BUSINESS LAW REFLECTION 2
Running head: BUSINESS LAW REFLECTION 1
A Reflection
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Crime
Crime can be either violent or white collar, but regardless of what type of crime it is, crime causes liabilities in the society and should be firmly dealt with at all costs. The protection of crime should safeguard society while ensuring justice as well as protection from false accusations. Crimes are considered a threat to society, and thus they attract heavy penalties when proven beyond reasonable doubt, while civil cases involve disputes between entities regarding legal duties owed to either party.
Criminal acts can either be due to voluntary, an entrapment or a conspiracy. The police thus have a responsibility to gather evidence according to the fourth amendment of the constitution. However, a warrant is required to conduct searches only if there is probable cause. The exclusionary rule is crucial in ensuring the privacy of private citizens is respected as it does not allow the improperly acquired evidence to be used in court to protect the society from the power of government (Beatty and Samuelson, 2012). In case of an arrest, the constitution allows the right to an attorney via the sixth amendment and the double jeopardy rule only allows an entity to be prosecuted only once. The arrested individuals should be arraigned in court.
Crimes are not limited to individuals but also to businesses such as larceny, fraud, online crime, arson, and hacking. These crimes create a threat to the business community. Hacking which is gaining unauthorized access is particularly common and has cost top companies billions of dollars. As a result, most companies have to ensure against hacking. There are also crimes committed by businesses based on the conduct of its representatives such as the making of false statements, money laundering, and racketeering and they are restricted by the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.
Intentional Torts and Business Torts
The constitution allows the freedom of speech, but the same law also has its limits as it dictates that that freedom is used responsibly. Thus statements either written or spoken that harm the reputation of another individual is called defamation. Defamation must achieve the aspects of falsity, communication to the third party, and injury or harm that is as a result.
The restriction of a person’s whereabouts without their consent can be identified as false imprisonment and is common in retail stores after either customers or employees are caught in theft cases. The store may question an individual, but they do not have the right to humiliate or chain a civilian in their store for more than three hours. Assault and battery are also common crimes (Beatty and Samuelson, 2012). Whereas battery remains the unintentional touching of an individual in a harmful manner, while assault is the mere threat to cause a battery
Fraud, on the other hand, is the intentional harm caused to another person due to the use of deception.
An example is when a real estate agent sells a faulty house to an ignorant client. Indeed, it is also a crime to cause personal emotional distress as a result of outrageous conduct. However, the law of tort has a limit on what is referred to as intentional infliction of emotional distress.
In case a plaintiff is successful, they receive financial compensation that is meant to restore the plaintiff in their prior position. An example is a compensation for medical expenses in civil cases, lost wages and trauma caused as a result of the case a plaintiff must submit accompanying evidence to depict the harm caused and the financial implications to be awarded damages. Below are some of the cases that have reflected on business law in practice.
McDonald’s hot coffee case
The hot coffee case involved Liebeck Stella and the McDonald company over a coffee spill that burnt her skin. This case received a lot of publicity and has been used as prime examples for various business-related cases involving large monetary damages. A keen view on the facts of this case and the evidence provided, the court and the judges involved made the right decision. However, most people did not get the real intention of Liebeck suing the company and confused they case with greed for compensation, but this case involved a working-class woman who tried to force the big company makes its products safer.
Stella had offered to settle the matter if the company paid for her $20,000 hospital bills. However, the company only gave her $800. This negligence made her take the next course of action to seek justice from the court following the previous complaints and accusations made about the excessively hot coffee of about 70,000 people. According to Stella’s attorney, S.Reed Morgan, the provided the following evidence before the court to support their complaint: The company sold coffee at 180 to 190 degrees Fahrenheit which is beyond the legal requirement and could cause third degree burns to the skin (McDonald, 2011). Additionally, the attorney said that third-genet=ration burns do not heal without skin grafting and whirlpool treatment that in most cases cost tens of thousands of dollars and causes permanent disfiguration, excess pain and disability of the victim for many years. According to the chairman of engineering and biomechanical of the University of Texas added that this type of burn is unacceptable as it is widely recognized by experts as a dangerous and permanent injury to the skin. McDonald company accepted that it was aware its coffee was hot beyond the consumption temperatures and had received complaints for the last ten years.
Further, witnesses for McDonald said that the consumers are unaware of the extent of risk of serious burns from spilled coffee and the company accepted these complaints but failed to explain why it did not create awareness of these risks associated with its products (McDonald, 2011). Also, the company accepted that its coffee was not fit for consumption because it caused severe scandals when drunk or spilled. The judge Robert Scott gave a verdict saying the company had to be responsible for the burns. Following this ruling, the company reduced the hotness of its coffee to 158 Fahrenheit that could cause the third generation over 60 seconds as compared to the previous ones that caused burns over seven seconds.
