No, a tort, in common law jurisdictions, is a civil wrong which unfairly causes someone else to suffer loss or harm resulting in legal liability for the person who commits the tortious act, called a tortfeasor. Although crimes may be torts, the cause of legal action is not necessarily a crime as the harm may be due to negligence which does not amount to criminal negligence. The victim of the harm can recover their loss as damages in a lawsuit. In order to prevail, the plaintiff in the lawsuit must show that the actions or lack of action was the legally recognizable cause of the harm. The equivalent of tort in civil law jurisdictions is delict.
Legal injuries are not limited to physical injuries and may include emotional, economic, or reputational injuries as well as violations of privacy, property, or constitutional rights. Torts comprise such varied topics as auto accidents, false imprisonment, defamation, product liability, copyright infringement, and environmental pollution (toxic torts). While many torts are the result of negligence, tort law also recognizes intentional torts, where a person has intentionally acted in a way that harms another, and in a few cases (particularly for product liability in the United States) "strict liability" which allows recovery without the need to demonstrate negligence.
Tort law is different from criminal law in that: (1) torts may result from negligent but not intentional or criminal actions and (2) tort lawsuits have a lower burden of proof such as preponderance of evidence rather than beyond a reasonable doubt. Sometimes a plaintiff may prevail in a tort case even if the person who caused the harm was acquitted in an earlier criminal trial. For example, O.J. Simpson was acquitted in criminal court and later found liable for the tort of wrongful death.
As shown in the author's definition of a tort, a right of action for tort arises where there has been a violation of a right given by law, while a right of action for breach of contract exists where there has been a violation of some right acquired by contract. These two fields, however, overlap. The same action may constitute a breach of contract and also a tort. In such cases, there is an election of remedies, and the party injured may sue either in tort or contract. The cases where this double remedy exists will be shown in the treatment of the various subdivisions of this subject. A common example of such cases are found in contracts which one party is induced to enter into by deceit.
A few legal differences in the cases of action of tort (ex delictu) and of contract (ex contractu) may here be noted. Joint tort-feasors are generally severally liable and no right of contribution exists among them;15 infants who are incapable of contracting are nevertheless generally liable for their torts;16 at common law actions of tort will never survive the death of either party.
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