Eron Brougton Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Eron Brougton - Essay Example Judge Black ruled against the plaintiff, sustaining that the defendants had no duty of care in that particular case as the plaintiff was on private property, whose owner or representative (in this case the security guard) was entitled to order him to leave. Then the plaintiff proceeded in filing an appeal in the first instance with the New South Wales Court of Appeal, which was also unsuccessful. Honourable Justices Brownie, Hodgson, and Handley unanimously decided in favour of the respondents, sustaining the reasons behind Judge Black's judgment and also making the distinction between "duty of care" and "Good Samaritan" cases. Duty of care entails "one person [having] the care of another, such as husbands and wives, parents and persons in loco parentus who have the care and custody of infant children, hospitals and patients, prison authorities and prisoners and so on" (Broughton v Competitive Foods Australia Pty Ltd & Ors2). ... from being considered a neighbour, was deemed to be a potential trespasser, and the security guard's duty of care was owed to his employer and the customers inside the premises he was hired to guard. Points in Favour of the Respondents in Case of a Second-Instance Appeal to the HCA Should Mr. Broughton be given leave to file a second appeal, this time to the High Court of Australia, he would very likely lose again. The High Court would rule in favour of the respondents and dismiss the appeal due to the following legal principles and reasons: 1) Australia's common law does not generally allow superior courts to act without regard to binding precedent, with the exception of the High Court of Australia. Even so, in the HCA the trend has also historically been to consider ratio decidendi based on the principle of stare decisis, despite the fact that it is not necessarily bound by its previous decisions. Therefore, it follows that the High Court of Australia would be likely to rule on Mr. Broughton's appeal based on careful consideration of what has motivated its decisions in the past on similar cases. Granted, there are few similar cases within the realm of the High Court, or even within Australia itself, but one that could be considered comparable is the strange case of Dianne Maree Hackshaw v. George Shaw4. It, too, involves the matter of injuries and of trespassing, albeit in a more outright manner. Shaw was working on a farm that had a gasoline dispenser on the property. He started to notice that the levels of gasoline were dropping and suspected that someone was stealing it. He took several precautions to keep it from getting stolen again, but nothing worked. After calling the police on several occasions and finally being told that he needed to provide