Dear Colleagues:

Can a bartender refuse to give back keys to an intoxicated patron? Although the High Court of Australia argued no in Scott v CAL, an interesting new article argues yes on the basis of bailment, public necessity, contract and criminal law, see C Hawes, ‘The Publican, the Customer, His Motorcycle and the Key’ (2010) Oxford University Commonwealth Law Journal  255-272.

The arguments in the paper raised a question (at least from me): Does the law recognize a type of bailment that is not gratuitous (in the sense that there is a business reason to do it) but which is not strictly contractual since the required formalities had not been met? The author calls these contractual bailments since they are not gratuitous (for profit) but that does not seem right to me.

 Sincerely,   

-- 
Jason Neyers
Associate Professor of Law
Faculty of Law
University of Western Ontario
N6A 3K7
(519) 661-2111 x. 88435