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Assault and Battery

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Submitted By kezar
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INTRODUCTION

This assignment endeavors to discuss in detail;
(i). the circumstances under which words threatening violence may constitute a tortuous assault.
(ii). How the victim’s consent may defeat an action for battery.

It is thus arrived at with the aid extracted from works of various renowned scholars, judicial precedents both binding and persuasive, and the legitimate Acts of parliament as well as, the student’s module which is a guide to the course outline.

Assault and battery are considered as a single offence under criminal law. However, tort law insists on taking them as separate offences and considers their distinction very essential. Assault is the act which creates fear for potential battery. In other words it is the very act that will lead the victim to apprehend an immediate violence of a battery, while battery is the actual infliction of unlawful force onto the victim. It follows therefore that where “X” stones “Y” but misses, constitutes an assault, the actual physical contact on “Y” becomes a battery.
Both assault and battery are deemed and considered to be intentional torts. Meaning that, the defendant intended to cause the plaintiff to apprehend. The wrongful touching need not to inflict physical injury .That wrongful contact may as well be indirect (such as contact through a thrown stone; or spitting). ASSAULT An assault involves;
• An intentional, unlawful threat or offer to cause bodily injury to another by force.
• Under circumstances which create in the other person a well-founded fear of imminent peril.
• Where there exists the apparent present ability to carry out the act if not prevented. An assault is an attempt or offer to apply unlawful force to a person by another. The offender must have the ability to carry out that threat, the basis

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