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Vicarious Liability - From: 1200 To: 1799
This page lists 4 cases, and was prepared on 02 April 2018.
ÂTurberville v Stampe (1698) 1 Ld Raym 264
1698
Holt CJ
Vicarious Liability
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Hern v Nichols [1700] 1 Salkeld 289
1700
Sir John Holt
Vicarious Liability
Sir John Holt discussed the liability of an employer for the acts of his employee: "seeing somebody must be a loser by this deceit, it is more reasonable that he that employs and puts a trust and confidence in the deceiver should be a loser, than a stranger."
1 Citers
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Mitchil v Alestree [1726] EngR 590; (1726) 1 Vent 295; (1726) 86 ER 190 (B)
1726
Twisden, Wylde JJ
Negligence, Vicarious Liability, Animals
In an action upon the case brought against the defendant, for that he did ride an horse into a place called Lincoln’s Inn Fields, (a place much frequented by the King’s subjects, and unapt for such purposes) for the breaking and taming of him, and that the horse was so unruly, that he broke from the defendant, and ran over the plaintiff, and grievously hurt him, to his damages, &C.
Upon not guilty pleaded, and a verdict for the plaintiff, it was moved by Simpson in arrest of judgment, that here is no cause of action: for it appears by the declaration, that the mischief which happened was against the defendant’s will, and so damnum absque injuria; and then not shewn what right the King’s subjects had to walk there; and if a man digs a pit in a common into which one that has no right to come there, falls in, no action lies in such case.
Curia contra, It was the defendant’s fault, to bring a wild horse into such a place where mischief might probably be done, by reason of the concourse of people. Lately, in this Court an action was brought against a butcher, who had made an ox run from his stall and gored the plaintiff; and this was alledged in the declaration to be in default of penning of him.
Wylde said: "If a man hath an unruly horse in his stable, and leaves open the stable-door, whereby the horse goes forth and does mischief; an action lies against the master."
Twisden: "If one hath kept a tame fox, which gets loose and grows wild, he that kept him before shall not answer for the damage the fox doth after he hath lost him, and he hath resumed his wild nature."
1 Citers
[ Commonlii ]
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Rex v Huggins and Barnes (1730) 2 Str 883; (1730) 2 Ld Raym 1574; (1730) Fitz 177
1730
KBD
Lord Raymond LCJ, Lord Chief Justice
Prisons, Crime, Vicarious Liability
The defendant Huggins was warden of the Fleet Prison. A prisoner, Arne, died in 1725. Barnes, a gaoler had put him in a room "without fire, chamber-pot or close-stool, the walls being damp and unwholesome, and the room built over the common sewer". Thus confined, Arne "by reason of his imprisonment in the said room sickened, and by duress thereof died" 44 days later. Huggins was indicted and tried at the Old Bailey for his murder, under an allegation that as warden of the Fleet he "had the care and custody of the prisoners committed thither", that "Barnes was his servant, employed by him in taking care of the prisoners", that at the time of Arne's imprisonment Barnes and Huggins knew the room to be as before described and that Huggins was "aiding and abetting Barnes in committing the said felony and murder." The jury had returned a special verdict finding that Barnes was in fact the servant of Huggins' deputy, Gibbon, and that Huggins had visited the cell only once, some 15 days before Arne died. Held: In a certiorari in the Kings Bench, the judges concluded that Barnes, if indicted, would, on the facts as found by the jury, have been guilty of murder, but that Huggins was not guilty.
Lord Raymond LCJ said: "Though he was warden, yet it being found, that there was a deputy; he is not, as warden, guilty of the facts committed under the authority of his deputy. He shall answer as superior for his deputy civilly, but not criminally. It has been settled, that though a sheriff must answer for the offences of his gaoler civilly, that is, he is subject in an action, to make satisfaction to the party injured; yet he is not to answer criminally for the offences of his under-officer. He only is criminally punishable, who immediately does the act, or permits it to be done. Hale's P. C. 114. So that if an act be done by an under-officer, unless it is done by the command or direction, or with the consent of the principal, the principal is not criminally punishable for it. In this case the fact was done by Barnes; and it no where appears in the special verdict, that the prisoner at the Bar ever commanded, or directed, or consented to this duress of imprisonment, which was the cause of Arne's death."
In Strange's report: "It is a point not to be disputed, but that in criminal cases the principal is not answerable for the act of the deputy, as he is in civil cases: they must each answer for their own acts, and stand or fall by their own behaviour. All the authors that treat of criminal proceedings, proceed on the foundation of this distinction; that to affect the superior by the act of the deputy, there must be the command of the superior, which is not found in this case."
Fitz-Gibbons reported: "The act of the deputy cannot criminally affect the principal; so that unless the act be by command, consent, or privity of the principal, so as to make him an abettor, he cannot be guilty."
1 Citers
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