Liability after accidentally breaking neighbor&#39;s sprinkler head
<p>Imagine you are out for an early morning jog.  Someone has their sprinklers on, so you cross the street to avoid them.  Unfortunately, there was a malfunctioning sprinkler head that you didn't know about.  It's dark so you couldn't see it, and since the sprinkler wasn't working and wasn't spraying water, you had no other way to know it was there.</p>

<p>As a result you step on it, it breaks, and begins gushing out water.  Naturally you leave a note claiming responsibility for the accident (it's early in the morning and the home owner does not appear to be awake, so you don't want to knock).</p>

<p>What would be your legal liability in such an instance?</p>

<p>In general, you are liable for any damage that you cause, even by accident (and irrespective of whether the person whose property you damaged is civil vs. hostile), if the damage was caused by your negligence. That could include the sprinkler, plus the wasted water. The question that the court would ask is whether a person using ordinary caution would have avoided the sprinkler head, and the main consideration would be, how visible was the head?</p>

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