Gould v. North Kitsap Business Park Management, LLC, 192 Wash.App. 1021 (2016)
In assessing whether to impose liability upon North Kitsap for negligence, it is critical to determine the issue that the case study reveals. Thus, the main issues are whether North Kitsap owed a duty of care to Gould, whether it was in breach of that duty; and whether the breach made Gould suffer injuries.
One of the fundamental principles under common law for the imposition of a duty of care is the neighbor principle. The neighbor principle was enunciated in the case of Donoghue v Stevenson [1932] AC 562. The ratio in the case was that a person is deemed to owe a duty of care to another person (neighbor) if the former can foresee that his acts or omission can cause injury to the neighbor. The case study reveals that the concrete wheel stop was under the care of North Kitsap; thus, applying the neighbor principle, the former ought to have contemplated the likely harm to be caused by its invisibility. North Kitsap, therefore, owed a duty of care to Gould.
As was held in the Donoghue case, a defendant is deemed to have breached the duty of care by acting below the standards. Against this backdrop, the failure invisibility of the concrete due to the lack of paint and mark points out that North Kitsap was in breach of the duty of care owed to Gould.
Having found that there was a breach of the question, as was held in Re Polemis and Furness, Withy & Co [1921] 3 KB 560, the question to pose is whether Gould suffered an injury due to the defendants’ negligence. Since it is provided that the cause of Gould’s injury is blamed for tripling over the invisible concrete, causation is thus proved. The finding is that North Kitsap is liable to Gould for negligence.
Works Cited
Donoghue v Stevenson [1932] AC 562.
Re Polemis and Furness, Withy & Co [1921] 3 KB 560.