Would you please comment about Pokemon characters on private property (not a public amenity space like a museum, but onto a single family home property)? For example - when there's a Pokemon on my home's front porch - and a player whom I don't know, falls over the planter there and breaks something getting to it... who is on the hook? When a player enters a closed gate on private property, and is cornered by a large dog, who is libel? Is there any way to make a property you own or manage a Poke'free zone? PS - yes I played the game for 4-days, it crashed so often, I uninstalled it.
Hi Catherine. Thanks for reading my article. Your comment is right on target. When someone trespasses on private property, the law generally inquires as to whether they had intent. The way that term is usually used involves an assessment of whether they knew they were entering onto land that they had no right to enter.
The fact that they may have had reasons for doing so that were either those that society would normally condone (such as a person who has a course of dealing in which they occasionally enter their neighbor’s property to borrow a container of milk) or those that society would frown upon (a crowd of unruly people entering someone’s front lawn to catch a fictional cartoon character) does not undermine the fact that there is intent to enter someone else’s property without express permission. However, it very well might impact whether there was implied consent to enter the property of another that would be a defense to that trespass claim. In our examples, there might be implied consent when there has been a course of dealing in which friendly neighbors enter one another’s property, and there might be an absence of implied consent when fifty unruly strangers come onto a person’s lawn to catch Pokémon.
Remarkbox