Category Archives: Negligence
Catherine Brown and others, ‘The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Duty and Standard of Care in Legal Practice: A “Disrupting Moment” for Laws That Protect Consumers from Economic Harm?’
ABSTRACT The increasing integration of artificial intelligence (‘AI’) into legal practice introduces a spectrum of automation goals, ranging from systems that merely assist lawyers in decision-making to those that aim to provide fully autonomous legal advice. In particular, the rise of generative conversational artificial intelligence (‘GenAI’), such as ChatGPT, is fundamentally changing the nature of […]
Kim and Kim, ‘Artificial Intelligence and the Paradox of Professional Liability’
ABSTRACT Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping professional services and complicating liability design. We develop a framework where experts differing in hidden ability adopt AI and choose effort. AI lowers accident risk but raises compliance costs. Even with asymmetric information, strict liability induces efficient AI adoption and care but negligence induces shirking and inefficient adoption, unless […]
Merle Hope Weiner, ‘Reconsidering Negligent Infliction of Emotional Distress for Loss or Injury to a Pet’
ABSTRACT This Article contends that a pet owner should be able to recover for emotional distress when the pet owner had a special relationship with the defendant, such as a veterinarian, and the defendant’s gross negligence injured or killed the owner’s pet. The Article argues that the American Law Institute (ALI) unnecessarily and improperly foreclosed […]
Chen Meng Lam, ‘The continued search for clarity on the scope of a doctor’s duty of care’
ABSTRACT The scope of duty test for determining liability in cases of clinical negligence is, as confirmed in Meadows v Khan [2022] AC 852, governed by the purpose of the duty, which is in turn determined by the risks of harm against which the doctor has the duty to guard. While Meadows made clear that […]
Farish Percy, ‘“It’s Not My Fault”: Mississippi Employers Should Not Be Permitted To Avoid Direct Liability By Admitting Vicarious Liability In The Event Of Employee Negligence’
ABSTRACT Without thorough consideration, and in reliance on a single federal district court case which made an Erie guess, the Mississippi Court of Appeals summarily adopted the preemption rule in 2017 and summarily affirmed it in 2024. Pursuant to the rule, employers who are sued for vicarious liability and direct negligence (negligent hiring, negligent training, […]
‘Costs of clinical negligence’ (National Audit Office)
BACKGROUND TO THE REPORT Clinical negligence is a breach of a legal duty of care which directly caused harm to the patient. If clinical negligence has occurred, a patient or their representative may claim for damages against the clinicians or their employers. NHS services are legally liable for any clinical negligence and must pay compensation […]
Chris Reed, ‘Autonomy, Responsibility and Agentic AI’
ABSTRACT Some have argued that AI technologies which have sufficient autonomy to direct their own actions create a ‘responsibility gap’, meaning that those who deploy those technologies no longer have responsibility for their actions. Agentic AI has a higher level of autonomy than predecessor AIs, and is thus a good test case for examining whether […]
Luke Meier, ‘Failure-to-Warn Suits Against Pharmaceutical Companies: Physician Testimony, Causation, and Summary Judgment’
ABSTRACT It is hard to win a tort suit against a pharmaceutical company. The theory that a drug or medical device has been incorrectly designed is often foreclosed under existing law. A plaintiff pursuing a tort suit based on a warning theory might have her claim preempted by federal law. Even if a plaintiff can […]
Abba Elgujja, ‘Reconstructing Medical Negligence for AI-Driven Care: Toward a Nigerian Standard of Reasoned Justification’
ABSTRACT Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping clinical decision-making in Nigeria, exposing gaps in doctrines built for exclusively human judgment. This article reconstructs medical negligence for AI-driven care by proposing a Nigerian Standard of Reasoned Justification (SRJ) – a unified test that requires empirical competence, logical defensibility, respect for autonomy, and institutional responsibility. Grounded in Okonkwo […]
Omri Ben-Shahar, ‘Safety score liability’
ABSTRACT Data technology is increasingly deployed to assign safety scores to people and products. Could these scores be used to apportion liability for accidents? Instead of liability based on ad-hoc care level (the negligence rule), ‘safety score liability’ imposes liability commensurate with the habitual propensity to behave unsafely. This article describes how such a regime […]