Lex loci delicti commissi

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Conflict of Laws

Preliminary matters
Characterisation · Incidental question
Renvoi · Choice of law
Conflict of Laws in the U.S.
Public policy · Hague Conference
Definitional elements
State · Jurisdiction · Procedure
Forum non conveniens · Lex causae
Lex fori · Forum shopping
Lis alibi pendens
Connecting factors
Domicile · Lex domicilii
Habitual residence
Nationality · Lex patriae
Lex loci arbitri · Lex situs
Lex loci contractus
Lex loci delicti commissi
Lex loci solutionis · Proper law
Lex loci celebrationis
Choice of law clause
Forum selection clause
Substantive legal areas
Status · Capacity · Contract · Tort
Marriage · Nullity · Divorce
Get divorce · Talaq divorce
Property · Succession
Trusts
Enforcement
Enforcement of foreign judgments

The lex loci delicti commissi is the Latin term for "law of the place where the tort was committed" in the Conflict of Laws. Conflict is the branch of public law regulating all lawsuits involving a "foreign" law element where a difference in result will occur depending on which laws are applied.

Explanation

When a case comes before a court and all the main features of the case are local, the court will apply the lex fori, the prevailing municipal law, to decide the case. But if there are "foreign" elements to the case, the forum court may be obliged under the Conflict of Laws system to consider:

whether the forum court has jurisdiction to hear the case (see the problem of forum shopping);
it must then characterise the issues, i.e. allocate the factual basis of the case to its relevant legal classes; and
then apply the choice of law rules to decide the lex causae, i.e. which law is to be applied to each class of issue or to the case as a whole.

The lex loci delicti commissi is one of the possible choice of law rules applied to cases arising from an alleged tort. For example, suppose that a person domiciled in Australia and a person habitually resident in Albania, exchange correspondence by e-mail that is alleged to defame a group of Kurds resident in Turkey. The possibly relevant choice of law rules would be:

the lex loci solutionis might be the most relevant but this might be difficult because three laws might equally apply, i.e. the parties themselves corresponded from two states but the damage was not sustained until the correspondence was published in Turkey;
the proper law which is the law which has the closest connection with the substance of the wrong alleged to have been committed; and
the lex fori which might have public policy issues if, say, one of the parties was an infant or there was the possibility of multiple jurisdictions having involvement over a world-wide internet issue.

Lex loci delicti commissi

Explanation

See also