Torts MBE Tip of The Day

Answer to the Torts MBE Question

Subject: Torts

Legal Issue: False Imprisonment

Legal Rule and Analysis: 

False Imprisonment is an intentional tort.  It occurs when the defendant acts with the intent to confine or restrain the plaintiff to a bounded area, actual confinement occurs, and the plaintiff knows of the confinement or is hurt by it.  With intentional torts, the key is to look at the defendant’s mental state.  The defendant must act with the intent to bring about the specific result.  If there is no intent, then the defendant cannot be guilty of the tort.

Here, it is clear the woman has been confined to the department store and she knows about it.  She’s checked for any method of escape and she can’t find any.  The actual confinement and knowledge of the confinement elements are met.  What we do not know is if the security guard acted with the requisite level of intent.

The facts don’t give any indication that the guard intended to lock all of the doors and trap the woman there.  If the guard had no idea that the woman was there, then the guard could not be guilty of false imprisonment.  However, if the woman could prove that the guard knew of her presence, this would go a long way to bolstering her claim.  If the guard reviewed the security cameras, and saw her, this would allow her to infer that the security guard acted with intent when he locked the doors if he knew that there was someone still in the dressing room.

Conclusion: If the woman can establish that the security guard checked the cameras before locking the doors and leaving and saw her, this would support her case as it would help her prove that the guard acted with the intent to confine her.

Look at the answer choices provided. Choose an answer choice that matches your conclusion. Review the other answer choices provided.

The answer choice (B) is therefore correct. (A) is incorrect because the foreseeability of someone remaining in the dressing room does not matter for a false imprisonment claim.  Foreseeability is more relevant to a claim of negligence as opposed to the intentional tort of false imprisonment.  (C) is incorrect because establishing the woman’s intent in being in the store does not help her claim as her intent is immaterial in a false imprisonment case.  (D) is incorrect because the woman does not need to be physically harmed in order to succeed in a false imprisonment claim.

MBE Tip: Use the cause of action stated in the call of the question to eliminate incorrect answer choices.  When the relevant claim at issue is stated, you can eliminate answer choices that utilize the improper standard.  Each category of tort (negligence, intentional tort, strict liability, etc.) has its own standard that the facts will be analyzed under, with certain key legal phrases being relevant.  If an answer choice seems to be analyzing the facts under a standard not relevant to the claim mentioned in the fact pattern, you can immediately eliminate that choice!