Acme Corp Case Analysis

ACME Corp Case Analysis

Related Parties

There are three main parties in the fact scenario. These are the ACME Corp, the Factory, and May.  These three parties are linked to Peter’s cause of action either directly or indirectly. The Corp carelessly allows the factory to spew toxic chemicals into the environment. The factory is responsible for the actual spewing of the chemicals into the environment against, and May endangers the life of the fetus knowingly. These three are likely to be found liable for different offenses leading to Peters’ disability.  

Legal areas and principles

The relevant legal areas are environmental law and tort law. Environmental law principles regulate pollution caused by the spilling of the chemicals into the environment and address the consequences arising thereof. Criminal law aspect address the corps violation of public duty resulting in endangering of other people’s lives.  Tort law would also concern itself with the ACME Corp carelessness which is classifiable as negligent behavior in work risking other people’s life (Singh, 2014, p.24).

Application of relevant legal issue

The legal concept of toxic tort will apply in the above circumstances; this is a tort where the claim is a personal injury, where the claimant alleges physical harm due to exposure to a toxic substance. These include the discharge into the environment. Both toxic torts and environmental suits share a lot of similarities. In both the defendants are accused of releasing toxic substances into the environment which cause harm to the plaintiffs (Cranor, 2016, p. 68).

For the decision phase, the court will make consideration based on the type of suit Peter files in the court. Peter can either file a toxic tort or environmental lawsuit against the factory under vicarious liability alleging negligence by their worker. In such a case, Peter has to prove that his disability is directly connected to the company’s action that his disability is a direct result of the company’s action. The other approach calls for Peter to sue his mother as well for negligence. This arises out of the fact that his mother chose to smoke despite her knowledge of the potential harm posed by her behavior to the unborn child. In such a case Peter will be citing her mother’s recklessness as the proximate cause of his disability.

Outcome of the fact scenario and validation

The court is likely to arrive at different conclusions depending on the approach chosen by the plaintiff.  The most important thing to the court in deciding this matter is causation. For the court to determine the case it has to rely on the exact cause of Peters disability. It is upon Peter to illustrate the right causation if he is to succeed in his claim. Causation shall be different in every approach and so shall be the likely outcomes. We look at each approach independently and predict the possible decision the court is destined to arrive at in each scenario.