Independent commentary and analysis covering tort law, personal injury, litigation, insurance disputes and developments in American civil law.
In the guides
Tort law
A tort is a private wrong the injured person can take to court. How it differs from a crime and a broken contract, the three kinds of liability, and what a court can award.
Draws on Cornell’s Wex encyclopedia (a secondary reference) and federal court guidance. Tort rules are set state by state.
Read the tort law guidePersonal injury
What you must prove, which losses are easy to document and which are not, how an insurance claim differs from a lawsuit, and why there is no single national deadline.
California court guidance as a labeled example. Not medical malpractice.
Insurance disputes
Sort out whose policy is involved, put the decision next to the policy wording, and know what a state complaint can and cannot do.
The complaint process described is Texas’s.
What happens once a dispute is likely to reach court.
Once a dispute is reasonably foreseeable, routine cleanup can give way to a duty to preserve relevant records. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37(e) separates ordinary loss of electronic information from destruction intended to deprive the other side of it.
Federal electronic-evidence rule; state courts and physical evidence can differ.
When an agreement binds, and what a breach claim has to show.
Courts ask what each side said and did, not what they privately meant. How that objective test decides whether a deal exists, and where sales of goods work differently.
California statutes cited and labeled.
A valid agreement, your own performance or a good excuse, the other side’s breach, and resulting harm, each usually shown with ordinary records.
Elements, defenses and deadlines vary by state.
Fees and confidentiality before and during representation.
Advance fee, true retainer or flat fee: knowing which one you are signing changes what is refundable and when.
Florida Bar guidance as a labeled example; your agreement and state rules control.
Privilege protects communications made to get or give legal advice, not every conversation involving a lawyer, and everyday habits can waive it.
Exceptions and waiver rules differ by jurisdiction.
Fault
How your own share of fault can shrink an injury award or block it entirely, under contributory, pure comparative, and 50% or 51% bar rules.
California, Texas and the contributory jurisdictions as labeled examples.
Proving negligence
How a broken safety law and an accident that “speaks for itself” each help prove carelessness, and what each doctrine still leaves the jury to decide.
California Evidence Code as the labeled example.
Emotional distress
What a plaintiff must prove, why “outrageous” and “severe” set such a high bar, and how negligent infliction claims differ.
California jury instructions as the labeled example.
Property
Both cover interference with someone else’s property, but only conversion makes the wrongdoer pay the item’s full value. Where the line falls, and when money counts.
California jury instructions as the labeled example.
Damages
How economic losses such as bills and lost pay differ from pain and suffering, plus loss of consortium, punitive damages and caps. No claim values.
California statutes as the labeled example.
Fatal injuries
A survival action carries on the claim the person who died could have brought; a wrongful death claim compensates the family for the loss. Who files, and what each covers.
California statutes as the labeled example.
CWC LAW is an independent publication of legal information, not a law firm, and nothing here is advice about your situation. Each guide links the sources it relies on, says which jurisdiction a rule comes from, and labels hypotheticals as hypotheticals. No guide is presented as attorney-reviewed.
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