This legal case involves Mark Bethel and the New York City Transit Authority. The court's majority opinion, written by Judge Levine, explains that common carriers have a duty to exercise the utmost care for the safety of their passengers, but this duty only applies to certain situations. The court concludes that the duty of highest care should no longer be applied as a matter of law to common carriers and realigns the standard of care required of common carriers with the traditional negligence standard of reasonable care under the circumstances. The plaintiff was injured when a wheelchair-accessible seat on a bus collapsed. The jury found in favor of the plaintiff, and the Appellate Division affirmed the decision. The issue on appeal is the propriety of the trial court's instruction on the carrier's duty of exceptional care. The court concludes that the carrier's duty of extraordinary care is inconsistent with the fundamental concept of negligence in tort doctrine. The reasonable person standard is used to establish an objective standard of conduct in negligence cases. It takes into account the specific circumstances of a case. The Indiana Supreme Court held that the appropriate level of care should be commensurate with the danger involved in the particular case, and it is up to the jury to determine the appropriate level of care under proper instructions from the court. Instructing the jury on the highest degree of care is misleading and invades the jury's province.

The duty of highest care on carriers has been criticized as creating a confusing and meaningless standard. The single, reasonable person standard is flexible enough to consider the hazardous nature of a tortfeasor's activity, including public transportation. The Kelly rule, which imposes a duty of extraordinary care on common carriers, is no longer necessary due to the Basso v Miller decision adopting the single reasonable person standard. The rule of a common carrier's duty of extraordinary care is no longer viable, and a carrier is subject to the same duty of care as any other potential tortfeasor. The case should be remitted to Supreme Court for a new trial as the jury was erroneously charged with the highest degree of care.