Case Summaries
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Rose and Frank v Crompton - 1923
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Intention to create legal relations in the formation of contracts. An American company and English company entered into a sole agency agreement in 1913 for the sale of paper goods in the USA....
Hill v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
The plaintiff’s 20-year-old daughter was attacked at night in a city street and died from her injuries. The defendant was a chief constable of the area in which the street was located....
American Cyanamid v Ethicon
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Guidelines and the issues to be taken into account by the court for the grant of an interim injunction. The issue on these facts was primarily the extent of any substantive claim necessary for the grant of an interim injunction....
Tulk v Moxhay - Case Brief
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Established that there are occasions in which equitable covenants can bind future purchasers of property and ‘run with the land’. The claimant, Tulk, owned several properties in Leicester Square, London, and sold one such property to another....
R v Dudley and Stephens - 1884
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
The availability to the defence of necessity for murder. The two defendants and a boy between the ages of seventeen and eighteen were cast away in an open boat at sea following a storm....
Lister v Hesley Hall Ltd - 2002
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Employer’s vicarious liability for personal injury caused by torts committed by employees. A warden was employed at an annex of a boarding school for boys and responsible for the day-to-day running of the school...
R v Ahluwalia - 1992
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
The definition in R v Duffy [1949] 1 All ER 932 as “sudden and temporary loss of control” is still good law as it is a readily understandable phrase. However, in cases of abused wives, the harmful act is often a result of a “slowburn” reaction, rather than immediate loss of self-control. ...
Anns v Merton London Borough Council
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
The availability of a duty of care in negligence. The local authority approved building plans for a block of flats and the flats were built later that year. ...
Airedale NHS Trust v Bland
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Doctors have a duty to act in the best interests of their patients but this does not necessarily require them to prolong life. On the basis that there was no potential for improvement, the treatment Bland was receiving was deemed not to be in his best interests....
Nettleship v Weston 1971
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Case Summary of Nettleship v Weston [1971] 2 QB 691. The case of Nettleship v Weston1 concerned the concept of a duty of care which is a fundamental element of the tort of negligence....
Jones v Padavatton - 1969
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Agreement for mother to maintain daughter; whether intention to create legal relations. A mother and daughter came to an arrangement whereby the mother agreed to maintain her daughter if she agreed to study for the bar....
Raffles v Wichelhaus - 1864
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
There had been no consensus ad idem or meeting of the minds between the parties to form a binding contract. The objective test made it clear that a reasonable person would not have been able to identify with certainty what ship had been agreed on....
Tinn v Hoffman and Co 1873
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
It was held in this case that there was no contract between Mr Tinn and Mr Hoffman for the iron. The cross offers were made simultaneously and without knowledge of one another; this was not a contract that would bind the parties for the iron....
R v Cheshire - 1991
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Chain of causation – Death in hospital following shooting. Cheshire shot a man during the course of an argument. The victim was taken to hospital to have surgery and shortly after developed respiratory issues....
Hill v Baxter - 1958
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Insufficient evidence to rely on defence of automatism in dangerous driving case. The defendant (B) was charged with dangerous driving. He claimed to have no memory from an early point in his journey to immediately after the incident....
Routledge v Grant 1828
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
The court held that the original letter did not bind the defendant to keep the offer open for a full six weeks, and as such it had been validly withdrawn by the defendant, and the claimant’s purported acceptance was ineffective....
Cundy v Lindsay
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
The case concerned whether a mistake as to the identity of a contracting party was so fundamental so as to negate the consent of the other party. The foundation of contract law is premised on mutual agreement, i.e., agreeing on the same thing in the same sense, popularly referred to as consensus ad idem....
Bell v Lever Bros - 1932
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Only a mistake to the identity of the parties or of subject matter to the contract, as well as an item’s quality, would be able to successfully negate consent and therefore void a contract, as if it had never existed. The mistake must be essential to the identity of the contract....
Hong Kong Fir Shipping Ltd v Kisen Kaisha - 1962
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Construction of contractual terms as ‘conditions’ and repudiatory breach of contract. Ship owners let the vessel, Hongkong fir, to charterers for a period of 24 months. Clause 1 of the contract obliged the owners to deliver a “seaworthy” vessel and Clause 3 further obliged them to maintain the vessel’s seaworthiness and good condition....
R v Moloney - 1985
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
The House of Lords allowed Moloney’s appeal. He had not intended to kill his stepfather. Knowledge of foresight of the consequences of an action were to be considered at best material from which a crime of intent may be inferred. ...
R v Stone and Dobinson - 1977
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Regarding the issue of negligence, the Court of Appeal held that in order to ground a conviction for manslaughter the defendants must have been ‘grossly negligent’ in respect of their breach of duty. ...
Entick v Carrington [1765]
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
An individual’s rights over their property. On 11th November 1762 the defendant and three other named individuals entered a property belonging to the claimant and spent four hours there searching all of the rooms, breaking open boxes and going through all of the claimant’s possessions....
Thornton v Shoe Lane Parking - 1971
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Automatic ticket machine at car park; incorporation of terms displayed inside. Thornton drove his car to a car park. Outside the car park, the prices were displayed and a notice stated cars were parked at their owner’s risk...
Pao On v Lau Yiu Long - Past Consideration
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
The plaintiffs (P) owned the shares of a private company which owned a building that the defendants (D) wanted to buy. The defendants were majority shareholders in a public company. P agreed to sell their shares in the private company to D so that D could acquire the building...
Hunter v Canary Wharf
Example case summary. Last modified: 28th Sep 2021
Television signal, actionable nuisance, property right requirement for claimants. A large tower was constructed in the Docklands area of East London which now goes by the name of One Canada Square...
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