Causation in law defines the connection between an action and the resulting harm or legal consequence, forming a fundamental principle for determining liability in civil and criminal matters. The concept ensures that legal responsibility is imposed when a defendant’s conduct directly produces an injury, loss, or prohibited outcome, preventing unfair attribution of blame for unrelated events. Courts rely on causation to establish accountability, applying it across multiple legal contexts, including torts, contracts, criminal offenses, healthcare, employment, and property disputes. Causation provides a framework for distinguishing between actions that merely create risk and actions that result in measurable harm, ensuring that legal judgments correspond to real-world outcomes.

Factual and legal causation are the two essential components that courts examine to determine whether a defendant’s conduct is legally responsible for the harm. Factual causation identifies if the harm happened directly because of the defendant’s actions, offering clear evidence that links the conduct to the result. Legal causation evaluates whether the harm was a foreseeable consequence of the act, limiting liability to outcomes sufficiently connected to the defendant’s behavior. Courts consider intervening acts, natural events, and actions by third parties or victims to determine if the causal chain remains unbroken. Establishing factual and legal causation ensures that liability in law accurately...

Read Full Story: https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMiXkFVX3lxTFBVWExNdVotb2dkNkM2aWd6X2p2...