Memoirs of a Bar Examinee

[smujd2007]

To make student loan companies rich and to network.

I don't know of any schools that teach for the bar exam.

Hence why Barbri and PMBR make so much money.

And therein lies the problem (or at least one of the major problems) with legal education.  Makes you wonder what those 3 years are for.

[Burning Sands, Esq.]

ewww, property. [vomit icon would go here if I weren't too lazy to find one]

I'm getting rrrreally concerned about my ability to pass the bar. This thread is depressing.

Girl don't sweat it.  Your school has like a 99.999% bar passage rate or something right?  You have to pass the bar. There's no option for you. Take the courses and you're good money.

Speaking of the course, DAY 3 - Torts. 

Finally, an uncomplicated subject.  I ended up getting 41 out of the 50 test questions correct!!!  How about that sh!t?  You can call your parents back home and ask them torts questions and even though they may not know the legalese terminology they can usually guess correctly as to who is liable.  The bar seems to love Strict Liability and Strict Products Liability questions. There were a slew of those. Also, they test big time on the differences between Invitee, Licensee, and Trespasser.  They cover your standard intentional and unintentional torts (battery, assault, defamation, negligence, etc.), plus they throw in invasion of privacy actions, which I didn't go over in my torts class so I missed those questions.  Oh, and one helpful thing that we learned is that on the bar exam, the bar exam instructions for the MBE tell you that you are to assume that every torts question takes place in a Comparative Negligence jurisdiction, so no contributory negligence stuff.




Torts hypo of the day:

Esteban parked his BMW convertible on a steep hill on California Avenue in San Francisco.  He then walked a few blocks to the China Grill to meet a few friends for lunch.  While Esteban was at the restaurant, his car rolled down the hill and struck Tiffany as she was walking across the street.  Tiffany suffered a fractured leg in the accident.

Tiffany sued Esteban to recover damages for her injury.  At trial, Tiffany merely introduced evidence that Esteban parked his car on California Avenue and the vehicle rolled down the street striking her.  However, Tiffany did not present any evidence showing negligence on the part of Esteban.

At the conclusion of the plaintiff's case-in-chief, both parties move for a directed verdict.  The court should


(A) grant plaintiff's motion, because it is more probable than not that defendant was negligent in allowing his car to roll down the street
(B) grant the defendant's motion, because plaintiff did not present any evidence showing negligence on the part of the defendant
(C) deny both motions, because under the circumstances the jury may infer negligence on the part of the defendant
(D) deny the plaintiff's motion, but allow the defendant to present rebuttal evidence before ruling on the defendant's motion

[Burning Sands, Esq.]

B.  Though it feels like a trap.

lol 

now you know you can't just leave it at B. You gotta say WHY B?

[A.]

C.  I think it can be inferred.  Res ipsa loquitur, right?  Properly parked cars don't just roll down hills. Let the jury weigh the evidence. Alternatively, B.

[Special Agent Dana Scully]

I feel dumb reading these questions 

[shaz]

I got the first K question right. I actually thought it was easy. I feel like such a law nerd.

I always think of FOB S/B as:

FOB S = Free shipping for the S.
Which means B paid for shipping.
So the truck is B's agent.
So once S delivers to the truck (B's agent), his liability shifts. 
[my own personal mailbox rule!]   

[Sparkz1920]

I wanna say B

Probably loud n wrong though

I wanna say B because the plaintiff proved no negligence on the defendants part

[«ě»]

C.  I think it can be inferred.  Res ipsa loquitur, right?  Properly parked cars don't just roll down hills. Let the jury weigh the evidence. Alternatively, B.

Hmm, well it could be a technical problem with the car, such as the parking break failing - in which case I can't really see how you consider it negligence if he wasn't aware of the problem, or if the problem occured while he wasn't in the car.

From a complete lay person perspective, I got a feeling this potentially exculpatory solution would point in the direction of D)... but who knows, not me. My 'logic' is that even though the plaintiff did not prove negligence, a jury would be likely to infer it.

[Burning Sands, Esq.]

C.  I think it can be inferred.  Res ipsa loquitur, right?  Properly parked cars don't just roll down hills. Let the jury weigh the evidence. Alternatively, B.

That's correct. The answer is C. Its a definite case of res ipsa.

For the 0L's, res ipsa loquitur is latin for "the thing speaks for itself" - its a tort law doctrine that allows a jury to infer negligence where you don't quite have all the pieces to the puzzle in situations where negligence must have happened because things ordinarily wouldn't have ended up how they did unless somebody was negligenct - like the car rolling down the hill.

[«ě»]

So, even if it was caused by a technical problem with the car, it would still be considered negligence?