Exam 7: Business Torts and Product Liability

When considering the risk-utility balance, courts consider:

Producers who do not know of that their products are potentially dangerous, because such dangers are not revealed until after years of use, are not liable for damages.

There are no defenses available in strict liability cases; manufacturers must pay whenever a consumer is injured.

Strict liability based on express warranties was applied originally to alcohol and tobacco products.

The consumer must purchase the (defective) product directly from the manufacturer in order to prevail in strict liability based on express warranty.

In MacPherson v. Buick, where the wheel on a new Buick collapsed, causing the car to crash, injuring MacPherson, the court of appeals held MacPherson could sue Buick because:

A study found that plaintiffs in Japan win a much smaller percentage of tort liability suits than do American plaintiffs.

In Gieseke v. IDCA, Gieseke formed a company to compete with his old employer and worked with one of the former owners of his old employer in the new company. His former employer moved some of the equipment of the new company and changed its mailing address without permission of Gieseke or his partner. When Gieseke sued, the courts held that the former employer acted properly to recover property and information improperly taken by Gieseke..

To win a case based on strict liability against a producer, the plaintiff must show that the product was defective, that a defect in it caused it to be dangerous, and the defect was the proximate cause of the injury.

The ____ doctrine holds manufacturers liable to consumers injured by defective products regardless of whether the manufacturer exercised all reasonable care or not.

The rule concerning ultrahazardous activities has been applied to:

The legal standard articulated in MacPherson v. Buick Motor, regarding negligence in of producers of products dominated product liability law until:

One element of fraud or intentional misrepresentation is scienter. That means:

Since the Greenman v. Yuba Power Products decision, strict liability in tort has meant intentional harms committed by manufacturers against consumers.

MacPherson v. Buick Motor Co. introduced the rule of negligence in tort for consumer products.

Worden entered into an agreement that allowed Yazdianpour to be the exclusive seller of Safebood Technologies patented products outside of the United States. Worden knew that the patents were only valid in the United States, but did not tell Yazdianpour who learned that fact when he tried to sell licenses for the products. He sued Worden for fraud. The appeals court held that Worden could:​

Parties engaging in ultrahazardous activities are liable for injuries:

In which of the following cases discussed in the text was the manufacturer held liable based on failure to warn:

A manufacturer of a commercial french-frying machine was sued after someone using the machine reached in to retrieve an item that had fallen out of his shirt pocket. The plaintiff was seriously burned as a result. The appellate court upheld the trial court's decision that imposed liability on the manufacturer based on:

In Parish v. ICON, where a man was seriously injured when using a trampoline, the courts held that the product was inherently defective because of the high rate of injury.