Case Study Question

Susan lives at Willingdon Apartments in Burnaby, BC.She rents her apartment, and the owner of the apartment building is Willingdon Apartments Ltd. ("Willingdon"). Susan has been living at Willingdon Apartments for five years, but is preparing to move to a new home very soon.

After five years, Susan has accumulated a lot of belongings, especially boxes and boxes of paper. The living room of Susan's apartment is full of papers in boxes and papers not in boxes piled on the floor. The piles of paper are 5 feet (1.5 metres) tall throughout the living room.

One day, Susan turns on a lamp in the living room as it begins to get dark and goes on the kitchen to boil water to make some tea. She comes back into the living room two minutes later and discovers it is on fire! The heat from the lamp caused paper in one of the nearby piles to set on fire. Susan tried to dump some water on the fire - there was no sprinkler system in the apartments- but the fire was too big, so she pulled the fire alarm and ran out of the building.

The firefighters arrive soon after and put out the fire, but not before Susan's apartment and some nearby apartment units are badly damaged from the smoke and fire.

Willingdon is suing Susan for negligence for causing fire damage to its apartment building.

Discuss whether Willingdon will be successful in a negligence claim against Susan. In answering this question, be sure to explain and apply all elements of negligence. Discuss defenses or other concepts only if they are relevant to the facts of the case. Use the IRAC format.

Sample Answer

Issue: Is Susan liable for negligence for causing fire damage to Willingdon Apartments?

Rule: In order to establish negligence, the plaintiff must prove four elements: duty of care, breach of duty, causation, and damages.

Application:

1. Duty of care: Susan, as a tenant, owes a duty of care to Willingdon Apartments Ltd. to take reasonable precautions to prevent foreseeable harm to the property. This duty includes the obligation to maintain the apartment in a safe condition.
2. Breach of duty: Susan's living room was filled with piles of paper that were not properly stored, creating a hazardous condition. By allowing the accumulation of flammable materials, Susan failed to exercise reasonable care to prevent fire hazards, thus breaching her duty of care.
3. Causation: The fire was caused by the heat from the lamp igniting the nearby pile of papers. Susan's failure to properly store and manage her belongings directly led to the fire and subsequent damage to Willingdon Apartments.
4. Damage suffered is foreseeable: The apartment building and nearby units suffered significant damage as a result of the fire. This includes both property damage and potential harm to occupants.

Conclusion: Based on the analysis of the elements of negligence, it can be concluded that Susan breached her duty of care by failing to properly store her belongings, which directly caused the fire and subsequent damages to Willingdon Apartments. Therefore, Susan is likely to be held liable for negligence in causing the fire damage.

Sample Format:

Negligence Assignment: Evaluation of an IRAC answer

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Issue

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Rules

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Application

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Conclusion

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Defenses

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