If you distill it down, it essentially comes down to not doing things that no law explicitly requires (lest you end up with walls and walls of law books simply describing very specific matters), but can be reasonably expected of you to have done.
What’s reasonable depends from time period to time period and the norms that exist, nevertheless the concept exists.
A good example would be you owning a house with a balcony in an unincorporated area where no law exists that sets requirements on structural integrity of such things.
You’re aware that the balcony might be a bit iffy and it has been decades since last it was checked out by a professional.
You have guests over, you don’t bother telling anyone to stay away from the balcony.
Some of your guests walk underneath the balcony, or worse, they go out onto the balcony to have a smoke.
The balcony collapses and your guests get injured or die.
You’re on the hook for negligence. Specifically negligence that resulted in tort in this case.
Hell, in some places, depending on the prosecutors in the area and the laws on the books, you might even be criminally liable for negligent homicide.
My comment on the EU and the regulations there isn’t to imply that the laws there apply to here in the US, rather it’s used (and could be used in real life) as a way to argue that the solution is inexpensive and not implementing it could be considered negligent because there is an easy solution available due to that regulation.
But what we're talking about here is that there are "bad guys" (tm) who stopped by your party and used a chain saw to cut the supports under the balcony, which would not otherwise have fallen down. But you could have prevented this if you had reinforced the supports with steel posts.
The Kias and Hyundais didn't steal themselves. Let's put the blame where it lies, on the f**ing criminals.
If you distill it down, it essentially comes down to not doing things that no law explicitly requires (lest you end up with walls and walls of law books simply describing very specific matters), but can be reasonably expected of you to have done.
What’s reasonable depends from time period to time period and the norms that exist, nevertheless the concept exists.
A good example would be you owning a house with a balcony in an unincorporated area where no law exists that sets requirements on structural integrity of such things.
You’re aware that the balcony might be a bit iffy and it has been decades since last it was checked out by a professional.
You have guests over, you don’t bother telling anyone to stay away from the balcony. Some of your guests walk underneath the balcony, or worse, they go out onto the balcony to have a smoke.
The balcony collapses and your guests get injured or die.
You’re on the hook for negligence. Specifically negligence that resulted in tort in this case.
Hell, in some places, depending on the prosecutors in the area and the laws on the books, you might even be criminally liable for negligent homicide.
My comment on the EU and the regulations there isn’t to imply that the laws there apply to here in the US, rather it’s used (and could be used in real life) as a way to argue that the solution is inexpensive and not implementing it could be considered negligent because there is an easy solution available due to that regulation.