Lead Poisoning Cases — the Framework of Georgian Law
Lead poisoning is most often connected with a residential or industrial environment: old paints, contaminated soil or technological processes. It must be said plainly at the outset: Georgian law has no US-style separate lead-paint statute — such damage is compensated under the ordinary tort rules of the Civil Code. There are two grounds: Article 992 — a person who causes damage to another by an unlawful, intentional or negligent act is obliged to compensate it; and Article 1000 — liability for damage caused by the increased hazard emanating from a structure. Damage from a lead-containing environment is assessed exactly within this framework.
The Structure Owner's Liability — Article 1000
Article 1000 provides: where an increased hazard emanates from a structure due to energy produced, stored or supplied in it, or to a fire-hazardous or explosive, poisonous or noxious substance, the owner of the structure must compensate the injured party if the realisation of that hazard entailed death, bodily injury or damage to a thing. The same liability applies to owners of such substances where an increased hazard emanates from them. The exception is force majeure — except accidents of power transmission lines and damage to installations supplying oil, gas, water or petroleum products. Thus the owner of a building or territory containing a lead source answers precisely under this norm.
In cases involving children this construction is particularly significant: a child's organism is more sensitive to the influence of lead, and the damage often comes exactly from the residential environment. For a parent this means that the direction of the claim will be the owner of the building or territory where the family lives or stayed — and establishing the source is the central pillar of the case.
Collapse of a Building and Falling Objects — Article 1004
Alongside the contaminated environment, damage is often caused by a defect of the building. Article 1004 provides: the owner of a building must compensate the damage that arose from its collapse or the collapse of its separate parts — except where the damage was not caused by improper maintenance of the building or by its defect. Where damage is caused by an object thrown, fallen or poured from the building, the person occupying the premises is liable — except where the damage occurred through force majeure or the victim's fault. These two rules are the second pillar of the owner's liability in cases connected with buildings carrying traces of lead.