A collusive lawsuit or collusive action is a

lawsuit - A lawsuit is a proceeding by a party or parties against another in the civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today. The term "lawsuit" is used in reference to a civil actio ...

in which the parties to the suit have no actual quarrel with one another, but one sues the other to achieve some result desired by both.

Examples

Constitutional law

For example, if two people think a law is

unconstitutional Constitutionality is said to be the condition of acting in accordance with an applicable constitution; "Webster On Line" the status of a law, a procedure, or an act's accordance with the laws or set forth in the applicable constitution. When l ...

, one might sue another in order to put the lawsuit before a

court A court is any person or institution, often as a government institution, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and carry out the administration of justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in accordance ...

which can rule on its constitutionality. Because courts generally reserve jurisdiction for situations in which there is an actual

case or controversy The Supreme Court of the United States has interpreted the Case or Controversy Clause of Article III of the United States Constitution (found in Art. III, Section 2, Clause 1) as embodying two distinct limitations on exercise of judicial review: ...

– i.e., a real dispute between the parties – where such a suit is suspected, the court may refuse to exercise

jurisdiction Jurisdiction (from Latin 'law' + 'declaration') is the legal term for the legal authority granted to a legal entity to enact justice. In federations like the United States, areas of jurisdiction apply to local, state, and federal levels. Jur ...

. For example, the

European Court of Justice The European Court of Justice (ECJ, french: Cour de Justice européenne), formally just the Court of Justice, is the supreme court of the European Union in matters of European Union law. As a part of the Court of Justice of the European Un ...

does not hear preliminary references arising out of hypothetical disputes.Case 244/80 ''Foglia v Novello''
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Tort fraud

Another form of collusive lawsuit involves

fraud In law, fraud is intentional deception to secure unfair or unlawful gain, or to deprive a victim of a legal right. Fraud can violate civil law (e.g., a fraud victim may sue the fraud perpetrator to avoid the fraud or recover monetary compens ...

, where two persons agree to fake an

accident An accident is an unintended, normally unwanted event that was not directly caused by humans. The term ''accident'' implies that nobody should be blamed, but the event may have been caused by unrecognized or unaddressed risks. Most researcher ...

, so that the "victim" can sue the other person in order to collect from the other person's

insurance Insurance is a means of protection from financial loss in which, in exchange for a fee, a party agrees to compensate another party in the event of a certain loss, damage, or injury. It is a form of risk management, primarily used to hedge ...

. This is a

crime In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a State (polity), state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definit ...

, and insurance companies investigate claims to determine that no collusion is involved. Because of the fear of collusive suits, many jurisdictions have, at various times, prohibited spouses from suing one another or prohibited children from suing their parents. Also, many jurisdictions have had

guest statute A guest statute is a term used in the law of torts to describe a statute that makes it significantly more difficult for a passenger in an automobile to recover damages from the driver for injuries received in an accident resulting from ordinary n ...

s which make it difficult for a

passenger A passenger (also abbreviated as pax) is a person who travels in a vehicle, but does not bear any responsibility for the tasks required for that vehicle to arrive at its destination or otherwise operate the vehicle, and is not a steward. The ...

in a non-commercial vehicle to sue the driver if the passenger is injured due to the driver's

negligence Negligence (Lat. ''negligentia'') is a failure to exercise appropriate and/or ethical ruled care expected to be exercised amongst specified circumstances. The area of tort law known as ''negligence'' involves harm caused by failing to act as a ...

At-fault divorce

Another example is in

divorce Divorce (also known as dissolution of marriage) is the process of terminating a marriage or marital union. Divorce usually entails the canceling or reorganizing of the legal duties and responsibilities of marriage, thus dissolving the ...

, in those

s where fault remains as a condition before commencement of an action for breach of the marriage contract.

References

Activism by type Civil procedure Lawsuits {{law-term-stub

Examples

Constitutional law

Tort fraud

At-fault divorce

See also

References