Also known as: imminent probabilities of injury · imminent harm · imminent danger
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
An immediate and probable risk of serious physical harm that triggers a duty to exercise reasonable care to avert the threatened injury. The standard is stricter than ordinary foreseeability and appears in master-servant and prisoner-litigation contexts.
Select any source to read its text and confirm it supports the definition.
State officials learn that an armed force is massing just across the border and will reach the capital within hours. They enter an agreement with a neighboring state for joint defense without first obtaining congressional consent. The agreement is upheld because the facts establish imminent danger that will not admit of delay under Article I Section 10.
A supervisor learns that a terminated employee has returned to the loading dock and is threatening coworkers with a weapon. The supervisor takes no steps to warn staff or call security. The employer faces liability because the known facts create an imminent probability of injury that the master must act to avert.
A manufacturer sells a car after skipping inspection of a wheel known to be prone to sudden failure. The buyer is injured when the wheel collapses on the highway. Liability attaches because the defect created an imminent probability of injury that reasonable inspection would have prevented.
A state law prohibits corporations from funding political advertisements shortly before an election. Banks challenge the restriction as preventing imminent injury to their First Amendment rights. The Court evaluates whether the prohibition creates an immediate probability of suppressing protected speech.
An officer shoots a burglary suspect who is climbing a fence and appears unarmed. The estate sues claiming the use of deadly force was unjustified. The claim turns on whether the facts showed an imminent probability of injury to the officer or others that would have justified the shot.
The standard imposes a duty only when the risk of harm is immediate and probable rather than merely foreseeable. Courts have applied the duty as a matter of law in unusual situations such as an on-duty officer failing to intervene in an ongoing assault.
Supporting sources
General foreseeability may support a duty in special relationships such as common carrier and passenger. For business owners and invitees or landlords and tenants the higher imminent probability standard is required before a duty to warn of third-party criminal acts arises.
Supporting sources
…customer recovered damages from the seller who affixed the label. “The defendant’s negligence,” it was said, “put human life in imminent danger.” A poison falsely labeled is likely to injure any one who gets it. Because the danger is to be foreseen, there is a duty to avoid the injury. Cases were cited by way of illustration in…