            In every country in the Pacific, leafy vegetables are sold in open-air markets. Suppose that in your jurisdiction there is a species of snail which commonly crawls over the leaves of vegetables, and sometimes, although rarely, deposits meningitis germs in its slime. (There actually is such a snail on some Pacific islands.) The disease ‘meningitis’ is sometimes merely incapacitating, sometimes life-threatening. Plants like lettuce and island cabbage can be cleaned to remove any slime, although it must be done with detergent; also, they can be grown in water tanks rather than in the ground, which allows the grower to keep off any snails, but of course this is expensive.

            Suppose that a British tourist buys some lettuce at a market stall, eats it in a sandwich, and falls sick with meningitis. The tourist sues the vendor in negligence.

If the court decides that the vendor had a duty of care, and there was a causal link between the lettuce and the illness, and that the purchase was made in the usual way (nothing said about snails or meningitis), should it hold that the duty of care was breached?

 

 

 

5.                                                                                                                        (value 10 marks)

 

            The governing authority of your jurisdiction’s capital decided to clean up and beautify the town this year, in honour of the centennial of Edward VII‘s accession to the throne. They announce that this should attract British tourists.

            Part of the beautification project is to repaint every streetlight or traffic-sign post, manhole cover, and city-owned fencing, in red and blue. This is done by a crew of city employees, who are making their way around town with their paint and equipment. One evening they finish for the day in front of Bali’s house. It’s a Friday, so they’re in a bit of a hurry to get away, and they leave large paint-cans near his entrance (but not on his property).

            After dark, Bali arrives home with his family, from a wedding rehearsal. Sara, the daughter who is going to be married, is still in the wedding dress Bali bought for her. Walking from the roadside into the yard, she bumps into one of the paint-cans . . . and the thousand-dollar dress is ruined.

            Bali has come to see you, the lawyer. He wants to sue the city for the value of the dress. He says it was all their fault: the whole centennial idea is stupid (in fact, it’s not even the right year) and the painting project is quite unnecessary; and not only were the cans left where people could knock into them, but the lids were not properly secured.

            If you are satisfied that Sara was in no way careless, does Bali have a case in negligence?

 

 

 

6.         Answer either A  or  B.                                                                           (value 5 marks)

 

 

            A.        As you have read in judicial decisions and in academic commentary, at English common law there is no ‘Good-Samaritan duty’. That is, a person is under no duty of care in negligence to assist someone he or she knows is in need of help, even if the need is great and the person is capable of helping with little risk or expense.

            Suppose this principle came up in a case in your jurisdiction. What argument(s) could you make that it should not be adopted as part of your jurisdiction’s law?

 

 

OR

 

 

            B.        Pila lived on a very small island, 20 kilometres from the nearest land. One day he was out fishing in his canoe, while all his family was away. On his return he saw a group of men on shore. He recognized them as belonging to a family with which he had a bitter land dispute – and they were waving what appeared to be spears, or heavy sticks. When he paddled toward his house they moved along the shore, always at the point opposite him. They kept this up no matter where he went, for the rest of the afternoon, until it was getting dark. Then they got into a motorized boat and drove away. Pila paddled ashore.

            Pila consulted a cousin about legal recourses, who told him the men committed no assault because they were never close enough to be a realistic threat. It is a fact that Pila was never in range of a spear, and knew that.

Now he has come to you, and asks, “Is it true that at common law, and apart from the trespass on our land, these men committed no tort at all against me?”