On The Burden Of Proof In Environmental Tort Lawsuit

At present, environmental infringement cases has increased day by day, because the legislation is vague,unclear, even blank, that make some common problems exposed. The results often lead to the same cases have different judgments, the application of law is not uniform, and the confusion of the judicial,eventually making two parties lost the reference standard.In the end,justice difficult to achieve. The problems of plaintiff’s burden of proof stand out.These common problems are: first, the plaintiff need to proof the relevance between pollution and damage, but there are judicial interpretation not the specific applicable method. Each environment infringement cases should have different standards. Second, the standard of pollutant emission has been the shield of polluters, as a "legitimate" excuse to escape the liability to pay compensation, and the court also made different judgments for different cases. Faced with different cases in the different role of case that plaintiffs how to proof to safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of oneself. Third, the range of pollutants reach the victim is the plaintiff must be evidence to prove, law has not stipulated, but in some cases the plaintiff could not proof pollutants reach the victim lead to lost the lawsuit.This paper gives the corresponding research conclusions through research the common problems of the environmental infringement cases: first, proof relevance between pollution and damage is a lower level of the burden of proof.How to apply in the complex cases, this article lists the three kinds of methods. Second, in the general environment infringement cases, the plaintiff does not need to proof the defendant beyond the standard of pollutant emission, but in some special environment cases, the plaintiff need to prove this. Third,plaintiff must prove the range of pollutants reach the victim, that need to be clear in the judicial interpretation.