From this ruling, I learned that the center for justices and democracy is a non-profit and non-partisan public interest that aims to educate the public about the importance of civil justice system and their rights to fight for a free trial by jury and independent judiciary systems for all Americans.
Hernandez v. Arizona board of regent’s case
Delta Tau is a fraternity with a chapter at the University of Arizona responsible for hosting all social functions throughout the year. Members contributed money to fund these social activities which included buying the alcohol for each event. The fraternity policies allowed all contributing members to drink alcohol regardless of their age. One of the fraternity member, John Rayner who was a minor, but a contributing member of the fraternity could drink excessive alcohol that made him cause an accident by colliding his car with another vehicle driven by Ruben Hernandez who died of serious injuries in 1990 (Schaffer, 2016,). Before Hernandez died, he had filled a case on his injury against John, and later added the pledges among others to his complaint. After his death, the personal representative has substituted the plaintiff, and a claim for wrongful death was included. The judges ruled that the non-lenses aspect alone could not be civilly liable for the accident but strongly held that giving alcohol to a minor was the major offense in this case.
In this case, I consider the summary judgment that the judge applies which is like that used in direct verdict cases. To achieve this goal, the judge should give motions for summary judgment if the facts supporting the claim or defense have very little evidence to present before the court. Additionally, the plaintiffs have set two similar and related theories that hold pledges responsible for Hernandez injuries and death. However, these theories are treated as being coextensive which had to be segregated to better analysis of relevant aspects of each theory. The first plaintiff pledges that all the members of the joint venture were liable because they provided alcohol to a minor. The second plaintiff argues that the pledges are liable because they were involved in a conspiracy within the meaning of restatement and providing a minor with alcohol.
Palsgraf v. Long island railroad case
The case involved the claimant, Palsgraf who stood on a station platform purchasing a ticket when two men ran into the train, and one of them tripped. One of the railway staff ran to help the fallen man while in a hurry that made the fireworks to fall and explode. This explosion made other scales to fall that injured the claimant. The defendant appealed to the supreme court after the court found favor on the claimant in its first ruling.
In the first ruling, Judge Cardozo delivers the majority ruling in favor of pals Graf who had received injuries while awaiting the train on a platform owned by the defendant. The judge said the third party had failed to secure his bag which contained fireworks. However, the employee who jumped to help the fallen man did not know the dangerous items when he threw the box to the next party (“3. The Perils of Analogy: Legal World-Making and Judicial Self-Fashioning in Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad,” 2015). Therefore, the court would hold the defendant liable if the negligence and the harm done to the plaintiff was foreseeable and occurred due to potential negligence. Thereby, there was no connection between the plaintiff injury and the railway employee.
KING v. head start family hair salons Inc. case
Kathy King had worked at the head start for 16 years until she quit the job and became a manager at the sports clips shop. The Head start filed a case claiming that Kathy was violating her noncompetition agreement which prohibited King from venturing into a competitive business within a two-mile radius of the Head Start premises for twelve months after leaving the company. Head Starts had 3o stations within the area making it almost impossible for King to find employment in the hair industry without violating the set agreements (Waxier, 2000). The court should enforce a more reasonable geographical restriction on the hair industry to relieve the undue burden on King and offer some protection to Head Starts.
Bear v. chase case
The plaintiff challenged the decision of the United States District Court which gave a summary judgment on the defendant who was a producer and a director of a company. The plaintiff confirmed that they had agreed with the producer orally that if the show became prosperous, the procure would take care of the plaintiff depending on the quality of his services to the company. However, the court ruled that the plaintiff had failed to demonstrate that the alleged implied constant and distinct terms of price and duration (Schaffer, 2016). The court reversed the granted summary on the plaintiff issues basing the claim on the statutes of limitations but affirmed the district court’s order.
References
Beatty, J. F., & Samuelson, S. S. (2012). Cengage Advantage Books: Introduction to Business Law. Boston, MA: Cengage Learning.
. The Perils of Analogy: Legal World-Making and Judicial Self-Fashioning in Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad. (2015). Creating Legal Worlds, 58-73. doi:10.3138/9781442624504-007
McDonald, M. C. (2011). Coffee. Oxford Bibliographies Online Datasets. doi:10.1093/obo/9780199730414-0102
Schaffer, J. (2016). It is the Business of Laws to Govern. Dialectica, 70(4), 577-588. doi:10.1111/1746-8361.12165
Waxier, T. (2000). Head Start Bureau Update: Head Start Family Literacy Project. PsycEXTRA Dataset. doi:10.1037/e306542003-017