Facts Of The Case Assessment Answer

    The actor, Christie Steeple, showed up one evening to class. She entered via the side door and immediately began screaming at Bond that he was a “no-good man” and that “he was going to get what he had coming to him.” She then charged at him and began to choke him.
    As he was being choked and was about to demonstrate his self-defense tactics, one of his students, Kelly Knight, ran forward and attempted to stab Steeple with a pen in an effort to protect her teacher. Unfortunately, because Knight is new to class, she had bad aim and missed Steeple – striking another student, Larry Lark, in the leg. However, Bob Eagen has been a member of the class for months. He used a manipulative technique to throw Steeple down to the ground and while doing so broke her arm.
    As Bond feared, several students did not know how to react to what they perceived as an actual attacker. They cowered in fear in corners screaming and sobbing and required months of intensive counseling after the incident in order to regain their confidence.
Sadly, one of the students, Sandy Slep, was so devastated after watching what she believed was an actual attack that she fled the building. She sprinted across the street and was struck by a car – killing her instantly.

Facts of the Case

JB, a self-defense instructor hired CS to make his students learn about how to defense in a real-world setting. When CS was performing her actions on JB, a student KK, thinking that the attack was actual, stabbed her to protect JB, but missed and hurt LL in leg. But, BE used technique and broke CS in the action to stop her from harming JB. All the students required intensive counseling, following the incident to gain back their confidence. SS, fled the premises and was run over by car and she succumbed to death. 

Relevant Issues

Based on the above facts of the case, following issues are eminent:
Whether, CS had a successful claim against JB.
Whether, CS had a successful claim against BE.
Whether, LL had successful claims against KK and JB.
Whether, the students had successful claims 
Whether, there can be any claim by SS.

Rule of Law

Tortious liability arises out of the omission or the commission of any actions, which under normal circumstances must not have been done. It is predominant that there is a duty of care towards everybody. One cannot be reckless and cause harm to the society. So, there is a duty to take care, followed by the breach of not doing it, and that breach caused the harm to the victim or the victims, and that loss so suffered by the victim, was reasonably foreseeable and is the proximate cause of the harm so suffered by the victim. So, failure to take the requisite duty of care brings the liability in the law of Tort. So, tort is a civil wrong, the remedy of which lies in the compensation. 

Analysis and Conclusion

In the present facts of the case, there are certain aspects of tort. JB employed CS to stage some action so that he can teach the self defense techniques to his students. Its nothing wrong on a part of the teacher to come up with new ideas and in so doing make the students learn out of the real-life situations. But, at the same time when an employer hires an employee, then the employer is also under obligation to show the reasonable duty of care towards his employee. So, in here JB is duty bound to two persons in a broader sense, one is his employee CS and secondly, his students. He owed a duty to take care to CS, since he is the employer and also to his students. Under the teacher student relationship, the teacher is duty bound and is liable to take reasonable care, but this imposition of liability is not categorized as the absolute liability, so when the liability is not absolute, then the teacher will have that duty to take care, which under reasonable circumstances, a reasonable person could have foreseen. In same way, there is the duty of the drivers, towards the pedestrian (Meaney v. Dodd 1988), and in same way there is also duty towards a customer, when it comes to a shopkeeper as was held in (Donoghue v Stevenson 1932). 
Under the present facts of the case, CS can bring an action of negligence as against JB for not doing the duty to take care towards his employee which he reasonably have failed to do, since JB could have made his students aware about the fact that, he is going to give a lesson on the use of the real life techniques, with the help of CS, then then students would not have approached to save the life of their teacher under false pretense. So, he failed in seeing the foreseeability of the harm, which he could have seen, and hence is in breach of duty to care towards CS was held in ( Stevenson v. Precision Std., Inc. 1999) and also in (Potts BE & K Construction Co., 1992) . 
On the other hand, CS can bring a charge of assault and that of the battery as against BE, if she can prove for battery that, there was an act on part of BE, which caused an offensive contact (Crihfield v. Monsanto Co. 1994), or there was an imminent apprehension based on that contact, and for assault she must prove beyond reasonable doubt that there was the presence of the intending acts on the part of the tort feasor (Mardis Mardis Robbins Tire & Rubber Co. 1995), which caused imminent apprehension, that there will be an offensive contact.
Similarly, LL can have his successful claims against KK if he can prove that battery was there as an act on part of KK, which caused an offensive contact, or at least there was an imminent apprehension based on that contact, and for JB, LL can bring the charge for negligence, only if he could establish that JB saw the foreseeable harm, but did not take the necessary duty to take care to restrain that, which ultimately made JB to breach his duty. 
All the students suffered psychiatric injury and was subjected to counselling to regain their confidence. So, they can jointly and severally bring a claim as against JB for causing psychiatric injury, if they could establish that a shock from the action of JB made them suffer psychiatric injury (Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire 1992), and the distress or the discomfort so rendered must be too much unreasonable, and in no way could be bearable or endurable by a reasonable human being was held in  (Soti v. Lowe’s Home Centers Inc. 2005) and also in (Ford v. Revlon, Inc. 1987).
As of SS, who fled the premises and succumbed to death, the only thing which needs to be proved in order bring an actionable claim as against JB by the family, is the negligence on part of JB, which led SS to suffer such nervous shock and psychiatric injury, and based on that she suffered death. But, here she died by getting run over by car, so death cannot be related as the direct cause or the proximate cause of negligence on part of JB, since if she was not run over by a car but she died due to nervous shock then JB could have been drawn for the death caused, but under current situation, family of SS can only be compensated due to psychiatric injury, and not due to death. 

References

Stevenson v. Precision Std., Inc. 1999. 762 So. 2d 820 (Ala. 1999)
Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire. 1992. [1992] 1 AC 310
Crihfield v. Monsanto Co. 1994. 844 F. Supp. 371 (S.D. Ohio 1994)
Donoghue v Stevenson. 1932. [1932] AC 562 (House of lords).
Ford v. Revlon, Inc. . 1987. 734 P.2d 580 (Ariz. 1987)
Mardis Mardis Robbins Tire & Rubber Co. 1995. 669 So. 2d 885 (Ala. 1995)
Meaney v. Dodd. 1988. 111 Wn.2d 174, 178, 759 P.2d 455 (1988)
Potts BE & K Construction Co., . 1992. 604 So. 2d 398 (Ala. 1992)
Soti v. Lowe’s Home Centers Inc. 2005. 2005 Ala. Lexis 15 (Ala. 2005)