Seth was shopping at a local music store looking for a CD,when he suddenly remembered that he had an appointment with his math professor.He pulled his calendar out of his backpack only to discover that he was late for the appointment.Seth quickly put the calendar back into his backpack and ran out of the store.As he made his exit from the store,a security guard asked Seth to accompany him to an office at the back of the store to which Seth consented.Once there,the guard accused Seth of shoplifting.The guard quickly searched Seth and his backpack and found nothing.The guard apologized to Seth and explained that the store had recently experienced an outbreak of theft.The whole incident took less than five minutes.Under these circumstances:

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The store has conditional privilege to stop persons it feels are shoplifting as long as the owner acts in a reasonable manner and detains the suspect only for a reasonable length of time.In this case the guard did not behave in an unreasonable manner and did not detain Seth for an unreasonable length of time.The store cannot be sued for false imprisonment,since false imprisonment is the intentional confinement of a person for an appreciable time without the person's consent.

Seth Was Shopping at a Local Music Store Looking for a CD,when