Understanding Tort Law: A Comparison to Criminal Law

Courts can find people liable for different types of wrongs. The one you probably think of first is a criminal wrong; someone commits a crime, the court finds them guilty of a criminal wrong and there are consequences that follow. However, the other type of wrong is a civil wrong; someone commits a tort, the court finds them liable for a civil wrong (i.e., for the tort) and there are consequences that follow. A tort itself is an act (or in limited cases, an omission) which causes harm to a person or their property; tort law is the area of law which aims to remedy this harm. 

See the table below for a couple examples:

A generalisation which can be used to distinguish criminal law and tort law is to remember that criminal law punishes criminals for crimes, whereas tort law compensates individuals for the harm they experienced (normally through obtaining monetary damages from the person who commits the tort).