Casualty Insurance Basics
Negligence is the core cause of action
Four elements must all be present: legal duty owed, breach of that duty, proximate cause (an unbroken, foreseeable chain), and actual damages. Defenses include comparative fault (Indiana's modified rule reduces damages by the plaintiff's share and bars recovery when the plaintiff is more than 50% at fault), assumption of risk, and intervening cause. Negligence per se arises from violating a safety statute; res ipsa loquitur lets the facts speak when the instrumentality was in the defendant's exclusive control.
Strict and vicarious liability
Strict/absolute liability needs no negligence - products liability, abnormally dangerous activities, dog-bite statutes. Vicarious liability holds an employer liable for an employee's acts within the scope of employment; hiring an independent contractor generally avoids that exposure.
Damages
Compensatory damages are special (medical bills, lost wages - documented) plus general (pain and suffering). Punitive damages punish intentional or gross misconduct and are typically uninsurable.
Personal and business auto liability
Part A bodily injury/property damage, Part B medical payments, Part C uninsured/underinsured motorists, Part D physical damage, plus supplementary payments. UM responds when the at-fault driver has no insurance; UIM responds when those limits are too low.
Traps
Confusing UM with UIM; treating general damages as documented; forgetting that defense costs sit outside the limit in personal auto but inside the limit in many CGL forms.
Rule of thumb
Write out duty, breach, proximate cause, damages in that order on scratch paper - any answer choice missing damages is wrong.