Monday, September 19, 2011

Law School #2

Vaughan v Menlove
Court of Common Pleas, 1837

"[Defendant built a hay rick near the boundary of his land not far from the plaintiff's cottages.  It was alleged that the rick was likely to ignite, thereby endangering the plaintiff's cottages, of which the defendant had notice; that the defendant was negligent in maintaining the rick in this dangerous condition and that the rick did ignite and the fire spread to plaintiff's land, burning his cottages.  Defendant denied that he was negligent.]"

I wonder: who is liable for the spontaneous combustion of a drummer who perhaps happens to cause damage to the venue or audience during a concert?

2 comments:

  1. Clearly, the plaintiff was just trying to collect the insurance on his cottages anyway.

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  2. Oh, yeah. The real idiot here is the Defendant. The circumstances of his actions are indicative of negligence to such an extreme as to no longer even be negligent but intentional. I think he wanted to damage the neighbor's cottages. Mostly, I just loved the wording, that so reminded me of spontaneously combusting drummers in "Spinal Tap."

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