A very recent judgement of the Supreme Court (Court of Cassation 1.02.2023 no. 2982) offers the cue to take up some central themes of civil litigation, which are always very topical.
The subject of the case was a claim against a municipality for damages suffered by a car due to the flooding of a road during a heavy rainfall. In first instance, the Court of Benevento ordered the municipality to pay the plaintiff the amount of approximately € 14,000.00, equal to the expenses incurred to repair the vehicle. The Court of Appeal of Naples reformed the decision, reducing the amount of compensation to € 2,500.00 or the market value of the car at the time of the events.
As is well known, one of the cardinal principles of damages is to place the damaged party’s assets in the situation they would have been in if the breach (in the case of contractual liability) or the wrongful act (in the case of non-contractual liability) had not occurred. This can take place either in kind (or, better, “in specific form”: the classic example is the delivery of a vase equal to the one that was destroyed) or in equivalent, through a sum of money. Read more
