G.L. c. 260, § 2A; G.L. c. 258, § 10(c); Commonwealth v. Porro, 458 Mass. 526 (2010)
Assault, battery and false imprisonment in Massachusetts
A claim in Massachusetts trial courts · Last verified August 26, 2026
Three intentional torts share this page because they arise from the same encounters and are pleaded together: a threat, a contact, and a confinement.
They are also the torts where the defendant's identity changes the analysis most. Against a private person they are ordinary claims. Against a public employee they fall outside the Massachusetts Tort Claims Act — G.L. c. 258, § 10(c) excludes intentional torts — which means the government is not liable and the employee is not protected.
What the claims are
Assault: someone made you reasonably fear an immediate harmful or offensive contact.
Battery: someone touched you in a harmful or offensive way without your consent.
False imprisonment: someone confined you without the legal right to.
Where the rights come from
Common law. Commonwealth v. Porro, 458 Mass. 526 (2010), states the modern definition of battery.
What a plaintiff has to prove
Assault:
- The defendant acted intending to cause a harmful or offensive contact, or the apprehension of one; and
- The plaintiff reasonably apprehended an imminent harmful or offensive contact.
No contact is required — that is the whole distinction from battery. What is required is imminence: a threat of future harm is not an assault, and a conditional threat generally is not either. The plaintiff must have been aware of the threat at the time.
Battery:
- An intentional act by the defendant;
- Resulting in a harmful or offensive contact with the plaintiff; and
- Without consent.
No injury is required. An offensive contact — one that would offend a reasonable person's sense of dignity — is a battery whether or not it hurt. Spitting, grabbing, unwanted touching, throwing something that lands: all qualify.
The intent is to the contact, not to the harm. A defendant who meant to make contact but not to injure is liable for the injury that followed.
False imprisonment:
- Intentional confinement of the plaintiff;
- Within boundaries fixed by the defendant;
- The plaintiff was aware of it, or was harmed by it; and
- Without legal justification.
Confinement can be by physical barrier, by force, by threat of force, or by a false assertion of legal authority. A reasonable means of escape defeats it — the confinement must be complete.
How long you have to file
Three years under G.L. c. 260, § 2A.
Accrual is the assault, the contact, or the end of the confinement.
Where the conduct was sexual abuse, longer periods apply under G.L. c. 260, §§ 4C and 4C½, and those provisions also displace the ordinary presentment requirement for claims against public employers.
Public defendants — the § 10(c) problem, and what it means
The Massachusetts Tort Claims Act waives sovereign immunity for negligent acts. Section 10(c) excludes "any claim arising out of an intentional tort, including assault, battery, false imprisonment, false arrest, intentional mental distress, malicious prosecution, malicious abuse of process, libel, slander, misrepresentation, deceit, invasion of privacy, interference with advantageous relations or interference with contractual relations."
Two consequences follow, and they point in opposite directions.
The public employer is not liable. No waiver, no claim against the city, the town or the Commonwealth.
But the individual employee is not immune either. The Act's exclusivity provision in § 2 protects a public employee from personal liability for negligent acts within the scope of employment. Intentional torts are outside the Act, so the officer, the guard or the teacher can be sued personally.
That is why claims arising from an arrest or a school incident are usually framed as intentional torts against individuals, often alongside a Massachusetts Civil Rights Act count and a federal § 1983 claim.
And presentment does not apply, because the claim is not under c. 258 at all.
The shopkeeper's situation
Retail detentions are the most common private false imprisonment claim. A merchant who detains someone suspected of shoplifting has a privilege to detain in a reasonable manner and for a reasonable time to investigate, and the question in every such case is whether the belief, the manner and the duration were reasonable.
A brief, civil stop to check a receipt is protected. Handcuffs, a locked room, hours of waiting, or a detention used to extract a confession is not.
What has to happen before you file
Nothing, for a private defendant. No presentment for an intentional tort against a public employee, because c. 258 does not govern it.
What the claim pays
Actual damages — medical expenses, lost earnings, pain and suffering, humiliation, and mental distress. No physical injury is required for the dignity torts.
Nominal damages, where the wrong is proved and the loss is not.
Twelve percent prejudgment interest under G.L. c. 231, § 6B.
No punitive damages at common law, and no attorney's fees. Where the facts also support the Massachusetts Civil Rights Act, that statute supplies mandatory fees — which is often the reason it is pleaded.
A criminal case does not bar the civil one, and the standards differ. An acquittal decides nothing here.
Who can be sued
The person who acted.
Their employer, for conduct within the scope of employment — which is contested in most intentional tort cases, because assaulting a customer is rarely within the scope of anything. The employer is more reliably reached through negligent hiring, supervision or retention, which is a negligence claim about the employer's own conduct.
A public employee personally, since § 10(c) leaves them exposed.
Common defenses
- Consent, express or implied — including implied consent to ordinary contact in crowds, sports and medical treatment.
- Self-defence or defence of others, using reasonable force.
- Defence of property, with the important limit that deadly force is never reasonable to protect property alone.
- Lawful authority — a valid arrest, a lawful detention, a parent's or teacher's reasonable discipline.
- The shopkeeper's privilege.
- No imminence, for assault, or a reasonable means of escape, for false imprisonment.
- Limitations.
What people get wrong
Assault needs no touching. It is the apprehension that is the wrong.
Battery needs no injury. An offensive contact is enough, and dignity is what the tort protects.
You cannot sue the city for an assault by its employee. Section 10(c) excludes intentional torts from the Tort Claims Act — but that same exclusion means the employee can be sued personally.
A criminal charge is not required, and an acquittal is not a defence. The burdens of proof are different.
A store can detain you, briefly and reasonably, if it reasonably believed you were shoplifting.
There are no attorney's fees on these claims. The civil rights statute is where fees come from.
Where it came from
These are the oldest torts in the common law — the trespass writs, actionable without proof of damage because the wrong was the interference with the person rather than any loss that followed. That origin explains their most distinctive features: no injury requirement, no proof of damage needed for liability, and a focus on dignity that survives into the modern rule that an offensive contact is enough.
What has changed around them in Massachusetts is the defendant. Most intentional-tort litigation now involves institutions — police departments, schools, hospitals, retailers, security firms — and the Tort Claims Act's decision to exclude intentional torts pushed those cases into a particular shape. The Commonwealth kept its immunity for deliberate wrongs, and in exchange the individual employee kept none.
That allocation is unusual and it is deliberate. Negligence by a public employee is the public's problem, compensated within a $100,000 cap. A deliberate assault is the employee's own, uncapped, and personally borne.
Common questions
How long do I have to sue for assault or battery in Massachusetts?
Three years. Longer periods apply to claims arising from sexual abuse.
Can I sue if I was not injured?
Yes. Battery requires only a harmful or offensive contact, and assault requires no contact at all.
What is the difference between assault and battery?
Assault is the reasonable apprehension of an imminent harmful or offensive contact. Battery is the contact itself.
Can a store detain me for shoplifting?
Yes, in a reasonable manner and for a reasonable time to investigate, where the merchant reasonably believed a theft occurred.
Can I sue a police officer or a city?
Not the city — G.L. c. 258 § 10(c) excludes intentional torts from the Tort Claims Act. The officer can be sued personally, and no presentment is required.
Can I recover attorney's fees?
Not on these claims. A Massachusetts Civil Rights Act count on the same facts carries mandatory fees.