## Facts

- A widespread electrical failure caused a citywide blackout in New York City lasting about 25 hours.
- Julius Strauss, a 77-year-old tenant in a Queens apartment building, received electric service to his apartment from Consolidated Edison Company of New York, Inc. (Con Edison) under a contract in his name.
- Con Edison provided electricity to the building’s common areas (including basement lighting) under a separate contract with the landlord, Belle Realty Company.
- During the outage, the building’s water supply was disrupted because it depended on an electric pump.
- Strauss went to the basement to obtain water and fell on darkened, allegedly defective basement stairs, sustaining injuries.
- Strauss sued Belle Realty for negligent maintenance or failure to warn regarding the stairs and sued Con Edison for negligent failure to provide electricity.
- The trial court applied collateral estoppel to preclude Con Edison from disputing gross negligence related to the blackout but denied Con Edison summary judgment on duty.
- The Appellate Division dismissed the claim against Con Edison, holding Con Edison owed no duty to Strauss regarding common-area lighting.
- The Court of Appeals affirmed the dismissal as to Con Edison; the landlord claim was not decided in that opinion.

## Issues

1. Whether Con Edison owed a tort duty of care to a tenant injured in a building’s common area during a citywide blackout when the landlord, not the tenant, contracted for electrical service to that common area.
2. Whether foreseeability of harm from a blackout is sufficient to impose a duty on the utility to persons lacking the relevant service contract for the location where the injury occurred.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeals affirmed dismissal of the negligence claim against Con Edison.
- Con Edison owed no duty to Strauss for injuries occurring in the building’s common areas because the common-area service contract was with the landlord, not the tenant.
- The court limited duty as a matter of public policy to avoid indeterminate and excessive liability arising from a mass outage affecting millions.

## Legal Principles

- Duty in negligence is not determined by foreseeability alone; courts may restrict duty on public-policy grounds to keep liability within defined bounds.
- In mass-outage settings, a utility’s tort duty for service interruptions may be limited by the contractual relationship associated with the specific service at issue.
- For injuries occurring in common areas supplied under a landlord-utility contract, the utility’s duty may run to the landlord as the customer of record, not to individual tenants, even if a tenant separately contracts for service to a private unit.
- Lack of contractual privity is not automatically dispositive, but courts may use the service contract as a limiting principle where the potential plaintiff class is broad and indefinite.

## Conclusion

The Court of Appeals held that Con Edison did not owe a duty to a tenant injured in a building’s common area during the 1977 blackout where the landlord, not the tenant, was the utility’s customer for common-area service, limiting utility liability in mass outages to defined contractual relationships for the location of the injury.


Strauss v. Belle Realty Co., 65 N.Y.2d 399, 492 N.Y.S.2d 555, 482 N.E.2d 34 (N.Y. 1985)