| Battery (tort) |
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At Common Law , battery is the Tort of intentionally (or in Australia negligently) and voluntarily touching another person without lawful excuse or justification. It is a form of Trespass To The Person . As distinguished from Assault , battery requires an actual contact. Battery is actionable per se, meaning that a claim for the tort may succeed without proof of damage. In many jurisdictions, to constitute battery a contact need not be 'harmful' or 'offensive'. Courts in England and Australia, following the principle 'plain and incontestable', 'that every person's body is inviolate', have held that battery is available where a plaintiff suffers 'not only...physical injury but...any form of physical molestation' (Collins v Wilcock {Link without Title} 1 WLR 1172 at 1177 per Goff LJ). Even benevolently motivated and ameliorative contact, such as the administration of medical treatment, will thus comprise battery unless undertaken with lawful defence. This general rule is qualified by the general exception that contact incidental to and generally accepted in modern life is not battery. In those jurisdictions that do require it be 'harmful' or offensive', a contact will fulfil the former criterion if it injures, disfigures, impairs, or causes pain. Contact is deemed "offensive" if it would offend a reasonable person’s sense of personal dignity, or alternatively, if he or she would not "seek out" or "want" it. Battery need not require body-to-body contact. Any volitional movement, such as throwing an object toward another, can constitute battery. Touching an object "intimately connected" to a person (such as an object he or she is holding) can also be battery. Intent can be transferred with battery, i.e. a person swings to hit one person and misses and hits another. He or she is still liable for a battery. The standard defenses to trespass to the person, namely Necessity and Consent , apply to battery. As practical examples, under the first, a physician may touch a person without that person's consent in order to render medical aid to him or her in an emergency. Under the second, a person who has, either expressly or impliedly, consented to participation in a contact sport cannot claim in battery against other participants for a contact permitted by the rules of that sport. SEE ALSO |