McGuire
v. Almy
Supreme
Judicial Court of Massachusetts, 1937.
297
Prosser,
p. 25-27
Facts: Almy was an insane person
under the care of McGuire. The plaintiff
entered a room where the defendant was having a fit and tried to grab a leg of
a chair from her. The defendant hit her
with the leg. The plaintiff sued for battery.
Issue: Is an insane person liable
for their torts?
Rule:
Though
there wasn’t an established rule in
Analysis:
The court
reasons that if children can be liable for torts, insane people ought to be
liable as well. As a policy matter, the court
says that if insane persons are liable for torts, it will make those caring for
them more careful to keep them from hurting others.
Conclusion:
The court upheld
the verdict for the plaintiff.
Notes
and Questions
1. A person who
is mentally ill may intend to hit Zarg the Space God and instead hit Aunt
Nellie. The doctrine of transferred
intent will say that they’re liable for hitting Aunt Nellie even though they
didn’t form the intent to hit her in particular. Intent seems to be different from fault, and
fault isn’t necessary for an intentional tort, but fault is harder to argue
for.
2. Wouldn’t it be
simpler if the requirements for criminal and civil law were harmonized?
3. I would be
interested in the view of experts in mental health and cognitive science.
4. The policy
implication would be that those employed to care for a mentally ill person
should be capable of taking care of themselves as well as the ill person.
5. If you can
prove someone doesn’t know what the truth is, it seems to make sense that you
could show it was impossible for them to deceive anyone.
6. It seems like
you can have negligence actions almost all the time.
7. If you’re
drunk, it would seem that it’s less of an excuse than being insane, especially
if you chose to get drunk. It’s one
thing to say that you can’t form intent, but it seems as though being drunk
just sort of mutates your intent.