Delahunt v. United Telephone & Telegraph Co.

Citations

• 215 Pa. 241
• 64 A. 515
• 1906 Pa. LEXIS 772

Syllabus

<p>Negligence — Telephone companies — Electric shock — Evidence—Burden of proof — Bes ipsa loquitur.</p> <p>In an action to recover damages for the death of a person killed by an electric current from a telephone on his premises, the rule res ipsa loquitur applies, and this notwithstanding the fact that the deadly current was not generated by the telephone company.</p> <p>Though the wire which connects with a telephone is intended to conduct only a harmless current of electricity, the telephone company is bound to know, that it can become the conductor of a deadly one, and that such a current will pass over it, if it is not properly insulated and should come in contact with a wire heavily and dangerously charged. It is as much the duty of the telephone company to see that no such current shall thus pass over its wires as it is to send only a harmless one from its own exchange.</p> <p>It is the duty of a telephone company to its patrons to exercise at all times the highest degree of care and vigilance to protect them from a dangerous electric current over its wires from any source. This is the implied undertaking of every such company, and in towns and cities threaded with dangerous electric wires the duty of the company is, by constant supervision of its wires, to prevent their becoming conductors of a dangerous current from others. When they do become conductors of it, there is reasonable evidence that there has been a neglect of duty, and the burden is cast upon the telephone company of showing that it has not been negligent. As it is not an insurer of its patrons against the danger of electric currents on its wires, the law will not hold it responsible for what it cannot help; but when there is an accident which in itself affords reasonable evidence of negligence, it must show why it should be relieved from liability.</p> <p>In an action against a telephone company to recover damages for death of plaintiffs’ father, it appeared that the deceased had been a patron