DELICT
DELICT, civil law. The act by which one person, by fraud or malignity, causes some damage or tort to some other. In its most enlarged sense, this term includes all kinds of crimes and misdemeanors, and even the injury which has been caused by another, either voluntarily or accidentally without evil intention; but more commonly by delicts are understood those small offences which are punislied by a small fine or a short imprisonment.
2. Delicts are either public or private; the public are those which affect the whole community by their hurtful consequences; the private is that which is directly injurious to a private individual. Inst. 4, 18; Id. 4, 1 Dig. 47, 1; Id. 48, 1.
3. A quasi-delict, quasi delictum, is the act of a person, who without malignity, but by an inexcusable imprudence, causes an injury to another. Poth. Ob. n. 116; Ersk. Pr. Laws of Scotl. B. 4, t. 4, s. 1.