Prima Facie Tort in United States

Prima Facie Tort 

A facial tort, that is a rebuttable determination of the existence of a legal duty, breach of that duty, and damages which flow therefrom due to proximate and legal causation.

Every prima facie tort consists of the following elements:

1) The existence of a legally recognized (as opposed to moral) duty of the defendant to the plaintiff
2) A breach of that duty by the plaintiff
3) But-for Causation (sometimes known as cause in fact or causa sine-qua-non): that is that the defendants breech was a fact which caused the plaintiff’s injury
Legal Causation (sometimes known as proximate cause): that is that the defendants act was also so close in time to the plaintiffs injury that it is a sufficient cause to create that injury a nd that there was no intervening or superseding cause resulted independantly in the accident.

In order to avoid a directed verdict the plaintiff must establish a prima facie case. That is he must introduce sufficent evidence such that the fact finder could reasonably decide one way or another on the basic elements of the tort. So a prima facie tort is the introduction of sufficient evidence such that a finder of fact could reasonably decide one way or the other on each of the above four elements of the tort.

See also: duty, breach, cause-in-fact, proximate cause.