GENERAL DAMAGES

(A) See damages. Refers to monetary awards in a lawsuit recovered for injuries suffered that have no precise amount that can be determined, e.g. pain and suffering. (B) torts. General damages are such as the law implies to have accrued from the act of a tort-feasor. To call a man a thief, or commit an assault and battery upon his person, are examples of this kind. In the first case the law presumes that calling a man a thief must be injurious to him, with showing that it is so. Sir W. Jones, 196; 1 Saund. 243, b. n. 5; and in the latter case, the law implies that his person has been more or less deteriorated, and that the injured party is not required to specify what injury he has sustained, nor to prove it.