Uncle Wang, who was over 80 years old, fell and broke his right ankle when he stepped on a banana peel while walking on the sidewalk of the community. Therefore, after checking the monitoring of the community, Uncle Wang sued the Longwan Court, claiming related losses from Ms. Wu who threw the banana peel. After the trial of the two-level court in Wenzhou, the Wenzhou Intermediate People's Court recently made a final judgment that Ms. Wu should bear 60% of the compensation liability, with a total compensation of 19,461 yuan.

Case review

On the afternoon of March 22, 2020, the defendant, Ms. Wu, took the little girl to play in the community playground where the plaintiff Uncle Wang lived. Ms. Wu threw the leftover banana peels on the grass beside the sidewalk, and the banana peels bounced back and landed on the sidewalk. Afterwards, the plaintiff, Uncle Wang, accidentally stepped on a banana peel on the sidewalk and fell and was injured. He was diagnosed with a fracture of the right ankle, costing 31,639 yuan in medical expenses and 797 yuan in assistive devices.

Court hearing

Defendant Ms. Wu throwing banana peels is an act that is detrimental to social and public morality, and at the same time, there is harm to the health of unspecified public. She is subjectively at fault, and her behavior has a causal relationship with the damage caused to the plaintiff. Ms. Wu should bear the civil compensation liability in this case. After comprehensive consideration of the accident in this case, the degree of fault of the perpetrator, causality and other factors, it was determined that the defendant, Ms. Wu, was responsible for 60% of the plaintiff's loss.

Defendant Ms. Wu throwing banana peels is an act that is detrimental to social and public morality, and at the same time, there is harm to the health of unspecified public, and she is allowed to do so. She is subjectively at fault, and her behavior has a causal relationship with the damage caused to the plaintiff. Ms. Wu should bear the civil compensation liability in this case. After comprehensive consideration of the accident in this case, the degree of fault of the perpetrator, causality and other factors, it was determined that the defendant, Ms. Wu, was responsible for 60% of the plaintiff's loss.

After the first-instance judgment, the defendant, Ms. Wu, refused to accept the judgment and appealed to the Wenzhou Intermediate People's Court.

Wenzhou Intermediate People's Court held that:

Civil subjects engaged in civil activities shall not violate the law or violate public order and good customs. In this case, the appellant, Ms. Wu, throwing banana peels is a behavior that is detrimental to social and public morals, and this behavior also has potential safety hazards that endanger the health of unspecified public. For the damage caused to others, they should bear the corresponding liability for compensation. The court of first instance ruled that it was appropriate to bear 60% of the liability. Ms. Wu's grounds for appeal were untenable, so the court of second instance ruled that the appeal was dismissed and the original judgment was upheld.

Evaluation

"Civilization, harmony, integrity, friendliness" is an important part of my country's socialist core values. As Chinese citizens, we should always practice the socialist core values. As citizens, it is not only our responsibility to keep the environment clean and tidy, but also a manifestation of our civilization. Although it is understood in a general sense that uncivilized behavior does not directly produce mandatory negative results in the legal sense, but only falls within the scope of moral condemnation, but if the uncivilized behavior has harmful consequences, then the perpetrator needs to bear the corresponding legal responsibility.

In this case, Ms. Wu failed to comply with the civilized requirement of not throwing garbage at will, and discarded banana peels at will, ignoring the possible harmful consequences, which caused Uncle Wang to slip and get injured. Therefore, as the perpetrator, Ms. Wu assumed the liability of nearly 20,000 yuan in compensation. Ms. Wu paid the price for her behavior.

Citations

Article 8 of the Civil Code of the People's Republic of China: Civil subjects shall not violate the law or violate public order and good customs when engaging in civil activities.

Article 1165 of the Civil Code of the People's Republic of China: If an actor infringes upon another person's civil rights and interests through fault and causes damage, he shall bear tort liability.

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