Causation in United States

Causation 

The notion that one event leads to another. Law distinguishes between remote causes which while necessary were not sufficient and material causes i.e. necessary and sufficient causes. Those causes but for which the accident would not have occurred are necessary but not always sufficent. When a cause is both necessary (legal causation, i.e. sine qua non causation) and proximate, i.e. sufficient, that is legal causation, then a tort will exist in common law. See: prima facie tort.

Main Elements of a Claim Under § 1605A FSIA

Causation Requirement

According to research about Causation from the Federal Judicial Center:Causation is a jurisdictional requirement of the FSIA’s state-sponsored terrorism provisions. Like its predecessor, § 1605A(a)(1) requires that the injury or death have been “caused by” one of the listed acts (and that such act was “engaged in by an official, employee, or agent of such foreign state while acting within the scope of his or her office, employment, or agency”). Both the D.C. and Fourth Circuits have rejected a “but for” interpretation of the “caused by” language found in both § 1605(a)(7) and § 1605A in favor of “proximate cause.”307 In Kilburn v. Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, the D.C. Circuit distinguished the issue of jurisdictional causation under the state-sponsored terrorism exception from the proof necessary to prevail on a substantive cause of action.308 With regard to the first issue, which may arise on a motion to dismiss, the court of appeals said that proximate cause exists so long as there is “some reasonable connection between the act or omission of the defendant and the damages which the plaintiff has suffered.”309 In Rux v. Republic of Sudan, which involved claims against Sudan by the relatives of seventeen U.S. sailors killed in the terrorist bombing of the U.S.S. Cole, the Fourth Circuit found the allegations sufficient to satisfy jurisdictional causation.310 The plaintiffs alleged that Sudan had provided “material support or resources” to the al-Qaeda operatives who planned the attack; Sudan challenged the sufficiency of the specific allegations. The court of appeals said that the statute only required the plaintiffs to allege facts “sufficient to establish a reasonable connection between a country’s provision of material support to a terrorist organization and the damage arising out of a terrorist attack.”311 It noted that at the jurisdictional stage, the “proximate cause” standard “serves simultaneously to weed out the most insubstantial cases without posing too high a hurdle to surmount at a threshold stage of the litigation.”312 In comparison, in Davis v. Islamic Republic of Iran, in ruling on a special master’s recommendations regarding damages following entry of a default judgment, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia stated that the FSIA requires plaintiffs to prove that the consequences of the defendants’ conduct were “reasonably certain,” that is, “more likely than not” to occur.313 More generally, causation and liability will be determined by reference to established principles of law, as reflected for example in the Restatement (Second) of Torts314 and as adopted in state jurisdictions. In this regard, a series of decisions from the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia reminds plaintiffs that the statute requires them to prove “a theory of liability” articulating a justification for the recovery of damages, “generally expressed ‘through the lens of civil tort liability.” Additional discussion of theories of recovery for wrongful death, survival, and intentional infliction of emotional distress can be found in Beer v. Islamic Republic of Iran. Note: FSIA is the acronym of the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976.

Causation Explained

References

See Also

• Tort
• Product Liability
• Duties

Causation

Leading Case Law

Among the main judicial decisions on this topic:

Cyrv. Adamar Assocs.

Information about this important court opinion is available in this American legal Encyclopedia.

References

See Also

• Tort
• Product Liability
• Duties

Resources

See Also

Popular Topics related with Causation

X

• Foreign Immunities
• Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976
• Foreign Sovereign Immunity Government
• Immunities Convention
• Immunity and Privileges
• Immunity of Citizens
• Immunity to Diplomats