A(nother) legal question.

In My Humble Opinion
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mangeorge, the resolution of the case in a court of law would depend upon the jurisdiction.

We start with the basic concept of negligence. Did the defendant owe a duty of care to the plaintiff, did the defendant breach that duty, and did the plaintiff suffer damages as the proximate cause of the breach?

Well, yes, the defendant owes a duty of care to the plaintiff. The dog is known to be aggressive; a reasonable person would assume this could lead to a biting attack. Indeed, the defendant clearly understood this as demonstrated by prior behavior. The defendant is inviting the plaintiff onto her property, thus the defendant needs to take reasonable steps to ensure that the plaintiff isn’t bitten by the dog. The plaintiff didn’t arrive at a totally unreasonable time, so the defendant won’t be able to say that the duty to protect the plaintiff hadn’t started yet. (I should point out that one could analyze this without the need to be specific to this case of an invited guest; the property owner has a duty of care to anyone who can be reasonably expected to come to the door).

Did the duty get breached by leaving the dog on the porch tied up at 3:30? This gets trickier, but a trier of fact could reasonably decide yes to this question. After all, as noted, the plaintiff’s arrival a bit early perhaps should have been anticipated. Further, leaving a dog that might bite someone on the porch tied up without supervision in reach of the path to the door isn’t exactly the most reasonable approach to things. Yes, an argument could be made that the duty of care didn’t really kick in until the defendant could reasonably expect the plaintiff to arrive, and that point hadn’t been reached, but it’s not impossible to come to the contrary conclusion.

In this case, proximate cause and damages are not debatable, really. Thus, negligence lies as a valid cause of action.

Now, you have made valid points about the concurrently stupid behavior on the part of the plaintiff (oh, the aggressive dog is out on the front porch; what the hell, I’ll just go up anyway and… OUCH!!). The trouble is this is where we have to look at the applicable law for the jurisdiction in which this happened. In some states, old contributory negligence laws apply. This means that, unless the plaintiff was MORE at fault than the defendant, the defendant is liable, and liable for the whole amount of the damages. In other states (e.g.: California), the defendant is only liable for the %age of their own comparative fault; thus, if the plaintiff was 40% at fault, the defendant only pays 60% of the damages. In still other states, some hybrid form of these concepts applies.

Mind you, this is a VERY sketchy answer to what could easily be the start of a good law school Torts class exam question on negligence. There are some interesting nuances I’ve skipped over. Still, the point is that Judge Judy might have been completely correct in her result from a legal standpoint, and from the standpoint of what a reasonable trier of fact would have concluded. Or, she might have had her head up her ass, where it usually resides.

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The booze helps.

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Of course, we are talking “Judge” :rolleyes: Judy here, aren’t we?

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IAMNAL but IMHO:

There are two issues that I see, one the forseeability of a client not arriving at the specified time but coming earlier or later than planned. Obviously if the client comes later no problem, if earlier, the defendant should have been prepared.

The other issue is assumption of the risk. Plaintiff knew of the dog’s vilent tendencies and neither called for assistance, nor waited until the appropriate meeting time. Instead she waltzed on in assuming the dog would allow her. She was wrong. I say that since there was a contract and plaintiff broke it that plaintiff bears the burden, but sadly Judy is the judge.

I feel confident that someone will tell me that assumption of the risk will not apply; please proceed.

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There’s also the issue of premises liability. I know this varies significantly by state (and in Judge Judy-land, the nuances of the actual law are but a very miniscule afterthought), but I remember vaguely from law school a person may have varying levels of duty to persons who come on his or her land. Presumably the cake buyer would be considered a business invitee (i.e. a member of the publice invited onto a business premises for the financial benefit of the business owner), and my recollection is that a business owner has historically been held to have a high duty to protect members of the public coming onto his or her premises. I also remember that some states have changed to a general “duty of reasonable care” to all persons on property, but in considering the reasonable care due, a business owner may be expected to do more than a private property owner who does not have the public coming onto his or her property.

Put more simply, if you are selling cakes to the public, you’ll probably be liable if you have dangerous dogs sitting in front of your business to bite customers.