What must a plaintiff establish to prevail in a negligence claim against a defendant?

To prevail in a negligence claim against a defendant, a plaintiff must demonstrate four essential elements: duty, breach of duty, actual causation (also known as cause-in-fact), and proximate causation, followed by damages.

• Duty refers to the obligation of the defendant to conform to a standard of conduct that would protect others from unreasonable risks of harm.
• Breach of duty involves showing that the defendant failed to meet this standard of care.

• Actual causation requires establishing a direct link between the defendant’s actions and the plaintiff’s injuries, meaning the injury would not have occurred "but for" the defendant's breach.
• Proximate causation limits liability to those harms that are a foreseeable result of the negligent conduct.
• Finally, damages must be shown, which are the actual injuries or losses that the plaintiff suffered as a result of the defendant's negligence.

This comprehensive framework emphasizes the crucial components needed to support a negligence case, enabling the court to evaluate liability based on the established standards of care, causal relationships, and actual injuries sustained by the plaintiff.

Other options distract from this established framework by including elements that do not belong to the essential components of a negligence claim, such as "settlement" or