New Jersey grandmother Linda Daniels depended on an electric-powered oxygen tank to breathe. However, according to her family, after falling behind on her PSE&G power bill, the power was cut to her home. Even though her children had been making payments, including $500 two days before power was shut off, they cut the power and she died hours later. In front of her daughter.
The day she died temperatures in Newark were as high as 91. Her daughter said, “We were getting ice and putting ice on her, fanning her, trying to make it cool, but we couldn’t pump the oxygen.” 1 It should be noted that New Jersey law prohibits utility companies from terminating service to households with a valid medical emergency.
However, PSE&G said in a statement that they were unaware of her medical condition and that while saddened to hear about her death, that they had tried to contact the family 15 times about their bill over the past seven months.
“I know that she would have eventually passed because of her condition but I didn’t know that because the lights went off that she would suffer the way she did.”
