Delict Summary of Cases

University of Pretoria v Tommie Meyer Films
Doctrine of subjective rights

Subject-object relationship: right to a thing
Subject-subject relationship: others have a duty not to infringe rights
Minister of Police v Ewels

Prior conduct as requirement for liability for omission
Prior conduct or control of a dangerous object may be a factor from which a conclusion of
wrongfulness may be drawn, but it is not an essential prerequisite for wrongfulness. An omission is
seen as wrongful conduct when the circumstances of the case are such that the omission does not
oly elicit moral indignation but the legal convictions of the community also require the omission to
be regarded as wrongful, and the resulting harm to be compensated by the person who omitted to
act in a positive manner. Duty of the policeman to prevent assault on the plaintiff.
Van Eeden v Minister of Safety and Security

Wrongfulness as a breach of legal duty.
Test for determining wrongfulness of an omission:
An omission is wrongful if the defendant is under a legal duty to act positively to prevent the harm
suffered by the plaintiff. Legal duty exists if it is reasonable to expect of the dendeant to have taken
positive measures to prevent harm.
State v van Wyk

Private defence
Question: Whether a person may protect his property in defence by killing attacker.
Normally the law values life more highly than property.
Van Wyk set up a gun in his shop to protect property. Shot and killed burglar. Van Wyk succeeded
with defence. Van Wyk tried all other options before setting the trap-gun. Court found that it could
not reasonably expect him to sleep in his shop to protect property.
State v Goliath
Necessity (grounds of justification)
X under compulsion from Y and fearing for his own life, helped Y to kill Z. Court recognised the
communities conviction that the ordinary human being does not consider the life of another person
to be more important than his own.
Kruger v Coetzee
Test for negligence
For the purpose of liability culpa arises if:
a) A diligens paterfamilias in the position of the defendant
(i) Would foresee the reasonable possibility of his conduct injuring another in his
person or property and causing him patrimonial loss; and
(ii) Would take reasonable steps to guard against such occurrence; and
b) The defendant failed to take such steps
Jones v Santam
Test for negligence
A person is guilty of culpa if his conduct falls short of the standard of the diligens paterfamilias – a
standard that is always objective and which varies only in regard to the exigencies arising in any
particular circumstances. It is a standard which is the same for everybody under the same
circumstances.
New approach to negligence i.r.o. children:

1) Reasonable person test, not reasonable child
2) Accountable? If child did not meet reasonable person requirements, was he accountable?
Prior to the decision in Jones the AD accepted that once the plaintiff’s degree of negligence had
been established, it was unnecessary to inquire into the extent to which the defendant’s conduct
had deviated from the standard of the reasonable. If the court had established that the plaintiff had
been 40% negligent it was thought to follow automatically that the defendant was 60% negligent.
Jones introduced new approach.
In order to establish the respective degrees of negligence, the carefulness of the conduct of each
party must be measured separately against the standard of reasonable person.
Example: plaintiff’s conduct deviates 70% from the reasonable person norm and the defendant’s
conduct deviates 80%. Ratio between the plaintiff and defendant’s degree of fault is 70:80 (7:8
(15)). The plaintiff ‘s degree of fault is thus 7/15 x 100 = 46.7% and the defendant’s 8/15 x 100 =
53.3%. The plaintiff thus receives compensation for only 53.3% of the damages he has suffered.
Weber v Santam Versekering

Reasonable person – characteristics
The court is not concerned with what reasonable person types would have been, such as a
reasonable educated person, a reasonable illiterate person, a reasonable skilled person, a
reasonable unskilled person, a reasonable adult or a reasonable child. There is only one abstract
objective criterion, and that is the Court’s judgment of what is reasonable, because the Court
places itself in the position of the diligens paterfamilias.
Confirmed the new approach in the Jones case
Union National Sout British Ins Co v Vitoria

Contributory negligence
Failure to wear a seatbelt constitutes contributory negligence.
Contributory negligence of the plaintiff is only relevant insofar as it has led to an increase in the
damage.
General Accident Versekering v Uijs

Contributory fault
The extent of a plaintiff’s fault is merely one of a number of factors which the court may take into
account in order to reduce the plaintiff’s damages in a just and equitable manner.
Greater Johannesburg Transitional Metropolitan Council v ABSA

Contributory fault
Held that a defence of contributory intention could succeed where both the plaintiff and the
defendant acted with intent.
T = employee of Soweto City Council. T steals cheques drawn i.f.o. his employer. Defendant raises
contributory negligence on the strength of the fraud of T, who was an employee of City Council.
Found i.f.o. plaintiff but ordered a 50% reduction of damages on account of contributory
negligence.
State v Mokgethi
Flexible approach to legal causation
There is no single and general criterion for legal causation which is applicable in all instances. A
flexible approach is accordingly suggested. The basic question is whether there is a close enough
relationship between the wrongdoer’s conduct and its consequence, for such consequence to be
imputed to the wrongdoer in view of policy considerations based on reasonableness, fairness and
justice. The existing criteria for legal causation such a direct consequences and reasonable
foreseeability may play a subsidiary role in determining legal causation within the framework of this
elastic approach.
Facts: Bank teller shot during robbery. Did not die immediately but only six months later.
Paraplegic as a result of shot. Resumed his work at the bank. Later re-admitted to hospital
suffering from serious pressure sores which developed because he had failed to change his
position in the wheelchair frequently. The Appellate Division held that the wounding of the
deceased could not be regarded as the legal cause of the deceased death for the purpose of a
charge of murder.
International Shipping Co v Bentley
Causation – condictio sine qua non
In order to apply this test, one must make a hypothetical inquiry as to what probably would have
happened but for the wrongful conduct of the defendant. This inquiry may involve the mental
elimination of the wrongful conduct and the substitution of a hypothetical cause of lawful conduct
and the posing of the question as to whether upon such a hypothesis, plaintiff’s loss would have
ensued or not. If it would in any event have ensued, then the wrongful conduct was not a cause of
the plaintiff’s loss. If the wrongful act is shown in this way not to be a causa sine qua non of the
loss suffered, then no legal liability can arise.

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University of Pretoria v Tommie Meyer Films

Doctrine of subjective rights

Minister of Police v Ewels

Van Eeden v Minister of Safety and Security

State v van Wyk

New approach to negligence i.r.o. children:

Weber v Santam Versekering

Confirmed the new approach in the Jones case

Union National Sout British Ins Co v Vitoria

General Accident Versekering v Uijs

Greater Johannesburg Transitional Metropolitan Council v ABSA

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