Duty Based on Undertaking PDF

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Torts I and II
Notes from Class/Casebook
Lecture Notes...

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Torts I and II Notes from Class/Casebook

1) Duty Based on Undertaking §42. Duty based on Undertaking An actor who undertakes to render service to another that the actor knows or should know reduce the risk of physical harm to the other has a duty of reasonable care to the other in conducting the undertaking if (a) The failure to exercise such care increases the risk of harm beyond that which existed the undertaking or (b) The person to whom the services are rendered or another relies on the actor’s exercising reasonable care in the undertaking

(a) Law imposes on the good Samaritan the duty to act with due care once he has undertaken rescue operations (a) Would be rescuers will rest their oars in the expectation that effective aid is being rendered 2) Duty Based on Special Relationship §314A. Special Relations Giving Rise to a Duty to Aid or Protect (1) A common carrier is under a duty to its passengers to take reasonable action: a. To protect them against unreasonable risk of physical harm, and b. To give the first aid after it knows or has reason to know that they are ill or injured, and to care for them until they can be cared for by others (2) An innkeeper is under a similar duty to guests (3) A possessor of land who holds it open to the public is under a similar duty to members of the public who enter in response to his initiation (4) One who is required by law to take or who voluntarily takes the custody of another under circumstances such as to deprive the other of his normal opportunities for protection us under a similar duty to the other

(a) Baker v. Fenneman & Brown Properties LLC. (a) Baker goes into a Taco Bell. Hands money to the cashier and the fell backward. He was knocked unconscious and began having convulsions. Baker claims when he regained consciousness, he stood back up and then he fell forward and was knocked

unconscious. Knocked out teeth and had laceration on his chin. Baker contends that Taco Bell owed him a duty under the §314A (b) Indiana standard for imposing duty: invitee and instrumentality causing the injury belonged to the defendant • The instrumentality requirement has been extended to where the illness or injury is due to natural causes, pure accident, acts of a 3rd person, or negligence of the plaintiff (c) “Taco Bell had a duty, as a business that invited members of the public to enter its facility, to provide reasonable assistance to Baker, even though Taco Bell was not responsible for Baker’s illness” (d) Twerski on Torts: “I don’t know what they are talking about” (b) Stockenberger v. United States (a) Stockenberger was a diabetic prone to hypoglycemic attacks. Stockenberg had been visibly ill all day on the day that he died. Stockenberger says that he wants to leave work. One of his co-workers gave him an Ensure and urged him to stay until he felt better. Stockenberger decided to drive home. He drove erratically and crashed into a tree and died. Plaintiff claims that the prison’s inaction in allowing Stockenberger to drive home in his condition was a breach of a duty of care (b) Exceptions to the no-duty rule: • 1) where the rescuer had explicitly or implicitly a contractual relationship to rescue plaintiff • 2) the victim was in the rescuer’s custody and without access to alternative rescuers • 3) The victim’s peril has been caused by the rescuer (c) The exceptions to the no duty rule would have to be enlarged to encompass the case where an employee became ill at the workplace for reasons unrelated to his work and the employer fails to use due care to treat the illness...