Tort law is a body of law that addresses, and provides remedies for, civil wrongs not arising out of
contractual obligations.
[1] A person who suffers legal
damages may be able to use tort law to receive compensation from someone who is
legally responsible, or "liable," for those injuries. Generally speaking, tort law defines what constitutes a legal injury and establishes the circumstances under which one person may be held liable for another's injury. Torts cover intentional acts and accidents. In contrast to criminal law (in which the offense is against the State and the State is the plaintiff), in tort law, the offense is against a person and that person is the plaintiff.
For instance, Alice steals a ball and accidentally hits Brenda in the eye. Brenda may sue Alice for losses occasioned by the accident (e.g., costs of medical treatment, lost income during time off work, and pain and suffering). Whether or not Brenda wins her suit depends on if she can prove Alice engaged in tortious conduct. Here, Brenda would attempt to prove Alice had a duty and failed to exercise the standard of care which a reasonable person would render in throwing the ball.
One of the main topics of the substance of tort law is determining the "standard of care"—a legal phrase that means distinguishing between when conduct is or is not tortious. Put another way, the big issue is whether a person suffers the loss from his own injury, or whether it gets transferred to someone else.
Returning to the example above, if Alice threw the ball at Brenda purposely, Brenda could sue for the intentional tort of battery (and the action might also, separately, be a crime against the State). If it was an accident, Brenda must prove negligence. To do this, Brenda must show that her injury was reasonably foreseeable, that Alice owed Brenda a duty of care not to hit her with the ball, and that Alice failed to meet the standard of care required.
