Intellectual Property Enterprise Court

Claim No: IP-2022-000086 - [2024] EWHC 1430 (IPEC)

Fecha: 19-Jun-2024

Joint Tortfeasorship

Joint Tortfeasorship

46.

The Supreme Court in Lifestyle Equities also clarified the law on joint tortfeasorship, holding that in order for persons to be held jointly liable with a tortfeasor for a tort, they must have knowledge of the essential facts which make the acts wrongful, whether or not the primary tort in question (such as trade mark infringement as it was in that case) is a strict liability offence and whether or not the accessory liability arises from procuring a tort or by a common design. As Lord Leggatt (giving the leading judgment and with whom the other members of the Court agreed) explained at [137]:

“137.

Although procuring a tort and assisting another to commit a tort pursuant to a common design are distinct bases for imposing accessory liability, they must operate consistently with each other and such that the law of accessory liability in tort is coherent. Considerations of principle, authority and analogy with principles of accessory liability in other areas of private law all support the conclusion that knowledge of the essential features of the tort is necessary to justify imposing joint liability on someone who has not actually committed the tort. This is so even where, as in the case of infringement of intellectual property rights, the tort does not itself require such knowledge.”