Doughty worked at Turner near a giant vat filled with
molten chemicals. Someone knocked a lid into the vat.
There was no splash, but a few minutes later, the entire
vat 'erupted' in some sort of explosion, and Doughty got covered in
chemicals.
There was some chemical reaction that no one was
expecting to happen.
Unlike in the comic books, he did not get superpowers.
Doughty sued on the basis of negligence.
The Trial Court found for Doughty. Turner appealed.
The English Appellate Court overturned the decision and
found for Turner.
The Court found that the risk of the negligence was from
splash, but there was no splash. Any subsequent events were not foreseeable,
and therefore outside of the scope of the risk, and there was no breach
of duty.
The judges compared this case to Hughes v. Lord
Advocate, which had a similar issue, although that case came to the
opposite conclusion.
One of the major criticisms of using a scope of the
risk approach is that the outcome of the case can depends on how risk
is defined. (contrast to Hughes)
The harm to Doughty was that he got splashed with hot
liquid because someone dropped a lid into a giant vat. Is there really
much difference between getting directly splashed and getting splashed
due to a chemical reaction?
