   a tort, in common law jurisdictions, is a civil wrongglanville williams, or grounds for lawsuit. learning the law. eleventh edition. stevens. 1982. p. 9 that unfairly causes someone else to suffer loss or harm resulting in legal liability for the person who commits the tortious act, called a tortfeasor. although crimes may be torts, the cause of legal action is not necessarily a crime, as the harm may be due to negligence which does not amount to criminal negligence. the victim of the harm can recover their loss as damages in a lawsuit. in order to prevail, the plaintiff in the lawsuit must show that the actions or lack of action was the legally recognizable cause of the harm. the equivalent of tort in civil law jurisdictions is delict. legal injuries are not limited to physical injuries and may include emotional, economic, or reputational injuries as well as violations of privacy, property, or constitutional rights. torts comprise such varied topics as auto accidents, false imprisonment, defamation, product liability, copyright infringement, and environmental pollution (toxic torts). while many torts are the result of negligence, tort law also recognizes intentional torts, where a person has intentionally acted in a way that harms another, and in a few cases (particularly for product liability in the united states) "strict liability" which allows recovery without the need to demonstrate negligence. tort law is different from criminal law in that: (1) torts may result from negligent but not intentional or criminal actions and (2) tort lawsuits have a lower burden of proof such as preponderance of evidence rather than beyond a reasonable doubt. sometimes a plaintiff may prevail in a tort case even if the person who caused the harm was acquitted in an earlier criminal trial. for example, o.j. simpson was acquitted in criminal court and later found liable for the tort of wrongful death. == history == roman law contained provisions for torts in the form of delict, which later influenced the civil law jurisdictions in continental europe, but a distinctive body of law arose in the common law world traced to english tort law. the word 'tort' was first used in a legal context in the 1580s,the word is derived from old french and anglo-french "tort" (injury), which is derived from medieval latin tortum,. see online etymology dictionary. although different words were used for similar concepts prior to this time. === medieval period === torts and crimes at common law originate in the germanic system of compensatory fines 
Tort_law