Proximate cause (continued)

Cause in fact is an element of proximate cause which means that the negligent act or omission was a substantial factor in bringing about the harm or injury, and without such negligence, the injury would not have occurred. A consideration in proximate cause is foreseeability. The test for foreseeability is whether the actor, as a person of ordinary intelligence, should have foreseen the danger to others created by the actor’s negligent act.

The specific or particular act need not be foreseen, but the injury must be of such general character as might reasonably have been anticipated. Timing is also a consideration. For negligence to be a proximate cause of an injury, the injury must have been foreseeable by the acting wrongdoer at the instant of the wrong.

Sometimes there is more than one proximate cause of the in juries or harm inflicted. Thus, there may be concurrent causes of an accident. This sometimes occurs in oil rig accidents or other catastrophic accidents. A "concurrent act" cooperates with the original act in b ringing about the harm or injury and does not cut off the liability of the original actor. Thus, all actors who contribute to an injury and that proximately caused such injury are liable. Just because another’s negligence is foreseeable does not mean that the chain of causation is broken. However, where the negligence of one party constitutes a new and independent cause, not connected form the original cause, which intervenes and breaks the chain of sequence, becoming itself the direct and proximate cause of the harmful event, then the parties are not liable for concurrent causes. The new and independent cause will then be seen as an intervening cause and thus will not be the proximate cause of the event.

Contact Corpus Christi personal injury attorney Scott Nelson if you or a loved one has been injured by another person’s negligence.  We also represent clients in Houston, Brownsville, Galveston, Laredo, and throughout Texas.